Misrepresentations and Remembrance of a Good Man

“This morning, I was saddened to know that Charles Kennedy passed away, and I must first express my sincere condolences to his family as they mourn his loss, which is our loss as well. Even though we disagreed on the issue of Scottish independence, Charles was a good man and a decent public servant, and especially with regard to the upcoming EU referendum, our political landscape is poorer without him.”

     This is what Alex Salmond, the former First Minister of Scotland – and now MP for Gordon – could have said in the wake of the untimely and tragic death of Charles Kennedy, the former leader of the Liberal Democrats and recently defeated MP for Ross, Skye, and Lochaber, at the relatively young age of 55.

Charles Kennedy in 2005
(Credit: Alison M. Wheeler via Wikimedia Commons cc)

     Alas however, while he did express condolence and sympathy like everyone else, he also managed to insert his cause of independence in the crudest fashion when he actually said this:

“Yes, he was an extremely generous human being. I have had one or two, but not many, people who had a bad word to say about Charles, and that’s very rare in politics. In terms of the independence referendum, I don’t think his heart was in the ‘Better Together’ campaign.

“His heart would have been in a pro-European campaign, that’s a campaign that Charles would have engaged in heart and soul. That is something he absolutely believed in.”

     Here, Salmond implied that that Kennedy was somehow not a supporter of the Union, and more so, was a closet supporter of independence. But as Alex Massie wrote in the Spectator:

“Charles Kennedy had ample opportunity to demonstrate his nationalist sympathies. To my knowledge he declined any and all such invitations. Perhaps because, jings, he wasn’t a nationalist. His heart and his head were Unionist.”

     Now Salmond said that Kennedy was actually a “federalist”, which is true in the sense that the Liberal Democrats tend to believe in devolution and federalism within the United Kingdom, but are nevertheless supportive in the basic notion of keeping the Union together. Allan Massie (Alex's father) attests to this in his Telegraph column, where he said “federalism is very different from Salmond’s Nationalism. Federalists seek to improve the United Kingdom, Nationalists to destroy it.”

     The use of the federalist label was merely Salmond’s attempt to drive a wedge between those who believe in a federal union and those who believe a unitary union, and to imply that federalism is somehow closer to independence in terms of political thought and ideology.

     Ahh, but you may say that Salmond said nothing about Kennedy’s support for the Union – just his lack of prominence in Better Together and his criticism of it. True, but this nevertheless implied that Kennedy didn’t really believe in fighting for the Union in contrast to being “engaged heart and soul” in the upcoming referendum campaign to retain Britain’s membership in the European Union, which as yet does not have an organization officially backed by the political parties.

     In reality, as Massie and others have stated, it was more likely that Kennedy’s health – long plagued by alcoholism – was the reason for his relative absence in the referendum campaign last year to keep Scotland as part of the UK. He may not have had the prominence of people such as Jim Murphy, Alistair Darling, Ruth Davidson, and Gordon Brown, but he did do his bit in speeches and other appearances to keep the UK together. To say the Kennedy’s heart was not in Better Together is like saying that Jim Sillars’ heart wasn’t in the main pro-independence campaign organization, Yes Scotland, because Sillars (more-or-less) carried out his own campaign take Scotland out of the UK, or that his heart isn't in the SNPbecause of his criticism of it as intellectually dumb and totalitarian under Salmond's leadership.

     Since yesterday, Salmond’s comments have attracted controversy for coming so soon after the announcement of Kennedy’s death, with Kennedy's successor as Lib Dem leader (and fellow Scot), Sir Menzies Campbell saying the Salmond's comments were “out of order.”

In response, some of his and the SNP’s supporters have accused others of using Kennedy’s passing to score political points against Salmond and his party. However, I argue that Salmond was attempting to score political points by bringing up Kennedy’s involvement with Better Together (or lack thereof), which made it seem as though he didn’t really believe in keeping the UK together.

     Even if that was not the case, and Salmond was merely referring to Kennedy’s criticisms of the Better Together campaign, and not his commitment to the Union, there was no reason to bring that up so soon, and Salmond should have followed the magnanimous lead of the his new party leader and current First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who simply said on Twitter.

“Sad beyond words to hear the news about Charlie Kennedy. A lovely man and one of the most talented politicians of his time. Gone too soon.”

     Other tributes from across the political spectrum – expressed by Gordon Brown, Ruth Davidson, Willie Rennie, Jim Murphy, Sir Malcolm Bruce, Nick Clegg, Prime Minister David Cameron, and several others – were gracious in their thoughts on Kennedy and sympathies to his family. Probably the best tribute came from Tony Blair’s former press officer and adviser Alastair Campbell, who tackled his own issues with drinking and developed a friendship with Kennedy as they faced a “shared enemy.”

     To his credit, Alex Salmond did praise Kennedy for his opposition to the 2003 invasion and war in Iraq – calling it his finest moment – in the face of “enormous pressure” and for his personal connection to his constituents in the Highlands, which helped him to make decisions and keep his seat in Parliament for 32 years.

     However, by bringing up the referendum the way he did and (seemingly) questioning Kennedy’s beliefs, Salmond poured salt on the raw divisions still apparent throughout Scotland in the aftermath of the two year long campaign. Even in this unfortunate circumstance, he found a way to make what appeared to be a snide remark at a departed opponent and in the process, he made himself the story.

     With regard to Charles Kennedy himself, as a young teenager, I remember watching the broadcast of Prime Minister's Questions on C-SPAN in the US and watching him among the many people presenting questions to then Prime Minister Tony Blair. As leader of the Liberal Democrats (as an independent third force in British politics) at the time, Kennedy had a significant role in the political discourse of the Commons, and was almost always seen at some point during PMQ's.

     The first thing that stood out was the fact that he shared the same name as one of our most prominent families, including a beloved president.

     Second, like that president, Kennedy appeared to be a regular guy (or bloke, as is said in Britain) - with a way of talking which suggested that he did not come from an upper crust

background. Indeed, it was an accent that was quite different from the other major party leaders, but I did not believe that this was indicative of him coming from another country - merely that he hailed from the same country as the others did, the United Kingdom - albeit perhaps, a different part of it. Nothing about Kennedy suggested anything other than this, and I treated it in the same way as I treat people with varying accents within the US, who are part of the same country, and in the UK itself, I knew there were many British accents.

     Eventually, I came to understand how the UK itself was a union of countries - a country in and of itself that had developed over time into what is now. It was not until later that I realized that Kennedy was Scottish, but this did not take away from the fact that he was the British leader of a British political party. Indeed, by the time of the 2010 General Election - after a period where I was not observing British politics so closely - I remember thinking that Kennedy was still leading the Liberal Democrats, only to find Nick Clegg and not knowing that Kennedy had been replaced long ago, and I certainly was not aware of the circumstances under which he stood down as leader.

     As time went on and I became more familiar with British politics, I also became more familiar with Kennedy - including the struggles with alcoholism which cost him his job as a party leader. However, I also gained an understanding of him as a decent man and talented political figure who stood for what he believed in, was authentic and had integrity, showed compassion, commanded the respect of his peers, and had a natural common touch and connection with people that many politicians envy (on both sides of the Atlantic).

     For these and other reasons, it was unfortunate that he did not lead the campaign to keep the UK together. Nothing against Alistair Darling (who has his own personal qualities which carried Better Together to victory), but people I have been in contact with believe that Kennedy - with his down-to-earth Highland roots - may have been a better communicator for the Union to the people of Scotland and more effective against Alex Salmond, for as some of my friends can attest, he was engaging as a speaker. Indeed, as Allan Massie said, people such as Kennedy were “actually expressing a stronger faith in the Union than those who preferred to dwell on the weaknesses of the case for Independence and the inadequacy of the SNP’s programme and arguments.”

     In researching for my book on the referendum, I found a video from 2012 which included Charles Kennedy making a remark that spoke of people who need not be political nationalists in order to be nationalistic Scots, so that support for independence and the SNP was not equated with pride in Scotland and being Scottish. This was something I found to be simple and true, and it is a sentiment that especially needs repeating today in the wake of the SNP landslide at the general election nearly a month ago that engulfed many pro-Union politicians, including Kennedy himself.

     His untimely death creates a hole in Scottish and British politics that will be hard to fill, if it is to be filled at all. Like that beloved American president with whom he shares a surname, he was - quite simply - taken away too soon.

     Rest in Peace, Charles Peter Kennedy.

UPDATE (11:00 PM, EDT): Alex Salmond has stressed that he was not suggesting that the late Charles Kennedy was for independence, and was only referring to his criticisms regarding the Better Together campaign - saying that Kennedy “was one of the first unionist politicians to realise that the result would be close and said publicly that he felt that the actions of the No campaign were contributing to this.”

     In light of this, the younger Massie has acknowledged on Twitter that his article (which was quoted here) had been “over the top”, and I must admit that my own tweets/retweets on the issue were just that - especially on the day when we should have been focused on honoring Charles Kennedy.

     For that reason, I still believe that Salmond should have at least made it clear during his original comments that he was not questioning Kennedy's commitment to the Union, for it did sound as though he was, and he ended up becoming the story.

     Nevertheless, he has clarified his statements, I understand what he was attempting to say, and all of us should move forward.

Proportional and Equal Representation in the House of Lords

     In the wake of the last general election, much commentary has been made by the media, opinion writers, politicians, and the public at large about the perceived unfairness of the United Kingdom’s age-old first-past-the-post (FPTP) system for electing members of the House of Commons - the lower house of the British Parliament.

     Such criticism is not new, for even in the days when the two major parties – Labour and the Conservatives – could command almost 90% of the popular vote between them in general elections, neither commanded a majority of the popular vote throughout the UK, though through the votes in each individual parliamentary constituency (or district), the parties often achieved majority status in terms of the number of seats in the Commons. Furthermore – with some exceptions – at least the election results had somewhat of a semblance to the actual number of seats won.

     However, first-past-the-post punishes smaller parties whose vote may be substantial but spread out across the country in such a way that it is not reflected in individual constituencies (where they tend not to stand a chance against the main parties), and therefore does not translate into seats in the Commons. From this view, the British Parliament is not representative of the electorate, resulting in a democratic deficit.

     Yet in many ways, this is what the system is designed to do: shut out smaller single-issue/regional parties and produce single-party majorities for stable and effective governance throughout the United Kingdom. But as the vote share of Labour and the Conservatives (a.k.a. Tories) has fallen to the rise of such smaller parties, this argument falls on the deaf ears of people who feel as though they are not represented in Parliament and the government of the day.

     It certainly seemed like a spurious argument during the 2015 General Election, when the opinion polls were predicting apocalyptic outcomes in which neither party would attain a majority of seats, and with the collapse of the Liberal Democrats – traditionally the third-largest party in Parliament and the coalition partners with the Tories since 2010 – there was talk of rainbow coalitions/post-election agreements with the Scottish National Party (SNP), UK Independence Party (UKIP), the Green Party, and the various parties from Northern Ireland – including the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP).

     As it was, the electorate produced a surprise – albeit wafer-thin – majority Tory government with 330 seats (out of 650) with party leader David Cameron as prime minister for a second term. This appeared to vindicate the continuance of FPTP, but the Conservatives achieved only 37% of the national popular vote – meaning that a clear majority of voters did not vote for the party. However, it won 51% of the seats in the Commons, and therefore gained a mandate to govern the entire UK without the Liberal Democrats or anyone else.

     Yet, if this appeared somewhat distorted, it was nothing compared to what happened in Scotland in particular, where the insurgent SNP won half of the vote, but took all but three of Scotland’s 59 seats in the Commons, which amounted to 95% of the seats and the party’s best electoral performance for a British general election. This has caused consternation among the half of Scots who did not vote for the SNP, especially those who support Scotland's place within the UK, whose voices are now only represented by three Members of Parliament (MP’s) – one each from Labour, the Tories, and Liberal Democrats.

     From a UK-wide perspective, the distortion was even more apparent with regard to UKIP, which received 13% of the vote across the UK, but returned only one MP, in contrast to the SNP, which won 5% of the UK vote but returned 56 MP’s because its vote was heavily concentrated in Scottish constituencies. This amounted to nearly 9% of the seats in the Commons and allowed them to displace the Liberal Democrats as the third largest party. For their part, the Lib Dems won 9% of the vote, but wound up with eight seats – or just over 1% of the Commons.

     These distortions – leaving the SNP overrepresented, the Lib Dems and UKIP underrepresented, and the Tories able to govern alone despite not having a majority of the electorate behind them – have fueled calls for FPTP to be replaced with some form of proportional representation in the House of Commons, so that the Commons can be more representative of the British electorate. It would have deprived David Cameron and the Tories of a majority, but also would have more accurately reflected the “sovereign will of the Scottish people” by preventing the SNP from taking more than about 30 seats and leaving respectable numbers for Labour and the Tories.

     However, there are people who value the link between MP’s and their constituents, which would be diluted in a pure proportional representation system. Another criticism is that PR would entrench high-ranking politicians since they would be placed at the top of PR voting lists, and would almost certainly be elected with no direct constituents to which they answer, which will make democratic deficits worse, not better. Then there are those who simply believe that FPTP, for all of its problems, has served the UK well, and subscribe to the belief that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

     The problem is that for many people in the UK, the system is broken, unfair, and unrepresentative. Throughout the referendum campaign in Scotland, one of the main talking points from the “Yes” campaign and its fervent supporters was that though Scotland had representation in the British Parliament at Westminster, it was nothing compared to the 533 English members and the English electorate, who could “out-vote” Scotland and deliver governments and government policies that “Scotland didn’t vote for.”

     Of course however, Scottish residents vote alongside their fellow British citizens (in England, Northern Ireland, and Wales) during general elections, and the elected Parliament and the subsequent government that is formed is the result of MP’s voted by the people from throughout Britain, and that government is one voted for by the British people as whole from Shetland to Land’s End. Its responsibility is to the United Kingdom as a whole (which includes Scotland) and not simply one part of it. In addition, MP’s are not organized into an “English bloc” or “Scottish bloc”, and nor do they often vote in such a way. Instead, they vote in accordance to their party and/or their personal values, which transcends the domestic boundaries within the UK.

     However, there perhaps is a case to be made that London and the South East do exert an inordinate amount of influence on the policies pursued by the government of the day by virtue of the concentration of people, wealth, and economic power in that area. With this in mind, it is therefore reasonable for parts of the UK outside of London to feel as though the capital and its environs have too much power over the direction of public policy in the UK.

     The fear of larger areas with concentrated wealth and power overpowering smaller areas with less wealth and power was a feature of the US Constitutional Convention of 1787, and it produced a deadlock amongst convention delegates, some of whom wanted a legislative body with two chambers based on population (which would have benefited larger states), whilst others wanted a single chamber body with equal representation, as it was in Congress under the Articles of Confederation. This was settled with a compromise in which the lower house of Congress would have membership allocated to the states in proportion to their population and the upper house of the Congress would allow each state to be equally presented by two members regardless of population.

     Eventually, the lower house became known as the House of Representatives, and as the chamber chosen by the people according to congressional districts within their state, it is larger than the upper house, the Senate, which is smaller and more exclusive, and functions to represent the interests of the states in a manner that befits a federation such as the United States. It means that the interests of the smaller states cannot be easily ignored as they can be in the House, where the sheer force of numbers from bigger states can drown them out.

     It sometimes means that the majority party in the House is not necessarily the majority party in the Senate, and even when both parties are in control, compromises may have to be hashed out in order to get things done, and by bringing the states to an even level with each other, it gives all of them a sense of having a significant role in governing the country. In addition, the Senate is also known for being the "world's greatest deliberative body" because of its tendency to slow legislation down for extensive debate, and to ensure that all voices are heard.

     If the United Kingdom is to move toward a federal system and address the legitimate concern of too much political and economic power being concentrated in the South East, then it is time to look toward changing elements of the UK’s parliamentary system, with a particular focus on reforming the upper chamber of Parliament - the House of Lords - so that it can become more representative of the UK’s nations and regions, as well as to more accurately reflect the will of the British electorate.

     To this end, I suggest that the House of Lords be composed of 100 members – with 25 allocated to each Home Nation and elected by some form of proportional representation (as is done in the Australian Senate, where twelve senators are elected via proportional means from each state, regardless of population).

     There are two main ways that this can be put into effect: proportional vote by Home Nation or proportional vote by region.

Option 1(a): Election of Lords via each Home Nation with simple proportional representation

     Under this plan, members would be elected according to the proportional vote for their party within their Home Nation. As with the European Union (EU) parliamentary elections, candidates will be arraigned according to a party list, but for the first part of this example, I will simply allocate candidates in relation to the percentage of the vote received by their party.

     Such a result based on simple proportional representation is expressed in the following graphs – beginning with the membership from England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.

DUP - Democratic Unionist Party; UUP - Ulster Unionist Party;

SDLP - Social Democratic and Labour Party; TUV - True Unionist Voice

     When the sums from each Home Nation are added up, here is what the UK House of Lords would look like under simple PR:

Option 1(b): Election of Lords via each Home Nation using the D'Hondt method of proportional representation

     The first variation of Option 1 used the percentage of the vote to allocate seats, and while this is very simple, it is not exactly proportional because it produces a fractional number of seats and requires rounding, the results of which some parties would protest. The D'Hondt method attempts to achieve a more perfect (though still imperfect) proportionality based on the actual votes cast, not the percentages, so that seat allocations are whole numbers and hopefully more fair to the parties and the electorate.

     This method of PR is named for Victor D'Hondt, a 19th Century Belgian mathematician and lawyer, and his system is used for elections throughout the world, including the election of British Members of the European Parliament (MEP's) from England, Scotland, and Wales. For more information on how D'Hondt's system works, I recommend this article from the BBC.

     Using that system, proportional representation in the Lord's is expressed in the following graphs – beginning with the membership from England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.

     When the sums from each Home Nation are added up, here is what the UK House of Lords would look like under D'Hondt:

     Comparing the two results, there is little substantial change, but there are winners and losers. Most significantly, the Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) in Northern Ireland would have one seat under simple PR, but none under D'Hondt. Another significant loser under D'Hondt would be the Greens, which would be left with one seat in England, as opposed to one in Wales and one in Northern Ireland as well under simple PR.

     With that system, the Conservatives could boast of being the only party to have representation at the British Parliament from all four Home Nations of the UK, but D'Hondt would take away their sole Northern Irish seat, which would be compensated with an additional seat in England - keeping them at 22 seats. Meanwhile, Labour would gain one seat in Wales and increase their tally to 24, whilst the Lib Dems lose one to bring their number of Lords to five.

     In Wales, UKIP would have a bigger number of seats there (4) than in England under D'Hondt (3), whilst simple PR would produce the opposite result. In Northern Ireland, UKIP loses a seat, whilst the DUP, Sinn Fein, and the SDLP all make gains with D'Hondt. Indeed, D'Hondt would slash the number of Northern Irish parties in the Lords from nine to five.

     The only parties throughout the UK with no changes between the two systems would be the SNP, UUP, Alliance, and Plaid Cymru.

Option 2: Election of Lords via regions within each Home Nation using either simple PR or D'Hondt

     For the first option (in either variation), the popular vote in each Home Nation was used to calculate the allocation of seats for each party in an elected House of Lords.

     This second option would see members elected via regions within England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.

     The benefit of this option is that it would capture the regional political, social, and economic variances throughout the United Kingdom. However, if such a regional option were to be adopted, the seats would have to be allocated through the regions as equally as possible.

     For this purpose, the existing electoral regions used for the Scottish parliamentary and Welsh assembly elections, as well as the regions used for electing MEP's in England could be used. Electoral regions for Northern Ireland would have to be created, as it does not have any.

     But true equality would mean that each Home Nation would have to have five regions, but the only one that has five is Wales, and so this raises the question of regions elsewhere. However, having to redraw them to suit this purpose, or using the existing ones and allocating seats to them as equally as possible may prove to be a contentious issue that goes beyond the scope of this article. Therefore, there will be no calculation of what the Lords would look like via regional proportional representation.

     In conclusion, creating a House of Lords that is elected by proportional representation can go a long way in equalizing the political balance between the nations and regions of the UK, as well as to more accurately reflect the British electorate. Areas with less wealth, power, and population will have a greater say in the running of the country as they are brought to the same level as the wealthier, more powerful, and more populous areas.

     By doing this, it has the potential to create another binding aspect of the Union. For Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales, this - as part of a move toward federalism - would amplify their voices in Parliament and move them closer into the heart of the Union, as opposed to the so-called "Celtic Fringe". Indeed, it may also force single-issue parties to step up and actually take part in shaping public policies and provide useful solutions to Britain's problems - putting themselves on official public record, as opposed to just protesting (and complaining).

     There are issues which need further discussing. For example, it can be argued that Northern Ireland is small enough to be a region in and of itself (as it is for EU elections), whilst England's size means that regional representation may be better at capturing its own political, social, and economic variances (i.e., Tories in the red Labour north and Labourites in the blue Tory south).

     In addition, there is the question of whether the Lords ought to be a body that has a mixed composition of elected and appointed members (or if it should be entirely appointed or elected), as well as to the extent it should be occupied by nonpartisan crossbenchers and Church of England bishops. Another issue is that of what to do with the officers of the Lords - some of whom are hereditary and occupy some of the oldest offices of state in the land.

     Then there is the question of what role the Lords would play - whether they would be able to (absolutely) block legislation from the Commons again, or remain as a revising chamber that provides useful scrutiny and amendments to government legislation and directives.

     As for how long members can serve, it may be advisable for them to be elected to lengthier terms (ten years perhaps) that are staggered compared to members of the Commons, and that such members may be limited to one term and subject to a minimum age requirement. Such measures can help to ensure that the Lords doesn't simply become a glorified version of the Commons and focuses on keeping the government of the day in check.

     But this and other issues noted here will be explored in future blog posts, which will focus on ideas to renew, refine, and reform Britain's constitutional system. For now, this article has discussed ways of using proportional representation to provide a proper outlet for the nations of regions of the UK in a similar way that the Senate does for US states, and as upper chambers tend to do in many countries (and typically with less members than the lower house).

     Almost everyone agrees that something has to be done about the Lords. Hopefully, the suggestions I have outlined can provide some guidance on the way forward for this honorable house, while also keeping its useful features intact and providing better and pluralistic governance for the United Kingdom.

First Post, An Introduction

Welcome to Hand's Across the Pond!

     This is a blog that will be dedicated to expression of views about the United Kingdom and its future from an American who has great admiration and respect for the country, its history, culture, peoples, and its special relationship with the United States.

      Some of you may know me from engaging on Twitter and Facebook on the referendum that occurred last last year, and on events since then, including the recent UK General Election, which produced an electoral triumph for the Scottish National Party (SNP), the party that advocates for Scotland to separate from the rest of Britain. It won 56 of Scotland's 59 seats in the House of Commons, leaving the three main pro-Union parties - Labour, Conservative, and the Liberal Democrats - with one Member of Parliament (MP) each.

      This of course, came only eight months after the referendum in which 55% of Scottish voters decided against the separation and for keeping the Union together on a record turn-out of nearly 85% of the electorate. However, 45% decided to opt for separation and to break up Britain, and the SNP successfully converted that 45% into votes for the General Election, which resulted in half - a slight majority - of voters voting for the SNP on a turn-out of 71%, and this translated into the SNP taking nearly all of Scotland's seats in the Commons.

      On the face of it, it would appear that the SNP represents all of Scotland, but this belies the fact that Scotland is a divided country - with another of half of voters not voting for the SNP. However, since that vote was largely split between the three main pro-Union parties, it meant that the party of separation was able to pull off its impressive victory.

     With this has come the feeling that Scottish independence is now all but inevitable, especially since the election also produced an unexpected Conservative Party parliamentary majority throughout the United Kingdom as a whole - the first in a generation - under Prime Minister David Cameron, who had previously governed in coalition with the Liberal Democrats. In Scotland, the Conservatives (a.k.a., the Tories) took 434,097 votes, which was an increase of 20,000 votes from the last General Election in 2010, but on a reduced share of 14.9%, resulting in them retaining their sole MP north of the Border.

      The narrative for the last 30-40 years has been that Scotland has had Tory governments it didn't elect, and now that Scotland has seemingly rejected all of the main UK parties for the SNP with a majority Conservative government running the whole of the UK, it has become easy to say that the end of the Union is upon us.

     There is no question that the situation does not present the best circumstances for the pro-Union parties and for the people in Scotland and throughout the UK as a whole who believe in the Union and wish for it to continue. However, to say that the end is inevitable may be premature. Again, despite winning nearly all of Scotland's parliamentary constituencies, the SNP secured only a razor-thin majority of the popular vote, and the party is still some way off from convincing a majority of voters to opt for separation, especially in light of the economic circumstances and question of whether an independent Scotland could be economically feasible.

     There is still a case to be made for keeping the UK together - economically, socially, and politically - and this blog will attempt to do its bit in doing that. On a personal level, I see the UK as a great country with a rich history and enormous potential going forward, and it would be an absolute tragedy to see it broken up. Yes, it is not perfect and has many faults, and it is also understandable that there is cynicism and dissatisfaction with the political system. However, too much is a stake to see the country break-up altogether.

     This blog will not try not to focus too much on the past referendum, for this will be the focus on my book on the three years of the referendum itself, which is currently in progress.

      What I hope to do here is discuss the current situation, including the politics and economics as it relates the UK and Scotland's place within it. There will also be discussion on the way forward for a Britain that appears to be heading down the road of federalism, and how such a system - far from weakening the Union, can actually serve to strengthen it as a lasting constitutional settlement. The problem with devolution thus far is that it has been asymmetrical and piecemeal - with seemingly little regard for how devolution in one part of the UK affects other parts, as well as the UK itself as a whole.

     A federal settlement decided by a convention or commission will, in my opinion, go a long way in bringing stability to a system that has so far gotten by on tradition, custom, and inertia.

      But of course, it will take more than a settlement on paper to ensure that Britain remains together. On this point, I also intend to discuss the UK as a social and cultural, as well as economic and political entity - with a focus on the institutions and people that make the UK what it is. The UK is greater than the sum of its constituent parts, and I hope that I can talk about how everyone from Shetland to Land's End contributes to British culture, society, and identity.

      Scotland voted decisively to maintain the Union. Now it is time to ensure that this decision stands and forge ahead with bringing Scotland and whole of the United Kingdom (including Scotland) together for a better future.