From the Act of Union to the Scotland Act, the United Kingdom in the twenty-first century and beyond.
A Scottish Parliament
Debates continued about Scotland’s position in the United Kingdom throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
By the 1970s there was a political consensus that power ought to be devolved to a Scottish assembly sitting in Edinburgh, although the Scottish National Party – which secured 11 MPs at the October 1974 general election – believed that Scotland should again be completely independent from England.
The result of a referendum held in March 1979, however, did not endorse the 1978 Scotland Act by a sufficient margin.
Broad consensus for change
The devolution debate ebbed and flowed during the 1980s but by the following decade there was again a broad consensus that power should be transferred to an assembly based in Edinburgh.
Another referendum held in September 1997 produced a large majority for devolution and, following Parliament’s endorsement of the Scotland Act in 1998, the first elections were held to the newly created Scottish Parliament in May 1999.
Control of much domestic policy
This has control of a wide range of domestic Scottish policy including health and education but, despite the view that devolution has been called the settled will of the Scottish people, debates continue about whether or not the Scottish Parliament should have more powers, or become completely independent.
Referendum 2014?
In January 2012, the Scottish Government put forward proposals for a referendum on Scottish independence to be held in 2014, with a draft referendum Bill scheduled for debate in autumn 2013.
So Scotland’s relationship with England, and its status within the United Kingdom, remains a live issue more than three centuries after the Act of Union.