An abrupt stop at independence ambitionsto be relaunched with a referendum bisfor the Scottish secessionist leader, the premier Nicholas Sturgeon, came from Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. The verdict, delivered today in London, bluntly denies Edinburgh the ability to convene a new popular consultation (after the one in 2014, won by the unionist campaign) on detachment from Great Britain, without the consent of the Westminster Parliament. The leader of the Scottish National Party he wanted to call on his compatriots to answer the fateful question: “Should Scotland be an independent country?”.
Supreme Court: ‘It is up to London to decide in a referendum and not a Scottish law’
The objective indicated in recent months by the company therefore vanishes First Minister to go to the polls already on October 19 next year, a completely symbolic date proposed by the Scottish independence party, with little chance of becoming a reality, given the opposition of the central government. In the reading of the verdict (passed unanimously) the President of the Court, lord Robert Reedhas rejected the legal arguments of the Scottish lawyers across the board: in a compact and unanimous way, it affirms that the convening of a referendum on secession, intended to have effects on the United Kingdom, cannot pass through the mere approval of a law to be part of the Edinburgh parliamentary assembly but it belongs to the central power of London. References to the right to self-determination were also dismissed, including comparisons between Scotland and others such as Quebec And Kosovo. The British supreme judges said that the matter had already been resolved at the time of the first referendum in 2014 and is therefore now closed. A bitter alt, which burns even more since the SNP could have counted on a sure majority in the Scottish Parliament, in favor of a second consultation.
Another picture of Scotland’s First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon
Sturgeon “disappointed”, the hopes on next year’s policies
Sturgeon said she was “disappointed” but at the same time respects the response of the judges, who “do not make the laws” but limited themselves to “interpreting” the existing one (the Scotland Act). His first declaration was then followed by an attempt to relaunch the pro-independence program, with a “plan B” which in any case remains rigidly within the legal and institutional boundaries, avoiding coups as happened in Spain between Catalonia and Madrid.
Sturgeon had in fact been all too clear: well before the verdict of the British Supreme Court, she had specified that they would not follow “constitutional forcing” in the event of a “legal defeat” of one’s own instances. His strategy is to bet everything on the field of political battle, making this objective the dominant theme of the next election campaign for next year’s vote.
There First Minister therefore trust in general elections in the United Kingdom, scheduled for the end of 2024: those, in his opinion, will be a “referendum de facto”, with a great victory of the SNP. For her, voting is the only “democratic, legal and constitutional means by which the Scottish people can express their will”.
The clash in the Municipalities with Sunak
Shortly after the Edinburgh premier’s speech, discussions began in London with the British prime minister Rishi Sunak engaged in Question Time in the House of Commons. After affirming that today’s judgment is “clear and definitive” – above all if one considers that both parties undertook in 2014 to accept the result of that referendum as a valid response for “a generation” – the conservative prime minister opened to one closer cooperation with the Edinburgh executive on a range of issues, from the economy to the war in Ukraine.
Rishi Sunak in the House of Commons
Reassurances that were rejected by Ian Blackford, leader of the SNP, who added that “democracy will not be denied”, despite the judges’ sentence. The pro-independence exponent in the Municipalities then used even harsher words: “The very idea that the UK is a voluntary union of nations is dead and buried”. Blackford was then confronted in the same session in a question and answer with the minister for Scotland of the Tory government, Alister Jack, insisting on the thesis according to which the right to reopen the question of independence derives from Brexit (passed after the Scottish referendum with a majority of Britons voting in favour, but only a minority of Scottish voters).
According to the recent polls, regarding a possible secession from the Kingdom, the Scots they result almost split in halfagainst the result of 2014 in which the “no” votes prevailed over the “yes” with 55.3% compared to 44.7%.
