Untitled Essay, Research Paper

Discuss the Impact of the Proposed Devolution for Scotland

“Britain has never relished doses of constitutional reform, although they

have

accepted the drip-feed of frequent, unpalatable and ill-fated local government

changes.

Ambivalence to reform was reinforced in recent decades. The 1974 Labour

government proposed an ambitious program of devolution for Scotland and Wales.

It

was a luckless policy, not least because of Labour’s divisions…

Now it is all different.

The case for Scottish devolution is being argued with renewed vigour. Its

consideration

is linked with proportional representation for a Scottish assembly.”

(Rt. Hon. Lord Biffen)

With Britain being so against constitutional reform in the past, the impact

of such reform could be

perpetuated by such reform coming at the same time as many other policies

on reform, such as

devolution in Wales and Northern Ireland. These reforms have all come at

the same time and in a short

span of time since Labour only became government in May 1997.

Devolution as described by Bogdanor is the delegation of power to local or

regional administration, so

power is dispersed from a superior to an inferior political authority, or

to be more precise it consists

of a sub-ordinate elected body on a geographical basis of functions at present

exercised by

Parliament.

Scotland is to have its own parliament, while still remaining part of the

United Kingdom. A referendum

held in September 1997 endorsed the Scottish parliament by a substantial

majority; 78% voted for a

separate assembly, although the turnout was only 62% of the electorate. Now

that the legislation has

passed through Parliament, it will be introduced as soon as possible. Elections

for 129 Members will

be held in early 1999. It is expected that the parliament, which will be

situated in Edinburgh, will

become fully operational in the year 2000.

The responsibilities which will be transferred to the Scottish parliament

will include: – health, education

and training, local government, housing, sports and the arts, economic

development, law and home

affairs and the environment. Among the areas of responsibility, which will

remain at Westminster, are

- overseas affairs, defence, national security, economic and monetary policy,

employment legislation

and social security.

Of the 62% of the electorate who turned out to the referendum, 68% agreed

that the Scottish

parliament should have some tax raising powers, there is however a limit

on the amount this tax can

be raised which will be up to 3p in the pound.

Lord Biffen caries on to say: -

“… Clearly Scotland makes the strongest case for constitutional change.

A tax-raising

assembly is probably a necessary development before the fundamental choice

that

has to be taken between independence or otherwise integration into the

union… the

financial relationships between a Scottish Assembly and a suspicious England

will win

no votes. Possibly it might lead to enduring resentment.”

This can show how the impact will be perpetuated just by giving tax raising

powers to Scotland, however small, so the impact of devolution is likely

to be much greater than the “enduring resentment” caused by financial

relationships between the two countries through tax raising powers.

Scottish affairs are executed by the British Cabinet and are headed by the

secretary of state forScotland. Five main departments of equal status: the

Department of Agriculture and fisheries of Scotland, the Scottish Development

Department, the Scottish Education Department, the Scottish Home and Health

Department, and the Industry Department for Scotland perform the statutory

functions of the secretary of state. As all of these departments, among others

will have their responsibilities transferred to the devolved Scottish Parliament,

the impact of Scotland making these decisions will not be to great to either

Scotland or Westminster as they have not all been performed solely by the

British Cabinet

Government will be closer to the people and would be more efficient both

nationally and locally as power would be dispersed more evenly leaving

Westminster more time to discuss English legislation, such as a mayor for

London etc. and the Scottish Parliament would be able to spend time carefully

debating purely Scottish legislature.

“Another layer of government may also produce greater confusion as to the

responsibilities of the different layers. Who should citizens complain to?

Who should be held responsible…”(Norton 1994)

The concept of localised law is likely to appeal to everyone, but there may

be a problem for Parliament as Britain is likely to need a written constitution

to lay down exactly which responsibilities lie with Westminster and which

have been transferred to Scotland and to what extent. At present Britain

has an unwritten constitution. The written constitution could include a Bill

of Rights, which would lay down the rights and freedoms of citizens of Britain.

The impact of a Bill of Rights is that Britain is likely to become more

democratic, as citizens would know their rights and politicians would

have to be more representative of the public as people would know that they

can take certain action under certain circumstances. So the actions of the

government would be scrutinised more as Parliament and the public will scrutinise

all legislation passed and the politicians themselves.

This would also mean that the government and Parliament would be more accountable

for their actions, which could lead to a decrease in the likelihood of an

“elective dictatorship” (Lord Hailsham), because politicians would be more

accountable and scrutinised by the public.

Devolution creates an elected body, which is subordinate to Parliament, and

so therefore devolution seeks to preserve ‘intact’ the supremacy

of Parliament, which is a principal feature of British politics. As devolution

will not depreciate the supremacy of Parliament, it will not cause a great

impact on Westminster particularly the executive, and so will not have a

great impact in this case on England.

Scotland however will have a degree of supremacy itself, as the power devolved

will be exclusive to Scotland therefore making Scotland’s parliament

supreme. This will have a beneficial effect on Scotland’s parliament

as they will have a degree of supremacy but at the same time have Westminsterto

‘fall back on’ if it has any problems.

Others, such as Norton argue that: – “By interposing a new layer between

central and local government, the potential for delay would be increased,

as would the potential for clashes between central and regional government.”

(Norton 1994)

So, in turn they argue that devolution will increase problems in both

Westminster, Scotland and the people of Britain themselves, as the clashes

will effect the executive, both parliaments and so will have

a great impact on the people of Britain as they will not know where they

stand, this could happen even if there was a written constitution. Before

the union of Scotland and England in 1707, Scotland had developed its own

system of law, which is based on civil law; this carried on after the union

although England practices a form of common law. The devolved parliament

will control this and so, the devolved parliament can carefully debate law

specifically with Scotland in mind, as they do not have to worry about any

English laws being ‘loop holes’ for Scottish law. This would make

Scotland’s parliament more democratic because the people who it will

be enforced against decide the law.

There was a reorganisation of local government in Scotland in 1975, when

the counties and burghs were abolished and replaced by nine regions and three

island areas. The nine regions were divided into districts, and a council

administers these units. The council members are elected on a fixed term

membership of four years. This was changed again in 1996 when council borders

were changed. This was a form of devolution within Scotland itself and it’s

local government and proved to have a good impact on Scotland, as people

felt that law was being made closer to them and so were happier with the

system.

“Since the Act of Union… there has evolved a framework for the governance

of Scotland which is basically sound and which has shown itself adaptable

to change.” (Cons. 1992)

This shows that the Conservatives were finally coming around to accepting

Scotland as needing devolved power. They explain that Scotland is adaptable

to change and so imply that devolution will not have any major impact that

Scotland will not be able to cope with or find a way in which to adapt.

The Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) is devoted to independence for Scotland

and is happy to do this through devolution and pushes for Scotland to have

greater European Union (EU) involvement, this view must be representative

of the Scottish population as the SNP are now second to Labour in

Scotland and hold over 27% of the vote. Scotland if they wanted to could

pull out of the union at any time: – “The union with England which was considered

so advantageous at the time, could be broken if it ceases to work to

Scotland’s benefit.” (Gamble)

So why if people want independence, do they not take it? Perhaps they are

afraid of the impact of independence in one blow and would rather ease into

a position of independence. This can be seen to show that Scotland are afraid

of the impact that devolution will have and are even more afraid of

theindependence they want.

Others in Scotland particularly those in or those supporting the Scottish

Nationalist Party (SNP) think that anything which allows Scotland to make

more decisions is a step in the right direction in favour of independence.

They embrace the day when Scotland returns to an independent state. However,

they do realise that independence will be an issue for the people to decide

and the SNP feel that “If we want it (independence) all we have to do is

vote for it…” In a recent BBC opinion poll 71% of Scots said that they

thought a devolved Parliament would be a step towards Scotland becoming

independent. However there is the question about ‘What if the Tories

get in?’ and if Scotland is coming close to choosing between independence

and keeping the devolved assembly, can the devolution be taken away so that

independence is harder to achieve for the Scottish. Although this is unlikely

considering the political position of the Conservatives at the moment and

the problems they would face if the Conservatives did follow a policy such

as this, it is not impossible in the future and it may well lead to a massive

impact on both Britain and Scotland if this were to happen due to the outcry

there is likely to be. This then leads us to believe that the Scottish Parliament

cannot survive without a written constitution with clauses strictly concerning

devolution within each country.

The Scottish parliament is likely to be more representative than Westminster

as there is an electoral agreement between Labour and the Lib Dems to achieve

a 50:50 male: female representation in the assembly. This is likely to have

a good impact on Scotland, as a group will make the decisions, which is more

representative of the population than Westminster. With this 50/50

representation, will the politicians in the Scottish assembly be representative

as people may not want a man or woman in certain constituencies and the

politicians may not be of high standards. To achieve this level of representation

would mean single sex constituency elections, which would be deemed as sexist

by the people, and so not having the effect that Blair wanted when he announced

it, in the hope of the impact of his speech would lead to people thinking

the Labour and Liberal Democrats want women to be politically equal to men.

He may have also been trying to prove that Labour and the Liberal Democrats

are fairer than the Conservatives, hopefully securing more seats for the

present government in the next general election and in the Scottish assembly.

The chances of a Conservative majority in either the next general election

or the Scottish Parliament are not very high, and so the repercussions of

Labour’s actions could prove to be a large disadvantage to Labour if

they do not endeavour to keep as close to a 50/50 representation as possible,

as the Labour public opinion will fall.

This leads to the ‘Westlothian Question’ introduced by Labour MP

Tam Dalyell, where Westminster MP’s will not be able to vote on Scottish

legislature, but Scottish MP’s will be able to vote on legislature passing

through Westminster. This means that Scottish MP’s will represent people

from Britain who did not actually vote for them this can have a good or bad

impact on Britain, depending on the legislature going through Parliament.

Devolution for Scotland will have negative and positive impacts on both Britain

and Scotland. The impact may be short term or long term but will still effect

people, their views and their future. Overall, the impact of any kind of

large-scale change in the British political system will take time. Any type

of reform especially devolution, which effects many people, is likely to

prove problematic until things ‘settle down’. The reform will need

some kind of written constitution to settle arrangements and responsibilities

and to make these problems as minimal as possible.

‘Negative’ impacts could have a positive effect on some people,

but not on the majority, the same goes for ‘positive’ impacts.

A ‘positive’ impact can have different effects on both Britain

and Scotland; a positive impact on Scotland could have a very negative effect

on Britain.

Overall, the effect of devolution will have a positive effect on Scotland

in many ways, but it may take time for the effects can be noticed and time

will be needed for legislation to go through the assembly. The effect on

Britain will be more of a mixture of good and bad impacts, but the effect

of devolution will make Britain as a whole more democratic, and so would

be classed as a good impact.

Eithne Whaley.