A new survey has found that 80 per cent of peers believe devolution has damaged the Union.
 
A decade on from the Scotland and Wales Acts and the Good Friday agreement, designed in part to see off the threat of separatism, the poll of members of the House of Lords found a vast majority believe the opposite to be true.
 
Three-fifths of peers (60 per cent) said that establishing the Holyrood parliament and Stormont and Welsh assemblies had boosted nationalism slightly, while 20 per cent said it had done so greatly.

Three quarters of Labour peers (75 per cent) and half of Liberal Democrats (50 per cent), the two pro-Union parties who pushed through the legislation, also agreed.
 
In contrast, just 11 per cent of peers said the process had strengthened or slightly strengthened the Union.
 
The results of the first ever Dods Polling peers panel were published by ePolitix.com on Monday.
 
Other findings included the fact that 59 per cent of peers think there should be a selective amnesty allowing illegal immigrants to earn British citizenship and stay in the UK.
 
Just over a third of members of the second chamber (35 per cent) said no such amnesty should be granted.
 
A narrow majority of peers (51 per cent) also agreed or strongly agreed that the government should make new laws that would require supermarkets to responsibly price alcohol. Only a third (34 per cent) disagreed or strongly disagreed.
 
And a majority (57 per cent) agreed or strongly agreed with the chancellor's decision announced last year to tax non-domiciled residents £30,000 per year. A third (34 per cent) disagreed or strongly disagreed.

Dods Polling interviewed 155 members of the House of Lords from March 6–27 by online and postal methods.

Dods Polling is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules. For more information, please contact dodspolling@dods.co.uk
 
By responding to the poll, peers have raised a cumulative donation to the British Legion of £2,500.