Scottish Devolution: the story continues...

St Andrews Day 2009 saw the Scottish Government launch their white paper on Scotland's constitutional future and it promised that a Referendum Bill would be introduced early in 2010. Following on from that, and after it became clear that a Referendum Bill would be defeated in the Scottish Parliament (the SNP government is a minority government), last week saw the Scottish Government publish its draft Referendum Bill.

The Bill will now be put to consultation and it proposes that the Scottish people be asked two questions in a referendum:

• Question 1 relates to increased powers and responsibilities for the Scottish Parliament and the consultation paper proposes two possible questions: either the Calman Commission proposals (the headline change being limited fiscal independence with the Scottish Parliament being required to set income tax rates for Scotland above a based rate of 10%) or "Devolution Max" (broad autonomy for Scotland in almost all areas other than Defence and Foreign Affairs). The Scottish Government prefers the second question;
• Question 2 is the independence question. The proposed formulation is to asked voters to agree or disagree with the proposition that the Scottish Parliament's powers should be extended to enable independence to be achieved.

Much ado about nothing? Perhaps. The draft Bill, if introduced, has little prospect at present of passing through the Scottish Parliament. If it did, time will be tight to have a referendum before the next Scottish Parliament election on 5 May 2011 and, in any event, opinion polls have never yet suggested a majority of Scots favour independence. If all that is overcome, and a "yes" vote were secured on Question 2, the Scottish Government would have a mandate to negotiate Scotland's exit from the Union - a process that would take years and most probably require approval by a further referendum.

Whilst the Scottish Government is continuing with its central policy commitment, it appears that there are a number of factors which are likely to ensure the status quo continues for the foreseeable future.

The Scottish Government's consultation paper is available here