THE MYTH OF NORTH BRITAIN

At the end of the 18th and into the start of the 19th Century Scotland was a hotbed of intellectual activity. The Scottish Enlightenment was in full swing and Scottish thinkers were internationally renowned. People like David Hume and Samuel Johnson led the way in the fields of philosophy and even lexicography. Yes, Scotland was at the forefront of European intellectualism, but, strangely, the people that were driving this great movement did not see it this way.

All the leading lights of the Scottish Enlightenment never mentioned the name of Scotland in their conversations and writings. They spoke instead of 'North Britain.' Scotland was an anachronism and its future lay in being part of a united Britain; hence their new name for their country.

Just like they were all taken-in by the Ossian fraud, however, these intellectual giants were also deluded in seeing 'North Britain' as being an equal partner in the Union. There were plenty of geniuses in England too at this time but not one of them ever spoke of 'South Britain.' In fact, nobody in 'South Britain' ever used this expression. It was England, pure and simple. Indeed, many in England never even used the term 'Britain.' If you look back at speeches or newspaper articles of the period you will find that England was at war with Napoleon, not Britain. Equally they spoke of the 'English' Empire, the 'English' monarch, the 'English' Government etc etc. Looking back now it seems that David Hume and his contemporaries were living in a wee fantasy world of their own making.

And this sort of thing is still going on. We all get told how those in favour of Scottish independence are  'racist' and blame the English for everything. What we are not told, however, is how racist many English people are towards the Scottish.

At the last election many English newspapers used disgusting, racist language to describe Gordon Brown. 'A one-eyed Scotch git' was one epithet. Why should the English be governed by a Scotsman?' was the cry.

Equally there was condemnation of the way that Labour relied on Scottish MPs to push through laws that affected the whole of the UK. There were many comments about how England was having laws imposed on it by 'Scotch' MPs. Of course, no mention was made of how Scotland had been used as a testing-ground by the predominantly English Thatcher government! It seems that scenario is totally different.

So, essentially, what these newspapers and commentators were saying was that it was okay for Scotland, as part of the UK, to have laws imposed by English MPs, but it was totally unacceptable if it happened the other way round! Of course, none of this was published in the Scottish editions of these newspapers!

So what we have is a Union that is not really a union at all. England is to dictate what goes on in Scotland and, indeed, Wales and heaven forfend that the 'Celtic Fringe' should act as equal partners by having MPs that dare to vote in legislation that might affect England as part of the UK!

This is just one of the reasons I'll be voting YES to independence next year. North Britain and South Britain never existed; all that matters to England is England and it is about time we felt the same about our country!