The Calman Commission Interim (Part 2)

Those areas in which the Commission has supported possible further devolution of powers to Scotland are broadcasting, energy policy, animal health and movement, firearms, misuse of drugs, regulation of health-care professionals and marine-planning. Whether this transfer of powers would improve governance or simple efficiency in these areas is most definitely a matter of debate. My own opinion is that we need a lot less regulation and bureaucracy (including the de-Establishment of our state broadcaster) in the world of broadcasting- and if that means more Scottish (or Welsh, or Northern Irish)-centric programming, then let it be down to the public demand as opposed to some Soviet-style Dept of National Broadcasting Directive dictating what we are allowed to watch/read/listen to.

"Animal health and movement" falls into the same category as "immigration" mentioned earlier; animal diseases do not respect land borders- and although there may in cases of emergency be a call for a narrower county or regional policy, this could be organised as well from London as from Edinburgh. "Firearms" and "misuse of drugs"? Yes, obviously, bad things. And how exactly would devolving legislation in this area reduce their overall "badness" effect on the United Kingdom as a whole?

The biggest inequities arising from the UK's devolution experiment have occured within what used to be the National Health Service; health-care professionals need exactly the same skills (and qualifications proving those skills) wherever they may be practising in the UK, so why should there be different regulation of this area in different parts of the UK? Which leaves marine planning and energy policy from that original list of seven- so, go ahead, save a bit of time and forget those other five areas and investigate the pros and cons of devolving solely these two issues to Edinburgh.

The one main area the Commission touched upon which, in the interests once again of good and joint-up government should be amended, repaired, or whatever asap, is the relationship between Westminster and Holyrood:

"...there ought to be an expectation that the Parliaments, Assemblies and Governments of the UK should work together in the common interests of UK citizens, even though there will sometimes be political differences between them"

...an imminently sensible truism to point out and it is a sentiment which every "governing" party in the UK should be required to sign , whether it ties in with their present short-term tactics or not.

Finally, the topic which has received most publicity is the one of granting further financial autonomy to Holyrood:

"Full fiscal autonomy is inconsistent with the Union and we do not consider it further".

"Correct" and "good" in that order. But the present asymmetrical financing system is also inconsistent with the Union- how does the Commission propose to solve that situation? The interim report agrees that looking at the block grant (ie the Barnett Formula) is quite clearly necessary and in both Scotland's and the Union's long-term interest. This is a matter which deserves a lot fewer populist soundbites and much more further, real economic consideration and if the Commission achieves nothing else, a workable solution to the problem would have made all the time and money spent worthwhile. But as I mentioned in my first part earlier, it cannot be looked at in isolation solely on the basis as to how it affects Scotland- how we devolve powers in one part of the UK affects the rest of the UK, the remit of the Calman Commission should be widened to pay much more attention to that fact.

The Calman Commission Interim (Part One)

The Calman Commission was set up to review the workings of devolution to date and to make proposals for how it could be improved in the further. Or, actually, to be more accurate, to review the workings of devolution in Scotland to date and any proposals made are restricted to north of the Hadrian's Wall- that's its main weakness for me as a UK Unionist; if we are a unified nation, then even with the deeply flawed system of asymmetrical devolution, governance cannot be changed in any part of the United Kingdom without it having a knock-on (and usually detrimental effect) elsewhere. So when the Commission talks of devolution being a "great success", it's talking specifically about its outworking in Scotland and even there, that subjective judgement has been thrown up (possibly to keep the arch-devolutionists quiet) without a great deal of collaborating evidence.

Moving onto details; the assertion that in a nation state defence and foreign policy should remain unified should be so self evident as to preclude any further debate; Salmond's attempts to prove otherwise to date have reminded me of the nuclear-free zones set up the likes of Camden Council at the height of the Cold War, ie the propaganda effect at home greatly outweighs any tangible, minimal benefit in the big, wide world at large. Similarly, in an unified state, it is quite clearly nonsense to believe that any kind of effective autonomous immigration or employment-health and safety law is desirable or practical- in the former, unless the SNP decide to instigate their own border controls at Gretna, then immigrants entering the UK at any point of entry in the nation need, in the interests of fairness and security, to be treated in a consistent fashion. And in dealing with the latter,well, in the immortal words of Basil Fawlty, we're all apart of the "Common Market" (sic) now anyway and that's the legislature where those aspects of our everyday life are decided. Devolved civil service simply means devolved not less bureaucracy and so in terms of governance there is no evidence to support its beneficial effect- once again the Commission was merely stating the obvious.

(To be continued)