Date: 29 June 2009 BROCKLEBANK REFLECTS ON TEN YEARS OF DEVOLUTION “When the people of Scotland voted for devolution they wanted a greater expression of self-government. Over the past ten years devolution has provided them with this. There have been many ups and downs on the way, most notably the cost of the new parliament building at Holyrood, but it is pleasing that a recent poll showed more than half of those questioned believed devolution had provided the Scottish people with a ‘stronger voice’.
“The Conservatives originally opposed devolution but we accepted the settled will of the people and are now firmly behind it. It has been particularly pleasing that in recent years we have been able to influence matters more than we had in the early days of devolution. By strategically aligning ourselves with the Government we were able to gain concessions in this year’s budget which totalled £234 million. This included a £60 million Town Centre Regeneration Fund, a cut in business rates for small businesses and a national strategy for drugs.
“Devolution has also shown that the Scottish Conservatives are going from strength to strength and the future is definitely looking bright for our party. In 2007 we saw four Scottish Conservative MSPs elected on the first past the post system, which was a very encouraging increase from 1999 when we had no members elected as constituency MSPs.
“The Scottish Parliament has allowed for greater consideration to be given to issues affecting the Scottish people and this has resulted in some very important changes in our country. The most notable achievement of the Scottish Parliament has undoubtedly been the introduction of the smoking ban. Scotland led the rest of the UK in introducing the smoking ban and it has proved to be a tremendous success.
“However, the current settlement is by no means perfect and there is certainly room for improvement. Since devolution began, the majority of the Scottish public have continually said that they do not want independence, but a strong and robust devolution settlement. The Calman Commission has provided proposals for how best to improve devolution within the Union and, while we will not be bound into accepting Calman’s proposals, the Scottish Conservatives will carefully look at his recommendations to see how we can improve and advance devolution.”
| 
