Prime Minister David Cameron has promised greater devolution to England’s cities, as a constitutional revolution looks to be set in train - after Scottish voters rejected moves to full independence in yesterday’s referendum.
The ‘no’ vote in the Scottish referendum polled more than two million votes, giving the Better Together campaign roughly 55% of the tally. Around 1.6 million Scottish residents voted in favour of full independence.
Citizens in some 28 out of 32 Scottish council areas voted no, but the Yes vote predominated in Glasgow, the UK’s third largest city and host of the recent Commonwealth Games.
Leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party, Alex Salmond, who led the ‘Yes’ campaign urged the leaders of the three political parties to honour pledges made over the course of the campaign.
Controversially, these included a commitment to grant Scotland a greater transfer of powers, effectively the ‘devo max’ option’ and retention of the controversial Barnett funding formula – which guarantees Scottish people an additional £1,623 per head on public services compared with English people.
‘The unionist parties made vows late in the campaign to devolve more powers to Scotland,’ Mr Salmond told ‘Yes’ campaign followers this morning in a speech conceding victory.
‘Scotland will expect these to be honoured in rapid course - as a reminder, we have been promised a second reading of a Scotland Bill by March 27 next year.’
In response, David Cameron, who had spoken with Mr Salmond after the outcome was known, said: ‘We now have a chance, a great opportunity – to change the way the British people are governed, and change it for the better.’
He said the Government had delivered on devolution and would ‘do so again in the next Parliament’.
The prime minister also announced that Lord Smith of Kelvin, who oversaw the successful running of Glasgow’s Commonwealth Games, would lead a process to take forward the devolution commitments with powers over tax, spending and welfare.
Mr Cameron said this process would be agreed by November with draft legislation published by January.
He also said that as a result of the greater devolution of powers to Scotland, the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland needed a greater say over their own affairs.
He said the new settlement for Scotland should be accompanied by new and fair arrangements for the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
This would mean more powers to the Welsh Government and Welsh Assembly and work to ensure the devolved institutions worked effectively.
He said that ‘the millions of voices of England must also be heard’ and said the question of English votes for English laws – the West Lothian question – deserved an answer.
He said talks on new tax, spending and welfare would take place in tandem across all four countries and at the same speed, and confirmed William Hague would be in charge of drawing up plans for cross-party agreement.
‘It is also important we have wider civic engagement about to improve governance in our United Kingdom, including how to empower our great cities. And we will say more about this in the coming days,’ Mr Cameron added.
