It is a United Kingdom matter and it was a United Kingdom referendum. As someone who believes in the Union, but believes in the politics of consent above all, I am very proud that our country offered the people of Scotland the opportunity to leave our Union. I hoped they would stay, but I thought we were right to offer them the vote. Just look at the dreadful mess in Catalonia, where the Spanish state will not offer people a democratic choice.
We were right to say that only the people of Scotland should determine whether it stayed in the Union or left. We did not ask the people of England, Wales and Northern Ireland; we let the people of Scotland determine their own future. They decided—I am very pleased and think they made a good decision—to stay in the Union. The next thing the Union did was have a referendum on whether the whole Union should stay in the EU. They had full opportunity to participate in that referendum and explain why more English people should have agreed with them, but they did not succeed. Under the rules of the Union, they have to live with the Union’s judgment.