One of the most interesting effects of the Scottish referendum has been the way in which it has accelerated the momentum towards more devolution to the cities and regions of the UK.
Scottish councils were making the case for more regional powers well before the vote in September, but in the weeks since the vote the argument has attracted more and more supporters across the country, with both the Tories and Labour backing the idea of increased autonomy for cities in England. The UK Government has also announced plans to transfer powers to Greater Manchester, giving councils in the region control over policing, transport, social care and other areas. The direction of travel, away from the centre, now seems clear.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Glasgow City Council leader Gordon Matheson has always been a supporter of such regional devolution, and last night he explored his ideas in more detail in a speech at Glasgow University. Transferring powers to cities, he said, helps boost regions which, in turn, helps drive the national economy. But there is a problem as far as he sees it: the Scottish Government had been slow to embrace the idea.
The Scottish Government did sign a City Deal with Glasgow earlier this year that will bring millions of extra investment into the city, but in his speech last night Mr Matheson said Holyrood only came on board after the UK Government announced its support. Glasgow's leader believes the Scottish Government is a centraliser by instinct and design and that Nicola Sturgeon and her colleagues see devolution as transferring power from one nation to another. Mr Matheson sees it differently. "Scotland should have more powers," he said, "but Holyrood should have fewer."
There is a lot of truth, and promise, in what Mr Matheson has to say. The Scottish Government has indeed demonstrated centralising tendencies and has been slow to acknowledge that the way it feels about London is similar to the way that some regions of Scotland feel about Edinburgh, most notably Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles, whose councils have been calling for more powers for some time.
The case for devolving power to regions is also strong economically and politically. It is better to have the power to make decisions close to those who live with the consequences of those decisions but, as Mr Matheson pointed out, the cities agenda also offers the prospect of a solution to some of the constitutional imbalances in the UK that more power for Scotland is likely to increase. Not only that, a revitalised local government structure with more regional powers might help reinvigorate local democracy and reverse some of the shockingly low voter turn-outs.
Reform will not be easy though, and the prospect of more local powers should be part of wider change (to the number of councils, for example, which is too high). But there is a growing appetite for more devolution not just in Scotland but across the UK and, as part of it, our cities should enjoy greater autonomy and responsibility for their own success.
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