The party of Scotland’s nationalist First Minister Alex Salmond won a historic majority Friday in elections for the Edinburgh parliament, bringing an independence referendum a step closer. In the first overall majority for any party since the parliament opened in 1999, the Scottish National Party (SNP) battered the once dominant Labour Party and secured 65 seats in the 129-seat Holyrood Assembly, results showed.
Salmond pledged to bring forward a referendum on Scottish independence within the next four years, something he could not deliver in his first term as the SNP were outnumbered by unionists in the Holyrood parliament. “Just as the people have bestowed trust in us, we must trust the people as well, and that is why in this term of the parliament we shall bring forward a referendum and trust the people with Scotland’s own constitutional future,” he said.