‘Considerable offer’ of post-Brexit powers for UK’s devolved governments
A senior UK minister yesterday sought to defuse tensions with the constituent nations of the United Kingdom and insisted that powers returned from Brussels would be fairly shared when Britain leaves the EU next year.
David Lidington said that some nationalists wanted to use Brexit to loosen or sever the centuries-old ties that have bound England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland into a union.
“Such an outcome would leave every one of our four nations both weaker and poorer,” he said in a speech in Wales.
“We are all more prosperous and more secure when we all work together for our common good as one United Kingdom,” said Mr Lidington, effectively deputy to Prime Minister Theresa May.
Politicians in Wales and Scotland have been critical of the government’s approach to Brexit and the question of who would control powers over issues such as fishing and the environment after March 2019.
Devolved governments in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales were all given powers in the 1990s. Scotland rejected full independence during a referendum in 2014 but bucked the UK trend and voted to remain in the EU in 2016.
Nicola Sturgeon – Scotland’s first minister and head of the pro-independence Scottish National Party – has bandoned plans for another independence vote until after Brexit but has said she would not agree to a “power grab” by Westminster.
Mr Lidington said yesterday that Westminster made a “considerable offer” to commit to sending the vast majority of powers brought back from the EU to the devolved governments in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Stormont.
But he also said that some powers were the purview of the UK as a whole.
Mr Lidington’s appeal for unity was rejected by Scotland’s Brexit minister, Michael Russell, a member of the SNP.
“The UK government’s approach to date makes a mockery of claims of a partnership of equals,” he said.