Smith Commission: cabin fever, thank yous & what's next

And breathe! I don't know about anyone else but the last four weeks have been somewhat frantic for Felix and I. We knew the timetable was tight and that there was a lot of work to do but I’m not sure either of us knew what we were getting ourselves into when we took the Smith Commission response on. However *cue drumroll* SCVO's submission to the Smith Commission is in!

‘Oh, outer space is reserved. Who knew?’

Our sincere thanks go to all of you who took the time to send in your submissions, to attend events and roundtables and in some cases just pick up the phone. Your thoughts were invaluable in formulating our response and highlighted the diversity of interests and wealth of experience the third sector in Scotland has. But I confess that it hasn’t been easy putting the response together. I’m now a lot more familiar with Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998 than I truly ever wanted to be. ‘Oh, outer space is reserved. Who knew?’ The Association in Scotland to Research into Astronautics apparently. At one point last Tuesday afternoon when hunkered down in the office trying to get the submission complete I swear Felix and I were hit by something akin to cabin fever - but thankfully that passed. So, now our response is in, to quote The West Wing's Jed Bartlet, what's next?

Okay, what's next? — Josiah Bartlet (@Pres_Bartlet) May 10, 2014

I suspect Felix will retreat to the relative safety of the Community Empowerment Bill and while I've not paid it much attention in recent weeks the monolith that is public service reform hasn't gone away. Yet this isn't the end of the devolution process. It's just the beginning. The Heads of Agreement will be with us before we know it, and a bill will appear in the new year both of which will require careful scrutiny. In addition, and SCVO has said from the outset, devolution is not just about the politicians. It’s about people and we maintain there's a need for a citizen-led process to examine what proposals Smith makes. We must ensure that the opportunity people had during the referendum debate to discuss the nature of the Scottish constitutional settlement and the kind of Scotland they want to live in, is also offered to them on devolution. Having been able to exercise their voices on the issue of independence it would be a mistake to exclude them from having their say now. What this may look like we don’t quite know, but we know it’s vitally important. I suspect this may be our next challenge.