Boris Johnson wrote this Tuesday January 14th to the Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon to inform him of his refusal to transfer to him the prerogatives of London on the organization of a new referendum of self-determination in Scotland.
As it stands, Scotland cannot hold a referendum on independence without London’s authorization after the 2014 consultation in which the Scots decided to stay in the United Kingdom. In this first referendum, the Scots voted 55% to stay in the UK.
While the UK’s exit from the European Union, against which the Scots voted in 2016, unlike a majority of Britons, is due to take place on January 31, Nicola Sturgeon wrote in December to Boris Johnson for him ask to open negotiations on a transfer from London to Edinburgh of the prerogative on the organization of a self-determination referendum, believing that the imminent Brexit had completely changed the situation.
Scotland had indeed voted 62% in 2016 against Brexit, but the province will be forced to leave the European Union on January 31, like the rest of the United Kingdom.
“I cannot accept any request relating to a transfer of jurisdiction which would lead to new self-determination referendumsReplied the British Prime Minister in this letter which he published on his Twitter account. He claims that the referendum accepted in 2014 by Nicola Sturgeon is the vote “of a generation“. “A new independence referendum would perpetuate the political stagnation in which Scotland has lived for a decade (…) it is time that we all work to bring together the whole of the United KingdomSaid Boris Johnson.
Nicola Sturgeon had officially asked in December for a new election on the independence of the region to be organized in 2020, because she believed that the imminent Brexit had completely changed the situation.
“This reaction was predictable, but it is also untenable and self-destructive“Said Ms. Sturgeon in a statement, accusing the Conservatives in power of being”terrified of Scotland’s right to choose“. “They know that if we are given a choice, we will choose independence“She said, saying that Boris Johnson’s party had”no positive argument in favorOf keeping Scotland within the United Kingdom.
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