Worrying trends in Scottish Government independence plans

It has taken some time for people to access, digest and evaluate the weighty volumes issued by the Scottish Government on 26 November on its proposed plans for independence. There are numerous aspects of the documents that raise profound legal issues. Particularly worrying is the way that the papers mix proposals for constitutional change with party political propaganda. Civil servants who are supposed to be politically neutral appear to have been involved in an unprecedented way in preparing an election manifesto for a governing party to fight the Scottish Parliamentary elections of May 2016, whether or not the country is by then an independent state.

The current Scottish Government was elected under the Scotland Act of 1998, the principles of which were approved by referendum the year before. Under these rules the Scottish Government has no legal powers on constitutional change. The SNP achieved a majority of seats in the Scottish Parliament in 2011 with about 45% of the votes cast on a platform for holding a referendum on independence and that commitment is being respected. 

But preparing the case for an independent Scotland is a very different matter from proposing policy for whatever government might come to power under such a scenario. If Scotland was independent there is no way of knowing what policies the electorate might support and the Scottish Government of the day might enact. The policies proposed for an independent Scottish government in the white paper are party political and civil servants should not have been involved in framing these parts of what is now officially to be renamed as the 'guide' to independence.

The party political elements of the independence white paper are indications of worrying trends in Scottish Government and do not bode well for constitutional government in the aftermath of a possible 'yes' vote or with the possible advent of independence. They provide yet another reason for voting 'no' next September.

Letter in the Edinburgh Evening News 18 December 2013