Devolution disaster?

To what extent does the current budget crisis strengthen or weaken the argument for devolution?

If you are behind the curve on this, the SNP government’s £33b budget for the next fiscal year was voted down by a coalition of Labour, Lib Dem and Green MSPs. Now the Lib Dems have committed a volte face and are apparently back in negotiations with the SNP about overcoming the impasse. The main Lib Dem sticking point was a 2p income tax cut the party wanted that the SNP would not agree to. The Lib Dems may now be prepared to drop that as part of the deal.

If the budget fails a second time, then the government is expected to resign and fresh elections called.

As one of the blogger pointed out on the BBC website, Scotland has gone from a coalition government, to minority government, and now small parties are determining who governs. Is this what the Scots wanted in a devolution settlement? Something else to consider is whether this is the kind of shenanigans we would want in the Westminster Parliament - after all this is what a post PR world would probably look like.