The Scottish Parliament, Devolution and a New Political Landscape

Abstract

The Scottish Parliament was established in May 1999 amid much expectation from public and media, a rhetoric of ‘new politics’, ‘consensus’ and a belief that things could be different and better than Westminster (Hassan, 1998; Taylor, 1999). Parliament almost immediately became the main vocal point of public life in Scotland in relation to politics, political discussion and media. This sudden shift had a number of consequences. For one, the Parliament’s 129 new MSPs were ill-prepared for this new attention and scrutiny, with only 15 of them in the first parliament already sitting Westminster MPs; wider systems of administering and maintaining the new parliament were also untested and in this environment, the new institution struggled.