I think the point in hand is that the UK isn't a federation of independent States. However this isn't quite true, since the Welsh Assembly gained influence on certain fields of employment and employment circumstances (surrounding government sponsored job creation, so there's a Quid Pro Quo to benefit the employer as opposed to primary legislative differences) and Scotland I only know has sufficiently nuanced and complicated variations to have presented obstacles to relocate the "Charlotte Square Mafia" of old line Edinburgh financial institutions when certain of them desired to re-establish in the City of London and float on the London Stock Exchange. I am not certain how much the watershed 1997 Act homologated matters but I am pretty sure that the situation is never allowed to conform to the definition of Westminster lawmakers if Hollyrood can ever help it. For non Brits, Scottish public finances in terms of service to the population are a dream world compared with the UK, resulting from extensive historic compensation for the Union and latterly, North Sea Oil.