Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Westminster is definitely not panicking or cobbling together anything

Here are a number of things that the Westminster parties’ response to the narrowing Scottish independence polls have definitely not been. Absolutely definitely not.

1. A cobbled-together response

The three parties deciding to announce the new powers for Scotland and timetable for the handover of those powers in the event of a ‘No’ vote may, to the untrained eye, have looked like a last-minute, last-ditch attempt to reverse the fortunes of the Better Together campaign. But no, argued Nick Clegg today when he sat before the the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. ‘I don’t accept the characterisation this has all been sort of cobbled together at the last minute.’ The Deputy Prime Minister argued that the ‘breakthrough statement’ on further powers came in August when all three party leaders agreed that there was an ‘irreversible process of devolution to Scotland’.

That as may be, but Gordon Brown’s announcement yesterday might never have materialised had the polls not narrowed. And the timetable – a draft Scotland Bill published by Burns Night in January 2015 – would surely never be quite so speedy were the parties not quite so desperate.

2. The Westminster leaders all looking the same

As James said earlier, the decision of Cameron, Clegg and Miliband to campaign together is risky because the Labour and Conservative leaders shouldn’t fuel the SNP’s narrative that Labour is basically the same as the Tories by being seen together. In this instance, the three leaders are definitely not better together. To avoid this, all camps are keen to stress that Cameron and Miliband will not be travelling together, will not be campaigning together, and will be nowhere near one another. If they accidentally bump into one another at an airport or railway station, they will not make eye contact. In fact, they’ll pretend they’ve never ever met.

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