Summary
Iris interviews Ruby Zajac, who works with Scottish media organisation Skotia. They discuss how Brexit affects our daily life and the role it played in the last Scottish elections, as well as the one it could play in the upcoming elections.
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Transcript
Intro: If you, if you ask a stupid question you get a stupid answer. These are steps we all must take to protect Scotland. The people of Scotland will not be disrespected by this parliament, Mr Speaker. Scottish Politics Explained, a podcast by Aff The Record and hosted by me, Iris Pase.
Iris: Hello my lovely listeners! First of all, apologies if you hear like a buzzing sound. My neighbours have decided to dedicate themselves to gardening today and it’s been going on for hours so I guess there’s little I can do about it. So I hope you’re well and that you registered to vote, if eligible of course. Welcome to a new episode of Scottish Politics Explained, I am your host Iris Pase. So last time, we discussed this years’ Scottish elections we talked about the basic key dates and how you can register to vote, what types of vote are available to you. But today I want to revisit one of those topics that were quite important in the previous election. I am talking about Brexit and I’m particularly interested in seeing how almost five years after the referendum, Brexit is and will continue to affect our lives. I want to see the kind of day to day effects on our lives. To do so I’m here with Ruby Zajac, who is a contributing editor at Skotia. I Ruby, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and welcome to Scottish Politics Explained.
Ruby: It’s great to be here. Thanks for having me.
I: So when we talk about Brexit, we often associate it with slogans like Brexit means Brexit and loads of propaganda and varied media coverage. But how does it translate in actual policy? What has changed since Brexit happened? And and what is going to change in terms of economy, government and law, for example?
R: Well, I think I mean, one of the big driving factors, I think, for the Brexit campaign was the changes in EU regulations around tax policy and tax havens. And really, I think the agenda of Boris Johnson’s government is to turn the UK into a tax haven where there’s, you know, massive deregulation, and when you look at the free ports, they’re already setting up, there is a real kind of drive to, to kind of expand our free market capitalist, you know, agenda, and, and kind of do away with the kinds of environmental and workers rights protections that the EU has been developing, although obviously, lots of people on the left would say, they haven’t been going far enough. And so I do think we’ve been starting to see, you know, the beginnings of the agenda from the UK Tory government in that respect, and also with regards to immigration. And I mean, the fact that they have obviously released, you know, the kind of outline of what a kind of desirable immigrant will be under the new system, in terms of basically, you know, only only the wealthy only people earning above 30,000 and make it very, very difficult to enter the UK without a certain level of wealth. And in fact, the latest horror in that story is the Home Office and Priti Patel have announced the kind of review of the asylum system, which is taking place during purdah when the Scottish Government can’t, you know, respond in any way, because we’ve got the election coming up. So I think it’s a really, it’s a really worrying kind of agenda and direction that we’re moving in, in terms of, of, you know, trade and migration and how that’s gonna affect, you know, 90 the 99%.
I: Yeah, definitely. And as you say, this is not something that we’ve seen in the news so much, but it will have serious consequences for our lives here in the UK. And another thing to note is that, I mean, of course, we won’t be protecting foreign workers, as much as they’re protected now, and this change will affect European workers but not only. I’m thinking of students, for example, and this might become a form of gatekeeping, like, fewer people will be coming in. And this is something important to think about, because we risk going towards a country that is increasingly more classist because of course, if we think about that point system, we are thinking about letting just kind of wealthy immigrants coming in the country, but how does this affect the everyday life of a British citizen? How does Brexit translate into everyday changes?
R: Yeah, that’s a it’s such a crucial question, isn’t it? You know, how does policy affect us in practice, and and it’s it’s all too easy to kind of just jump to things like, oh, when people go on holiday, they’ll be there might be a visa system, which of course is, you know, incredibly unlikely. And it’d be incredibly easy, I’m sure, in whatever system that is established for Brits to holiday abroad on the continent. So I suppose that the ways that it’s going to affect us is actually harder to tease out. But I would just go back to those kinds of trade and workers rights issues and migration issues that I mentioned before, because in in your day to day that’s talking about, you know, having food on our supermarket shelves, which doesn’t necessarily have the regulations, in terms of safety standards, we’ve all heard the kind of threats of the chlorinated chicken from the USA and and that the threats also to local branding of food in a kind of, you know, this is Scottish smoked salmon, you know, doing away with that, that protection, I can’t remember the name of it at this moment. And the threat that that poses to local economies and local businesses in Scotland, that could, you know, there will be a knock on effect. In fact, we’re already seeing in the case of the seafood industry in Scotland, a lot of businesses are, you know, really seriously under threat and like absolutely haemorrhaging money because they can’t get their produce into the EU at the moment. And because the the regulations and checks that are in place, and that, you know, there hasn’t been enough preparation for I mean, we’ve seen in Northern Ireland, people were being affected in a very real daily life way, when the the trade checks were supposed to come into place, and and ultimately, they just didn’t, at the time they were meant to, because there would have been food shortages, you know, so these are very real things. But then, but then there is that more complex question of, you know, the kind of bolstering of the gig economy and the work that you know, a vast number of people in the country do in service industries, in telecommunications, which won’t necessarily be protected by the the kinds of human rights protections that were very kind of strong under the EU. So that might not affect, you know, the people in the middle, it might not affect the haves in the same way they will affect the have nots, but it is it is part of a kind of worrying picture, which is eroding our rights. And the UK has laid a very clear UK Government has displayed a very clear ambition to kind of water down the Human Rights Act. So I think those are things that we’re going to see affecting us, but they’re not necessarily the kind of headline grabbing, oh, we’re not going to get to holiday in Spain, you know, I don’t think that’s really what it’s going to be about.
I: I believe that what you say is also important in terms of keeping in mind what democracy looks like. Having people here who are from all over the world means having a wealth of experiences that can help make the government accountable for their actions, because of course, they have seen different ways of how democracy, for example, is conducted. So that’s surely kind of a wealth that is coming in this country.
R: Yeah, I mean, I think that there are kind of very worrying things that are coming to light from the UK government in in the current context, for instance, the blog that was published on the London School of Economics, a British policy website by by a couple of academics, but one of whom is an advisor on international trade to the UK Government. And it was a blog that kind of weighed up the the case for Scottish independence from an economic perspective, and it was very positive, you know, and it said that Scotland would have every chance of, you know, flourishing, succeeding economically. And the UK government made a statement saying it was not their opinion, which of course, it wasn’t, but then the blog post was removed, you know, apparently at the behest of the authors but he has a very clear indication that as one of them works for the UK government, and the there may have been pressure there and that is an extremely alarming kind of state of affairs. And I think that being part of the European community and the European Parliament where there is that kind of accountability and comparison with other countries, I mean, don’t get me wrong, you know, I don’t think that the EU is in any way perfect. And you know, early on in in the days of the campaign when we would hear you know, the of the remain campaign, the kind of hesitancy from Jeremy Corbyn, there was certainly, you know, from my perspective, there were some good arguments being made. But it became clear very quickly that that was not what Brexit was about, you know. Brexit was always about a right wing populist agenda. And so anyone who voted for it, you know, with this kind of left wing ideals, I think was, was very misled into what their vote was actually going to be used for. But I think that, for example, Yanis Varoufakis’ movement are the name escapes me. But you know, that that movement, very kind of pan European movement to democratise the EU and reform from within the EU, you know, in some of the stuff that he’s written, you know, with his experience as the Greek Finance Minister, when, when the European Union was so heavy handed with the Greek economy, if even he was saying, you know, there are things to be done, but the best chance we have of kind of promoting, you know, socially just, well, let’s just say socialist ideas that are, you know, protecting the common good is together, not by isolationism, I feel like I slightly lost the thread of what the question was.
I: Oh, don’t worry, I think we were just kind of chatting at this point. But I do have a follow up question and what you were just saying there. So you were saying that the debate around Brexit played on right wing populist propaganda, and this had a huge impact on our lives and on the general conversation, because of course, Brexit really changed the course of our public debate. Do you think that Brexit will still be affecting or will have an influence on the upcoming elections?
R: Yeah, that’s interesting, isn’t it? Because of course, the last Scottish Parliament elections were the same year as the Brexit referendum. So, you know, that question was very much on people’s minds. And although it happened before the referendum, and I think that there there is a sense that, you know, it’s been five years and you know, now the question on everyone’s minds is Coronavirus. And so I don’t think it will be kind of the first, you know, the biggest issue, the biggest factor, but I definitely think that the SNP stance on Brexit has brought a lot of people to the SNP cause or I think it’s changed a lot of people’s minds. And both the SNP is kind of open hearted, open minded kind of policy. And also, you know, the fact that Brexit happened, because one of the arguments that was made in 2014, in vis à vis Scottish independence was that, you know, if we were independent, we wouldn’t be in the EU. And that was something that a lot of people within a certain kind of demographic bracket, we’re very concerned about. So now, you know, the only way to be in the EU is to become independent. And I think that is going to be a draw. And certainly, it’s something that the, you know, is being kind of an argument that’s being made to new Scots and new voters who are voting for the first time in this election, who are EU citizens and refugees, and basically everyone who’s got residency, which is very exciting. And and, of course, that’s a, you know, that that’s something that would appeal from the Green Party’s campaign and kind of platform as well. So I think there is a real sense that, you know, Scotland did vote remain, and we have been taken out of EU against our will. And it does just kind of compound the case for independence, which is obviously in the case of the Scottish Parliament elections, the case for the pro independence parties, but we can’t forget that, you know, there was a third of the vote in in the referendum, the Brexit referendum, that voted to leave in Scotland, so that that may also kind of play into people’s decision making.
I: Yeah, that’s something that surely needs to be acknowledged and taken into consideration, even if only as some kind of subtext in these elections, because it plays into the bigger picture into the values and goals that that will determine our next government. Well, thank you so much, Ruby, for this chat and for coming on the podcast, this was kind of my last question.
R: It’s been really interesting, chatting via all these wide and varied issues that we’re all grappling with at the moment.
I: It’s been my pleasure. This is all we have time for today. But if you’re looking to learn more about Scottish politics, you could have a we listen to our other episodes, including our first election special from last week. For now, thank you so much for listening and I wish you a great weekend. Bye!
Scottish Politics Explained 