At his prompting, the House of Commons accepted an amendment to the Scotland Act 1978 that a majority voting "yes" in the 1979 referendum on establishing a devolved Assembly would have to constitute at least 40 per cent of the Scottish electorate, without which the proposal could be withdrawn and the Act repealed by statutory instrument.
[3] Although “yes” won a majority of those voting in the referendum, as the "yes" constituted only 32.9 per cent of the electorate, the Labour government decided it would not proceed with devolution.
[3] The Conservative Party, which was opposed to devolution, won the subsequent general election; the Scotland Act was repealed in June 1979.
Cunningham lost his seat by just 363 votes (1%) at the 1983 general election to Labour candidate Chris Smith.
[2][4] Mavis, who unsuccessfully contested Twickenham for Labour in the October 1974 election, pre-deceased her husband.