Scotland: Economic Recovery and Renewal

If we look at the value rather than simply the cost, the opportunity that devolution has afforded Scotland to do things differently often offers the rest of the UK a template—a test—of change, which through collaborative working could support well-being and quality of life across the UK. On Tuesday, your Lordships debated the Second Reading of the Health and Care Bill. Health and social care integration was established in law in Scotland in 2014; in conjunction with the Social Care (Self-directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013, that legislation may not have delivered on the policy intention—I accept that—but, as England struggles to grasp the nettle of the future provision of health and social care, the integrated systems in Scotland, as well as in Wales and Northern Ireland, offer valuable lessons.

It is the same with digital healthcare. Our experience in Scotland, where the demands of serving remote communities such as Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles from specialist centres in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen has meant that, long before we all rushed online because of Covid, clinicians and patients in Scotland were testing video consultations from 2016. The system, which is now known as Near Me, has been evaluated for its clinical appropriateness and for how patients experience it by the University of Oxford, and its recommendations have been acted on. In my own area of neurology and neurological services, national guidance is being developed collaboratively for the use of virtual versus face-to-face appointments. The Scottish Government have commissioned a further phase of evaluation to explore the rapid scale-up of this system in response to the pandemic—evidence that would be extremely relevant to the current debates throughout the UK on face-to-face versus virtual access to doctors and health services.

If we look to the future, post the pandemic—in those sunny upland days, although there is a climate emergency—we see that Scotland is in the strongest position to drive growth of the green economy in the UK by significant margins, based on its existing green infrastructure and future potential. We have a strong base of existing green economy jobs in sectors such as onshore and offshore wind, solar and hydroelectric power and, based on the size of the labour market, we have the highest concentration of green jobs in the UK. For future sector planning, Scotland also benefits from the largest relative number of higher education students studying green-related subjects, such as engineering, technology, building and planning and agriculture. The Scottish Affairs Committee recently noted in its report in September that investment in the national grid was necessary so that the renewable energy generated in Scotland could reach the rest of the UK. Can the Minister give us some reassurance on future plans in this area? Is this not the union dividend that we should be emphasising?

An area that we must support throughout Whitehall is the Scottish business community. Strathclyde University recently found that Scotland had the second-highest total early-stage entrepreneurial activity in the UK and, interestingly, that Scottish entrepreneurs were likely to be from non-white ethnic groups and activity was most prevalent in outlying hard-to-reach geographical areas such as the Highlands and Islands. Does this not feed very comfortably into the challenges that we face in other areas for levelling up in the rest of the UK?

I turn to the creative sector, because it is another Scottish success story. Just two and a half years after selecting Glasgow for a new hub, Channel 4 now has its biggest creative team based in Scotland. This is possible only because of the supply chain of independent production companies, which supports hundreds of jobs—and it is an example where a small level of publicly funded support in the early stages can generate positive economic, cultural and social impact in Scotland and across the UK. The 2019 report of my noble friend Lord Dunlop stressed that devolution must work not only in Scotland but throughout government here in Westminster. I hope that the Minister will keep a close eye on the impact of future plans that Channel 4 may have for this sector in Scotland.

Clearly now is not the time for indyref2 but, as my noble friend Lord Dunlop warned in his review, we must not devolve and forget. We must ensure that the unionist cause is not reduced simply to accountancy. To ensure quality of life throughout the whole UK, we have to work together across all levels—economic, health, education, social and cultural, on devolved and reserved matters, together. In closing, I ask the Minister to champion across government departments the integral role of Scotland in our recovery and to concentrate on the practical things that make devolution work for the whole UK. I look forward very much to this debate and beg to move.

This leads to a separate, if connected, focus. That is the enormous potential of various parts of Scotland to contribute to the UK economy. Here the Government’s recently published strategy, Build Back Better, is to be welcomed.

In 2022 and 2023, and following their prescriptions, what steps will be taken to create free ports and trade hubs in Scotland? Where and how will Scotland benefit from the current review of United Kingdom transport links? Can the Minister also indicate when the process to roll out gigabit broadband in rural areas will begin and what timescale is envisaged for this? On proven growth industries, what plans do the Government have further to advance financial services and insurance, which in 2018 and 2019 was already the largest industry for Scottish exports to the rest of the UK? What plans do they have for utilities, the second largest Scottish growth industry, which has been driven by an increase in electricity exports?

Next, and concerning Scotland, are the very good prospects of the UK’s creative industries. We may take heart that, between 2011 and 2019, their gross value-added measure grew four times faster than the rate for the rest of the UK economy. The sector exported £36 billion in services worldwide and accounted for almost 12% of the UK’s services exports.

That apart, renewed efforts must continue to be made to spread out these advantages—still far too heavily concentrated in south-east England—much more to the rest of the UK. What government intentions and proposed actions, therefore, are there to extend them to Scotland?

The central issues may be education, apprenticeships and jobs. The Government are investing in city and growth deals in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland—and included within a range of new and worthwhile avenues—are international city partnerships, the vastly increased scope for education as a result of digital technology, and more effective options and approaches towards skills, apprenticeships and jobs.

In Europe, the structure of twinning cities together, initially to build up good will after the fighting of the Second World War, has now evolved a further and pragmatic agenda which goes beyond reconciliation and good will. Through trade, culture and academic exchanges, increasingly the same twinned cities form working synergies, sometimes—for best mutual advantage —by widening the original network with additional cities.

As Scottish consul for Croatia, I have been keen to encourage this process, enabling the city of Dundee to form a working partnership with the city of Zadar in Croatia. Some of those among Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, Aberdeen, Inverness, et cetera, are twinned with cities outside Europe, yet not least with cities or regions within the human rights affiliation of the 47 states of the Council of Europe, within which the UK remains a prominent member.

Would my noble friend the Minister agree that the accomplishment of international city working partnerships is an area where Scotland may already be leading within the UK? Does he identify certain respects, whether through funding or in other ways, in which the Government’s current city and growth deal might further support such partnerships?

Then there is the increased scope for education through digital technology. This includes both formal and informal education and its ability to be applied at any and all levels, whether local, national or international.

The Government’s pre-Covid industrial paper calls for the better teaching of maths, sciences and technical knowledge. All such programmes would be best delivered online. There is also a strong case to include the humanities within a comprehensive range of subjects. Video games systems, such as those designed in Dundee, already cover a number of subjects with excellent results, particularly when, through use of the Socratic dialogue, learners are also challenged to ask questions and drawn out to give their own opinions on what they are learning.

Where it already exists, there may be no need to replace good teaching at schools and universities. Instead, locally and nationally within the UK, the purpose of online learning delivery is to supplement teaching as required, although it may occasionally provide courses in the first place, if they are otherwise lacking.

Internationally, however, the purpose is different. Within a full range, it offers countless numbers of people abroad whichever subject or subjects they need and want to learn but have not been able so to do, owing to an insufficient availability of teaching in their own countries.

The Minister will recall that, in chairing the G7 summit in June this year, the UK launched an initiative to assist education internationally. A key issue is that online learning courses should meet standards and lead to qualifications. As a Council of Europe parliamentarian and through its committee structure, I am writing a report on that now.

The Government are already committed to supporting, for the next three years, the UK games fund, which is based in Dundee. In connection to both this and their G7 commitment, what steps are being taken to ensure that online learning delivered internationally meets standards and that its learners receive qualifications? Equally, what plans do the Government have to inspire the design of such programmes within the creative industries?

In Scotland’s towns, cities and rural areas there is an urgent need to encourage apprenticeships, leading to employment, and to provide training and motivation for young people as well as for other community groups, including refugees—in the latter case to help them settle in and find jobs.

Local authorities are fully mindful and conscientious, yet inevitably overstretched, with limited resources and many responsibilities. Significant progress can often be made, however, through public-private joint initiatives or through local charities, such as our own small family one which works in this way in Dundee.

Can the Minster advise in which respects current government city and growth deals and other projects can help with motivation, skills, training and apprenticeships for young people and other relevant groups in Scotland?

Recent findings compare well-being measures in Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales. On two of these, overall happiness and the extent to which people feel that the things they do in life are worthwhile, Scotland scores worst. Nevertheless, and equal with England and Wales, Scotland is first on overall life satisfaction and, together with England, it also has the lowest anxiety level.

Even in theory, let alone as a desirable political deployment, well-being has always been slightly elusive and suspect, such as the reference of Epicurus to happiness as the only possible good. Later on, picking up the reins with utilitarianism, Jeremy Bentham may have been a bit more convincing, but there was still the challenge of demonstrating how something as private as well-being could ever be much advanced within the necessary nuts-and-bolts machinery of a working economy.

In view of this apparent inconsistency, and owing to the dry subject matter of his further writing, although he and Mill remained staunch advocates of collective human well-being—the greatest happiness of the greatest number—there came the joke rhyme pretending that Mill might have become tempted to change horses all the same:

“John Stuart Mill, by a mighty effort of will, overcame his natural bonhomie, and wrote ‘Principles of Political Economy’”.

That apart, in OECD countries in recent years, there has been a welcome and growing consensus for well-being to take a central role. One explanation for this shift of opinion is the recognition that, however subjective, its effects can still be fairly easily measured over a number of different fields, including health, education, relationships, personal activities and so on.

Another explanation is the understanding that GDP and well-being indicators do not have to conflict with one another. Instead, they can be complementary.

I know that your Lordships will support me in paying tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Layard, for his enormous contribution and vision within the wide field of well-being and its pursuit.

The priority is to increase opportunities for learning and employment, particularly so that young people sustain confidence and motivation from matching their skills and abilities to an ever-widening and diversified range of apprenticeships and jobs.

Not least through digital technology and the creative industries, this is already the direction of a much better UK economy: one in which Scotland can come to excel, thus demonstrating to the benefit of others elsewhere its good practices; and a proven consistency between daily work, well-being and the quality of life.

I am unashamedly a pro-business Tory. I believe, yes, that hard work, endeavour, production and earning, and providing for one’s family are good for the individual, for health, self-esteem, freedom, increased choice and agency. However, I also believe that what work does for the individual, business does for the country. A healthy economy gives us the funds and levers to improve public policy and grants greater influence in an ever more integrated world to be able to shape improvements on a global scale. It is a virtuous circle.

That is why I despair when I see people—even those of my own party—dismissing business or disrespecting the herculean efforts that people have gone to, especially in the last two years, to look after their staff, do well by them, keep the show on the road, survive and fight back. We know that it is all interconnected. A feeble economy, suppressed earnings and high levels of unemployment increase poverty, and poverty, particularly intergenerational poverty, impacts enormously on health outcomes, educational outcomes, employment outcomes and future earnings. As businesses are being asked once again to send workers home, it is more important than ever that this Government and all the devolved Governments and Administrations work together to support firms back to health.

No Government, particularly not a Conservative one, would seek to tell companies how or whether to operate, nor welcome the sustained taxpayer subsidy of profit-making industries. Yet, in the extraordinary times we find ourselves in, this Government have mobilised to do both, to keep people safe and protect the economy. I for one am proud that my Government made the decision to invest £400 billion in British business, protect more than 14.5 million jobs and make over £100 billion in business grants and loans available to ensure that fundamentally sound companies that would not otherwise have made it survived. Within that envelope, we see 910,000 Scottish jobs protected through the furlough scheme and 100,000 Scottish businesses supported through UK Government loans.

Supporting both the labour market and the companies that sustain it has been so important. It is one of the reasons why the UK has the fastest rate of economic growth in the G7. It is why we see record job vacancies across the country as firms are able to bounce back. Yet both the UK and Scottish economies still find themselves 2.1% smaller than in the last quarter before the pandemic struck, so there is work to do. Scotland’s whisky producers, food manufacturers, financial service providers, farmers, hoteliers, truck drivers, shops, bars and restaurants will be every bit as key to this recovery as Midlands garment makers, Yorkshire farmers, Welsh agribusiness, Northern Irish tourism operators, Essex bank workers or Mancunian nightclub owners.

I would like to say a word about the recognition on the part of businesses that their responsibilities go far beyond the bottom line and further still than looking after their own workforce, to contributing to their home communities. When Covid struck, I was still an MSP, representing a city-centre constituency. I know from my own experience of businesses that dipped into their own pocket to support their staff while they waited for government help to kick into gear. I know of companies that dedicated time, product lines and personnel to help with the volunteering effort, to ensure the vulnerable and clinically vulnerable were okay. I know of firms which were not content to just clap NHS workers once a week, but supported them directly with transportation, discounting or food. I know—well—one gin distiller who immediately switched production, using his white spirit to make hand sanitiser to donate to charities and not-for-profits around the city, so they could carry on their important work at the very beginning of the pandemic when sanitiser was short. It was a superb effort—especially as the one thing the rest of us needed when Covid struck was gin.

This is why I so appreciate what this Motion attempts to convey. There is an enormous recovery under way, and Scotland, its companies, its people and its resources are playing a full part in that recovery effort. They do so not because a healthy economy is an end in itself but because it is that healthy economic recovery which will support hospitals everywhere, including in Scotland, to start tackling the treatment backlog, and because it is a strong economy which will underpin educational investment, training the next generation of research scientists so that any new vaccines are as likely to come from Edinburgh or Glasgow as they are from Oxford.

It is only through a healthy economy that we can support the thing that matters most of all: giving people the belief and opportunity to ensure that their children have a better quality of life than they did.

Devolution in Scotland worked—and worked well—between 1999 and 2007, when we had a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition, working well with Westminster. We saw some huge advances in Scotland. There was free personal care for the elderly—we are just getting round to that in England now. The smoking ban was in Scotland first. Free travel for elderly people was introduced in Scotland; again, ahead of England. The SNP is now trying to take credit for some of those things, but it was a Labour-Liberal Democrat Administration who introduced it.

Negotiations took place between Westminster and the Scottish Parliament. I remember it well because for a year I was Minister of State for Scotland and I used to take part in them. They were friendly. Sometimes they were quite—not difficult—serious and strong negotiations. I remember on free personal care it was about who should pay for it. I had discussions with Malcolm Chisholm, who was the Minister then, and we eventually came to an agreed conclusion, but they were serious negotiations.

However, there was a change in 2007. The change came with Alex Salmond and the result of that election. I think it is still uncertain whether the SNP won that election, but that is another story. The SNP started to build up the campaign for independence, using the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government as a campaigning vehicle for independence. That is what it is doing. They are a campaigning tool for independence, rather than for the delivery of the services devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

As a result, we have seen a decline in those services. We have heard from previous speakers about education in Scotland. Sadly, on some international criteria, education in Scotland has deteriorated rather than improved in the last few years. We have had the ferry fiasco, with rusting ferries at Ferguson on the Clyde, while ferries operating to the islands are breaking down and the islanders are left isolated. We have had the deaths at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, which somehow Nicola Sturgeon and her Health Minister, Humza Yousaf, seem to shrug off as someone else’s responsibility, but they are the people responsible.

What should the United Kingdom Government do in relation to these matters? I have two suggestions. First, they should rein in spending by the Scottish Government on areas that are not devolved. The constitution is a reserved area and I would argue that using the time of civil servants, publishing documents and arguing the case for independence using public money is not right. It is irresponsible and should be clamped down on by the United Kingdom Government. They have 26 Ministers in Scotland—that is more than the Government of Norway, an independent country—and some of them work on reserved areas.

Let us take foreign affairs. It is a reserved area. No one here would deny that. To quote the website of the Scottish Government, they say:

“We also have a network of eight offices worldwide who work to promote Scottish interests overseas and strengthen our relationships with countries and continents.”

In fact, that what they are promoting overseas is Scottish independence. They are arguing the case for Scottish independence in other countries. Where are these overseas offices? They are in Beijing, Berlin, Brussels, Dublin, London—“overseas” seems a strange definition of London; they might like one, but there is no sea between Scotland and England, thankfully—Ottawa, Paris and Washington DC. In my view, that is improper expenditure.

When I was a Minister at DfID, we agreed on some expenditure by the Scottish Government in Malawi. Just as local councils can complement and add to DfID expenditure, so should the Scottish Government, but not a whole development programme, which is what they propose.

I say to the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, that I have raised this with Ministers on a number of occasions. I think they are afraid to do anything. They are fearful of the Scottish Government. We know that the Scottish Government have a grip over the media in Scotland but we should not be afraid to argue what is right—and keep on arguing. I think the time is right. It is long overdue, as I see from social media. When I post these things, I get people coming and agreeing with me very strongly.

I can tell noble Lords also that when I go to Tynecastle to support Heart of Midlothian—and most recently when I was at Livingston and surrounded by Hearts supporters—they say to me, “Keep rattling that woman’s cage.” Noble Lords know the woman they are talking about.

The second thing I want to come to is the need for a UK constitutional review. I admit an error as far as the Labour Government are concerned: not following up on devolution—we gave it to Scotland, it followed in Wales and it was already there in Northern Ireland—but there is an English democratic deficit and we should have followed up. We did try with the abortive referendum in the north-east of England, but we were not offering real power and it was carried out at a very inauspicious time.

We now end up with a hotchpotch of mayors and other so-called devolution, but it is not real devolution and the counties of England are forgotten. What we need is a convention, somewhat like the Scottish Constitutional Convention, which moved quickly to legislate. The Labour Government were able to legislate quickly because we had the blueprint from the Scottish Constitutional Convention. We need a UK constitutional convention, or it could be a royal commission or a Speaker’s conference or something like that, but we need something on a UK basis.

I have been arguing this—I have written to Minister after Minister about it but they seem to shrug their shoulders—but it is the responsibility of the UK Government to do it. The Labour Party has set up a commission, which Gordon Brown chairs. I welcome that and I have accepted that, but it is more of an academic exercise. The reality is that what could be done can be done only by the Government. I see my noble friend Lady Wilcox is here. I think it is a mistake that the Labour Government in Wales have set up a separate commission to look at devolution—all the options for the development of devolution in Wales, including independence. They have a Plaid Cymru person as one of the joint convenors. I think that is a mistake. With the campaign for indyref2 in Scotland, with this new Welsh commission and, unfortunately, with the consequences of Brexit in Northern Ireland, I see the break-up of the United Kingdom getting nearer and nearer.

My time is running out, although apart from the Front Bench I am the only Labour speaker, so if noble Lords would excuse me a little, I think the union is in grave danger of disintegrating and it would be an absolute disaster. As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Frost, trying to answer some questions earlier—not very well—Brexit shows how breaking up a union of 40 years has caused problem after problem. How many more problems would be caused by breaking up a successful union of 300 years? The UK Government need to take some action now.

I know the Minister. I am very pleased to see that it is the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, here, although I extend my sympathies to the Minister who was not able to be here because of Covid. I was very friendly with the noble Viscount’s father. He and I worked very closely together in Ayrshire on an all-party basis and he was a great man, a man I had great respect for. With due respect to the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, I know that he cannot give me answers to these questions today but I ask him just one thing. Will he take the pleas that I have made today to the Prime Minister, to Michael Gove, to the Secretary of State for Scotland—to people who can make decisions so that we can get some answers that will preserved this United Kingdom?

Other industries important to Shetland are aquaculture and fishing, which account for nearly 40% of Shetland’s exports. One-fifth of all fin-fish landed in Scotland and about one-sixth of that landed in the UK are landed in Shetland. More fish and shellfish are landed in Shetland than in any other port in the UK except Peterhead. The weight of fin-fish landed in Shetland in 2020, at 51,000 tonnes, was almost as much as the total landed in England, Wales and Northern Ireland—52,700 tonnes—and was greater than that landed in all of England and Wales: 40,800 tonnes. Perhaps my noble friend when he comes to reply might indicate what the implications of the post-Brexit negotiations are for Shetland’s fishing industry.

Other important developments include the Shetland Space Centre on Unst. Following the Government’s approval for Lockheed Martin to transfer its satellite launch operations, the space centre estimates that by 2024 the spaceport could support a total of 600 jobs in Scotland, including 140 on Unst and 210 across Shetland. Although there has never been a whisky distillery in Shetland, there is now a gin distillery on Unst, which in addition to juniper relies on local seaweed for a flavour which I hope your Lordships would find most palatable.

Tourism is of increasing importance to Shetland. In years gone by, only birdwatchers and archaeologists made the journey. Now visitors include ecotourists, gastronomes and fishermen—the trout fishing is exceptional, the local rule being that if the fish are unco-operative, you change not your fly but your loch. I believe my late father’s record of a 20-pound sea trout caught in Tingwall Loch still stands. I hope the pandemic will subside soon enough for the cruise ships to return, bringing as they do welcome tourists to Jarlshof, Eshaness and some of the most beautiful countryside in the world.

On 9 September 2020, the Shetland Islands Council voted in favour of a Motion that

“The Shetland Islands Council formally begins exploring options for achieving financial and political self-determination.”

It is easy to understand why it did so. Let us hope that the council’s Motion has been noted in Edinburgh, which I very much doubt. However, I am confident that it will have been noted in London. Whatever future governance arrangements eventuate, Shetland will continue to contribute, as it always has in peace and war, to economic recovery and the well-being and quality of life of what I hope will remain the United Kingdom.

Scotland has some outstanding performers, yet the substantial potential remains unfulfilled. Take exports: Scotland has around 350,000 businesses; only 11,000 of them export and, of those, just 100 account for over 60% of all Scotland’s international exports. If Scotland could increase its international export share of GDP to the same level of the UK as a whole, it would be worth £16 billion annually to the economy. That would provide a lot of financial firepower to help tackle, for example, the blight of child poverty in Scotland.

Fulfilling potential is a challenge that Scotland shares with the UK as a whole. One of the UK’s most intractable problems of the past 30 years has been regional economic inequality. Scotland and the UK have some of Europe’s most dynamic and productive cities and regions, yet the UK remains one of the most economically unbalanced countries in the industrialised world. Disposable incomes in the north-east of England, Wales and Northern Ireland are more than 40% lower than in London, and disparities between, for example, North Ayrshire and Edinburgh, are similarly large. Half the UK’s population, including those in the poorest parts of Scotland, live in regions with productivity no better than the poorer areas of the former East Germany. This has held back the UK’s economic performance and undermined the cohesion of the union.

International evidence suggests that economies grow faster and more strongly when they grow more evenly, and they do that where governance is less centralised. Why should that be? Because communities have greater control over resources, policies are better tailored to local needs, public investment is more effective, and beneficial yardstick competition develops. Why, for example, is Manchester doing better than Newcastle? What can we learn from Birmingham and Glasgow? Today, the UK remains one of the most centralised states, despite significant devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Within Scotland, devolved power is hoarded in Edinburgh, with local authorities increasingly emasculated. We cannot hope successfully to meet the challenges ahead without empowering local communities, north and south of the border, to play their part. There is mutual interest in this agenda—one that is unifying after all the division of recent years. London and the south-east are obviously the main drivers of the UK’s economic success—the places where returns from public investment are highest, thereby generating resources to fund better public services and support less prosperous areas. However, reducing reliance on London and the south-east can only be healthy for Scotland and all parts of the UK. As we have heard, nearly two-thirds of Scotland’s exports are sold in markets in the rest of the UK. Building stronger English regional economies will create greater opportunities for Scottish businesses, and vice-versa. I understand that the levelling-up White Paper has been delayed until the new year, so we must wait to see if the Government are serious about pursuing this agenda, but I have to say that the indications seem to be encouraging.

A less centralised UK will alter fundamentally the nature of government in this country. When significant powers were devolved to Scotland, the mistake was not to think harder about the continuing need for joint working where devolved and reserved powers intersect. Michael Gove, the first formally titled Minister for Intergovernmental Relations, is working hard to rectify that omission, and he needs to.

Covid has highlighted just how much the UK and devolved Governments depend on each other to be successful. Whatever the deep divisions are over our constitutional future, the vast majority of people in Scotland are united in wanting to see the UK and Scottish Governments working together on their behalf.

In conclusion, building what I have described as a union of co-operation will require a culture change from a Whitehall used to issuing directives and jealously guarding the purse strings. There needs to be a change of attitude in Edinburgh too. New partnerships will need to develop, in which the centre and more peripheral areas of the UK learn to work together in new ways. Whitehall will need to continue to improve its capability to negotiate with and mediate between the demands of different tiers of government. Other countries seem to manage this successfully, and there is no reason why we should not do so too.

My message to the Government and my noble friend on the Front Bench is this: do not give up when the Scottish Government refuse to work with you on valuable UK initiatives such as the connectivity review and free ports. Scotland’s network of city and growth deals shows that co-operation is possible. Press to deepen that co-operation in areas such as new green technology, space and export promotion, where Scotland has so much to contribute. Do so confident that this approach is in tune not only with the Scottish business community but the Scottish people as well, and so clearly in the best interests of Scotland and the UK as a whole.

I occasionally go and look at the ceiling in Banqueting House on Whitehall. Since I was last there, they have put beanbags in, so you no longer have to crane your neck in quite the same way. There is a wonderful iconographic celebration of the union there. England and Scotland are shown as great, fleshy, Rubenesque ladies, coming together and bestowing the crown on the baby Charles I, as Prince of Wales, while the weapons of war are consigned to a furnace. In a funny kind of way, the Stuarts created a sense of shared Britishness, although not in the way that they intended. The shared nationality came out of a common opposition to that dynasty.

It is striking that, when you look at what was happening during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, you see that people were not arraying themselves as English or Scottish; they were making alliances across the border, as royalists or puritans, with Presbyterians and whoever else. In the end, I suppose, it was almost intrinsic in the design of that Rubens ceiling, for which Charles I paid the almost astronomical price—at least, in those days—of £3,000. It looked a bit foreign, and the Stuarts felt a bit foreign. In a shared opposition to this rather transalpine school of art that was thought to influence the dynasty’s thinking, a common Britishness was forged, resting on shared language, manners and beliefs.

Of course, when the Acts of Union went through, people were change-resistant; Parliaments were change-resistant. A certain amount of cajolery was needed on both sides of the border to get the legislation through. For some reason, that cajolery was remembered and resented in Scotland but has been almost completely forgotten in England. Had there been a referendum, I am pretty that it would have gone against England. Luckily, the Acts of Union went through and, as Adam Smith pointed out, having lived through it, the removal of that border opened the door to a united Great Britain, rising above the run of nations. It no longer needed to fret about internal borders and turmoil; it could concentrate on the rest of the world.

In doing so, it lifted the well-being not just of people in this archipelago but of peoples elsewhere, as a family—as peoples with a community of interest and shared affinities that go well beyond simple geographic proximity. It is relationship that I sometimes think was incarnated in that between Boswell and Johnson; teasing and occasionally joshing, their relationship was fundamentally deeply affectionate. Neither of those men would have reached the heights of fame that they have now attained without the participation of the other.

It is a relationship sometimes summarised by what is possibly an apocryphal story but such a good one: that of the highlander at Dunkirk who, observing the total rout on the beaches, told his sergeant, “You know, if the English give in too, this could be a long war”. In that spirit, we see something of our shared national outlook, resting as it does on character and what James VI and I called “similitude of manners”. It was that bridling at injustice and slowness to anger but resolution when roused, if you like, that led the peoples of these islands together on the great endeavours of ending slavery, spreading law and justice around the world, and saving Europe, first from Bonapartist tyranny and then from fascism, and then playing a brave role in saving it from Stalinist tyranny. These were the achievements of a common people, resting not just on proximity but on real affinities of outlook. We have only just got started.

Does the Minister agree that we must learn from history, be inspired by our history and seek to encourage the striving for a better and more optimistic future?