CONTRIBUTION TO ACADEMIC AND PUBLIC LIFE OF SIR NEIL MACCORMICK

That this House acknowledges the vast contribution made to academic and public life by the late Professor Sir Neil MacCormick; notes in particular the legacy of his academic accomplishments not least at the University of Edinburgh and his contribution to politics as a Member of the European Parliament and then as a Scottish Government Special Adviser; agrees with the words of Joxerramon Bengoetxea that with his untimely death in 2009 Scotland loses its best thinker since the Enlightened Philosophers and Europe loses a powerful intellectual vision of peace, solidarity and self-determination; and welcomes the Edinburgh Law School initiative to produce a collection of four busts of Professor MacCormick as a lasting tribute to this gifted, kind and generous man.