Leader: Wendy Alexander's road-map to fiscal maturity

Published on Wednesday 2 March 2011 14:24

Stretching to some 239 pages, the report of Holyrood's Scotland Bill committee, chaired by Labour's Wendy Alexander, is a substantial document and a document of substance.

It is thorough, examining the Westminster proposals to give more powers to Scotland with a critically forensic eye, and analytical. More important than the impressive committee work are the proposals it makes and the impact it will have on the debate over Scotland's constitutional future. In this respect, Ms Alexander's report is the most significant development since the publication of the Scotland Bill, which heralded the setting up of the Scottish Parliament more than a decade ago.

For the committee has made recommendations that go far beyond the plans drawn up by the Calman Commission - set up by Ms Alexander with the Tories and the Liberal Democrats and which formed the basis of the current Scotland Bill - by calling for a wide range of new powers to be devolved to Holyrood, with not even corporation tax ruled out in the longer term. We have argued Scotland needs "fiscal freedom", power to raise its revenue and bringing fiscal responsibility over spending. Ms Alexander's committee has not gone that far and, unsurprisingly, its plans have been dismissed by the SNP - odd though that is for a "gradualist" nationalist party. But if Westminster politicians are brave enough to implement these proposals, they will take Scotland much further down the road to fiscal and political maturity. As she leaves Holyrood, that could be Ms Alexander's legacy.