Question Of The Week
Tonight's edition of Newsnight Scotland featured duelling lawyers, with conflicting views on the legality of the Scottish Government's proposed referendum. Professor Adam Tomkins from the University of Glasgow put forward the opinion that Holyrood basically had no power to do anything at all and should be grateful for Westminster's "very generous" offer to help out, while Professor Stephen Tierney (University of Edinburgh) posited the interpretation that an advisory referendum was perfectly fine as it didn't in itself lead to legislation and therefore exceed the Parliament's competence.
Presenter Raymond Buchanan tried to navigate the tricky constitutional minefield between the two, and after Prof. Tierney had given his explanation of why the referendum bill might be lawful, Buchanan stabbed right at the heart of the dilemma when he asked the question viewers across the nation were shouting at their screens:
"Just to clarify that: so, so, if there was a Yes vote, which said "Go and negotiate with Westminster" and then, uh… then Westminster… or the… what you're saying whether the voters rejected that then, what would happen or… Westminster rejected it, what impact would you, were you saying?"
Well and truly clarified, we'd say. It was a feat of no small magnitude that the Daily Record's Torcuil Crichton actually managed to haul the intellectual level down a couple of notches from there later in the show, but that's another story. The important thing is that the future of the independence debate is in safe hands!
Sorry guys,the presenter was Raymond Buchanan. Gary Robertson is on GMS in the mornings.Possibly at home now reading "how not to conduct an informative interview"-its all about meeee,its allabout me….its all……
How embarrassing – I always muddle those two up. It's been a long day, corrected now. Cheers for the heads-up.
if the referendum ballot paper is a straight yes/no to independence and the result being, no. will all political parties (mibbee no torys) go into the 2016 scottish election, on a maifesto that champons dev max?
In your dreams.
No. A defeat for independence will kill devo max for a generation, just like the AV referendum killed PR.