An independent Scotland could succeed in staying in the European Union, despite legally having little power to block Brexit, a constitutional expert has argued.
His comments come after the German MEP Elmar Brok, an ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel, said the EU27 could “make a fuss” over Scotland in the Brexit negotiations.
Jeff King is a professor of law at University College London, and a specialist in the UK constitution.
He said that the Supreme Court ruling on Article 50 had confirmed that Scotland would be unable to veto Brexit from within the UK.
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But he argued this did not mean Scotland would need to leave the EU.
“Independence for Scotland could very well be a sweet deal for the rest of the European Union,” he told a European Parliament event.
“The independence movement, which has some extremely good politicians in it, is going to be in the strongest position they have been for a long time.”
A multi-layered game of bluff
The SNP’s Brexit negotiations currently resemble a rather wooden play. It is being acted out for the benefit of Scotland’s sceptical majority, who, polls suggest, would not vote for independence just because of Brexit. They have to be convinced.
The latest act is the Scottish government’s paper, Scotland’s Place in Europe. First, it asks for a Brexit Britain to stay in the single market (Theresa May has already ruled this out). Second, it asks for a different deal for Scotland, along the lines of the “Norway option”. And third, it asks for a share of the EU powers now being repatriated to be devolved to the Scottish Parliament.
According to Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh, the SNP’s trade spokeswoman at Westminster, the ball is now in the UK government’s court.
“As far as what happens next, we are really waiting for the government to confirm what their position is in relation to our document, Scotland’s Place in Europe,” she told me. “Are they going to agree to a differentiated agreement for Scotland, and if not, then a decision will require to be taken.”
If the SNP are reading their lines for the benefit of Scottish voters, they are doing so with one eye on Germany. As I’ve written before, at the time of the 2014 independence referendum, it wasn’t clear that an independent Scotland could stay in the EU. The SNP believe an intervention from Angela Merkel could provide the reassurance they need. They will be cheered by Brok’s words.
But Germany is a negotiator too. As The Daily Record reports, there is goodwill towards Scotland in the EU27, but also an awareness that a constitutional crisis could blow up in the UK government’s face.
If Merkel’s friends and allies continue to talk about their sympathy for Scotland, the idea that the EU considers keeping an independent Scotland in to be a “sweet deal” will seem commonplace. The question for Scottish voters then will be: but how sweet is it for us?