"A Lament for Scotland"

[rhythmaning]

Today I read a piece in the Economist entitled “A lament for Scotland”, which f4f3 mentioned. This article was a rather better exposition of the ideas that were discussed in the seminar I wrote about yesterday than either the lecturer or I could convey.

The Economist (the articles are always anonymous, since they reckon it is the voice of the magazine rather than individual writers that are important – though that said, I heard the writer interviewed on Radio Scotland’s “Good Morning Scotland” programme on Friday or Saturday, so he can’t have been that anonymous*) argued that devolution hadn’t delivered what it had promised: instead of being the powerhouse of economic recovery and establishing a new enlightenment, it had increased reliance on England and increased Anglophobia (commonly characterised as the “the Celtic whinge”).

The Scottish Executive, it goes on, is crippled by having spending power without the need the responsibility to raise any revenue, since the vast majority of its funds come from England, distributed in accordance with the Barnett formula. Because of this, the Executive isn’t accountable; and so it created some pretty poor legislation – banning hunting (“hurrah”, you cry), banning smoking in enclosed public spaces (“hurrah, hurrah”, you cry doubly) and changing the land rights (“hurrah, hurrah, hurrah”, if you are a walker or a crofter).

And, like John Thomson in the seminar, the Economist says that the Scottish Executive has done nothing for business, preferring instead to extend the public sector.

So, basically, it says that devolution hasn’t really worked. What I don’t quite understand is the Economist’s assertion that the cure for this is greater devolution – for the Executive to take control of raising the revenue, and to take back more legislative control from Parliament in London.

So what Holyrood (the Scottish Parliament – wonderful building, horrible price) isn’t doing well at the moment – they should do more of? I don’t get that at all: they can’t walk, so let’s get them to run?

Perhaps Holyrood isn’t working as it should because, as some people assert, it is little more than a talking shop; but I really don’t see that as an argument for increasing the powers they have.

* The one thing the BBC interviewers seemed to object in the article to was that the writer had described Scottish politicians as “numpties”. Actually, he didn’t – he wrote that Scottish local government “is richly people in many minds with ‘numpties’” – so clearly, although some people like me might think they are numpties, he clearly doesn’t. Glad to clear that up then. By the way, a numpty is a rather foolish kind of person, a bit – but not much – better than a ned.