Download or read book The Battle for Britain written by David Torrance and published by Biteback Publishing. This book was released on 2013-11-12 with total page 235 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On 18 September 2014, Scots will decide their future: should the country quit the United Kingdom and take control of its own destiny, or should it remain part of what advocates call the most successful political and economic union of modern times? Everyone in the country has a stake in this decision. Now, in this fascinating and insightful new book, David Torrance charts the countdown to the big day, weaving his way through a minefield of claim and counterclaim, and knocking down fictions and fallacies from both Nationalists and Unionists. He plunges into the key questions that have shaped an often-fraught argument, from the future of the pound to the shape of an independent Scottish army. With access to the strategists and opinion-makers on both sides of the political divide, this book goes straight to the heart of the great debate, providing an incisive, authoritative, occasionally trenchant guide to the most dramatic constitutional question of our times - the battle for Britain.

Download or read book The Palgrave Handbook of European Referendums written by Julie Smith and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2021-03-02 with total page 736 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook provides an empirically rich analysis of referendums in Europe from the end of the Second World War to the present. It addresses a range of perennial theoretical and legal questions that face policy-makers when they offer citizens the chance to take or influence decisions by referendum, not least whether to accept the ‘will of the people’. Taking a multi-disciplinary approach, drawing on historical, philosophical and political science perspectives, the book includes a contextual section on the history of referendums, the theoretical questions underpinning their use, and on constitutional and legal questions about the use of referendums. The empirical sections are divided into those referendums that focus on domestic issues, such as constitutional matters or questions of social policy, and those related to the European Union, including membership referendums and treaty ratification.

Download or read book Referendums in the United Kingdom written by Great Britain. Parliament. House of Lords. Select Committee on the Constitution and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Scotland Analysis written by Great Britain: Scotland Office and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2013-02-11 with total page 114 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The UK Government is undertaking a major cross-government programme of analysis prior to the referendum on Scottish independence in 2014. The aim is to provide a comprehensive and detailed analysis of Scotland's place in the UK. This paper, the first of a series to be published in 2013 and 2014, examines the UK's constitutional set-up and the legal implications of independence. The UK Government is convinced that the current devolution offers the best for Scotland: the Scottish Parliament and Government are empowered to take decisions on a range of domestic policy areas - such as health, education, policing - while Scotland continues to benefit from decisions made for the UK as a whole - defence and security, foreign representation, economic affairs. Independence is very different to devolution. Based on independent expert opinion (published as Annex A), the paper concludes that if there were to be a vote in favour of leaving the UK, Scotland would become an entirely new state whilst the remainder of the UK would continue as before, retaining the rights and obligations of the UK as it currently stands. Any separation would have to be negotiated between both governments. Legal and practical implications of independence, both at home and abroad, are addressed. An independent Scotland would have to apply to and/or negotiate to become a member of whichever international organisations it wished to join, including the EU and NATO. Scotland would also have to work through its positions on thousands of international treaties to which the UK is currently party.

Download or read book Scotland s constitutional future written by Great Britain: Scotland Office and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2012-01-10 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This consultation document discusses how to deliver a referendum that is legal, fair and decisive. The Scottish Government is aware of the limits of its powers. It acknowledged those limits in 2007. Since the Scottish National Party's success in May 2011, the Scottish Government has provided no new explanation of how it would deliver its manifesto commitment to hold a referendum, despite the limits to its power. The UK Government has therefore considered the proposals put forward by the Scottish Government in February 2010 but those cannot be legally delivered by the Scottish Parliament. The UK Government does not believe that Scotland's constitutional future should be decided in court. The referendum must be legally watertight and that can only be provided by legislation involving the UK Parliament although this can be done in different ways. For the referendum to be fair as well as legal it should be overseen by those who have both the demonstrable neutrality and proven expertise. Finally, for the referendum to be also decisive, it is the UK Government's view that there must be a single, straightforward question; and that question must be asked as soon as possible

Download or read book Reporting the Road to Brexit written by Anthony Ridge-Newman and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-05-07 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited collection brings together leading international scholars to explore the connection between Brexit and the media. The referendum and the activism on both sides of the campaign have been of significant interest to the media in the UK and around the world. How these factors have been represented in the media and the role of the media in constructing the referendum narrative are central to assisting the development in our understanding of how UK and global democracy is being manifested in contemporary times. This book explores these topics through presenting a wide range of perspectives from research conducted by leading international scholars, and concludes with an assessment of the potential democratic and international implications for the future. By grappling with a highly important and controversial topic in a comparative and varied way, the volume contributes to theoretical debates about the nature and role of the media in complex social, political and cultural contexts.

Download or read book The Referendum in Britain written by Lucy Atkinson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-11-29 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The European Union referendum of 23 June 2016 proved to be the trigger for the most prolonged period of political turbulence in the peacetime history of the UK; leading to major policy changes and realignments in the party-political system. This book considers from an historical perspective the democratic device that provided the focus for this upheaval. Beginning in the late nineteenth century, it discusses how the idea of using referendums to resolve major political disputes first came onto the agenda, and why. It considers who advocated it, and in what circumstances. The book describes how referendums eventually came into use from the 1970s onwards, and the different patterns in their deployment in the decades that have followed. Major political figures, from Herbert Henry Asquith and Winston Churchill to Clement Attlee, Harold Wilson and Margaret Thatcher; to Tony Blair, David Cameron, and Boris Johnson form part of the story. Governments have come to power and fallen in the context of demands for referendums or the results they produced. The authors provide detailed accounts of each of the 13 major referendums that have taken place. Referendums took place at UK and sub-UK level. They were held on the position of Northern Ireland (1973) and Scotland (2014) within the UK; on devolution to Wales (1979; 1997; 2011) and Scotland (1979; 1979); on the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement (1998); on devolution to London (1998) and North East England (2004); on the parliamentary voting system (2011); and on UK participation in European integration (1975; 1975). The book provides a constitutional and international perspective, and ask how far the original ideas lying behind the referendum were fulfilled in practice.

Download or read book Story of the Scottish Parliament written by Hassan Gerry Hassan and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2019-07-01 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Marking the first twenty years of the Scottish Parliament, this collection of essays assesses its impact on Scotland, the UK and Europe, and compares progress against pre-devolution hopes and expectations. Bringing together the voices of ministers and advisers, leading political scientists and historians, commentators, journalists and former civil servants, it builds an authoritative account of what the Scottish Parliament has made of devolution and an essential guide to the powers Holyrood may need for Scotland to flourish in an increasingly uncertain world.

Download or read book A Comparative Study of Referendums written by Mads Qvortrup and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2005-10-07 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Combining an account of the political history and philosophy of the referendum, with a thorough assessment of the practical experiences with referendums in western democracies, this book has established itself as the unrivalled market-leader in the field. Fully revised and with new chapters on campaign spending and the administration of referendums, the second edition of this book provides a thorough overview of the theory and practice of referendums.

Download or read book Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot written by John Lloyd and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2020-03-24 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Scottish nationalists seek to end the United Kingdom after 300 years of a successful union. Their drive for an independent Scotland is now nearer to success than it has ever been. Success would mean a diminished Britain and a perilously insecure Scotland. The nationalists have represented the three centuries of union with England as a malign and damaging association for Scotland. The European Union is held out as an alternative and a safeguard for Scotland's future. But the siren call of secession would lure Scotland into a state of radical instability, disrupting ties of work, commerce and kinship and impoverishing the economy. All this with no guarantee of growth in an EU now struggling with a downturn in most of its states and the increasing disaffection of many of its members. In this incisive and controversial book, journalist John Lloyd cuts through the rhetoric to show that the economic plans of the Scottish National Party are deeply unrealistic; the loss of a subsidy of as much as £10 billion a year from the Treasury would mean large-scale cuts, much deeper than those effected by Westminster; the broadly equal provision of health, social services, education and pensions across the UK would cease, leaving Scotland with the need to recreate many of these systems on its own; and the claim that Scotland would join the most successful of the world's small states - as Denmark, New Zealand and Norway - is no more than an aspiration with little prospect of success. The alternative to independence is clear: a strong devolution settlement and a joint reform of the British union to modernise the UK's age-old structures, reduce the centralisation of power and boost the ability of all Britain's nations and regions to support and unleash their creative and productive potential. Scotland has remained a nation in union with three other nations - England, Northern Ireland and Wales. It will continue as one, more securely in a familiar companionship.

Download or read book Constitutional Referendums written by Stephen Tierney and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2012-04-05 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The use of referendums around the world has grown remarkably in the past thirty years and, in particular, referendums are today deployed more than ever in the settlement of constitutional questions, even in countries with little or no tradition of direct democracy. This is the first book by a constitutional theorist to address the implications of this development for constitutional democracy in a globalizing age, when many of the older certainties surrounding sovereignty and constitutional authority are coming under scrutiny. The book identifies four substantive constitutional processes where the referendum is regularly used today: the founding of new states; the creation or amendment of constitutions; the establishment of complex new models of sub-state autonomy, particularly in multinational states; and the transfer of sovereign powers from European states to the European Union. The book, as a study in constitutional theory, addresses the challenges this phenomenon poses not only for particular constitutional orders, which are typically structured around a representative model of democracy, but for constitutional theory more broadly. The main theoretical focus of the book is the relationship between the referendum and democracy. It addresses the standard criticisms which the referendum is subjected to by democratic theorists and deploys both civic republican theory and the recent turn in deliberative democracy to ask whether by good process-design the constitutional referendum is capable of facilitating the engagement of citizens in deliberative acts of constitution-making. With the referendum firmly established as a fixture of contemporary constitutionalism, the book addresses the key question for constitutional theorists and practitioners of how might its operation be made more democratic in age of constitutional transformation.

Download or read book Acts of Union and Disunion written by Linda Colley and published by Profile Books. This book was released on 2014-01-02 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United Kingdom; Great Britain; the British Isles; the Home Nations: such a wealth of different names implies uncertainty and contention - and an ability to invent and adjust. In a year that sees a Scottish referendum on independence, Linda Colley analyses some of the forces that have unified Britain in the past. She examines the mythology of Britishness, and how far - and why - it has faded. She discusses the Acts of Union with Wales, Scotland and Ireland, and their limitations, while scrutinizing England's own fractures. And she demonstrates how the UK has been shaped by movement: of British people to other countries and continents, and of people, ideas and influences arriving from elsewhere. As acts of union and disunion again become increasingly relevant to our daily lives and politics, Colley considers how - if at all - the pieces might be put together anew, and what this might mean. Based on a 15-part BBC Radio 4 series.

Download or read book The Media in Scotland written by Neil Blain and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comprehensive study of the media in Scotland.

Download or read book Scotland and Wales written by Bridget Taylor and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study presents an anlysis and interpretation of the studies by CREST (Centre for Research into Elections and Social Trends) of the electorates in Wales and Scotland at the time of the 1997 devolution referendums.

Download or read book The Road to the National Assembly for Wales written by James Barry Jones and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first detailed examination of the course of devolution from 1979 to the Act setting up the Welsh Assembly.

Download or read book Yes to Europe written by Robert Saunders and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-03-15 with total page 525 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first modern history of the 1975 European referendum, ranging across 1970s Britain to assess why voters said 'Yes to Europe'.

Download or read book Scotland s constitutional future written by Great Britain: Scotland Office and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2012-04-04 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dated April 2012. Summary of responses to Cm. 8203 (ISBN 9780101820325) which sought views on how to deliver a legal, fair and decisive referendum on whether Scotland should leave the United Kingdom