The current debate about devolution in the UK, particularly in the case of Scotland, clearly forms part of a wider trend towards a 'Europe of the regions' and a regionalisation of government in the member states of the EC. For those who wish to see a more federal European Community, this raises many difficult issues. It is important to bear in mind that the regional process brings both dangers and opportunities and there may be limits to how far it can go.

Membership of the European Community challanges many of the basic assumptions of the British constitutional order. The Community is like a federal level of government and has a like effect on the sovereignty of its member states. One of the most important questions it raises for us is whether a state the size of the UK can continue as a member without developing some form of regional or devolved government i.e. by sharing its sovereignty internally with sub-national structures of government. Although in no way a prerequisite for membership, we cannot escape influences from our partners and the pressures which are tending towards regional government.

It is impossible to predict the outcome of the devolution debate in the UK as it depends on a whole series of other imponderables. The only conclusion one can draw at this stage is that ultimately, there will be some form of regional devolution in the UK beginning with an assembly and administration for Scotland. There is clearly a majority in Scotland for devolution and there is probably a majority in the UK, both for Scottish devolution and for some form of regional administration in the rest of the country.

There is no clear and uniform pattern to the regionalisation process or to the 'regions' which result from it. The situation of the 255 or so units of government in the EC between the national and the local level which could be considered as 'regions' is extremely varied and offer several models for the UK to follow. However a move to a fully sovereign, independent Scotland would result in a truly unprecedented situation which would pose many difficult challenges to the Community.

Regional demands for representation in Community procedures are legitimate and might well add to the complexity and difficullty of EC decision-making. Federalists tend to put all their faith in the European Parliament as a sufficient source of democratic legitimacy in the EC. The trend towards regional assertiveness serves to reminds those who want a federal Europe that there are other collective identities and territorial interests who can quite legitimaly claim a right to be represented at the European level beside the already recognised rights of the states and the people to representation.

Regions also supply the European level of government with an important source of legitimacy and potentially a strategic partnership against the national level of government in-between the two. These regional claims are unlikely to go away. They may ultimately upset our vision of a smooth transition to a bicameral legislature with a balanced representation of the states (Council) and the people (Parliament).

This trend cannot be ignored, and ultimately we may have to conceive of some kind of tricameral or 'variable geometry' legislative arrangements.

Conclusion

The issue of regional devolution is not confined to British politics.

It is of crucial significance to the future of the whole continent, for 3 main reasons:

it is a problem which affects Germany in a particularly acute way;

it is a problem intricately entwined with the prospects for stability in the new democracies in the East and for the potential role of the West in helping them to build that stability;

it is a problem posed in the particularly stark terms of British politics by the real prospect of Scottish independence.

For these reasons, it is essential that western Europe tackles the problem successfully, both at the national and the European levels and its foreign relations, by accomodating regional demands for representation in more effective and imaginative ways. There is a special responibility on the British to achieve a moderate and sensible resolution of the Scittish problem before other more extreme solutions can cause any disruption in an already unstable Community.