The range of alternatives implies deep constitutional reforms, revisions to international treaties and a potential breakup of the UK. James Stokanlocal authority leaders, were promoters of the early phases of transcendental proposals for change and acts of rebellion against the concentration of power by the British central government and, in the last two decades, by Scottish local government.

Council members also introduced a motion authorizing the OIC to “explore options for alternative models of government that provide greater fiscal security and economic opportunities for the Orkney Islands”, which was approved by fifteen votes in favor and six against in the July 4 plenary session. .

Stockan proposed addressing different systems of self-governance in official “investigations”, including those in the British Crown Dependent Islands (such as Jersey, Guernsey and Man) and overseas territories, including the disputed Gibraltar and Falklands. And it raises above all else to analyze “nordic connection” of Orkney, placing particular emphasis on the quasi-independent regime of the Faroe Islands, the North Atlantic archipelago located between Iceland and Norway, which are a constituent part of the kingdom of Denmark and remain outside the European Union (EU).

“The government has failed us,” the Scottish island district leader said as he presented his plans to the OIC. “I am not proposing this motion with the express desire to destroy anything,” Stockan added at the risk of dividing the islands from the rest of Scotland and the rest of Great Britain. Opposing the proposal, councilor David Dawson dismissed the independence route as “fantasy” and drew parallels with the consequences of Brexit. “If the UK has a problem with dissolving our union with the EU, what hope will counties like us have if we seek to secede from Scotland and the rest of England?”, asked the mayor and former agent of the now disbanded Police of North Scotland.

The green light approved by the city council will give Orkney voters an opportunity to announce the conclusions of this review and other forms of management consistent with the principle of subsidiarity and respect for regional autonomy. At this time, the investigation schedule and the time frame for the opinion poll have not been disclosed. On the other hand, the costs of the two exercises, which both London and Edinburgh suspect, will likely have to be met from internal budgets.

international uproar

The most immediate impression of the population is positive, according to the newspaper’s online survey ‘Orkadians’ which opens 24 hours after the municipal election. 51.4% of the 1,871 registered responses later supported the motion, compared to 37.9% against it and 10.7% who were undecided.

The embryo of a plan to push Orkney towards a version of a Norwegian protectorate caused tremendous media reverberation, outside and within the UK, which could influence the results of unofficial polls. Analysts also pointed out that the municipality’s motion was presented without the usual informative filming among the people or prior mobilization campaigns that could heat things up. The pulse of constitutional reform this time was launched from regional power, not from the basis of activism.

“The majority of Orcadians would support the principle of decentralization, but the idea of ​​more radical autonomy has never found verifiable majority support,” he wrote on academic platform ‘The Conversation’ Matthew Nicolson, Scottish historian, author of doctoral thesis ‘The politics of culture, identity and constitutional change in Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles, 1966-1990’. ).

Nicolson recalls three distinct instances in the last fifty years when the question of his Nordic identity was reopened in Orkney and the option of breaking ties with London and Edinburgh was raised as a strategy for expanding the sphere of regional power. The impetus of all the apparent attempted rebellions had a common denominator: disagreements over economic matters and disagreements with central or local authorities over the transfer of power.

The Stockan initiative stems from a dispute, which is still unresolved, with the autonomous government of Scottish National Party (SNP) regarding the financing of a fleet of ferries that will replace the old regular transport ships between inhabited islands in the archipelago. The majority of council members are also suspicious of the tendency towards centralization of power adopted by Edinburgh since the creation of the autonomy, in 1999.

Priority over Christopher Columbus

Politicians and activists from the Scottish region claiming pre-eminence over Christopher Columbus in the discovery of America – historical records place the feat in an expedition by Henry Sinclair, Earl of Orkney, which would land in Nova Scotia, Canada, circa 1398 – try periodically to capitalize on its origins. -his Viking origins. Hence, in August 1967, they called for a ‘back to Denmark’ for the islands in a campaign of protest against the British central government’s restructuring of the regional police service and water authority. “Orkney is dying under the British Mandate, let’s reunite with Denmark,” read posters hanging on the streets of Kirkwall and other major cities in the region.

Later, according to historians from the University of Edinburgh, the expansion project for the Dounreay nuclear power plant, in Caithness (the northern tip of mainland Scotland, a few miles from the archipelago), sparked the 1986 Declaration of Wyre. In this historic text it is addressed to the King of Norway and Queen of Denmark, who written in Visigothic script and on display in Kirkwall’s Lynnfield Hotel, the leaders from Orkney and Shetland reaffirmed their “strong historical ties” with the two Scandinavian nations and They implored the two heads of state to mediate in this turmoil and demanded that the Government of Great Britain “keep the law, our rights, and our traditions… until the day our constitutional status is settled.”

alternative models

Today, Norway has informally announced that there is no clear legal way to wrap up a supposedly independent group of islands from Britain under an autonomous regime similar to the Faroe Islands. At the same time, Rishi Sunak’s government lifted the handbrake as soon as the IOC gave approval to local officials to launch an investigation into alternative models of governance that helped improve the economic and fiscal situation in these beautiful, harsh and remote places. . “There is no mechanism for granting Crown dependency or oversea territory status in any part of the UK,” said a Downing Street spokesman for the Conservative President.

Historian Nicolson has not ruled out a popular resurgence of “pro-autonomy sentiment” that emerged in Orkney years ago if the discord and discontent between councilors and islanders with the central government continued. But the prime minister’s office warned that the country was “stronger as one United Kingdom” and ruled out reforming the home governing system to address the grievances of the Viking islands or the Scottish nation as a whole. On the other hand, Scottish nationalist politicians fear that Kirkwall’s actions will weaken the general campaign for self-determination in a de facto consent referendum (with a majority vote in legislative elections).

The remains of one of the most important Neolithic settlements in Europe, declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, are preserved on the islands. Tourism has remained constant and the population has grown in recent decades above Scotland’s national average, although not by a record level 32,000 souls listed in the 1881 census. His fate remains, for the time being, anchored in England.