Committee (3rd Day) (Continued)

Part of Scotland Bill – in the House of Lords at 10:30 pm on 28 February 2012.

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Photo of Lord Wallace of Tankerness Lord Wallace of Tankerness Lords Spokesperson (Attorney General's Office), Lords Spokesperson (Wales Office), The Advocate-General for Scotland, Lords Spokesperson (Scotland Office) 10:30, 28 February 2012

My Lords, can I perhaps be somewhat boring and brief at this time of night by focusing on the amendment? It would insert the word "Devolved" into Clause 30, Clause 37 and Schedule 4, where the reference would become to the devolved Scottish Government. Clause 15 changes the formal name to the Scottish Government from the Scottish Executive. It was felt that the Executive were increasingly widely known as the Scottish Government and that it made sense to amend the Act to reflect public perception and to avoid confusion. However, the fact that the Scotland Act refers to "Scottish Executive" prevents the use of "Scottish Government" in legislation, contracts and other legal matters. Therefore, Clause 15 is designed to prevent inconsistencies in what the Scottish Executive are called by the public and in the legal name.

The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, wishes to insert "devolved" in front of "Scottish Government". That is unnecessary and may even lead to further confusion. Altering the name of the Scottish Government to "the devolved Scottish Government" would in no way strengthen the position of devolution. Indeed, it is important to note that no such prefix attaches to the devolved Administrations in Wales and Northern Ireland. It would look very odd and lopsided if it happened just in Scotland.

That said, this has been a useful debate on devolution. I will not go into all the highways and byways but some important points were made. Some of us who very much support what has happened over the past 12 years sometimes miss a trick because so often, ahead of the debates in 1997 and the referendum leading up to that, we talked about devolution in terms of the Scottish Parliament dealing with matters related to the domestic agenda of the people of Scotland and the United Kingdom Parliament being responsible for macroeconomic policies, defence, foreign policy, social security and pensions. Although we will undoubtedly debate where the boundaries should be-the Bill seeks to address some of these issues-I nevertheless believe that the idea of a Scottish Parliament within a United Kingdom still commands the support of the vast majority of the people in Scotland. I hope that the noble Lord will withdraw the amendment.