The end of summer recess (in both Westminster and Holyrood) seems like a reasonable moment to leave tribal party politics at the door and assess whether 25 years of devolution in Scotland has met expectations. Has it improved the quality of life of ordinary Scots, and how it might be changed to ensure that it does better in future?
I am still relatively new to politics, having enjoyed a career in business prior to being appointed a Scotland Office minister in 2021, but I was in the room long enough to experience both the satisfaction of being able to make a difference and the frustration of not being able to do more. It became very clear to me that politicians should be judged by only one criterion: have they improved the lives of the citizens they serve?
With that in mind, I have brought together a range of contributors, with the help of the Centre for Policy Studies, in a series of essays called ‘Wealthy Nation, Healthy Nation’. We Scots own the legacy of Adam Smith. Smith’s masterpiece, ‘The Wealth of Nations’, today still out-sells John Maynard Keynes and Milton Friedman combined. As a former trade minister, I am happy to say that Smith may be Scotland’s greatest export. For Smith, the purpose of wealth is not to be rich. The purpose of wealth is to enable us to live happier and healthier lives, including by paying for the public services which underpin our modern society. This is my ambition for Scotland: to use devolution to be the wealthiest, healthiest, and best-educated part of the UK.
At the moment, we are not doing this. Devolution has not lived up to the claims made for it by some of its strongest supporters. In many areas, things have definitely got worse, despite the fact that public spending has increased from 43 per cent of GDP when the Scottish parliament was established to a historic high of 52 per cent of GDP in the latest figures – which rises to 55 per cent if North Sea oil is excluded. So for those of us who value the institution of devolution, if not its performance, this is the time to intervene in order to improve it.
Two things in particular have held Scotland back over the last 25 years and need to be mitigated. The first is the dominance of the constitutional debate, which has led to a maximisation of discussion on structures of government and a minimisation of discussion on day-to-day policy. Nationalists have sought to use devolution as a stepping stone towards full independence rather than a tool with which to improve people’s lives. Unionists, meanwhile, have responded by treating devolution as something to be tolerated as a mechanism to stop nationalism from expanding rather than an opportunity to promote the day-to-day advantages of a devolved Union.
The second is the social democratic mindset which has permeated Holyrood debate throughout devolution and which presumes that the key to economic progress, and indeed progress more generally, lies in the hands of Scottish government ministers and central bureaucrats who should direct, manage and control things from Holyrood as they see fit. How ironic that this SNP government continually calls for devolution of more powers from Westminster to Edinburgh, but steadfastly refuses to devolve control from Edinburgh to local communities in Scotland.
The constitutional focus has been particularly dominant since the SNP came to power in 2007. This was true in the run up to the 2014 independence referendum and the years thereafter and continues right up until the current time. Whenever the Scottish government’s record in improving the economy and public services is challenged, it refuses to take responsibility and defend its position. It just changes the subject and claims that its powers are inadequate to deal with the problem.
However, the SNP cannot shoulder all of the blame for this concentration on the constitution, since the pro-UK parties at Holyrood have also played their part. While it was totally reasonable for my party, the Scottish Conservatives, to oppose independence and argue for the benefits of the United Kingdom during and after the referendum, we must accept that this has been done to the exclusion of other important areas of debate. Defence of the United Kingdom has served the Conservatives extremely well electorally, but it has held back the policy development that Scotland so desperately needs.
Defence of the United Kingdom has served the Conservatives extremely well electorally, but it has held back the policy development that Scotland so desperately needs.
What is required is a fresh political approach from every party. The current constitutional debate needs to be replaced with a more relaxed – yet open – approach. Ideally, all parties would accept that another referendum is not going to happen anytime soon, and that the devolved constitutional settlement set out in the Scotland Act – which divides powers between the UK and Scottish governments – is the settled will of people in Scotland.
However, all parties, including my own Conservatives, should also accept that the division of powers between Westminster and Holyrood should not be set in stone. Two Acts amending the original Scotland Act, in 2012 and 2016, have already been passed at Westminster, and there is now a requirement for a sensible process to look at the respective powers of the two parliaments.
For instance, we should be able to agree that Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act – all those areas reserved to Westminster and which means anything not included is automatically devolved to Holyrood – requires regular review, possibly once every 10 years, to ensure that the balance is appropriate. For example, control over most of energy policy is reserved, but planning powers are devolved making it impossible to construct a coherent UK-wide energy policy. Those decennial reviews would, therefore, examine whether particular issues are better handled at Westminster as well as examining if there are areas where additional power should be devolved to Holyrood.
A process of this kind would separate day-to-day governance from the wider question of the respective powers of the two parliaments. It would allow us to focus on making Scotland the most prosperous and best governed part of the UK. Only once that milestone is achieved might we have the constitutional debate once again. The Scottish people can then decide their future direction, but from a position of strength not weakness.
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