Alex Salmond accepts defeat and presses for new Holyrood powers
Thirty months after launching the pro-independence campaign, the first minister of Scotland conceded that his opponents had won the referendum, with the final result expected to put the no vote at 55%.
First minister says pro-independence vote was ‘substantial’ and he expects fast delivery of measures for Scottish parliamenthttp://www.theguardian.com/politics/video/2014/sep/19/alex-salmond-defeat-no-vote-independence-devolution-video
In a dignified speech to a solemn Scottish National party (SNP) rally in Edinburgh, Salmond said that although the Highland region had yet to declare, «we know that there’s going to be a majority for the no campaign. And it is important to say that our referendum was an agreed and consented process and Scotland has, by a majority, decided not at this stage to become an independent country. And I accept that verdict of the people. And I call on all of Scotland to follow suit in accepting the democratic verdict of the people of Scotland.»
The leader of the Yes Scotland campaign had understood he was likely to lose before the vote counting began on Thursday night. He cancelled an expected appearance at the count for his own constituency in Aberdeenshire, flying by private jet from Aberdeen to Edinburgh.
He then avoided the national count centre at Ingliston showground, beside Edinburgh airport, and headed instead to the Dynamic Earth science centre, where the SNP had hoped to stage a victory party.
Salmond said he was due to speak to David Cameron shortly after making his speech, signalling immediately that he would press the prime minister to deliver on the latest promise of more powers.
To raucous cheers and applause, Salmond told the rally that 1.6 million people had voted for independence – a «substantial vote». The turnout was one of the highest ever, he said, at 86%. It was a «triumph for democracy» and a vindication of the decision to stage the referendum.
But he issued repeated warnings that he expected quick delivery of the package of new powers promised several times by Cameron, Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, and Labour leader, Ed Miliband, which had been driven by the «fear and scares of the Westminster establishment» when they saw how quickly backing for independence had surged.
In reference to a signed statement printed on the front page of the Daily Record on Tuesday – a statement likely to have hardened the pro-UK Labour vote – Salmond said: «The unionist parties made vows late in the campaign to devolve more powers to Scotland. Scotland will expect these to be honoured in rapid form.»
He said the parties had promised that a Scotland bill containing new tax and welfare powers would have a second reading by 27 March 2015.
«Not just the 1.6 million Scots who voted for independence will demand that the timetable will be followed, but all Scots who participated in this referendum will demand that that timetable is followed,» he said.
The first minister said the referendum had empowered hundreds of thousands of Scots who had been marginalised from mainstream politics. «It is something so valuable, it has to be cherished, preserved and built upon.»
He said Scottish politics had been revolutionised by the campaign: «I don’t think that they will allow business as usual politics again.»
19 de septiembre de 2014
Escocia rechaza la independencia
El “no” parece haber triunfado con la mayoría de los distritos electorales escrutados. Vídeo
Por Agencia EFE
Encuestas a boca de urna indicaban que los resultados eran muy cerrados. (AP)
Edimburgo – La campaña del «no» a la independencia de Escocia se impondrá en el referéndum celebrado el jueves, según predijo hoy la cadena británica BBC a falta de escrutar seis distritos electorales.
Los unionistas suman un respaldo del 54 %, a falta de adjudicar seis de los 32 distritos electorales, entre ellos Edimburgo, pero la distancia con el «sí», que tiene ahora el 46 %, es ya inalcanzable, según la BBC.
La victoria del «sí» en la principal ciudad de Escocia, Glasgow, con un 53 % de los votos, no fue suficiente para alcanzar al bando unionista, que se ha impuesto en la gran parte de las circunscripciones.
En Glasgow hubo una participación del 75 %, de 364,664 censados, por debajo de la media cercana al 85 % en toda Escocia.
Hasta el momento, 1, 176, 952 personas han votado a favor de la independencia de Escocia, mientras que 1, 397, 077 la han rechazado, lo que para la BBC es suficiente para predecir que el «no» se impondrá en el referéndum.
Solo cuatro de 24 distritos electorales escrutados han elegido el «sí»: Glasgow, Dundee, North Lanarkshire y West Dunbartonshire.
La viceministra principal escocesa y número dos del Partido Nacionalista Escocés (SNP), Nicola Sturgeon, ha declarado que, aunque el resultado aún no está decidido, «acepta» lo que las estadísticas «podrían estar indicando».
También señaló que, sea cual sea el resultado de la votación, el pueblo escocés «ha pedido un cambio» y se mostró dispuesta a trabajar con cualquiera que lo facilite.
Se espera que el ministro principal escocés y líder del SNP, Alex Salmond -principal promotor del referéndum-, comparezca en las próximas horas en el centro nacional de recuento, cerca del aeropuerto de Edimburgo.
Todavía queda por conocer el voto en la capital escocesa, donde las encuestas arrojaban un triunfo del «no».
Leve ventaja del No en referendo de Escocia
Escoceses votarán si se mantienen como parte del Reino Unido u obtienen la independencia
19 September 2014Last updated at 04:37 ET
Scottish referendum: Scotland votes ‘No’ to independence
Scotland has voted to stay in the United Kingdom after voters decisively rejected independence.
With the results in from all 32 council areas, the «No» side won with 2,001,926 votes over 1,617,989 for «Yes».
Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond called for unity and urged the unionist parties to deliver on more powers.
UK Prime Minister David Cameron said he was delighted the UK would remain together and said the commitments on extra powers would be honoured.
Mr Cameron said the three main unionist parties at Westminster would now follow through with their pledge of more powers for the Scottish Parliament.
«We will ensure that those commitments are honoured in full,» he said.
He announced that Lord Smith of Kelvin, who led Glasgow’s staging of the Commonwealth Games, would oversee the process to take forward the commitments, with new powers over tax, spending and welfare to be agreed by November, and draft legislation published by January.
The prime minister also acknowledged that the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland must have a bigger say over their affairs.
And he promised a resolution to the West Lothian question – the fact that Scottish MPs can vote on English issues at Westminster.
Royal Bank of Scotland said it would keep its headquarters in Scotland following the «No» vote.
Wales’s First Minister Carwyn Jones said he was pleased Scotland voted to stay in the Union, adding: «Together we will shape a new constitutional future for the UK.»
Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson said he was «delighted» Scotland would remain in the Union and he would hold talks with his Welsh counterpart to discuss the wider implications.
Scotland rejected independence by 55% to 45%. For latest results and full coverage, go to bbc.co.uk/scotland-decides.
The result became a mathematical certainty at 06:08, as the returning officer in Fife announced a comfortable No vote.
Shortly afterwards, Mr Salmond said he accepted the defeat and called for national unity.
He said the referendum and the high turnout had been a «triumph for the democratic process» and promised to keep his pledge in the Edinburgh Agreement which paved the way for the referendum to respect the result and work for the benefit of Scotland and the United Kingdom.
The moment the No side won an unassailable lead over the Yes camp
He told supporters: «The unionist parties made vows late in the campaign to devolve more powers to Scotland.
«Scotland will expect these to be honoured in rapid course – as a reminder, we have been promised a second reading of a Scotland Bill by March 27 next year.
And the First Minister said: «Whatever else we can say about this referendum campaign, we have touched sections of the community who have never before been touched by politics, these sections of the community have touched us and touched the political process.»
In a rallying call to his supporters, Mr Salmond urged the Yes voters to reflect on how far they had come.
«I don’t think any of us, whenever we entered politics, would have thought such a thing to be either credible or possible,» he said.
«Over the last few weeks we have seen a scare and a fear of enormous proportions – not a scaremongering directed at the Scottish people but the scare and the fear at the heart of the Westminster establishment as they realise the mass movement of people that was going forward in Scotland.
Alex Salmond and David Cameron react to the result
«Today of all days as we bring Scotland together, let us not dwell on the distance we have fallen short, let us dwell on the distance we have travelled and have confidence the movement is abroad in Scotland that will take this nation forward and we shall go forward as one nation.»
This margin of victory for the Better Together campaign – 55% to 45% – was greater by about 3% than that anticipated by the final opinion polls. The winning total needed was 1,852,828.
What the ‘No’ vote means for Scotland and rest of the UK
Speaking in Downing Street, Mr Cameron said the result was decisive.
He said: «Now the debate has been settled for a generation, or as Alex Salmond has said: ‘Perhaps for a lifetime’.
«So there can be no disputes, no re-runs; we have heard the will of the Scottish people.»
The prime minister also spoke of the implications for the other nations of the UK.
‘English voices’
«In Wales there are proposals to give the Welsh Government and Assembly more powers and I want Wales to be at the heart of the debate on how to make the United Kingdom work for all our nations,» he said.
«In Northern Ireland, we must work to ensure that the devolved institutions function effectively.»
Mr Cameron said «millions of voices of England must also be heard».
«The question of English votes for English laws, the so-called West Lothian question, requires a decisive answer so just as Scotland will vote separately in the Scottish Parliament on their issues on tax, spending and welfare, so too England as well as Wales and Northern Ireland should be able to vote on these issues.
«And all this must take place in tandem with and at the same pace as the settlement for Scotland.»
The people have spoken. But it’s not over.
BBC political editor Nick Robinson
The people have spoken. Scotland has rejected independence. The result has been accepted by both sides. So that you might think is that. Not a bit of it.
The fact that over 1.5m British citizens voted to break away from the rest of the UK, the fact that a majority in Scotland’s biggest city – Glasgow – backed independence, the fact that the Westminster establishment briefly thought this vote was lost, is the reason for that.
The leaders of the three UK parties are now promising significant constitutional change and not just for Scotland but for England, Wales and Northern Ireland as well.
They have agreed on a timetable for giving more powers to the Scottish Parliament but are a long, long way from agreeing proposals.
Alistair Darling, who led the Better Together campaign, said the people of Scotland had «chosen unity over division and positive change rather than needless separation».
«It is a momentous result for Scotland and also for the United Kingdom as a whole,» he said.
Mr Darling said the result had «reaffirmed all that we have in common and the bonds that tie us together», adding: «Let them never be broken.»
«As we celebrate, let us also listen,» he said.
«More than 85% of the Scottish population has voted. People who were disengaged from politics have turned out in large numbers.
«While they have voted on the constitution, that was not the only or perhaps the major issue that drove them to the polls.
«Every political party must listen to their cry for change, which could be echoed in every part of our United Kingdom but had this opportunity to express itself in Scotland.»
Constitutional revolution on the way
Analysis by Andrew Marr
What started as a vote on whether Scotland would leave the UK has ended with an extraordinary constitutional revolution announced outside Downing Street by the Prime Minister.
It throws down the gauntlet to the Labour Party, and hints that we are going to see very big change coming and it had better come quickly.
We always used to be told that if you laid all the economists in the world end to end they still wouldn’t reach a conclusion and I think that could be said often about parliamentary committees and inquiries and commissions.
Well, it can’t happen this time because it’s not taking place in a sealed room with the Westminster parties, the old smug consensus, getting round an argument with each other as before.
This is really taking place in a huge glass house, being watched by all the Scottish voters and by millions of people around the UK.
What the Scottish shock has done is produce a constitutional revolution on a very, very tight timetable. Possibly the most exciting political story in my lifetime.
Mr Darling thanked his «great team of volunteers» who had worked on the Better Together campaign.
He added: «You represent the majority of opinion. Your voices have been heard. We have taken on the argument and won. The silent have spoken.»
Mr Salmond’s deputy, Nicola Sturgeon, said in an earlier concession statement that there was a «real sense of disappointment that we have fallen narrowly short of securing a ‘Yes’ vote».
But she said the country had been «changed forever» and vowed to work with «anyone in any way» to secure more powers for Scotland.
Across Scotland, the «No» vote was a majority in 28 of the country’s 32 local authority areas.
Glasgow, Scotland’s largest council area and the third largest city in Britain, voted in favour of independence by 194,779 to 169,347, with Dundee, West Dunbartonshire and North Lanarkshire also voting «Yes».
But Edinburgh, the nation’s capital, rejected independence by 194,638 to 123,927, while Aberdeen City voted «No» by a margin of more than 20,000 votes.
19 September 2014Last updated at 01:21 ET
Scotland votes ‘No’: How the ‘No’ side won the referendum
By Vanessa BarfordBBC News
Scotland has voted No to independence in a referendum, meaning its 300-year old union with the UK will continue. So how did the No campaign win?
The No side had a head a start
1. They were always the favourites
The No camp had a head start. When the Edinburgh Agreement was signed on 15 October 2012, paving the way for a referendum in 2014, polls suggested about a third of Scotland’s 4.2m voters wanted independence.
A plethora of polls over the next 18 months consistently put the No camp ahead.
In June – by which time there had been 65 opinion polls – all bar one had put the No side in the lead, according to polling expert Professor John Curtice.
«The No side were always favourites to win, which is why the YouGov poll for the Sunday Times which put the Yes vote ahead about 10 days ago created such an upset,» he says.
Happily for the No side, most of the following polls put them back in the lead again and they were able to finish ahead of the underdogs on polling day.
One in three Scots say they are «equally Scottish and British»
2. The Scottish feel British
A resurgence of Britishness – either caused by, or coinciding with the referendum – is credited with giving the pro-union No campaign a boost.
The number of people living in Scotland who chose British as their national identity rose from 15% in 2011 to 23% in 2014, according to the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey. The number of people who chose Scottish fell from 75% to 65% over the same period.
However, there is also evidence that the rising tide of British sentiment in Scotland has taken place over a longer timescale.
Almost one third of Scots now say they are «equally Scottish and British» – the highest proportion since former Labour PM Tony Blair came to office in 1997, according to the survey. Less than one in four describe themselves as «Scottish not British».
«At the end of the day, Scotland still feels moderately British,» says Prof Curtice.
No leaflets often emphasised risks such as pensions, jobs and money
3. The risk factor
The No campaign came under fire from the Yes campaign for being negative, with some dubbing it «Project Fear».
However, the No vote suggests Better Together was successful in «drawing people back from the prospect of taking a risk that was not necessary,» according to Prof Curtice. Just two days ahead of the polls, voters were twice as likely (49%) to regard independence as a risk than staying in the Union (25%), he says.
In April, Scotland’s First Minster Alex Salmond called the No campaign «the most miserable, negative, depressing and thoroughly boring» in modern times. In contrast, he said the «Yes» campaign was «positive, uplifting and hopeful».
More recently the leader of the SNP criticised the «scaremongering» of No, saying the Yes side was «determined to focus on opportunity».
The Better Together campaign always denied being too negative, saying the campaign was a positive one, emphasising what the union had achieved with Scotland in it, and how much more could be done when the UK «stands together».
However, it often accused Mr Salmond of not giving answers, with Mr Darling saying voters were «very alive to the risks» and uncertainty of independence.
Earlier this week, UK Prime Minister David Cameron told Scottish voters it was his «duty» to warn them of the stark costs of a «painful divorce».
What the ‘No’ vote means for Scotland and rest of the UK
The YouGov poll for the Sunday Times suggested that 51% planned to back independence
4. They stemmed the Yes surge
The Sunday Times YouGov poll which put the Yes camp in the lead 10 days ago led to a surge of momentum, and increased mobilisation, in the Yes camp. Suddenly the prospect of a victory was in sight.
The response of the No camp was swift. Mr Cameron and labour leader Ed Miliband skipped their weekly Prime Minister’s Questions clash to travel to Scotland. Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg went too. The Saltire was flown above Downing Street.
Former prime minister Gordon Brown, who has high approval ratings in Scotland, set out a timetable for boosting the Scottish Parliament’s powers if voters reject independence, promising a draft new law for a new Scotland Act would be published in January.
Prof Curtice says the interventions of «the three wise men heading north» didn’t really change people’s opinions of devolution, or their view on the referendum. It did yield an eight point rise in those who thought Scotland would get more more powers though, he says.
What the No campaign’s final actions successfully managed was to halt the momentum of the Yes campaign. «It stemmed the tide,» he says.
Currency was a key issue in the referendum debate
5. For richer, for poorer?
This was one of the biggest questions for voters, if not the biggest question.
Both sides battled hard over the economy, with claims and counter-claims over currency, oil and business playing a big part of the debate. The No vote suggests Scots were not convinced that an independent Scotland would be better off.
The pound was at the heart of the disagreement, with the Scottish government consistently stressing a currency union would be in the «best interest» of both Scotland and the rest of the UK – something the UK government strenuously rejected, along with a currency union.
How much of the North Sea oil it would be entitled to – and what it might be worth – and the future of financial institutions and businesses north of the border were also the subject of heated discussion.
So was the amount of money in people’s wallets. The Scottish government calculated that «each Scot would be £1,000 better off» after 15 years. However the UK Treasury claimed Scotland, as part of the UK, would be able to have lower tax or higher spending than under independence. This «UK Dividend» is estimated to be worth £1,400 per person in Scotland in each year from 2016-17 onwards.
Ultimately, no-one knows whether an independent Scotland will be better off or not. There are too many variables on issues such as productivity, tax and employment levels.
But the No vote suggests people in Scotland were more persuaded by Better Together’s arguments.
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The No side had a head a start
One in three Scots say they are «equally Scottish and British»
No leaflets often emphasised risks such as pensions, jobs and money
The YouGov poll for the Sunday Times suggested that 51% planned to back independence
Currency was a key issue in the referendum debate
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