Brexit means Indyref2 but independence wont affect our cUK trade

The Brexit referendum brought the doublethink of the Scottish nationalist movement to new levels. Whether this was Nicola Sturgeon standing shoulder to shoulder with the "Red" Tories and the "Real" Tories in the campaign, or rather the First Minister of Scotland arguing against Scotland taking democratic decisions about fishing in its own waters. 

Even more breathtaking was the SNP leader arguing passionately that it was perfectly reasonable for nations to "pool some sovereignty for mutual advantage" a line that is the cornerstone of the argument many Unionists deploy (I certainly do)!

However over the sounds of the screeching handbrake turns now being employed by the nationalist movement, as they argue against pooling and sharing once more, we are faced with a wonderful piece of doublethink that some nationalists don't even recognise until it's pointed out.

The Norway option, no case for an independence referendum 

The process starts when we are faced with the material change of Brexit on Scotland, the "deeply damaging and painful consequences" of breaking a Union that Sturgeon rightly points out. For Sturgeon protecting Scotland from this focuses on Scotland maintaining access to the single market. The concept being that if there is no single market access for Scotland to the EU then the costs of this will be substantial to Scotland. All well and good and perfectly logical on it's own. 

However let's pause for a second. What if Scotland (through the UK) can maintain free single market access through a so-called Norway type deal? I'm happy to argue about the possibility of this form of deal another time (I actually think it is the most likely) but for the purposes of this exploration of the argument lets say it happens.

Should a "Norway plus" deal be achieved by the UK then Scotland would have free market access, this negates all the deeply damaging and painful consequences of the Brexit and therefore the material change that caused the case for a second independence referendum is no more.

Hard Brexit and the case for an independence referendum

Therefore the case for an independence referendum rests on a hard Brexit, that is one where Scotland and the UK no longer have access to the single market and therefore our trade of £11.6bn in exports to the EU would be at risk.

This then represents the deeply damaging and painful consequences of a Brexit to Scotland. Therefore Scotland must become independent and get back into the EU to protect these exports. The inference here is clear: without free and open single market access to the EU Scotland's trade will be at risk. That clearly does not mean it will stop, but it will be harmed enough to cause deeply damaging and painful consequences. We'll call this a DDPC trade reduction in this case on £11.6bn.

But then a cursory glance at the figures shows a much, much bigger problem for independence.

If leaving the EU single market (which is not a real single market: it doesn't apply to services and we have a different currency) causes a DDPC trade reduction on £11.6bn in exports what would leaving the UK single market cause (which is a true single market between Scotland and rUK with a shared currency). By logic alone on this basis leaving the UK must case a greater DDPC trade reduction on £48.5bn of exports. Clearly that must have more deeply damaging and even more painful consequences.

Therefore the circumstances which give arise to the material change (a hard Brexit) create far, far greater pain to Scotland by the very logic employed by the nationalist movement.

The doublethink escape clause
This is where the doublethink suddenly turns up. Without effort or apparent understanding of their own contradictions the highlighting of a DDPC+ trade reduction on £48.5bn is brushed aside with something along the lines of "oh you think rUK will not longer trade with us".

The trouble is that nationalists seem to forget that if Scotland joins the EU then the terms of trade between Scotland and cUK are not decided between Scotland and cUK but by the EU and cUK (which at once highlights the contradictions between the independence movement and EU membership).

We have already established that the UK and EU terms of trade will be harmful - the DDPC trade reduction - otherwise the Norway option applies, or there is no harmful effects of Brexit and in which case the reasoning for an independence referendum is no longer there. Therefore Scottish trade with cUK is now EU trade with cUK which, by logic, must suffer the DDPC+ trade reduction.


Failing to update the narrative
There are many occasions when I've seen the nationalist movement failing to update their narrative - look closely and you'll see the odd SNP MP talking about the Currency Union "bluff" forgetting that there case has since been shredded by events.

However this is one of those rare cases where the nationalists aren't updating their narrative within their own argument. The fact is the foundation of the indyref case is that trande change is going to be deeply damaging and painful for Scotland.

If it isn't trade change then there is no indyref case.

If it is trade change then there is an indyref case but that involves far greater deeply damaging and painful consequences.

That's not a nice corner for a nationalist to have painted themselves into and you have to feel sorry for them when they eventually realise.