Bernard Ingham: Toxic Celtic fringe flirting with disaster for the UK

Over the past fortnight, I have distinctly heard electioneering politicians from Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales show that they now see themselves as separate entities.

All of them, backed up by the lunatic Greens, have demanded that if the UK votes to leave the EU in a 2017 referendum, they should be able to opt out. In other words, three of the four parts of the UK with less than 20 per cent of the 63 million population want to override the considered majority view.

If that attitude is not halfway towards independence, I am a Masai warrior herding cattle in Kenya.

It does not surprise me coming from Sinn Fein and the nationalist SDLP in Northern Ireland. They, after all, want a united Ireland.

It is also entirely in line with the SNP’s aim of independence at the earliest opportunity – and to hell with last year’s referendum.

But it also shows you that the Welsh Nationalists are not only queueing up, like Scotland and Northern Ireland, for more English money but also want to go their own way when it suits them.

Let me remind you that under the Barnett formula for the distribution of public funds Northern Ireland gets £2,347 more on average per head than the English; the Scots an extra £1,628 and the Welsh £1,180.

Nothing would perhaps bring the unholy trio more quickly to their senses than independence within Europe. Brussels would never be as financially generous to them as the soft-hearted English, even though there is next to no control over Euro spending. But that is by the way. The important point is that independence now infects the Celtic fringe.

We would do well to examine some of the implications.

First, why do they, like Labour, want to remain in the EU when it is economically in the doldrums and the single currency is likely to be a drag on its performance for the foreseeable future?

The answer is that the EU is essentially socialist. It is a better fit for them than a freer-market UK. They would get more to their taste through the EU than they are ever likely to get through Westminster, even with Labour in government. That is why the trade unions now back EU membership, having earlier regarded it as a capitalist ramp.

But what if any of the three territories voted to leave the EU while the UK as a whole chose to stay? Would they then demand that their voters’ will should be respected?

I doubt it. Their democracy is not quite so rigorous as some menacingly nasty Scot Nats are exhibiting – as they did in the independence referendum – with their explicit hatred of the English and especially English Tories.

Still, we have to face the fact that Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland now have substantial secessionist elements.

If they realised their ambitions these islands, for so long protected by the English Channel, would effectively acquire a land border with Europe. Some people felt that the Channel Tunnel was a step too far in undermining our moat, as it were.

It is true that we would lose a troublesome but “controlled” land frontier if Ireland became united, no doubt over the dead bodies of many Unionists. But how would we handle the Welsh Marches and the Scottish border from Berwick to Carlisle?

This is not an academic question with Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond around and mouthing their loathing of the English. It is a serious issue when, with England overwhelmed by immigration, these frontiers could become a new entry for illegal fortune hunters and murderous jihadists.

Let us not make the mistake of assuming that we in England would benefit financially from the UK’s 
break-up.

Certainly, the three potential secessionists would lose their largely English-generated subsidies, but 
think of the expense of closing 
hitherto wide open borders for our protection.

Nationalists in Wales and Scotland should ponder it, too. It is all too evident they have not thought independence through when the Scots have missed the boat in the North Sea as an oil and gas province and the Left in Wales is making a terrible mess of running Aneurin Bevan’s NHS.

The Picts, Scots and Celts could do a lot worse than stick with a Tory-governed UK. We might then have a successful economy. They should be careful what they wish for in trying to remain in the EU while disintegrating the UK.