Confused Dotty Con "Scotland is another country)

A Wales Office minister has described Scotland as "another country" after a recent trip to Edinburgh.

Aberconwy MP Guto Bebb said he had left feeling "despondent" because it reminded him of Dublin.

That 

"should be a warning when visiting a city which is a crucial part of the UK", he said.

Mr Bebb, a Conservative party whip, was in the Scottish capital for a British and Irish council meeting

He said

"We have a huge amount in common with citizens of the Irish Republic, as we do Scotland," including similar television programmes, popular music and "in many ways a shared literature".

But he said

"read their papers, listen to talk shows and watch the news and it's clearly another country".

Mr Bebb said leaving Edinburgh made him feel the same way as he does when leaving Dublin. Leaving Dublin.

"For me Dublin is somewhere which is recognisable but very different.""That is fine in the context of the capital of an independent country but it should be a warning when visiting a city which is a crucial part of the UK.

He added: 

"The sense of nationhood in Edinburgh is palpable. For a long time it has been satisfied within the UK.
"Is that changing though? My gut feeling is yes and that should be a cause for regret to all of us."

If readers in Scotland are bemused with the seeming flash of insight from a Tory south of their border.it is as nothing to us in Wales as Bebb is not some dyed in the wool Tory from the English shires is a former Plaid Cymru activist and was chair of the party in Plaid's heartland of Caernarfon. He defected to the Conservatives because of his Eurosceptic views.

Indeed he a member of a old Plaid family being  the grandson of Ambrose Bebb, 

A co-founder of Plaid Cymru Ambrose Bebb  was inclined towards the sort of right wing nationalism (some would say fascist) influenced of Charles Maurras of the Action Française movement. With the outbreak of the Second World War, Bebb became a vocal proponent of the War Effort against Nazi Germany, and considered Germany's total defeat "essential".In the 1945 General Election Mr Bebb stood for the Plaid Cymru in the seat of Caernafon, and came in third place

Now no one should take responsibility for their Forebears and certainly when he was a member of Plaid Guto wouldn't even find an echo of Grandad's  Ambrose's views.  

But Gutto would have been immersed in the view that Wales was a Nation in in an area which has elected a Plaid MP since  1974 and which is largely Welsh speaking

Perhaps it was the shock of largely monglot English speaking Scots in Edinburgh which left Guto confused .

Or maybe it was akin to Labour MPs who where shocked to find that their late Leader John Smith  supported devolution out of genuine belief rather than political expedience and that Scotland claim to Nationhood is not coming from people alienated from  Westminster but a realisation this is their time to take their place  among the nations of the world.