BRITAIN:Scottish Conservatives have hit back at British chancellor Gordon Brown in the growing debate about Britishness, accusing him and the Labour government of doing almost nothing to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union.
On the eve of today's anniversary of the passing of the union between England and Scotland, the Conservative shadow Scottish secretary David Mundell tabled a Commons motion celebrating the legislation that created the United Kingdom of Great Britain. And he specifically challenged Labour MPs to sign the motion asserting the conviction "that all four countries" that now comprise the United Kingdom - England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland - "benefit from the Union" and "achieve much more together" than they would as separate nations.
Mr Brown - who is expected to succeed Tony Blair as prime minister later this year - coupled a weekend call for a debate about Britishness with the charge that some Tories were forming "an opportunist coalition" with minority nationalists around "a newly fashionable but perilous orthodoxy" stressing what divided rather than united the UK.
However, Mr Mundell countered: "It's no good saying on one day you want to promote the union and then only being prepared to come up with a new £2 coin to mark the event." Nor, he said, should the Conservatives "take lessons" from Mr Brown on promoting Britishness "when his government seeks to undermine British values at every turn with support for the European constitution, English regionalisation and ID cards."
Mr Mundell said his motion set out clearly the Conservative Party's position on the union, "recognising that it has been one of the greatest political success stories of modern European history".
Calling upon all unionists to use the 300th anniversary "to reiterate the case for and continued relevance of the union for this century and beyond", Mr Mundell said he was particularly calling for the backing of Labour MPs. "On the union, as with their record over the past 10 years, Gordon Brown and Labour will be judged by their actions, not their words."
Meanwhile, Welsh and Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain, who is a candidate for Labour's deputy leadership, backed Mr Brown's call for a debate on Britishness, which, he said, was "long overdue - not least because the union is under attack from the Laurel and Hardy partnership of the Tories and the nationalists."