The Localism 2.0 Blueprint

The recent Scottish referendum has ignited a national debate about the devolution.

Many different ideas and proposals are being bandied around, but, as usually is the case in life (and as the recent history of Scottish and Wales devolutions have demonstrated), it’s quite easy to get things wrong, which leads to missed opportunities, disappointing outcomes or even costly mistakes.

So, is there a way to make devolution work right (meaning: reap its benefits and avoid the pitfalls)?

What a good, well-functioning devolution would look like?

And if successfully implemented, what problems will it solve, what benefits will it bring?

In this document, I’m going to answer the 3 most important questions relating to devolution:

1. Why should we want devolution? Why is it important? How would it benefit us, our families, our neighbourhoods and the country?
2. How should it be implemented, so that it works as intended, as we want it to work for us? What are the potential pitfalls in its implementation and what we need to do to avoid them?
3. Why now is the right time to do it and why it is urgent?