Politics of Scotland
The politics of Scotland operate within the constitution of the United Kingdom, of which Scotland is a country. Scotland is a democracy, being represented in both the Scottish Parliament and the Parliament of the United Kingdom since the Scotland Act 1998.
Most executive power is exercised by the Scottish Government, led by the first minister, the head of government in a multi-party system. The judiciary of Scotland, dealing with Scots law, is independent of the legislature and the Scottish Government, and is headed by the Lord Advocate who is the principal legal adviser to the Scottish Government. Scots law is primarily determined by the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Government shares some executive powers, notably over reserved matters, with the Scotland Office, led by the Secretary of State for Scotland.
The Kingdom of Scotland entered a fiscal and political union with the Kingdom of England with the Acts of Union 1707, by which the Parliament of Scotland was abolished along with its English counterpart to form the Parliament of Great Britain, and from that time Scotland has been represented by members of the House of Commons in the Palace of Westminster. The Scottish Parliament was re–convened in 1999 as a result of the Scotland Act 1998 and the preceding 1997 Scottish devolution referendum, held under the Referendums Act 1997.
The issues of Scottish nationalism and Scottish independence are prominent political issues in the early 21st century. The Scottish National Party formed a majority government following the 2011 Scottish Parliament election, and passed the Scottish Independence Referendum Act 2013, with the Edinburgh Agreement enabling the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. The referendum was held on 18 September 2014, with 55.3% voting to stay in the United Kingdom and 44.7% voting for independence.
History
Kingdom of Scotland
The unified kingdoms of Dál Riata, Cat, Cé, Fortriu, Fib, Strathclyde, Galloway, Northumbria and the Earldom of Orkney became the Kingdom of Scotland, an independent sovereign state which existed until the signing of the Treaty of Union in 1707 with the Kingdom of England. The unified Kingdom of Scotland retained some of the ritual aspects of Pictish and Scottish kingship. These can be seen in the elaborate ritual coronation at the Stone of Scone at Scone Abbey. While the Scottish monarchy in the Middle Ages was a largely itinerant institution, Scone remained one of its most important locations, with royal castles at Stirling and Perth becoming significant in the later Middle Ages before Edinburgh developed as a capital city in the second half of the 15th century.The Crown was the most important element of government in the Kingdom of Scotland despite the many royal minorities. In the late Middle Ages, it saw much of the aggrandisement associated with the New Monarchs elsewhere in Europe. Theories of constitutional monarchy and resistance were articulated by Scots, particularly George Buchanan, in the 16th century, but James VI of Scotland advanced the theory of the divine right of kings, and these debates were restated in subsequent reigns and crises. The court remained at the centre of political life, and in the 16th century emerged as a major centre of display and artistic patronage, until it was effectively dissolved with the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
The Parliament of Scotland also emerged as a major legal institution, gaining an oversight of taxation and policy. By the end of the Middle Ages it was sitting almost every year, partly because of the frequent royal minorities and regencies of the period, which may have prevented it from being sidelined by the monarchy. In the early modern era, Parliament was also vital to the running of the country, providing laws and taxation, but it had fluctuating fortunes and was never as central to the national life as its counterpart in England.
Treaty of Union
The signing of the Treaty of Union in 1707 with the Kingdom of England ended both Scotland and England's political independence, unifying both countries into a new state known as the Kingdom of Great Britain. The Parliament of Scotland, the Kingdom of Scotland's legislature situated at Parliament House, Edinburgh, was merged with the Parliament of England to establish the new Parliament of Great Britain which would be based in London.Following the ratification of the Treaty of Union, Parliament House became the seat of the Supreme Courts of Scotland in which it remains today. Under the terms of the Treaty of Union, various elements of independence from England was retained for Scotland, such as a separate education and legal system as was the countries church and religion. Additionally, the Crown of Scotland and the Honours of Scotland were to remain in Scotland, as were all parliamentary and other official records.
Until 1832, Scottish politics remained very much in the control of landowners in the country, and of small cliques of merchants in the burghs. Agitation against this position through the Friends of the People Society in the 1790s met with Lord Braxfield's explicit repression on behalf of the landed interests. The Scottish Reform Act 1832 rearranged the constituencies and increased the electorate from under 5,000 to 65,000. The Representation of the People Act 1868 extended the electorate to 232,000 but with "residential qualifications peculiar to Scotland". However, by 1885 around 50% of the male population had the vote, the secret ballot had become established, and the modern political era had started.
Liberal and Labour Party dominance
From 1885 to 1918 the Liberal Party almost totally dominated Scottish politics. Only in the general election of 1931 and the general election of 1955 did the Unionist Party, together with their National Liberal and Conservative Party allies, win a majority of votes.Following the coupon election of 1918, 1922 saw the emergence of the Labour Party as a major force, and replacing the Liberals as one of the two dominant parties. Red Clydeside elected a number of Labour MPs. A Communist was elected for Motherwell in 1924, but in essence the 1920s saw a 3-way fight between Labour, the Liberals and the Unionists. The National Party of Scotland contested their first seat in 1929. It merged with the centre-right Scottish Party in 1934 to form the Scottish National Party, but the SNP remained a peripheral force until the watershed Hamilton by-election of 1967.
The Communists won West Fife in 1935 and again in 1945 and several Glasgow Labour MPs joined the Independent Labour Party in the 1930s, often defeating the official Labour candidates by wide margins.
The National Government won the vast majority of Scottish seats in 1931 and 1935. The Liberal Party, banished to the Highlands and Islands, no longer functioned as a significant force in central Scotland.
In 1945, the SNP saw its first MP elected at the Motherwell by-election, but had little success during the following decade. The ILP members rejoined the Labour Party, and Scotland now had in effect a two-party system.
Devolution
refers the process by which powers to legislate and govern are transferred from the UK Parliament in Westminster to a range of sub-UK level bodies, such as metro areas and the countries of the United Kingdom. Since the re–establishment of the Scottish Parliament, all matters have been devolved to that body by default, except those matters explicitly reserved to Westminster, and Westminster does not by convention legislate on devolved matters which are the responsibility of both the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government, except by consent.In Scotland, matters devolved to the Scottish Parliament exclusively include justice and law, police and prisons, local government, health, education, housing and student support, social welfare, the economy, food safety and standards, planning policy, economic development, agriculture and rural affairs, culture, tourism, the arts and sport. A number of other matters are shared such as some elements of transport, public pension and taxation. The Scottish Government receives a funding allocation from the UK Government, calculated under the Barnett Formula, but it does also have its own tax resources.
Subsequently, the Scotland Acts of 2012 and 2016 transferred powers over some taxation including Income Tax, Land and Buildings Transaction Tax, Landfill Tax, Aggregates Levy and Air Departure Tax, drink driving limits, Scottish Parliament and local authority elections, some social security powers, the Crown Estate of Scotland, some aspects of the benefits system, some aspects of the energy network in Scotland including renewable energy, energy efficiency and onshore oil and gas licensing, some aspects of equality legislation in Scotland and gaming machine licensing.
The programmes of legislation enacted by the Scottish Parliament have seen the divergence in the provision of public services compared to the rest of the United Kingdom. While the costs of a university education, and care services for the elderly are free at point of use in Scotland, fees are paid in the rest of the UK. Scotland was the first country in the UK to ban smoking in public places, with the ban effective from 26 March 2006. Also, on 19 October 2017, the Scottish government announced that smacking children as punishment was to be banned in Scotland, the first nation of the UK to do so.
In a further divergence from the rest of the United Kingdom from 1 January 2021 all Scottish legislation will be legally required to keep in regulatory alignment in devolved competences with future European Union law following the end of the Brexit transition period which ended on 31 December 2020 after the Scottish Parliament passed the UK Withdrawal from the European Union Act 2020 despite the United Kingdom no longer being an EU member state.
Future constitutional status
A large debate in modern Scottish politics is over the constitutional status of Scotland. One common proposal is for the independence of Scotland from the UK; this would mean Scotland would once again become a sovereign state. There was an independence referendum in 2014 in which Scottish residents voted to remain within the United Kingdom, however this debate has been reignited due to the Brexit process, with the Scottish Government calling for a second independence referendum. This position is supported by the SNP and Scottish Greens, among other groupings. Independence advocates propose that independence would resolve a democratic deficit for Scottish voters and allow Scotland to rejoin the EU. Opponents argue that Scotland would be worse off economically after independence.In 2022, the Scottish Government under First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon launched the first paper in a series of independence prospectuses entitled Building a New Scotland. The publication is a series of papers published by the Scottish Government that seeks to lay out a prospectus for Scottish independence. The Scottish Government had previously proposed holding an independence referendum on 19 October 2023. On 7 September 2021, Nicola Sturgeon stated that she would resume the case for independence and restart work on a prospects for independence. On 13 June 2022, Nicola Sturgeon published the first independence paper. On 14 July 2022, Nicola Sturgeon published the second independence paper. As of March 2024, a total of ten papers had been published.
Other proposals include more devolution for Scotland, supported by the SNP in lieu of full independence. Under the pressure of growing support for Scottish independence, a policy of devolution had been advocated by all three GB-wide parties to some degree during their history. This question dominated the Scottish political scene in the latter half of the twentieth century with Labour leader John Smith describing the revival of a Scottish parliament as the "settled will of the Scottish people".