Humza Yousaf was writing on X the other day and – hoorah! – I agreed with him. The UK Government’s Rwanda bill, said the First Minister, was the most disgraceful piece of legislation in modern UK political history. Yes, absolutely: misguided, unlikely to achieve its aims, divisive, and disgraceful. I agree with you Mr Yousaf, well said.
But then came the next bit. “Westminster values are not Scotland’s values”, continued Mr Yousaf, and the SNP will continue to oppose the Rwanda bill and campaign instead for a humane asylum system. Again: yes, we need legal asylum routes. But the stuff about values is more troubling. Even on an important subject like this, it would seem like nationalists just cannot help themselves.
In fact, Mr Yousaf was it again recently when he wrote a piece about Europe for the magazine Politico. He said Scots voted decisively to remain in the EU and their decision was driven by the economic advantages of being in the single market but also by the values that Scotland shares with the EU. There’s the word again: values.
The obvious question would be what Mr Yousaf means by the values Scotland shares with the EU because it wasn’t explained in his piece. The closest we got was stuff about the EU's motto “united in diversity”, but in what way can diversity be considered a Scottish value as distinct from an English or Welsh one? Quite apart from what diversity means, there are people in all of those countries who may be supportive of it and there are people who may not. As for the countries themselves, they are neutral. A country has no opinion.
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So, if what Mr Yousaf means when he refers to Scotland’s values is SNP values, he should say so because part of the diversity he mentions is surely diversity of opinion. Scots disagree, usually politely, sometimes rudely, and there’s certainly nothing we could all agree on that could therefore be considered a Scottish value unless it was something so vague as to be meaningless. Like fairness. Or niceness. Or remembering to send your mummy a card on Mother’s Day. As soon as you get less blandly nice, people disagree and it cannot therefore be called a national value. Because no such thing exists.
Why do nationalists insist then that Scottish values do exist? Simple really: if there is such a thing, they can argue our values are different to English ones and we must therefore have referendums and all the rest of it. To do anything else, to accept similarities rather than differences, undermines their case.
In his remarks on X, Mr Yousaf was also clearly making a false comparison: Westminster values, he said, are not Scotland’s values. In other words, he was comparing the values of a country – which, as we’ve established, do not exist – to the values of “Westminster” by which he really means the Tories. This is unsound, first because there are some Scots who agree with the “Westminster values”, and secondly because the so-called Westminster values can be changed by voting in a different government, which Scots like me intend to do thankyou very much.
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All of this, I would suggest, goes to the heart of how someone like Mr Yousaf thinks and why there’s so much mutual lack of understanding between Scots of a unionist and nationalist persuasion. Mr Yousaf says national values exist and the logical extension of that is pride in those values and then we’re into the realm of anthems and flags and tear-moistened eyes and teaching Scottish values in schools. And so much of it based on a fallacy: a Scottish gestalt.
And so a final word to Mr Yousaf if I may: say what you want about the Rwanda bill because I agree with you, but opposition to it is not a Scottish value, it is an opinion only. If it’s to have any point at all, a belief in diversity must also mean a belief in, and respect for, a diversity of views. So stop saying “Scotland’s values” when you really mean something else. Say “SNP values” or “my values”. And have a think about the one value, or principle, that every good First Minister should always bear in mind: respect for the fact that lots of people disagree with you.
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