Perhaps some of the Scottish and Welsh devolutionists should come on a fact-finding mission to the ACT before they too readily embrace proposals for their own assemblies and law-making capacity as outlined by the British Government last week. Self-government is a wonderful ideal, but unless it is backed with reasonable financial security, all you get is a grumpy electorate and a legislature in an impossible position trying to fulfill great expectations from the wrong side of Micawber’s equation.
In addition to the financial squeeze, the fledgling assemblies will also find themselves in a sovereignty squeeze. On one hand, the Parliament in Westminster seems determined to keep a wide range of powers itself, including some that might reasonably be exercised on a more local level, such as abortion. Apparently, the Westminster MPs were worried that Scotland might take a more restrictive view than in England, but, surely, that’s local democracy. Irrespective of what one might think or feel about the issue, it is one that, if there is to be a Scottish Parliament, should be decided by that Parliament.
On the other hand, the European Community is taking ever greater leaps into legislative and administrative action eroding the national sovereignty of all European countries on matters as diverse as human rights and food standards. That environment makes separate Scottish and Welsh assemblies of less moment.
In any event the calls for separate assemblies have largely been driven by the intellectual classes, particularly those who will benefit most from them: journalists and politicians. There has been less enthusiasm for devolution among ordinary Scots and Welsh. But now the opportunity is on the table, approval seems very likely. But the people of Scotland and Wales should not imagine the dawning of a new age of prosperity and independence, better than under the union, will automatically follow.