I don’t think you need conclude, from the “No” win, that most of your fellow countrymen (even most of the “No” voters) really want to continue to be governed by the likes of Cameron or Miliband, just that they do not think that breaking up the UK is a good way to go about getting something better.
It is probably worth looking at the wording of the Vow that was made by the three main parties intended to address the issue of Scottish independence:
The people of Scotland want to know that all three main parties will deliver change for Scotland.
WE ARE AGREED THAT:
The Scottish Parliament is permanent and extensive new powers for the Parliament will be delivered by the process and to the timetable announced by our three parties, starting on 19th September.
And it is our hope that the people of Scotland will be engaged directly as each party works to improve the way we are governed in the UK in the years ahead.
We agree that the UK exists to ensure opportunity and security for all by sharing our resources equitably across all four nations to secure the defence, prosperity and welfare of every citizen.
And because of the continuation of the Barnett allocation for resources, and the powers of the Scottish Parliament to raise revenue, we can state categorically that the final say on how much is spent on the NHS will be a matter for the Scottish Parliament.
We believe that the arguments that so powerfully make the case for staying together in the UK should underpin our future as a country. We will honour those principles and values not only before the referendum but after.
People want to see change. A No vote will deliver faster, safer and better change than separation.
David Cameron
Ed Miliband
Nick Clegg
What exactly has to be delivered?
Open to interpretation, I think. Keep the Barnett formula, but it does not say they won’t change it and its mention is really just a statement of the current status, which is that Scotland controls the NHS in Scotland. No change there.
The rest seem to be statements of principle and a process and a timetable.
What are the politicans saying?
'Mr Brown spoke of three “lock ins” which he said demonstrated that promises would be kept:
a resolution has been signed by David Cameron, Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Mr Brown committing to a timetable of action including draft legislation for a new Scotland Bill by the end of January. It will be lodged in the House of Commons on Monday.
civil servants were already at work drawing up a timetable and detailed plans so that a “command paper” setting out new powers can be published by the end of October.
a House of Commons debate to be held on Thursday 16 October to ensure the plans are on track.’
So the big deliverable is Scotland Bill by the end of January.
What they need to do is ensure that whatever it contains is part of a consistent plan for the rest of the UK and does not unbalance the constitution.
That is the difficult bit. Constitution reform is not a subject that can be rushed. There is no clear plan how to balance the powers in the rest of the UK. It is a difficult problem and there is no consensus within parties never mind between them.
The three parties each had different ideas about what their plans for more powers for the Scottish Parliament. I would guess the Scotland Bill would be enabling legislation. There will be a UK General Election next May which will have these constitutional issues at the forefront and Wales and Northern Ireland will be looking for some more powers but only up to a point.
So Scottish Parliament will keep up the pressure, but in order to deliver it, the bigger problem affecting all of the UK has to be solved. I would expect the full participation of the UK Scots MPs in solving this conundrum. Constitutional arguments usually go on for a long time, and then it has to be sold to the electorate. The Scots seem happy to have a the Scots Parliament but in England selling the idea of another layer of a politicians has not been successful in the past. If people don’t vote or do not feel engaged, these extra levels of government will become useless talking shops for local big wigs prone to feathering their own nests. The quality of existing local government is not highly regarded in England, there is little reason to suppose it will be any better at a regional level no matter how elegantly such structures fit into a constitutional settlement. People complain about Westminster centralism, but we need an alternative that is viable within England.
Scotland will force this issue.
I see a rocky road ahead.
The Scotch whisky industry is about to get a rather nasty surprise. I posted this elsewhere but the competition to Scotch is getting a whole lot more intense(particularly from the US). What we are seeing is a golden period for Scotch. The industry as a whole will soon suffer badly, and with it taxation revenue fall. Something will have to give, either the whsky firms go out of business, or taxes on it will need cut drastically.
I am old enough to have heard this argument three times already.
It was LC Strawhouse who mentioned the jokes about Yes majority areas being full of delinquents. PaulParkhead was refuting the stigmatisation, not supporting it.
In the post LC Strawhouse is responding to, it looks like the No and Yes links got mixed up, which explains (his?) confusion on that matter. They each refer to a different side voting based on welfare, but the labels got switched.
That ignores the fact that the Calman Commission has been going for many years. Devolution of powers will occur- as was pointed out by several people yesterday, active reneging on either Barnett or Devo max would be like handing out a million SNP membership cards. There is already talk of covenenting- look up Scottish history. I am also predicting that Gordon Brown and Alex Salmond will be an impressive and challenging double act on the issue whoever is Prime Minister in May 2015.
Indeed. I’m wondering what Pjen thinks the “Vow” (what a stupid term) actually is, and what, concretely, it promises. I see no mention of second readings of bills within the “Vow”, or any reference to Gordon Brown’s promises, which always seemed completely separate and non-binding to me.
Yes, then you’ll remember the previous downturns in the Scotch whisky industry. Downturns which lead to the closure of distilleries, layoffs and the falling off of tax revenue. These things invariably run in cycles of 20 years or so. This current boom period will not continue forever. Your attitude is the kind of attitude that thought Scottish shipbuilding, Steel production and heavy industry would always exist. Well, those damn Asians sure put paid to that belief.
The US whisky industry is also about to make huge inroads into the Scotch whisky market. Changes in US legislation has meant 1000 small/craft distilleries have opened in the US these past few years. If even only a small number of these guys produce decent whisky then its really a huge danger to our industry. A rival industry located in a country with less taxation and better climate for quicker maturation is not an industrial rival to write off. And the thing is, the British(and Scottish) Government dont give a damn about this real and present danger. They are too content raking in taxation proceeds from Scotch. Taxation that will make our industry less competative against this new competition.
And I have seen its regular recovery from cyclical crises. I have little confidence in any social, political or financial prediction for more than a few years on the future. Events, dear boy, events.
The Scottish Conservatives set up a commission under Lord Strathclyde to look into possible future plans for the devolved Scotland :
http://www.scottishconservatives.com/2014/06/strathclyde-commission-scotland-full-powers-income-tax/
is a precis and this
is the full thing. Basically, it recommends that (almost) full control of income tax in Scotland devolves to the Scottish Parliament, along with other tax and welfare proposals. It would make a decent blueprint for the Scottish aspects of the Westminster deliberations, I think. Certainly the Scottish Conservative leader (the admirable Ruth Davidson) supports it.
The Vow was published on the front page of the Record and promoted together with a timeline agreed with Cameron. Reneging on it would be very difficult. How much more untrustworthy can our representatives be seen to be. It would certainly put pressure on for another referendum.
Pjen, your side lost, and you need to accept that. The loss wasn’t even close, neither. You lost by hundreds of thousands of votes on a referendum that could be won by 50% + 1, an absurdly generous standard for those proposing such a momentous level of change, with heavy losses in supposed SNP safe seats despite the SNP pumping out record levels of nonsense during the entirety of the campaign. There’s not going to be another referendum before 2044. Just accept it, and stop with this delusion that any failure to abide by some timetable to completely change the UK’s constitution is going to result in a new referendum. It’s pretty obvious to everybody that change is coming, and the change is going to be much bigger than anything promised during the campaign by the “No” side, as it’s involving all four home nations, as any constitutional change on this scale obviously would.
There’s a General Election next year, so after that there’s no “reneging” involved. No-one is bound after that.
Not that I think they will, but the new government will have to reaffirm its commitment for the process to continue. That said, one of the three signatories will almost be PM next year (it’ll be Cameron, of the good Scottish name), and will no doubt choose to be bound by it, but a putative Labour government in 2020 wouldn’t be.
Your idea that politicians are bound by headline-making promises is somewhat absurd, and contradicted by everyday reality. Every politician breaks promises on a regular basis.
You came off easy compared to my country. We had a civil war over it. 
Once again your legalistic rigidity misleads you. With skill Scottish independence can be put to bed for a generation. Consider the position in May 2016 where the Barnett Formula has been removed and no new powers had been transferred. There would be an SNP landslide in the elections to the Scottish Parliament, followed by a claim of right because the NO vote would have been seen as having been purchased by a pack of lies. Suppose by then the opinion polls show a 70/30 split in favour of YES. Now that would be a serious crisis with sterling under pressure and politicians reconfirmed as liars.
As noted above, the referendum was won by promises of Financial continuity and further devolution on a strict timetable. Do not doubt that dishonourable disavowal would result on considerable chaos.
An politician worth their salt could come up with some solution to modify the Barnett formula to suit their purposes. The other nations of the UK are unlikely to support a continuing subsidy to Scottish Parliament by tying it to the narrow terms of the out of date agreement.
God knows we have heard quite enough about what Scots think about themselves, the UK and independence. The debate has moved on the consider the constitution of the UK and Scotland is one of four nations within that Union.
All the parties will have different ideas about how to settle the constitutional issue with due reference to commitments made during the independence debate. It is no longer the preserve of the SNP and its oft-voiced and partisan pronouncements on the subject.
It is not just about Scotland anymore, it is about the UK. You know, that political entity that the Scots voted for in preference to independence?
It needs a little work.
Yep, and that’s why they won’t do it, as I said. Doesn’t mean they can’t. The main point being that, if Scotland starts trying to be completely irrational and acting in a way that will harm the UK, we are not bound to let it, even if doing so would break “The Vow”. Hopefully none of that will happen, because hopefully cooler heads than yours will be doing the negotiating for transfer of power, and then using that power.
Gordon Brown has confirmed that a resolution to implement the Vow will be placed before Parliament on Monday. It contains the time scale set down previously and is signed by Cameron, Clegg, Miliband and Brown.
See the update above!