GLASGOW, September 22 (RIA Novosti), Mark Hirst – The leaders of the three main UK political parties have learned nothing from the Scottish independence referendum campaign as they continue to disagree on what additional powers Scots should have, the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) said Monday.
The leader of the Conservative Party, Prime Minister David Cameron, Labour leader Ed Miliband and Liberal Democrat leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg had jointly "vowed" to give Scotland additional new powers, short of full independence, if Scots voted No in last Thursday's referendum. But now a major disagreement between the parties looks set to delay or stall the process.
"The perpetual squabbling between the politicians in the three unionist parties over their enhanced devolution proposals, how quickly they should be introduced and on what terms, shows that they have learned nothing from the recent referendum campaign," STUC General Secretary Grahame Smith said in a statement.
Smith added that voters on both sides of the argument now expected significant new powers would come to Scotland and warned the UK Government not to delay further, or compromise on the commitments they made before the referendum.
"[The electorate] are not going to be passive participants in the process or tolerate political obfuscation or compromise," Smith added.
"The sooner the politicians recognize this and get down to working with civil society and the communities and people of Scotland to deliver a comprehensive new devolution settlement the better."
Outgoing First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, has already accused the UK Government of "tricking" voters after failing to meet a pledge to publish a specific timetable that would allow more powers to be devolved to Scotland.
The Scottish independence referendum took place on September 18 in which 55.3 percent of Scottish voters backed continued membership of the UK.
