Documents newly released reveal how, in 1977, the heavyweights of the civil service rallied against Labour plans to give power to Scotland

CIVIL servants wanted Labour ministers to ditch their Scottish devolution policy in the 1970s, as they feared the plan could break up the United Kingdom, according to newly-declassified documents.

Whitehall officials said home rule was "potentially destructive of national unity" and discussed ways of "distracting" Scots from constitutional change.

They suggested giving Scottish MPs more debating time at Westminster as an alternative to a legislative assembly.

The fears have been revealed following last week's release of hundreds of government files by the National Archives in Edinburgh.

The period covered, 1977, was significant, as it was the time when prime minister Jim Callaghan's Labour government was trying to push through its plan for a Scottish Assembly.

At the time, Scottish secretary Bruce Millan, leader of the house Michael Foot and junior minister John Smith were strong supporters of home rule, despite misgivings of Labour backbenchers.

The government's devolution bill, which included Scotland and Wales, was dealt a blow in February 1977 when the government lost a "guillotine motion" to curtail debate on the legislation.

According to the files, defeat prompted Michael Foot to propose to Cabinet a "strictly confidential" study of the options, such as "whether there could be some other form of devolution decentralisation rather than devolution".

This prompted a flurry of letters from senior mandarins to the Cabinet Office, in which their hostility to devolution was revealed.

A senior official in the civil service department said of home rule: "It may be that devolution, as we tried to warn ministers in 1974, cannot be established on any stable basis and is all too likely to end in separation. The problems inherent in constitutional change are likely to prove intractable."

He added: "It would seem that the minds of the Scots and the Welsh might be distracted from major constitutional change if, and perhaps only if, they could see some early prospect of a major assault on their deep-seated economic problems."

The second permanent secretary of the Treasury, Leo Pliatzky, was also scathing. He wrote of the devolution plans: "There must be doubt, therefore, whether any set of institutional proposals can be devised to resolve the deadlock - and we have doubts, of a different kind, whether a primarily institutional approach is the right one at all."

He added: "This letter reflects boldly the thoughts of those of us in the Treasury directly concerned at an official level with devolution matters."

The environment department's most senior civil servant also savaged the concept of home rule.

"Starting from a desire for devolution in Scotland, we could end up with a total upheaval of both central and local government in England of a kind which is unwanted, unnecessary, irrelevant and expensive. It would be the tail wagging the dog with a vengeance," he wrote.

Arthur Peterson, permanent under secretary at the Home Office, also expressed hostility to the assembly plans.

"The effect of all this is to imbalance the system of government of the UK to such an extent that many people have become fearful of its continued stability.

"I think we should consider whether we ought not to advise ministers that the issues raised by this first attempt at devolution are too potentially destructive of national unity to be subordinated to short-term considerations."

Meanwhile, civil servants floated policy alternatives to a Scottish Assembly, such as "devolution within parliament", which amounted to Scottish MPs having a regular period in the chamber for their own business.

Another civil servant paper, entitled Fallback Options, asked whether ministerial representation at the Scottish Office could be strengthened, or whether Scottish ministers could control social and industrial spending as part of the block grant.

However, the then Scottish secretary, Bruce Millan, was dismissive of non-devolution ideas.

Tony Benn, then a Labour Cabinet minister, noted in his diaries at the time of the government losing the guillotine motion: "Quite what will happen in Scotland and Wales I don't know. It could become a nasty situation, very quickly."

A new devolution bill, this one separate from Wales, was then introduced in November 1977, but the project failed two years later after an insufficient number of Scots voted for home rule in a referendum.

Tam Dalyell, the former Labour MP and critic of devolution, said of the released files: "I knew the civil servants were against it because they told me, but they were in an awkward position because they couldn't make public statements. Beyond that, Jim Callaghan didn't believe in it and Dennis Healey thought it was balls."

Bruce Millan said: "The civil service don't count at the end of day. It was a government policy and ministers ran the show.

"Quite frankly, I couldn't care what the Home Office civil servants thought about it, or anything else."

An SNP spokesman said: "There was clearly a Whitehall culture opposed to the very principle of devolution in the 1970s, which is a key reason why it was not delivered, even though a majority voted Yes in the referendum.

"Thirty years on and there is still resistance to devolving powers to Scotland - ironically the main obstacle now is the Scotland Office, as we have seen in relation to air weapons, the drink-driving limit, and even responsibility for running the Scottish elections."