Scotland and the Union

Debate between Angus Brendan MacNeil and John Robertson

Thursday 29th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[John Robertson (Glasgow North West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen North (Mr Doran). The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) talked about how, come independence, the Scots would be able to walk tall. I have been to Perth, and I have not noticed anyone walking with their head bowed of late. I know plenty of Scots who walk tall. Scotland walks tall; it is only little-minded people who do not.

“Scotland and the Union” is the title of our debate today. There would be no Union without Scotland. Scotland and England came together to form the Union under the two Crowns more than 300 years ago, and we have moved on since then. Who would have thought that, 300 years on, we would be having a debate and a referendum on how we might split ourselves up after all this time? The Scots have defended the Union with their lives and with their labour for centuries. We have led battles on the battlefield, and we have led in science and technology. The Scots not only pull their weight; they over-pull their weight. As a nation, we walk tall and we hold our heads high. Scots are known throughout the world for that. There are probably more Scots outside Scotland than in it, and as we get further away from home, we often get more nationalistic, with a small n.

I have great concerns about the way in which Scotland is being governed at the moment. It has a majority Government, but there is no scrutiny of any of the Bills that the Government pass or of any of the work they do. They have a committee system that is very similar to our own Select Committee system. In our system, when a Member joins a Select Committee, they do so not as a member of a party. Their job is to scrutinise the Government or the people who are running the industry of our country. We do not do that with any party bias. In Scotland, however, there is no scrutiny. The Committees are being run with a party bias. Whatever happens, the Scottish National party is right and everyone else is wrong. Any amendments that are tabled to a Bill are automatically shouted down.

The bullying by the Scottish Government that seems to be going on is an absolute disgrace. People are being threatened, and companies are told that if they do not do as they are told, they will not get contracts. That is no way to run a country. It is certainly no way to run an independent country. I have great fears about that, and we should look seriously at how the scrutiny of Government Bills is carried out in Scotland.

It will be no surprise to anyone that I also want to mention shipbuilding. Shipbuilding on the Clyde has sustained Scotland for centuries. When the tobacco trade first started up, the development of shipbuilding on the Clyde created employment and made Glasgow the second biggest city in the empire. That would never have happened if we had not been part of the British empire and of Great Britain. We led then, and I believe that, in many ways, we lead now. The Type 45 destroyer is the best ship of its kind anywhere in the world. It is envied by the Americans, by the Russians and by anyone who has any idea of what a destroyer should look like. It is a cut above everything else.

We would not have those ships without the decision by the British Government to build them. If the last Labour Government had not secured the procurement of those ships, the Clyde would now be closed. I have absolutely no doubt that, under independence, the Clyde would close almost the next day, and that 3,500 jobs would be lost—

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Robertson]

Not this side of hell freezing over!

The Scottish Government want to sell thousands of jobs, and there would be no more ships on the Clyde. I am a Glaswegian. I am Scottish, but I am probably a Glaswegian before anything else. I am also British and proud of it. I want people to vote in the referendum. I want us to get through it so that Scotland can get back to where it should be. When we have voted down the proposal for independence, we need to give serious consideration to how the governing is being done in the Scottish Parliament. I believe that the threatening and bullying, and the lack of scrutiny of Bills, needs to be looked at seriously. Those are the most important things.

In the short time I have left, I also want to mention the cost of separation. There would be a cost not only to Scotland but to the United Kingdom. I have tabled a parliamentary question to various Departments to ask how much it would cost simply to re-badge everything from the day of independence. How many millions of pounds would it cost not only the people of Scotland but the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland? How much would every single taxpayer have to pay? And there would be further costs when jobs were lost as the companies that are threatening to move out did so. Just this week, BAE Systems was threatening to do that. Scotland is better together with the United Kingdom, and I have no doubt that we will remain one of the leading countries of the world.