First Scottish, now Welsh nationalism takes hold in Britain

Spoiler alert: much of the plot of popular Netflix series The Diplomat centres around fears about Scottish independence. The spectre of that possibility leads British and U.S. politicians to commit acts which are unacceptable…or, truth be told, unspeakable.

Fiction in this case may be stranger than reality, but the idea of an independent Scotland is not so far from the possible. The Scottish National Party has been the leading party of the Scottish government since 2007. Scottish voters voted against independence in 2014, but 45 percent were in favour of it.

Now the independence buzz has stretched to Wales, the third largest of the four countries which make up the United Kingdom – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Plaid Cymru, Wales’ pro-independence party, became the leading party in the Senedd, the Welsh parliament, in May elections, for the first time since a devolution of power allowed for Welsh elections 27 years ago.

Nationalist parties in themselves are nothing new in Europe. Anti-immigration party Reform UK is leading in opinion polls in Britain. But the Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties have a different approach from the far-right stance of parties like Reform UK and Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party in France. The Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties’ policies are left-wing and inclusive, embracing all those who live in the countries, whatever their origins.

“It’s a civic nationalism, not an ethnic nationalism,” Laura McAllister, professor of public policy and the governance of Wales at Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre, told The Sentinel, explaining the appeal of Plaid Cymru. “Reform is a British nationalism, focused on an English history and heritage,” said McAllister. “Plaid plays out well with civic Welshness.”

Plaid Cymru won in Wales because of dissatisfaction with the ruling Labour government, but also because of a determination to keep Reform out, McAllister said.

“Plaid were perceived to be the party which stood up for Wales,” she said, adding that “there was some tactical voting among those who felt Reform would be a nightmare government.” 

Reform UK did massively increase its MSs – members of the Senedd – to 34 from no members in 2021. Plaid Cymru has 43 members. However, half of Welsh people said they did not want to see Reform UK as part of the next Welsh government, more than said so of any other party, according to a YouGov poll prior to the election.

Plaid Cymru won’t waste time in pushing for independence for Wales, wrote Anwen Elias and Elin Royles of Aberystwyth University in a recent article in The Conversation.

“During the election campaign, Plaid deliberately played down its longer-term goal of Welsh independence in an effort to broaden its appeal beyond pro-independence voters. But now in government, the party will want to begin laying the groundwork for a longer-term constitutional change,” Elias and Royles said.

A devolution of powers to Scotland and Wales in 1999 paved the way for elections for separate Scottish and Welsh parliaments. Voters in Scotland and Wales also vote in UK elections.

However, the powers of the separate countries remain limited. Wales could in theory raise income taxes or increase borrowing to bring in cash to improve services. But McAllister said the Welsh government’s hands largely remained tied.

“Raising income tax is not going to be popular, it’s unlikely to be on Plaid’s agenda – that’s where the problems come in.”

Plaid Cymru is the largest party in the Senedd, but it is also restricted by the fact that it did not win a majority of the seats.

“Plaid put forward an ambitious programme, delivering it is going to be tricky,” McAllister said.

“How do they even get legislation and policy through, when they are six seats short of a majority?” Plaid Cymru lost a vote on extra spending plans on July 14, after failing to get backing from Labour.

Meanwhile, devolution in England has also seen a renaissance, after Andy Burnham replaced the unpopular Keir Starmer as Labour Prime Minister on July 20. Burnham has promised to devolve power in England away from Westminster.

It’s a change which could make sense, Julian Clark, reader in political geography at the University of Birmingham, said in a recent article.

“England remains one of the most centralised political systems in the developed world, with comparatively little spending and decision-making occurring below the national level,”

Among English regions, Cornwall in the southwest is seeing a resurgence of nationalism, for example. It was a subject dear to the heart of best-selling twentieth-century writer Daphne du Maurier, who set several of her novels in Cornwall and supported the nationalist cause.

Scotland, Wales, Cornwall – there’s got to be something in there, surely, for the next generation of political drama writers.