Since devolution, policymaking in Scotland has been profoundly conservative

Scotland has been largely self-governing in major areas such as health, education and local government since devolution in 1999. All types of policy innovation were promised with devolution and are promised by advocates of independence. In this context it is salutary to reflect that the overall record of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament in these major policy areas in the decade and a half of their current existence is, with a few exceptions, conservative, argues Norman Bonney.