Category: Scotland
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Stormont tax review foreshadows Scottish Debate
Sir David Varney published his long-awaited review of tax policy in Northern Ireland this week. As most observers expected, Varney rejected the case for a corporation tax cut to match levels in the Republic. What was more surprising was that that was all he did. His original remit was to consider ‘how current and future…
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Varney contradicts Alexander on corporation tax
When Labour’s Holyrood leader Wendy Alexander announced her devolution proposals last month, she cast some doubt over whether the Scottish Parliament could legally be given control of corporation tax: We should approach this with an open mind but there are constraints here. Some suggest VAT for example but EU rules appear to preclude VAT variation…
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Paisley on Salmond
Balrog points us to in interesting exchange in the Northern Ireland Assembly yesterday: David Burnside (UUP) asked the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister to outline what discussions it has had on constitutional issues with the First Minister of Scotland. Ian Paisley (DUP) The Member will be aware that the deputy…
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Brown’s three stooges at Holyrood
Wendy Alexander may be under intense pressure to step down over the Labour donations row, but that didn’t stop the Tories and the Lib Dems falling in behind the Scottish Labour leader at Holyrood yesterday. The three parties united to push through a proposal for a constitutional commission that would consider new powers for the…
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Alexander on the edge
The former Chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, Sir Alistair Graham, has called on Wendy Alexander to consider her position: "Normally, when people face the danger – and I presume she does face the danger here of a criminal prosecution – then normally you step aside from your position so you can…
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Whose agenda for Scotland?
Wendy Alexander’s lecture on Friday, A New Agenda for Scotland, was on one level an attempt to take the initiative on the devolution issue back from the SNP. Her proposed Scottish Constitutional Convention is clearly intended as a rival to the Scottish Government’s National Conversation: This Commission should have a mandate from Holyrood, unlike the…
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Donations row overshadows Alexander devolution call
Labour’s Scottish leader Wendy Alexander has found herself embroiled in her own donations row over the last couple of days. On Wednesday, it emerged that Alexander’s leadership campaign team had accepted a donation from Paul Green, a businessman based in the Channel Islands. Her campaign manager Tom McCabe claimed the donation had been made through…
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Beyond Brown’s Britain
One of the most striking indications of the sense of crisis currently engulfing Gordon Brown’s government is Jackie Ashley’s suggestion that Brown could step down before the next election. There is still plenty of time for Brown to turn things round, and it is probably too early for talk of ‘Black Wednesday’ moments. That said,…
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‘Informal deal’ between SNP and Tories
Interesting coverage in Scotland on Sunday of the quiet rapprochement between the SNP and the Tories. Eddie Barnes suggests this is a no-brainer for Alex Salmond, but not necessarily for David Cameron: as his party’s grass roots will no doubt be reminding him, the Conservative Party still has the word ‘Unionist’ in its title. So…
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Upping the ante over devolution
The Conservatives plans for an English Grand Committee are all over the news today, although The Sunday Times seems to have backtracked on a report that David Cameron had made Malcolm Rifkind’s proposals official party policy. Rifkind has written a paper and submitted it to Kenneth Clarke, the chairman of the party’s democracy task force.…