The Northern Independence Party (NIP) was established in October 2020, with the specific aim of redressing the historic injustice of the North-South divide. In 12 short months, the party have amassed over 59,000 followers on their Twitter account, put forward a candidate for the Hartlepool by-election in May, and have officially been registered with the Electoral Commission. They are a secessionist political party, advocating for the creation of an independent North of England, under the name Northumbria. The NIP aren’t a single issue party, however. They run on a manifesto based on principles of democratic socialism: adopting policies which are popular with a broad base of society, which simultaneously tackle particular regional concerns.
For too long has the north been treated as a peculiarity, an animal caged in a zoo to be ogled at, wondered and theorised about. Theory and promises are all well and good, but they’re not substantial. The vapid rhetoric of “levelling up” and establishing a “Northern Powerhouse” is superficial, lacking any substance, any weight. What the NIP proposes is a radical solution to the North’s plethora of problems: independence. “Not mayors. Not assemblies. Not devolution. And certainly not more establishment politicians,” declares founder and leader Philip Proudfoot, in the foreword to their manifesto, “We can’t trust a system built on inequality to dismantle that same inequality”.
The North-South divide is historic. England united under a southern centralised government very early on, and has remained relatively stagnant ever since. Though the Industrial Revolution somewhat shifted the balance of economic power to the North, this proved to be short-lived. Throughout the twentieth-century, northern industry experienced a decline, as industries began to shift towards the south; but, of course, this was exacerbated to the extreme under Thatcher and deindustrialisation. The issue with this was not deindustrialisation in and of itself, but the failure to provide northern economies with a replacement: jobs that provided the same financial security. Instead the north has undergone continued periods of “managed decline”, as its youngest and brightest are forced to move to London to pursue careers, and endless politicians pay lip-service to regional inequality, with hollow promises of creating a “Northern Powerhouse”. Yet, nothing ever changes. The government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic only highlighted the stark inequality in treatment between the north and south.
So the question remains: could they really win?
I don’t want to burst any bubbles. Believe me, an independent north is something that I believed could only exist in my wildest dreams. But the answer is no. Britain’s archaic first-past-the-post electoral system frustratingly makes it near impossible for smaller political parties to gain a foothold in Westminster.
Even UKIP’s historic result at the 2015 General Election of 3,881,129 (over 3 million votes), amassing 12% of the overall share of the vote, produced only one one seat, and this with major financial backing. This antiquated system remains two party-dominated, and the two parties fundamentally share the same interests, if wrapped in ever-so slightly different packaging – it’s hard for a party to breakthrough to gain some seats, let alone take the required amount of seats to form a government. But even if NIP could win (through some miracle, or electoral reform), would they want to? The system itself is broken, premised on centralising all power and control in one tiny corner of the country. In the 2003 postscript to Tom Nairn’s The Break-up of Britain, he writes that the devolution pursued under Tony Blair, instead of being a radical departure “was intended to continue, or even to strengthen the Union state”. Working within the current political system of Britain cannot produce change, results, equality. Any attempt at redressing the balance reinforces the centrality of Westminster and removes power from the regions. By winning a General Election, the NIP would simply be playing into the system it seeks to dismantle.
So if they could never win, and if winning isn’t actually the ultimate aim, what does the party hope to achieve?
The growth of regional nationalism and calls for independence is not a recent phenomenon; it has a rich history in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. The possibility of the break-up of the British state feels ever more real, despite the intense pushback it receives from Westminster. If Ireland was to unify, and Scotland and Wales were to become independent nations: where would that leave England? Isolated and clinging on to delusions of grandeur. But none of this would change the position of the north, we would still be dominated by centralised rule that has continually and systematically decimated us for decades, under the aegis of “managed decline”. Thelma Walker, (the first ever NIP candidate at the Hartlepool by-election earlier this year) Red Pepper wrote in: “The demands of the NIP for an independent Northumbria may be a catalyst for a move towards an England of the future, if and when the other nations of the UK gain independence. An England that is itself independent of ‘Great Britain’ and unshackled from the British state. Is this a transition period where we can challenge the nature of the British state and its political democracy? There has been a deference to Westminster for too long; we need a strategy for democratisation in each of the UK nations. The NIP’s demands can be part of that and the beginning of meaningful democracy.” The goal of the NIP is not, then, to achieve political power within the current system; but to begin a process of democratisation, a process which will dismantle the British state as we know it and provide control, dignity, and power, to the regions too long neglected.
Though the NIP’s primary political focus is addressing regional inequality through independence, it’s important to note that this is a distinctly left-wing, socialist type of nationalism. Their manifesto includes a commitment to Community Wealth Building i.e. the Preston Model, a £12-15 an hour living wage and a trial of the 4 day work week, affordable housing for all, nationalisation of core industries and utilities, a commitment to a Green New Deal and a new green economy (or a “green-industrial rebirth), as well as commitments to cultural and community development through funding libraries, youth and leisure centres to combat social isolation, support local industries and mutual aid groups, and removing hostile and inaccessible architecture. Socialist policies, such as those outlined in the NIP manifesto are popular with a broad cross-range of people nationwide, and following the Labour party’s shift to the right under Keir Starmer’s leadership, a gaping vacuum has appeared. People want socialist policies, and the NIP who style themselves as the “Left Vote”, are providing that outlet. As mentioned before, the NIP have virtually no chance of winning a General Election, it’s even unlikely (though of course not impossible) that they will win seats, at least not at present. But the NIP does have the potential to completely decimate the Labour vote. NIP can, and has, provided a refuge for the voters who flocked to the Labour party in their hundreds of thousands, who voted for socialist politics and a socialist government, who have been made politically homeless by the reprehensible treatment at the hands of the new Labour leadership, and Keir Starmer’s shift to the right, his hope to emulate Tony Blair, despite those politics being outdated, irrelevant, and out of touch. The haemorrhaging of the Labour party, it’s predicted share of the vote, and its previous losses in numerous by-elections, isn’t ideal. Of course, we don’t want the Conservatives to continue to rule. However, if the NIP can succeed in splitting the Labour vote, it could seriously force political leaders to take seriously the demands to address regional inequality in England, and to embrace popular socialist policies. At the very least, if northern independence seems like too much of a fantasy, the Northern Independence Party can hope to force its grievances, and the grievances of the north onto the political agenda, working within the framework of the established power of the system.
Edited by Charlotte Lewis ( Editor-in-Chief)
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