Yesterday’s Evening Standard—not a paper that I read that often, or that I always agree with—noted that the political system was
in danger of collapsing, that the financial crisis had caused an economic meltdown, and that the MPs’ expenses scandal, media phone hacking, and police corruption had eroded trust in the established institutions. People are turning away from the established parties, and in England the response has been increasing support for an insurgent political party that, ironically for Members from nationalist parties, offers more Westminster, more privatisation, more austerity and more neo-liberal economics.
In Wales and Scotland, people are increasingly persuaded that a different political direction and social justice will be secured by empowering our national democratic political institutions. I was sceptical about the Unionist vow to Scotland, and am even more so now, given the twisting and slithering from the Unionist parties.