Cross-party group proposes new Act of Union

Laws are being drawn up by a group of cross-party politicians for a new Act of Union to “wrest back the initiative from the separatists” and ensure the preservation of the 300-year-old United Kingdom.

The group envisages a bottom-up federal system that would be put to the UK’s four nations in the next few years. It would require the consent of all four nations, with each having a veto.

Labour peer, Lord Hain, a member of the Constitution Reform Group (CRG), said: “What is distinctive about the model we are proposing is whereas devolution up until now has been a top-down process…this is a bottom-up process.”

He added the four nations would “federate upwards to the UK and decide what is done at the centre and at a national level”.

The former Welsh Secretary suggested this would strengthen the UK, particularly Scotland, because it would mean “deciding what is done at the centre rather than the centre deciding what is allowed to be done by Scotland”.

He added: “That is what makes it attractive; a new Act of Union on this particular model.”

The CRG is chaired by the Marquess of Salisbury, who told the House of Lords Constitution Committee, which is examining devolution and the Union, that those powers reserved to the centre could include defence, basic health and social care, economic security, human rights and spreading the wealth from the south east of England to elsewhere in the UK.

In written evidence to the committee, the group stated: “We see an immediate threat to the constitutional future of the United Kingdom in the likelihood of a repeated referendum on Scottish independence in the near future.”

Lord Salisbury also told the committee: “Those who want to keep Scotland in the UK need to wrest back the initiative from the separatists, which has been lost.”

His solution is a new Act of Union, over 300 years since the original in 1707.

“It could be brought into force only by a post-legislative referendum; which would obviously have to be approved by all four parts of the kingdom,” he said.

He added the idea could be “injected into the political bloodstream” ahead of May’s elections across the UK.

“We have made very considerable progress in a first attempt at a draft bill, which we hope to have at least three-quarters cooked within the next relatively few days,” Lord Salisbury said.

The group’s proposals will be tested with opinion polls and focus groups in the coming days.