If you're in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, do you still feel part of a 'united' kingdom?

[JesusInTheCabbageVan]

I'm in Wales, with family in England. Obviously I've always been aware of the divide (with some aspects more divided than others) but I feel increasingly like I don't even recognise England. It doesn't sound safe, the government is so chaotic it's not even funny any more, and now yesterday. Does anyone else feel like England's handling of the pandemic will permanently and fundamentally change the dynamics of the UK?

Argggh huge typo there! Boris was going out of his way to AVOID a joined up effort!

Haven't felt like part of a "United" kingdom my whole life - mid 40s. My childhood consisted of Thatcher tearing Scotland apart implementing Poll Tax in Scotland first being one example. 3rd generation unemployment due to Conservatives destruction of industry. For our sins we get Trident .

We did not benefit from boom times the way the wealthier English regions did but were subject to the same bust. Why should our taxes fund HS2 when won't benefit from it in the slightest. It is not a democracy for Scotland as it doesn't matter what we vote our population is smaller . We are being dragged out of Europe against our will and many No voters feel totally betrayed by "the vow" which should be renamed "the lie".

And I meant virtually everyone that I have spoken to about it here that voted leave now regrets it.

(Half asleep today)

@Pumperthepumper we can still be part of the EEC. Leaving the EU doesn't mean we have to leave the EEC. We can still have trade with Ireland and the EU if we remain with the EEC, it's just means Germany cannot dictate our laws and humans rights legislation.

London was an example given because it's in England and because I find people on here, and IRL often talk about the English as though they are a separate species, that we have nothing in common with, when as a Scot I am as likely to feel as much of a bond with a Londoner as I am with someone from Inverness. And personally I think all of our governments are about as much of a mess right now, even if there are one or two things that a particular government might have done better than the others.

No. I live on Wales but work in England. Sometimes I feel stuck between a rock and a hard place in Covid terms.

[quote TOADfan]@Pumperthepumper we can still be part of the EEC. Leaving the EU doesn't mean we have to leave the EEC. We can still have trade with Ireland and the EU if we remain with the EEC, it's just means Germany cannot dictate our laws and humans rights legislation.[/quote]
The EEC doesn’t exist anymore, it hasn’t since 1993.

I'm from N Ireland and broadly a unionist I suppose. (Although I don't feel terribly strongly about it, and have a lot of sympathy for why other people feel strongly about a united Ireland). But I'm not a DUP unionist. And I voted no to Brexit.

I haven't felt like part of the UK for a long time. I'm tired of being portrayed as a dinosaur denying religious fanatic, or a loyalist thug, for starters, even though I have no connection to those people. The DUP are as thick as champ to have thought that their Tory cronies would support them in return for their support on Brexit.

If Scotland leaves the UK, as I feel it eventually will, then we won't have a physical connection to the rest of the UK and it will be the end of the line. Only instead of angry insults on Twitter it will maybe be a return to the N Ireland I grew up in with actual violence. But hey, it will only be us bearing the brunt of it and as long as Boris and his mates get their Brexit it's all good. We can make the bold sacrifice on their behalf. Maybe they'll visit occasionally and tell us how much they appreciate it. Self serving hypocrites the lot of them.

No, I'm Scottish and haven't felt part of the UK or united for a very long time.
I voted yes for independence and will do so again. Totally fed up of being ruled by Westminster and a government that the overall majority of my country have not voted in. Change has to come, sooner the better.
I am not anti English in the slightest, have relatives there and have spent many happy holidays there. Politically I just think we're different and that's fine.

@zahra2 we can’t have a referendum again unless Westminster agrees....that’s what we are waiting for!

[quote TOADfan]@Pumperthepumper we can still be part of the EEC. Leaving the EU doesn't mean we have to leave the EEC. We can still have trade with Ireland and the EU if we remain with the EEC, it's just means Germany cannot dictate our laws and humans rights legislation.[/quote]
Germany don't dictate our laws.

You're speaking as if the EU is something that the UK never had any part in. As if they didn't have representatives just the same as everyone else.

@cologne4711 fair point - I imagine that Scottish (Welsh, Northern Irish) people living in England right now are feeling all sorts of things.

I was thinking primarily though about how it feels for people 'on the outside looking in'. And I use that phrase because that's exactly how many people in England seem to view us. It's just that previously England has always been seen as the most privileged of the four nations in many respects. Maybe it still is, but it certainly doesn't feel that way right now.

No, we should be part of a united Ireland

Have never felt like a willing member of the United Kingdom (have lived all my life in Scotland).

It’s not about bigotry, or national pride -my mother is from NI, my dad’s family from Nottingham...they just so happened to settle in Glasgow.

It’s simply that Scotland is not getting any real access to democracy.

We vote very differently, so very differently...but this is lost when it comes to UK elections. 5.5 million people in Scotland cannot make a meaningful dent in the votes made by 65 million south of the border. Which might be ok, if Scotland was voting like a mini-England. But we don’t and we haven’t for over 50 years.

I'm not going to be able to respond to all the replies I'm afraid, but personally I voted Remain and was gutted and ashamed (and baffled) that Wales overall voted Leave.

@SaltyAndFresh

Scottish here, no I don’t feel united at all. Particularly difficult with an English partner and family. Scotland requested an extension to furlough when shit started to hit the fan in Scotland and was told no chance. Yet when in England is in trouble it’s all systems go. The fact Scotland still don’t seem to know how this new lockdown and furlough extension will affect Scotland is a disgrace.

[quote BashfulClam]@cologne4711 read the title, it asks for the views of people in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland.[/quote]
Are the views of people in England not valid then?

I think division rules now. You only have to look at the posts on this page (why do you have moral high ground, Wales voted leave get what they ask for, why can't people in England comment on the post) none of which were answering the question or seeing the point behind the post to see the division that johnson and Co. have wrought.

I'm Welsh living in Wales now, studied and lived in England for years.

I think the pandemic will change how the devolved nations feel, Brexit too. Pandemic because Johnson has tried to control the devolved govt's and cast aside any opportunity to work together. Slagging off devolved govts is never a good look, and will never unite. He's so dismissive, it is bound to stir up division.

Add in the fact that many people were duped into voting for Johnson, and are watching the appalling handling of brexit and the giving money to mates over putting public health first fiasco that he's brought, and I think it's inevitable that they feel taken advanced off now. A recourse to nationalistic politics is inevitable I think.

I can't say that I feel any less a part of the uk, but angry and sad that they have caused so much division for personal financial gain.

Scottish - have never felt part of the UK

@JesusInTheCabbageVan

I'm not going to be able to respond to all the replies I'm afraid, but personally I voted Remain and was gutted and ashamed (and baffled) that Wales overall voted Leave.

Someone posted this article in another thread-

"Wales voted leave by a majority of 52% to 48% in the 2016 referendum – a result that took some analysts by surprise. However, work by Danny Dorling, a professor of geography at Oxford, found that the result could in part be attributed to the influence of English voters.

“If you look at the more genuinely Welsh areas, especially the Welsh-speaking ones, they did not want to leave the EU,” Dorling told the Sunday Times. “Wales was made to look like a Brexit-supporting nation by its English settlers.”

About 21% (650,000) of people living in Wales were born in England, with nearly a quarter aged over 65. The country voted for Brexit by a majority of just 82,000.

Border towns and areas of central Wales with large English communities, such as Wrexham and Powys, recorded a higher proportion of leave votes, whereas Welsh-speaking areas such as Gwynedd and Ceredigion had high remain votes."

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/sep/22/english-people-wales-brexit-research

Why doesn’t NS just call a Scottish Independence vote regardless?

I’m sure “Westminster” will say it has to go through Parliament, but who cares? Look how BJ tried to prorogue Parliament earlier this year to get his “oven ready” Brexit deal through (which he’s now trying to wriggle out of). If Scotland just carries out its own referendum and the vote is independence, then surely that will speak for itself?

@crazyfrogs no because it’s asking how the other 3 nations feel not how people in England feel. This is what I detest, we ask about the other nations who are an afterthought and people from England get the hump!

@zhara2 because it would cost millions when we are skint and not be valid.

I think there is a general feeling that the UK government primarily governs in the interest of England- and I would say even within that it is fairly focussed on the south, London in particular. You only have to look at things like infrastructure spending and how it is planned (HS2 being a prime example) to see that in action. By focussing spend in the south, it has hamstrung other areas to a greater or larger extent.

Another example, of England-centric thinking is when Wales asked for extra money to allow an early lockdown or Scotland wanted to more money to allow longer lockdown with furlough if needed, they were told it had to come from existing money (presumably as England were not planning to do what the devolved government/administration were considering). Now that England has required to enter a lockdown? Of course, the funds are instantly available (as they should be). I’m not arguing the rights and wrongs of who should have locked down and when/whether the Welsh got it right or not etc. I’m am saying that extra money was made available the instant England asked. Other areas of the country would not/did not get the same response.