Gerry Hassan: Even Unionists see asking royals for help is desperation from UK

WILLIAM and Kate were in Scotland last week, having been promoted as the new saviours of the Union and Scotland’s continued membership of it. This raises questions about the role of the Royal Family in politics and what all this means, if anything, for the case for the Union?

The royals are meant to maintain the facade that they are politically neutral, in itself contradicting the House of Windsor being described as “a constitutional monarchy” – a phrase which belies that they are an intrinsic part and parcel of the state, government and arrangements by which political power is exercised in the UK.

Royals have intervened previously in the past in politics, at huge moments of constitutional crises such as Edward VII and George V in the high drama of 1909-11 and the stand-off between the Liberal government and House of Lords.

The current monarch has been much more circumspect, but allowed her displeasure at Margaret Thatcher to be publicly known in 1986 on the issue of South African apartheid, sanctions and the role of the Commonwealth.

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There have also been previous comments on devolution from the Queen, first in 1977 and more recently, and in the most coded way, on Scottish independence in 2014.

But now the royal household – or at least parts of it – has decided to undertake a concerted briefing operation on behalf of the Royal Family and their take on the future of the Union.

Late last year William and Kate undertook a very brief Scottish sojourn that hardly seemed worthwhile. At this point Downing Street got into the briefing wars, talking up this new constitutional role for the royals in projecting the virtues of the Union.

Subsequently this has morphed into a full-blooded love-bomb exercise, with a source close to the royal household telling The Sunday Times: “They think of it as their Union. It was originally a union of crowns. They think the politicians have been losing Scotland for them. What William is doing is a deliberately more muscular approach to the Crown investing in the relationship with Scotland.”

These are not helpful remarks if you are pro-royal or pro-Union.

This illustrates the threadbare nature of the Union case, which seems to now amount to three things: telling the Scots they can’t hack it without Westminster subsidies, plastering Union flags on as many things as possible, and the symbolism of using royal charm and allure to shore up the idea of the UK.

It seems that the Union has no detailed plan about how to save itself, beyond going on about the need to save it all the time: a kind of Corporal Jones Dad’s Army “Don’t panic” approach which induces, as it did in the TV series, the exact opposite: further panic!

Instead any serious pro-Union argument would embrace the idea that the UK needs far reaching, structural reform – not just politically but economically and socially.

We could even call this the Gordon Brown-plus argument, combining his rhetoric of warm words about the need for reform with an understanding that every dynamic of power in the UK has to change – from the political centre to the nature of its relationships with the nations and regions of the UK to the nature of the unbalanced economy and capitalism on these isles. Rather than do that, the UK Government is going in the opposite direction, talking of banning the use of the term “four nations” about the four nations of the UK.

Without understanding and acting on the above – which seems highly improbable under Tories or Labour, the pro-Union case is reduced to scaremongering, flags and the symbolic appeal of the royals.

As Alex Massie put it: “These ploys ask us to imagine a voter hitherto undecided on the national issue whose views might be swayed by discovering that the heir to the throne [or rather heir to the heir] intends to spend more time at Balmoral.”

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The Guardian’s John Harris summarised their lack of understanding about the problem of Scotland in saying: "We never voted to be under the cosh of successive Tory governments”, and coming up with the answer: "Have some more Prince William."

Ultimately all of the above represent desperate throws of the dice from Boris Johnson, the Tories and Downing Street, who have no coherent approach towards Scotland and the multiple crises of the Union.

This is not because they are anti-Scottish, but because of something more fundamental - they do not understand these numerous crises because they work to further the self-interest of the Tory coalition in England. That contributes to them having no real comprehension of Scotland, the Union, or the nature of the UK.

This Tory Government clearly has no real idea on how to save or reform the Union. But, given permission and legitimacy by Brexit, their 2019 election victory, and the appeal of Boris Johnson to parts of England, they feel they can start playing with parts of the constitutional order to maintain their power and dominance, dragging the Royal Family into high wire politics.

This will not end well for the existing constitutional order, the royals if they continue to allow themselves to be used as political pawns, or indeed for the Union itself.