The Scottish committees and the goal of a ‘New Politics’: a verdict on the first four years of the devolved Scottish parliament

Abstract

The launch in 1999 of a devolved Scottish Parliament with primary legislative powers was accompanied by extensive talk of the creation of a ‘new politics’ North of the Border. Eschewing the ‘yah‐boo’ adversarialism of the British House of Commons, ‘new politics’ in Scotland was to be open, consensual and participative in the style of the small Nordic democracies. It was to be predicated on a distinctive three‐way sharing of power between the government (Scottish Executive), parliament and people (civil society), which represented an attempt to devise a synthesis of traditional representative democracy and elements of a participatory form of democracy. The first part of this article explores the concept of a ‘power‐sharing democracy’ as it evolved through the Constitutional Convention debates of the early 1990s. The second focuses on the Scottish Parliament's committees which, combining the standing and select committee functions of their Westminster counterparts, were viewed as a motor of the ‘new politics’. The final part analyses the extent to which Scotland is a power‐sharing democracy. It is argued that, in linking parliament and civil society, various aspects of committee practice have lent a new dimension to Scottish politics. However, an innovative power‐sharing relationship between the Scottish Executive and Scottish Parliament, diverging in its essentials from the Westminster model, was neither envisaged by the architects of the new parliament, nor has it emerged. Beyond some tinkering with higher education and free face‐washing for granny, little has changed. Kirsty Scott, A new hymn sheet, The Guardian, 10.5.2003