Scot-free Empire
Sir: Allan Massie's questioning of the present constitutional arrangements of the UK (`Stands Scotland Where It Did?', 12 May) hits many nails squarely on the head. Some of the differences he points to between the position of Scotland on the one hand, and that of Ireland and Wales on the other, are points well made. But to say that Wales and Ireland were conquered early enough to have obliterated even the memory of existence as a nation state would be similar to denying the concept of England and Englishness before the battle of Hastings. When the conquerors came to Ireland and Wales, there were Irish and Welsh to subdue. They had their own languages,.
'Haven't you people got second homes to go to?' social structures, institutions and histories. In Ireland, these influences were strong enough to cause the conquerors eventually to go native, which in turn provoked more invasions. (The same happened to the 1066 Normans but the French were in no posi- tion to mount repeated political re- education incursions every couple of cen- turies.) For special reasons only the last invasion of Ireland by those known as the Ulster Scots, among which I myself would be counted, has not assimilated fully. Now at last, after three divisive centuries, that process is slowly beginning to happen, as Mr Massie chronicles, and it has been given added impetus by the spectacle of Dublin Castle European summits during an active Irish EC presidency. However, all this is founded on the concept of `a nation once again' which was never def- eated in the minds of the Catholic con- quered and which inexorably permeated sections of the Protestant ascendancy. I can only hope that the main thrust of Mr Massie's view is correct, that the concept of Europe will permeate to the point where it can be seen as a new political context for the British Isles as an English-speaking entity. Maybe one day there will be a Scottish EC presidency.
Don Anderson
17 Manse Road, Co. Down, Northern Ireland
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