Should the small nationalist parties merge together/a new 'celtic' party be formed?

I feel as though this is a bit of a dumb question/debate but here we go.

So i had a thought. A lot of the nationalist parties (e.g Plaid Cymru, SNP, Mebyon Kernow) all want the same sort of things at their core. They want their area to be listened to, poverty rates to decrease, preservation of their culture, more housing/people to be in safer housing (ik scotland has an issue with this), lots of environmental policies. Those kinds of things. They are all very similar and the same sorts of stuff every manifesto.

A lot of people vote for these parties not because they actually want independence (some do ofc) or because they are particularly nationalistic but because the main parties are every English focused.

Surely forming a larger party in the current system would help to have more power and maybe achieve some of these things. I think the majority of people would still vote Labour/Conservative but this could be the third biggest or fourth biggest party. Which would surely benefit people?

Obviously there would be issues if they all merged and making a new party and getting people to vote would be hard but in an alternative world where this could happen without fall outs, would this be a good idea/has anyone attempted this?

Sorry this post is a bit rambley with no actual facts or anything as i just had this cross my mind.

It might help if they proposed policies that could actually benefit people, rather than policies that promote differences in people based on identity politics.

The SNP has a whole raft of political and economic levers to make change but refuse to use them. So far the SNPs policies have resulted in Scotland going backwards in most areas.

That way they get to gain power by peddling myths that their failures are the result of somebody else.

now we’ve left the EU, we’ll hopefully see supper for these parties decline to pre EU/EEC levels.

Yeah i am quite sick of identity politics as well. I feel like when i look at these parties, particularly their economic policies make me cringe. I would like to point out i dont actually support any of these parties its just a weird thought i had.

These parties definitely only really increase in popularity when the main parties **** up which is not sustainable. I am not entirely sure what will happen to these parties in the near future as i think people are pretty unhappy with the current main parties especially amidst the pandemic (eventho the SNP has also messed up a fair bit but that seems to be overshadowed, swept under the rug a bit)

I do wish a party would come along that does actually have good policies but um yea i am doubtful.

Nationalists don't tend to work very well with others, when push comes to shove.

The SNP has a whole raft of political and economic levers to make change but refuse to use them.

Such as what? :-)

APD, which others?

now we’ve left the EU, we’ll hopefully see supper for these parties decline to pre EU/EEC levels.

Doubt it, especially for Scotland, given they have lost out thanks to explicit English nationalism (no one can claim Brexit was a British project).

How have we lost out exactly?

What I’ve seen is the SNP do very little preparation for Brexit. A first minister who weakened the UKs negotiating position by feeding information the the EUs chief negotiator and major SNP financial donor driving his fish wholesale lorries par downing steet.

Remind me again why when Scottish fish get to market on the continent their sale price is less than they used to be? That’s right, because Europe’s on lockdown and nobody’s eating out

Doubt it, especially for Scotland, given they have lost out thanks to explicit English nationalism (no one can claim Brexit was a British project).

You're not aware of the fact the UK (in particular Scotland) always got more out of EU membership than it put in? Such as in infrastructure spending and what not? You think Westminster is going to replace the lost spending, aside from a naked electoral bribe.


Thats very nice but what does any of that have to do with what i said? In particular that odd bit about Scottish fish of all things and some conspiracy...?

As a net contributor to the EU, how did we receive more back from the EU.

I expect the U.K. taxpayer across the whole of the U.K., not just Scotland will be filling their gaps. Hopefully we may even start seeing little flags out on the projects so we can see where the monies come from.

There’s no conspiracy. I was merely pointing out that ScotGov has received £200 million for brexit planning yet appear to have done very little with it. A bit like the cladding money.

In fact, the SNP appears to have sat on its hands recently, and the only people
Offered up giving explanations as to how bad things are is an SNP donor who’s also a fish wholesaler.

I think you’ll find it was a British project.

https://order-order.com/2019/09/10/leave-beat-snp-half-westminster-seats/

What exactly have we lost out on. Please do tell me.

Once again, what does any of this have to do with my comment? Or is this merely an excuse for a bit of SNP bashing..?

Probably should avoid celtic and nationalism in the same sentence given that neo-Nazis use celtic symbolism.
https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/celtic-cross

Doesn't really given off the right vibe.

My apologies i didnt realise. Obviously i had no idea about the celtic symbol thing. I thought using celtic would sum it up better for everyone and it easier to understand what im on about. I hope its clear that this post was not made in any relation whatso ever of that. I am Cornish myself so i use the word celtic quite frequently to refer to the countries of the UK and nationalist parties seemed like an appropriate word to describe the parties i am on about (just the SNP, Plaid Cymru, Mebyon Kernow in particular.) as opposed to any local parties that don't focus on preserving their culture.

Thank you for educating me on this matter (whoops i will be more careful next time). If you would like i can edit the title of this post.

https://www.farminguk.com/news/snp-accused-of-putting-nationalism-before-farming-_50638.html

https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5787710/scottish-grenfell-fears-loophole-hazardous-materials/

https://www.insider.co.uk/news/property-firm-demands-scottish-government-23344085

We have however nationalised an airport that doesn’t handle any planes. And nationalised a shipyard that was losing money but was owned by a major SNP financial donor.