Scotland had an extraordinary turnout – 85 per cent – for the independence referendum in a year when Britain struggled to get 50 per cent in parliamentary by-elections and the European elections. That is the good news – people were engaged and enthused. The downside is that it has created a deeply divided country with 45 per cent of the people voting for independence. That is what differentiates this one from the 1999 referendum, where Scots voted three to one to establish the Scottish Parliament. The obligation therefore is on politicians both at Holyrood and Westminster to be sensitive to the views of that sizeable minority, and to pull together to deliver the promise made by the three UK party leaders to increase the powers of the Scottish Parliament.
For me as a Liberal that is not a problem. The party of William Gladstone and Lloyd George spoke of “home rule all round” and we have always accepted the current devolution settlement as unfinished business. Indeed as its first Speaker, I said at the time that no self- respecting parliament could exist forever on a grant from another parliament. A predecessor mine, former Liberal party leader Jo Grimond, argued that he did not like the word “devolution” – the term used to describe the handover of certain powers from Westminster to the Scottish Parliament – as it implied something graciously handed down from the centre, instead of accepting that the nations of Scotland and Wales should decide what powers to delegate to the United Kingdom and the European Union.
Events have moved on quickly: First Minister Alex Salmond is leaving the stage, and Prime Minister David Cameron has appointed Lord Smith, who masterminded the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, to head a commission to draw up proposals with a tight deadline to lead to draft legislation before the UK general election next May.
To be clear, the transfer of further powers to the Scottish Parliament is not the difficult part. Scotland needs total control over taxation so that Scots can decide on how to raise the money we spend. That should include everything consistent with common sense, and include control over welfare benefits policy. That would leave foreign affairs and defence to the UK parliament, as well as macroeconomic policy. (One of the reasons the “yes” campaign lost was because of the uncertainty of Nationalist plans for a future currency – we already have a good working currency union.)
No, the really difficult part is the necessary changes to the Houses of Commons and Lords if Britain is to grant more authority to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. There has long been a grievance about Scottish MPs voting on purely English matters in the Commons when English MPs obviously no longer are able to vote on Scottish matters.
We used to have, before devolution, a Scottish Grand Committee which handled all Scottish legislation – Scots law has always been different – subject to the final approval of the whole House of Commons. What we now need is an English Grand Committee from which the Scots are excluded. That is easier said than done because of the current party political complexion of the Scottish MPs.
The Conservatives have only one, so any such exclusion mainly hurts the Labour Party, which is therefore somewhat unenthusiastic. But frankly, Labour needs to face up to the principle of dividing powers and accept the party-political consequences as inevitable.
At the same time the government has to give more thought to the demands of some English regions such as Cornwall, and potential city states like London, for greater devolution from the centre to them.
Most interesting of all is the possible abolition of the appointed House of Lords and its replacement by a senate elected, as in Germany, by the component parts of the United Kingdom. House of Lords reform has been an enduring topic for more than a century, and the government made a mess of it in the last session when its bill was obstructed in the Commons because it proposed the popular election of an Upper Chamber which would have undermined the supremacy of the Commons.
Among the significant late converts to such a quasi-federal senate is the former prime minister Gordon Brown, whose stature has been hugely restored by his speeches in the referendum campaign). Indeed he has written an entire book on the subject now at the forefront of public debate, My Scotland. Our Britain – a future worth sharing. I anticipate that this whole topic is going to dominate the party conference season which is about to start, and will occupy much of the time when parliament resumes next month until it is dissolved at the end of March.
Any proposals have to be worked on by the parties for implementation in the next parliament, but nobody can foretell what the colour of the government will be after the general election.
Thanks to Scotland, British domestic politics has become exciting again. Watch this space.
David Steel was founder Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament and an MSP from 1999 to 2003. Earlier, he was leader of the Liberal Party and a Member of the House of Commons