Vote won: Now fresh battles loom, What Scotland's 'No' vote means for David Cameron
September 19, 2014 -- Updated 1049 GMT (1849 HKT)
Editor's note: Robin
Oakley was political editor and columnist for The Times newspaper in
London from 1986 to 1992, the BBC's political editor from 1992 to 2000,
and CNN's European Political Editor between 2000 and 2008.
London (CNN) -- David Cameron has had the narrowest
of political escapes. Success for the "Better Together" campaign has
saved him from catastrophe: he will not, after all, live on in history
as the Prime Minister on whose watch the Scottish nation chose to leave
the United Kingdom. But serious questions will now be asked in his party
and in the country about his future.
Cameron will also face an
almighty battle in Parliament to deliver the consolation prize of
greatly enhanced powers for the Scottish Parliament, the so-called "Devo
Max" package, which he was forced to concede in the panicky latter
stages of the No campaign.
On Friday morning, the
tired but relieved-looking Premier told reporters at 10 Downing Street
that it would have broken his heart to see Scotland leave the UK.
"The people of Scotland
have spoken," Cameron said. "They have kept our country of four nations
together, and like millions of other people, I am delighted."
Cameron 'delighted' with Scotland vote
British media: Scotland votes no
First Minister of Scotland concedes
Scotland and England's rocky relationship
Cameron called on the
country to move forward with a "balanced settlement, fair to the people
of Scotland -- and importantly, to everyone in England, Wales and
Northern Ireland as well."
But although Scottish
voters ultimately rejected independence by a margin of 55% to 45%, this
story is far from over for Cameron.
Did Gordon Brown save it?
Cameron and his party
were not the only ones to blame for a referendum campaign that so nearly
led to the break-up of the United Kingdom. But he is being widely
blamed for a variety of tactical and strategic errors. Many members of
Parliament (MPs) will say that he and the "Better Together" campaign
were only rescued by the campaigning fervor and passion of the former
Labour Party leader and Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Cameron had sought to
detach the questions of Scottish independence and his own future.
Warning the Scots that what they were walking into was not a trial
separation but a final break, he pleaded with them not to throw away the
union in a protest vote just because they disliked him and his party.
(Of the 59 Scottish seats in the Westminster Parliament only one is held
by a Conservative MP).
Insisting on the
finality of a constitutional divorce was probably his best card. But in
emphasizing that the question on the ballot paper was not his future but
the future of the union, Cameron was also acknowledging that he is held
to blame by many for boosting the nationalist vote.
Where Cameron went wrong
He is blamed firstly for
the terms he agreed on the staging of the referendum. Critics lambast
Cameron now for giving Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond two
years to build momentum for his cause, and for opening the vote to 16
year olds. They blame him for agreeing to a ballot paper question which
meant that the supporters of independence were the ones campaigning for a
"Yes" while their opponents were bound to look negative in seeking a
"No."
They blame him for
agreeing to let one vote decide the issue: when a Labour government in
the 1970s agreed to a referendum on setting up a Scottish Parliament it
insisted that 40% of those voting must approve the change. There was a
majority for the Parliament but the 40% margin was not achieved and the
Scots had to wait another 20 years for their own Parliament.
Above all, the critics
insist Cameron was wrong to exclude from the ballot paper the compromise
option of the so-called "Devo Max" — a huge extension in the
tax-raising and spending powers of the Scottish Parliament. This
devolution of power from London to Edinburgh appealed to many as an
achievable compromise which would have taken the steam out of the
separatist case. But Cameron overruled such advice, only to find that he
and the other Westminster party leaders were forced to concede Devo Max
anyway — win or lose the vote — as the campaign threatened to run away
from them.
Even during the lead-up
to the vote, when many Conservative MPs kept quiet for fear of making
things worse for the Better Together campaign, some were warning that
the concessions on Devo Max wrung from Cameron by Gordon Brown might not
be deliverable.
What comes next?
Conservative MPs are
already vociferously demanding that any concessions to the Scottish
Parliament must be balanced by greater powers for the English regions --
namely, by reducing the number of Scottish MPs in the Westminster
Parliament and by ending the process whereby Scottish MPs at Westminster
can vote on English-only matters while English MPs have no say in
matters delegated to the Scottish Parliament.
As a moderate and
pragmatic politician, Cameron has had an uneasy tenure already over a
right-leaning party growing ever more Euro-skeptic as it faces the rise
of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP). The further
difficulties he will face in pushing through legislation to honor his
commitments to the Scots will do nothing to add to his authority.
But Cameron will breathe
a sigh of relief at a partial reprieve: had he seen the Scots depart
from the UK he might well have faced a rebellion in his party which
could have gone as far as the tabling of a vote of no confidence in his
leadership -- a process which requires 15% of his MPs (46 of them) to
sign up to the proposition.
For the moment at least
he soldiers on. But there is further trouble looming. Opinion polls
indicate that next month his party will lose its first Parliament seat
to UKIP in a by-election caused by the defection of former Tory MP
Douglas Carswell.
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