Add a comment October 13th, 2008 by ThunderDragon
Over at the Wardman Wire, we are holding an online symposium on devolution and most specifically the issue of an English Parliament.
So far:
- Dave Cole argues that it’s “a long way to Westminster” and the English devolution should be provided on a regional level - but he doesn’t deny that it is needed;
- Garbo claims that we don’t need an English Parliament, and can’t have one due to them complications; and
- Matt Wardman considers the way(s) in which we are governed and the the potential role of an English Parliament.
In my post, I’ve taken the debate in a slightly different direction, with a greater consideration of the democratic implications of devolution.
Go and read them, and contribute to the discussion!
1 Comment July 3rd, 2008 by ThunderDragon
The West Lothian Answer is not this:
Mr Clarke’s committee suggests there should be voting restrictions when MPs look at the “committee stage” of a bill - when most in-depth amendments are discussed.
For matters relating solely to England, only English MPs should vote, while English and Welsh MPs alone should vote on issues only affecting those two countries, it argues.
MPs from all countries could later vote to pass or reject the bill as a whole, the committee adds. (BBC)
That doesn’t solve the West Lothian Question. It isn’t even an acceptable temporary solution.
The only answer to the question is for proper devolution - English, Scottish, and Welsh Parliaments with equal powers. Until proper political equality has been achieved, it cannot be resolved.
At the moment, the Scots have a massively disproportionate amount of political power. They have more MPs than they should, as their constituencies contain much fewer voters. Plus they have their on Parliament to make laws for themselves - but their MPs still have a vote on issues that do not afect their own constituencies. It is just wrong.
Equality means equality.
What this Tory proposal - that Labour wants to copy [not for the first time!] - means is that equality will not be achieved. The important aspect is that Scottish and Welsh MPs will still be able to vote on laws that do not affect their constituencies.
Whilst that happens, the West Lothian Question will still be as pertinent as ever.
Add a comment October 28th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
The idea of an English Grand Committee is a good one. It will reduce the currently enormous democratic deficit currently enforced upon England and its people.
But this is only acceptable and appropriate as a short-time solution. This will only reduce the democratic deficit, not remove it. If a grand committee is acceptable for England, why is it not also acceptable for Scotland and Wales? There should be equal - truly equal - democratic representation for all four parts of the United Kingdom.
England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland should all have Parliaments with the same powers, and an equal level of centrally-raised finance per head. Extra money can then be granted for specific reasons or for specific projects, and any extra wanted can be raised for taxes from their own taxpayers.
The reason that it is the money which gets the English “so cross” is because that is a tangible thing that can be seen and quantified. It can be directly compared. Political power, on the other hand, isn’t obvious in the same way - and Scottish MPs have not yet been used to push through a policy that only effects England that is of wide enough interest.
An English grand committee is the minimum that should happen - and it should happen now. And then we can start on the discussion on how devolution should be properly organised in order to remove the democratic deficit that currently exists within the UK.
Sources: BBC, The Telegraph, The Times, The Observer
Add a comment October 14th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
Toque has made a new petition on the PM petitions site:
We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to stop saying ‘Our country’ or ‘This country’ when he is talking in relation to devolved issues such as health, education and housing. If Mr Brown is talking about English matters then he should say ‘England’, even if it is politically inconvenient for him to do so…
There is a tendency amongst politicians of all hues to conflate England and the UK as if devolution had never happened. It’s less complicated that way. But devolution has happened and referring to England as ‘our country’ is confusing to a public that is not always aware that Mr Brown may be talking about policy areas that do not have a direct affect on his own constituents (to whom he is democratically accountable) because in Scotland those areas are the responsibility of MSPs in the Scottish Parliament and Government.
Either call English issues English issues, or give us our own Parliament. And it applies to David Cameron as much as to Gordon Brown.
Sign the petition here.
Image: Little Man in a Toque
3 Comments September 18th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
Today is “Devolution Day” in Wales, a decade since the referendum narrowly in favour of devolution, which is now claimed by First Minister Rhodri Morgan to be the glue which unites Wales and allows it to “grow up”. Bloggers such as Ordovicius want the Welsh Assembly to gain more powers and become a parliament like that in Scotland. I can but agree with him that it should be - and there should be an English Parliament as well.
But will - or could - this lead to the situation that Belgium is in now?
Beer, the national dish of “moules et frites” or “mosselen met frieten” and a pervasive cynicism with politicians are all that holds Belgium together after 100 days without government.
Despite increasingly desperate calls by Belgium’s King Albert for national unity, the federal state has hit its worst crisis for 177 years after national elections on June 10 failed to produce a government and coalition talks descended into ugly squabbling between francophone Walloons and the Dutch-speaking Flemish…
At the core of Belgium’s crisis is a democratic deficit hardwired into a federal system that institutionalises divisions between Flanders, in the north of the country, and the southern region of Wallonia.
Belgium’s 10.5 million citizens vote along ethnic lines, there are no national political figures in the country’s 11 parties and there are five parliaments organised on rigid regional and linguistic lines. (The Telegraph)
Is this going to happen to Britain in the future? Will fish’n'chips end up being all that holds a devolved, federal, Britain together in the future? Probably not. If the UK breaks up into separate parts it will be long before such a tenuous link develops as the only reason for the Union.
But the UK is in far more serious danger for as long as there is unequal devolution. There should be English, Scottish, and Welsh Parliaments all with equal powers, and equal sized constituencies for the federal government. That is the only way that the UK can prevent getting into a similar and as degrading state as Belgium currently is. Devolution must be equal or non-existent.
Sources: The Telegraph, icWales
1 Comment September 11th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
We want a referendum, and he’s going to try and get us one:
David Cameron is planning a Parliamentary ambush over the new EU treaty in an attempt to
The Tory leader revealed his plans to mobilise the rapidly growing cross-party support for a nationwide vote in an exclusive interview on Telegraph TV [viewable below].
He pledged that within weeks of Parliament’s return on Oct 9 he would force a Commons vote demanding a referendum on the successor treaty to the abandoned European Constitution.
Mr Cameron said he would “push the government all the way on this issue”, adding “when Parliament returns we will hold an Opposition day debate and put down a very simple and clear motion to support a referendum on the European constitution”.
He would “pressurise” Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs to vote for that referendum. Labour MPs had fought the 2005 general election campaign on a manifesto pledge to give the British people the final say - and they should not be allowed to “break that promise”. (The Telegraph)
Excellent. I’ve written on the subject of a referendum on this EU Constitution - Reform Treaty, sorry - plenty of times recently so I won’t go on too much. But finally a party leader has made it their official policy to have a referendum on this!
The result of a vote is nowhere near as important as having it. So long as it is the People who make the decision themselves and not the politicians deciding for us, the outcome doesn’t matter. Of course I would vote no, but that is less important to me than actually having a referendum itself.
Unfortunately in the interview, he also says that we shouldn’t have an English Parliament, but just English votes for English laws. That is just the first step, and not enough in itself to rectify the devolution bias.
He also knocks back the absurd idea of making people pay to park at the supermarket.
3 Comments August 17th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
It seems that even some on the Left are coming around to the inherent problems with the current constitutional situation:
Pressure mounted yesterday on Labour to curb the power of Scottish MPs at Westminster and the “unfair” funding formula which channels public spending to Scotland.
Gordon Brown, himself a Scottish MP, was urged by a Left-of-Centre think-tank [IPPR] to remedy the perceived constitutional unfairness stemming from the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999.
As a result of devolution, English MPs can no longer vote on key issues such as health and education in Scotland. But Scottish MPs at Westminster, the majority of whom are Labour, can still have decisive say on English domestic policy…
The Conservatives have previously called for a system of “English votes for English laws” as their solution to what is known in constitutional terms as the West Lothian Question. That would involve only MPs representing seats in England being able to vote on purely English-legislation…
[T]he IPPR report, entitled The End of the Union?, said “they [the Scottish] are still over-represented compared to England”. (The Telegraph)
To say that it is “unfair” is a gross understatement. When Scottish MPs have a potentially decisive vote over policies that do not affect their constituents at all, and especially when they use and abuse the ability, it is more than “unfair” - it is absolutely wrong, on pretty much every level. If you believe in democracy, then you can’t accept the current status quo.
The “English votes for English laws” idea can only possibly work as an immediate, short-term solution. Fundamentally, the entire political system in the UK needs some sort of overhaul to reconcile devolution to all constituent parts of the United Kingdom and fit it with out constitution. The IPPR idea of a “British Constitutional Convention” is a good one. Instead of piecemeal approaches to change, the entire system needs to be considered as a whole.
An “English votes for English laws” programme should be instituted immediately whilst considerations on the final format of the solution is decided. This is the minimum requirement. As far as I am concerned, an English Parliament is essential. It does require any [or certainly many] extra politicians, as MPs could carry out their role in both devolved and national parliaments. Neither would an English parliament need a new building - Westminster Palace can serve fine for both. English nationalism is growing, and must be heeded - sooner or later.
Source: The Telegraph
6 Comments June 12th, 2007 by ThunderDragon
Is it possible to the United Kingdom to survive the inequalities that exist within it - all of which are to the detriment of the largest constituent part of it, and which provides the funding for the inequalities as well?
Government has been devolved to both Scotland and Wales, with the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly - and yet England lacks any form of self-government as an individual country. This is not acceptable, not in the short-term and certainly not in the long term. The very least that should - nay, must - happen is that any Bill in the UK Parliament that only affects England should only be voted on by MPs with constituencies in England [and any that affect only England and Wales should only be voted on by MPs elected by constituencies in those countries]. This is, of course, a minimum - and only a viable alternative until a long-term solution of an English Parliament is reached.
What is most disturbing is the extent to which inequality is rampant within the United Kingdom. Two days ago I blogged on the fact that Scottish university students are gong to get free education - and grants - at the expense of taxpayers in England, just as student debt breaks through the £3 billion mark. Like I said there, and I will repeat again:
It really is hypocritical that the Scottish Nationalist Party will fund their policy on free university education through funding that they would not have were they an independent state. If they want to prove that they can act and live as an economically viable independent state, then they should only use Scottish-raised taxes to fund the elements of Scottish policy on which the Scottish Parliament currently controls.
If the SNP were to provide free university education from their own taxes, I could have no opposition to it - and I would in fact applaud their prioritising. But when they plan to provide free university education off English taxes when English student debt has breached £3 billion, I can have nothing but contempt for their hypocrisy and for this government for allowing it to happen.
It is just plain wrong when taxpayers in England are funding a policy of free university education in Scotland when England’s own student debt problem is soaring. Especially ironic since it is the SNP who are doing it. How can Scotland survive independently if they can’t even fund their policies in the areas they already control?!
And then there is this story on health:
“A drug that improves the eyesight of almost a third of people suffering from the biggest cause of blindness in Britain will be available on the NHS in Scotland from today, but not in England. While Scottish patients with wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD) will receive free Lucentis injections, thousands living south of the border could go blind if they cannot find up to £28,000 to obtain the treatment privately.” (The Telegraph)
So people in Scotland with this problem get drugs, but not those in England. Nice and equal that, eh?
If these inequalities do not get sorted soon, then I am not sure whether the Union can survive. I am even beginning to question whether it should if this is the state in which it will continue to exist - with a minority having such electoral power over the majority. And I haven’t even started on the West Lothian Question, with the still huge over-representation of Scotland and Wales in the Commons, despite having devolved government. There’s enough material there for an entire rant on that alone, even disregarding everything else.
Click here to sign the petition for an English Parliament.
