Here are a number of things that the Westminster parties’ response to the narrowing Scottish independence polls have definitely not been. Absolutely definitely not.
1. A cobbled-together response
The three parties deciding to announce the new powers for Scotland and timetable for the handover of those powers in the event of a ‘No’ vote may, to the untrained eye, have looked like a last-minute, last-ditch attempt to reverse the fortunes of the Better Together campaign. But no, argued Nick Clegg today when he sat before the the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. ‘I don’t accept the characterisation this has all been sort of cobbled together at the last minute.’ The Deputy Prime Minister argued that the ‘breakthrough statement’ on further powers came in August when all three party leaders agreed that there was an ‘irreversible process of devolution to Scotland’.
That as may be, but Gordon Brown’s announcement yesterday might never have materialised had the polls not narrowed.
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