The polls in Scotland hadn’t been closed for more than an hour or two before the outcome of the independence vote was clear. By the time all the votes were tallied, 1.6 million Scots voted for independence while two million voted to stay in the United Kingdom. The massive turnout represented a remarkable 85 percent of all registered voters in Scotland, and the outcome prevented, for the time being anyway, the end of Scotland’s 307-year union with England.
Polls testing the waters just days before the election revealed a contest too close to call. The single question on the ballot, “Should Scotland to be an independent country?” could only be answered “yes” or “no,” and polls measuring the number of those voters planning to vote “no” slightly outnumbered those planning to vote “yes.” It wasn’t until the heads of the three major political parties in Westminster published a last-minute bribe on Tuesday that the fate of those favoring independence was sealed. Prime Minister David Cameron of the Conservatives, Ed Miliband of the Labour Party, and Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats signed an open letter published in the British tabloid the Daily Record.
Titled “The Vow,” the letter stated,
The people of Scotland want to know that all three main parties will deliver change for Scotland.
We are agreed that: The Scottish Parliament’s permanent and extensive new powers for the parliament will be delivered by the process and to the timetable agreed and announced by our three parties, starting on September 19…. We can state categorically that the final say on how much is spent on the NHS [Scotland’s National Health Service] will be a matter for the Scottish Parliament.
Read the story here...
http://bit.ly/1ykwKrw
Polls testing the waters just days before the election revealed a contest too close to call. The single question on the ballot, “Should Scotland to be an independent country?” could only be answered “yes” or “no,” and polls measuring the number of those voters planning to vote “no” slightly outnumbered those planning to vote “yes.” It wasn’t until the heads of the three major political parties in Westminster published a last-minute bribe on Tuesday that the fate of those favoring independence was sealed. Prime Minister David Cameron of the Conservatives, Ed Miliband of the Labour Party, and Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats signed an open letter published in the British tabloid the Daily Record.
Titled “The Vow,” the letter stated,
The people of Scotland want to know that all three main parties will deliver change for Scotland.
We are agreed that: The Scottish Parliament’s permanent and extensive new powers for the parliament will be delivered by the process and to the timetable agreed and announced by our three parties, starting on September 19…. We can state categorically that the final say on how much is spent on the NHS [Scotland’s National Health Service] will be a matter for the Scottish Parliament.
Read the story here...
http://bit.ly/1ykwKrw
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