SNP shelves Burns Night independence referendum bill launch

Published on Tuesday 19 January 2010 21:46

ALEX Salmond has ditched his plans to publish an independence referendum bill to coincide with Burns Night.

Opponents have accused the SNP of delaying the publication to make sure the referendum is still a live issue during the general election campaign.

For two years the First Minister has made it clear that 25 January was the day he was "looking at" to publish his flagship bill. In May 2008, he said: "If you are launching a referendum bill you should launch on a propitious day."

But last night a spokesman for Mr Salmond confirmed the bill would not be handed to the parliament until late next week.

Normally it takes three weeks to clear the competency of a bill, and this means, with a one-week holiday for Holyrood next month, it is unlikely to be published until the end of February.

Last night, there was speculation in Holyrood that the delay was because the SNP did not want the referendum killed off quickly.

Mr Salmond recently admitted to The Scotsman that the economy, rather than constitutional matters, would be the number one issue for voters.

The Scottish Government loses control of a bill as soon as it is published. This means that, through agreement on the parliamentary bureau, the unionist parties could kill off the bill in a fortnight, by having a truncated committee stage and then voting it down on the first reading.

If published on Monday, it could have been dead by the middle of February. But by delaying it, the bureau will not see it until March, and with another two-week recess in April it would fall just before the expected election date, 6 May.

Last night, Mr Salmond's spokesman denied the delay was anything to do with an election.

He said: "The Scottish Government is focused on the budget at the moment."

INDIE ARTISTS

CULTURE minister Fiona Hyslop has claimed that Scotland would have more artists if it was independent.

At the Celtic Connections festival she said: "A more confident nation leads to an even more creative one – a virtuous circle of increasing confidence and creativity."

But critics have pointed out that Robert Burns, Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson all wrote after the Act of Union.

And Scottish composer James MacMillan warned: "Over the last 100 years the best breeding ground for imagination was in totalitarian dictatorships. Now, that might happen in an independent Scotland, but ah hae ma doots."