An Anniversary forever in shadow; The devolution referendum of 1997

IT seems to be Scotland's lot to have her political achievements eclipsed by extraneous events. September 11 will forever be associated with the Manhattan bombings rather than the most decisive moment in modern Scottish history - the devolution referendum of 1997. It was the same back in 1979, when the first devolution campaign was overshadowed by the winter of discontent and rubbish bags in the street.

And five years ago this very weekend Scotland was again being upstaged by events beyond her control: the extravagant national mourning for Diana, Princess of Wales. The referendum campaign had been put on hold until after the funeral of the "people's princess", as Tony Blair had styled her. There was an eerie silence on the streets of Edinburgh, as the plastic flowers and improvised shrines gathered around irrelevant public buildings, such as the Scott Monument in Princes Street.

For those of us who had been involved in the Scottish home rule story it was all very frustrating. Scotland's moment of national reawakening had been eclipsed by a surreal, if tragic, accident, and the media psychodrama that followed it. The Scottish people had always shown themselves to be supremely uninterested in the antics of the "Hello" princess. For her part, Diana loathed the midges and rain of Balmoral, yet here she was, intruding her private grief on our public affairs.

Hardline opponents of devolution could hardly contain their glee. The home rule campaign, they believed, was being destroyed at the very last moment, by an extraordinary quirk of fate. The union had been given a final chance to prevail against what had seemed insuperable odds. It was 1992 all over again - an opportunity to seize a very Scottish defeat from the jaws of victory.

On the newly devo-sceptic Scotsman newspaper, for which I was writing at the time, the consensus in the oak-panelled editor's office was that the game was a bogey. I was advised that the turnout would be dismal and that the vote would be split with a narrow "yes" to a parliament and a "no" to tax powers. This would be too feeble a mandate, according to The Scotsman's editors, to justify proceeding with the parliament. The paper should right away prepare the arguments for ditching the entire project.

I dutifully disagreed. Like the other liberal left journalists and academics of "civic Scotland", I insisted that appearances could deceive. There may have been no demonstrations on the streets in favour of home rule, no rousing hustings meetings, no flags and honking horns. But the Scots were an undemonstrative race, not given to triumphalist politics, especially at a time of national mourning. Anyway, I said, Scots were sick of the arguments; they had made up their minds long since and just wanted to get on with it.

I didn't crow at the 6am editorial conference on September 12. I didn't need to. The referendum result had, of course, been a massive endorsement of devolution. To his credit, the then editor, Martin Clarke, accepted the verdict of the people without a moment's hesitation and tried to reshape the paper's editorial policy accordingly. I'm not sure that those in higher authority did the same.

In reality, neither I nor anyone else really knew what the Scots had been thinking during that strange anti-climactic episode in our national story. The Scottish people were, as always, keeping their cards close to their chests. In the dying days of the truncated campaign, I had walked the damp streets of Edinburgh looking for clues, not finding any. It was quiet - unnaturally quiet. Even allowing for the baroque passions being played out in London, and radiating across the nation through the media, it was all too damn quiet.

As it happened, Neal Ascherson, the celebrated writer and commentator, was at that very moment touring Scotland as part of the "Common Cause" roadshow, ruining his larynx for the purpose of home rule. He was discovering much the same thing as I was, as he explains in his new book Stone Voices. The lack of popular identification with the project which characterised the campaign-that-never-was in that incontinent September was, Ascherson argues, a manifestation of something deeper. It was an expression of that great sense of national self-doubt which he calls the "St Andrew's Fault". This is a rift in the national consciousness, a failure of self-confidence, which makes Scots curiously shy and reluctant to participate fully in their own public life. Far from hailing Holyrood as a great and enduring national achievement, the solid foundation of Scotland's national future, Ascherson concludes his book by saying the parliament is fragile and might not even survive.

There is clearly something to the St Andrew's Fault, as every Scot knows. We are not very good at taking ourselves seriously and celebrating our own achievements. Just look at how the parliament was rubbished by the popular press in Scotland almost from day one, even in papers that campaigned for devolution. This was not just out of editorial animus. The Scottish people themselves developed a deep resentment against the parliament created in their name and this was reflected and magnified in the popular press.

Ascherson laments the failure of Scots to get involved in their new democratic institutions, and fears the worst. But he is surely carrying pessimism of the intellect a little too far in suggesting that the parliament may fail altogether. You might even call it a manifestation of the very St Andrew's Fault he talks about in Stone Voices. It is simply inconceivable that the Scotland Act could ever be repealed, the parliament shut down and legislation sent back to Westminster. Devolution is, in practice, irreversible.

I suspect that Ascherson appreciates this too. So what does he mean by the parliament failing? It's probably not so much Holyrood failing as the people themselves failing. Neal Ascherson is a brilliant writer on Scottish affairs and his investigation of the national consciousness is both fascinating and original. But I suspect he was one of those many commentators on devolution who rather expected that it would be, if not a slippery slope to independence, then at least a staging post towards full national status.

For Ascherson, an expert also on Eastern European nationalism, didn't expect the Scots to settle for a halfway house, and is perhaps a little disappointed that this is precisely what they appear to have done. At least for the time being.

Certainly, as parliament returns this week for the crucial re- election year, the SNP seems to be making singularly little progress against the Labour Party. The SNP is becalmed in the polls and turning in on itself as it tries to come to terms with performing the difficult task of being a loyal opposition in a parliament it never really wanted. The discontent in nationalist ranks is palpable, but nobody - not even Margo MacDonald - seems to know what to do about it.

After three years of scandal, resignation, cronyism and sleaze, the SNP ought to be miles ahead of Labour at this stage in the political cycle, but instead they are trailing in double figures behind the enemy. Not all of this can be laid at the door of their leader John Swinney. He may not be the most charismatic leader, but he is capable, does his homework and has in many ways pulled the party together after the trauma of the 1999 campaign when the Labour- dominated Scottish press treated the SNP appallingly. His public confidence ratings are high, even if his visibility is low.

Rather, it is that Swinney has been handed an impossible task: to make the parliament work on its own terms while seeking to persuade Scots to opt for something better. It is, as the former leadership challenger Alex Neil has argued recently, a double bind. The more they make the parliament work, the more they undermine the case for independence. Yet, writing recently in a Sunday newspaper, Neil does not provide a credible alternative strategy. The idea that the SNP could win popular support by downing tools and walking out of Holyrood is simply risible. There is no indication that Scots are in a mood to move, full speed, to full independence.

In many ways the argument over the economics of independence has itself moved on - and largely in the SNP's favour. It is now established beyond reasonable doubt that the so-called "Barnett squeeze" on Scottish public spending is not just a figment of nationalist propaganda. The long-delayed convergence between Scottish per-capita spending and that south of the Border is finally happening. However, this is being concealed by the fact that overall spending has increased massively across the entire UK, thanks to the Chancellor's decision finally to open the spending stopcocks.

The case for independence will receive a further boost later this month with the publication of a new book, Scottish Independence: A Practical Guide, by the respected Scottish editor of The Economist, Peter Jones, in association with the Constitution Unit. This promises to be the most exhaustive examination of the economics of self- government produced since the 1970s. Its broad conclusion is that there need be no great damage to Scotland's economic wellbeing if disengagement from England were handled judiciously.

The authors do not formally advocate a "velvet divorce". Indeed, they insist that the separation road could lead to disaster if taken too fast. But the book has already aroused intense interest in the SNP. The Nationalists will now be able to claim independent authority when next they seek to rebut Labour's accusation that "divorce is an expensive business". It needn't be.

Recently, support for the SNP's call for "fiscal freedom" has been coming from the most unlikely quarters. The CBI director, Digby Jones, has called for the Scottish parliament to be given "responsible" tax-raising powers. On the other side of the political fence The Guardian's leading columnist, Jonathan Freedland, contends that not only would the repatriation of tax-raising powers be good for Scotland, it would be good for England. The New Labour sociologist Anthony Giddens has argued that taxation and spending needs to be brought closer to the people if it is to be accepted as legitimate by the new, hyper-sceptical voting public. Scotland could be an ideal proving ground, says Freedland, for a new deal on tax and spend - but only if the Scottish parliament were to be given responsible tax-raising powers itself.

Now, it has to be said that while fiscal autonomy may be flavour of the month in London Labour's intellectual salons, it is far from being taken seriously in Scotland. Jack McConnell has repeatedly ruled it out as a divisive policy which would not be in Scotland's long-term interest. However, Labour are not overly worried about rarefied debate on hypothetical futures taking place this autumn. This is because they believe they have won the political argument in the here and now.

Labour's internal polling confirms what the national polls have been suggesting - that Scots are, if anything, becoming less, not more, interested in independence. Indeed, Labour focus groups are suggesting independence is, to many Scots, becoming a largely meaningless concept. Now that a parliament is up and running in Edinburgh, and being condemned as profligate and intellectually underpowered, it is hard to build a case for further constitutional change. What, after all, would full independence mean? Fiscal autonomy, perhaps, but embassies? Armies? A separate social security system?

Labour are quite relaxed to see the SNP talking independence because they think the Scots aren't interested. While the UK economy seems to be performing well - with unemployment and inflation low and average incomes rising - it is hard to articulate the economic case for independence. This may change. The departure of the electronics multi-nationals may herald a long-term decline in the Scots economy - which has not exactly been performing spectacularly in the past two decades. But until some economic dislocation happens, the SNP have their work cut out.

This may be a matter of regret to those who hoped that the Scottish story would lead to more rather than less independence. It has certainly made Ascherson ask questions about the nature of Scottish national sentiment. He concludes that historically, it is the exception rather than the rule for Scottish nationalism to be expressed politically. The deep insecurities and doubts of Scots mean they tend to express national identity in other forms than through the assertion of formal national rights.

But again, this is taking a highly pessimistic, almost dismissive view of the rights the Scots have actually asserted in recent years. It is too easy to dismiss the outcome of the 1997 referendum. I firmly believe that it was a hugely significant moment in Scotland's national self-discovery, even though it is most unlikely ever to lead to formal independence.

In that quiet revolution of five years ago, the people of Scotland made a real choice. It was as decisive an assertion of support for home rule as could possibly have been imagined. The turnout of 60% was good if not spectacular, but following a campaign dominated by a dead princess, nobody could have expected more.

The massive three-to-one vote in favour of a Scottish parliament on September 11, 1997, drew a line under 150 years of constitutional debate. It was one of those rare occasions when the people of a country really did unite behind a proposition. The fact that they did so without any great fuss and noise seems to me to be a tribute to the phlegmatic Scottish character and should not be seen as a psychological fault. They were, in a sense, voting above the heads of the existing political parties - which is, I think, why many of the political classes have had difficulty understanding it. The Scots did not vote for Labour, or the SNP, they voted for home rule.

The overwhelming vote for tax-raising powers was also highly significant. It indicated that a second choice had been taken, another long-standing issue resolved. The "yes" to tax powers was an affirmation of that bedrock of social democratic principles which had always been imputed to the Scots, but never properly demonstrated.

All opinion poll evidence since 1997 suggests that if Scotland were to stage a replay of September 11 - preferably on a different date - the results would be largely the same. Around two-thirds to three-quarters of Scots still support devolution, even after the tragedies, cock-ups and disillusion of the past three years. The most striking message that comes through the polls is that most Scots expect the parliament's powers to increase in the next decade. As Donald Dewar always said: devolution is a process not an event.

All the arguments about whether home rule really was the settled will of the Scottish people or just the preoccupation of a handful of intellectuals were finally laid to rest on September 11, 1997. For the first time in modern Scottish history, it was possible to say unequivocally that Scotland was no longer divided about her constitutional destiny. The Conservatives never recovered.

I was glad to have been a part of it. I'll be raising a quiet glass in 10 days time, and I think most of Scotland will be joining me - even if the media's attention will be elsewhere.

Readers' Views on Devolution

DEVOLUTION was not a good option - we should be more globally aware rather than becoming more insular and inward focused. It also negates economies of scale which could be achieved at Westminster. The imminent redrawing of boundaries and loss of Scottish representation at Westminster is also, I feel, a negative move which will ultimately be to our detriment.

Rona Taylor, Glasgow

STEPS must be taken to prevent the will of the voters from being overturned, as was done when the Liberal Democrats made a pact with New Labour. The result was to make a fool of democracy.

Peter Spinney, Glasgow

THE new parliament [building] has been unfairly denigrated. It is a superbly innovative building for the 21st century and for an independent Scotland. Its completion will be an achievement to celebrate with pride.

Archie Black, Inverness

CENTRAL government, with its focus on economic liberalisation, still has excessive influence over the Scottish executive. While there have been positive achievements, the limit to radical policies delivered by the Scottish parliament has been a disappointment to many and has unfortunately increased cynicism about politics in Scotland.

Emma Miller, Glasgow

THE parliament has done as well as Westminster planned it should. It was designed to prevent independence, not to act as a stepping stone to independence.

Robin McKenzie, Edinburgh I LIKE the second vote system that allows list MSPs from the SSP and Green Party to sit in parliament.

Peter Woolverton, Penicuik

THE quality of MSPs is too low. The workload of some ministers is too high. The expectation that we would see more reasoned debate and less name calling etc hasn't materialised. Henry McLeish discredited the office.

Gary Brewer, Dollar

Copyright 2002
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