He then took his Diploma in Legal Practice at the University of Edinburgh School of Law and worked for a number of years as a solicitor before moving into corporate finance as a senior manager with Deloitte & Touche.

He was a former Chair of CREATE (a group campaigning for rail electrification between Aberdeen and Edinburgh); a chairperson of STAR (Save Tor-na-Dee Hospital and Roxburghe House); and the founder and director of Grampian Enterprise.

He was briefly a Member of Parliament for the Kincardine and Deeside constituency, elected in the November 1991 by-election following the death of Conservative and Unionist Alick Buchanan-Smith.

[7] Following the resignation of Jim Wallace in May 2005 as leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, Nicol Stephen announced his intention to stand for the leadership.

However, since the Liberal Democrats had indicated that they would not enter discussions with parties which continued to favour a referendum on independence, no formal talks were held.

The SNP became a minority administration and officially entered government on 17 May 2007; Nicol Stephen ceased to be Deputy First Minister and began led his party to the opposition benches.

He developed a reputation among some journalists as an effective and forceful critic of some aspects of the Scottish Government's policy and performance, especially at First Minister's Question Time.

[11] Along with Wendy Alexander and Annabel Goldie, he took his party into the Commission on Scottish Devolution chaired by Sir Kenneth Calman, but was opposed to any suggestion that this would result in powers of the Parliament being returned to Westminster.