Regardless of what administration is formed in Scotland, the one thing that I believe will never be the same again following last week’s Scottish Elections is the attitude of the English towards Scots in the Westminster Parliament. The West Lothian Question has been brushed under the carpet ever since the Scottish Parliament was created. But even if Scotland does not become an independent country, the grumbling about Scots being able to vote on English matters now looks set to come to a head, particularly with Gordon Brown as Prime Minister. As a result, I think the time has come for Lib Dems to now back an English Parliament as the only solution.
If I’m honest, an English Parliament is far from the ideal situation as far as I am concerned. Despite the rejection of the idea by the North East, and despite declining support for them amongst the Lib Dems, I still favour the party policy of having English Regional Assemblies. One of the most important reasons for devolving power is that decisions are made closer to the people they effect and allows you to make decisions based on local circumstances. But to me an English Parliament feels no closer than the current one we have in Westminster. However, I accept this is perhaps because I live in Yorkshire, and I feel as much patriotism about being from Yorkshire as I do about being English, something which people in the South East or East Midlands do not feel.
But the reason we need an English Parliament is because it solves a problem which is becoming more of a concern for voters than parliament simply being too remote, that is Scots having too much power at Westminster. Constitutional issues like this have never, often to the disappointment of Lib Dems, been a key concern of voters over the years. But times have changed and I am now hearing time and time again the complaint, “Why should we have a Scottish Prime Minister when Scotland has its own parliament.” The answer is very simple. “Westminster is still in charge of many of the big political decisions that effect Scotland, and so Scottish MPs have to have a say in those and so should also be able to lead the country too.” But people do not easily accept that explanation.
An English Parliament would be able to use all of the facilities of the House of Commons, and so would not necessarily be that expensive to set up, but it would remove a huge constitutional anomaly by being given the same powers as the Scottish Parliament (with the Welsh & Northern Irish Assemblies also acquiring the same powers at the time). But what I think would be important would be to make members of the English Parliament separate from those of the Westminster Parliament. This would then stop a confusing and ludicrous situation where potentially a Labour Prime Minister could be in charge two days of the week but then in opposition another two days of the week. If UK MPs and English MPs were elected separately it would allow them the independence to do their own thing more and would ensure that they didn’t have to be both ruling party and opposition. Also by giving away powers, the UK Parliament could then cut the number of MPs.
I don’t have a view one way or another on whether Scotland should be an independent country. I could probably construct all sorts of economic, historical and cultural reasons as to why Scotland should remain a part of the UK or why it should be independent. But what I don’t have is one thing that is as important as all of these, a patriotic and instinctive feeling about what it means to be Scottish and where you want the country to be in the future. But if Scotland remains a part of the UK, there has to be an English Parliament too.
16 responses so far ↓
Chris Black // 8 May 2007 at 5:45 am |
Yes I think I would support this now…. and if so I would cut the number of UK MPs. Unless someone can persuade me that Anders is wrong ?
Also I’m sure you are right about feeling a ‘patriotic’ Yorkshireman Anders – but I have a very positive feeling for Essex!
Joe Otten // 8 May 2007 at 8:01 am |
We must have it because the grumbling looks set to come to a head?
Is this really a good reason for a constitutional upheaval that hardly brings decisions any closer to us anyway?
IMHO the declared sovereignty of the Scottish Parliament on internal matters is a fig leaf; it is there on the sufferance of the Westminster Parliament. So is the Welsh Assembly and the London Assembly.
While that is the case, there really is no anomaly if Westminster delegates powers differently to different parts of the country.
And I do think an English Parliament could easily become a threat to the union if an English Parliament tries to assert itself within the UK.
Greg // 8 May 2007 at 1:32 pm |
The West Lothian question arises because of the absurd British hodge-podge of constitutional arrangements. It can easily be eliminated by the simple replacement of the United Kingdom with a British Federation – the Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish and English national assemblies having the same powers as each other, the Westminister parliament governing foreign affairs and other matters where the entire country was affected.
This is the model that functions successfully with infinitely fewer potential constitutional crises in Germany, the US, and potentially most importantly Canada, which specifically uses the Westminster system of Parliamentary government (and which only became sovereign in the 1980s, Ottawa being subserviant to London until that point).
There should of course be assemblies closer to the people than London, although the level at which it is done is open to debate – I too prefer regional assemblies, as I identify with being a Somersetter far, far more strongly than I do with being English (’English’ and ‘British’ being labels that I personally consider meaningless), although English would be an improvement over British – particularly given the current unaccountability of Scottish MPs voting on English issues.
Tom Papworth // 8 May 2007 at 1:58 pm |
As with all the best debates, I’ve ended up writing an essay by way of response!
The whole missive is available at http://liberalpolemic.blogspot.com/2007/05/case-for-english-parliament.html.
jamesgraham // 8 May 2007 at 2:11 pm |
No no no no. Anders, you are way off base here.
First of all, there is simply no evidence that the average person in England gives two hoots about the need to set up and English Parliament. Sure, you can find plenty of opinion polls full of people having a whinge, but they whinge about all sorts of things.
Ask the public if they support PR, and significantly more people will say they do compared to those supporting an English Parliament. But do you see them caring enough about it to make it an election issue? I wish I did!
Yet the anomalies that emerge from our electoral system impact on Parliament on a daily basis. In comparison, the “West Lothian anomaly” has only emerged on a few occasions. As point of fact, Scots MPs DID have a national interest in voting on top up fees since it affected the amount of money coming to Scotland due to the Barnett formula. The only issue in living memory in which Scots MPs decided a truly England and Wales-only matter was on Sunday trading legislation back in 1992 – 7 years before the creation of a Scottish Parliament.
There is simply nothing for an English Parliament to do that should not be devolved to a lower level. We should be concentrating on that (which in a lot of cases doesn’t necessarily mean regional government), not on building new institutions that are completely pointless. Read the pro-English Parliament websites: the only issue those bozos seem to want their newfangled Parliament to decide on is what the national anthem should be.
PR, radical devolution, and the principle that any area can demand greater powers for itself set in law is the ‘answer’ to the WLQ – not pandering to cynical Tories and flag-waving football hooligans.
What You Can Get Away With » The Harold Godwinson Memorial Parliament // 8 May 2007 at 3:16 pm |
[...] Anders has written an interesting post on an English Parliament, which has generated a followup from Tom, so I thought I’d throw in my 2p’s worth while it was the hottish topic of the Lib Dem blogosphere. [...]
brian // 9 May 2007 at 2:26 pm |
I think you need to answer a bigger question? What is the point of the United Kingdom?
If you had an independent England, you are more likely to sell the idea of an English National Parliament AND regional assemblies. Why should the English have to sacrifice any claim to self-determination, unlike Scotland or Wales, and instead make do with regionalism only? It is not going to work! I’m English first-and-foremost, not a south-easterner.
What we have at the moment is an attempt to shoe-horn one union (the UK) into another (the European union). Britishness and Britain is the problem. Independence for all the home nations is the solution.
Jamesgraham is an idiot. If he should just read the website of the Campaign For An English Parliament (http://www.thecep.org.uk), and those associated with it, he’ll realise that we do not just discuss national anthems. We are more concerned with fundamental issues like democracy, fairness and good government. We will discuss asymmetrical devolution, the Barnett formula, English identity etc. with intensity, not because we are “flag-waving football hooligans.”, but because we care about the issues and know that they will increasingly come to define Gordon Brown’s Premiership. Jamesgraham shouldn’t resort to cheap stereotypes that wouldn’t be tolerated if we were discussing Welsh or Scottish devolution.
Stephen Gash // 9 May 2007 at 4:36 pm |
This whole problem goes back to the 1970s when Heath abolished and merged counties.
People identify most with their home counties, then their country. Look at how people determinedly re-established Rutland and moves are afoot to do the same eleswhere.
The Tories imposed the regions on England, gerrymandering the borders to suit its own electoral wellbeing. Then Labour regerrymandered the borders to the same end. It even stupidly split the North of England into the North East and North West, thereby ensuring Northerners were against regions from the start.
All three main parties are equally culpable in riding roughshod over the English electorate, instead of garnering its support. Any larger political groupings should have been determined by the people themselves, not imposed from on high.
Gordon Brown and New Labour alienate English people by speaking of “the nations and regions of Britain”. If any party thinks the English will approve the abolition of England, then it will have to think again.
The Liberal Democrats have been in the forefront in seeking to wipe out England. Charles Kennedy said to Scottish Lib Dems “In England devolution is moving at such a pace it is bringing into question the very existence of England itself”, thus ensuring I would never vote Lib Dem (I’m a former SDP man).
The party which supports a return to the old counties, overseen by an English Parliament will be the party which wins the next general election. We English no longer trust the three main parties to look after our interests as they have all actively tried to destroy England.
They all (and the Lib Dems especially) believe in local government, provided the government is local to Brussels.
Stephen Gash // 9 May 2007 at 4:45 pm |
No no no no. James Graham, you are way off base here.
“First of all, there is simply no evidence that the average person in England gives two hoots about the need to set up and English Parliament. Sure, you can find plenty of opinion polls full of people having a whinge, but they whinge about all sorts of things.”
Spoken like a true Liberal Democrat – not liberal, not democratic.
You believe in PR you say. So do I to a point. I also believe in referenda – and more importantly abiding by the results. Obviously you don’t, judging by your dismissiveness of polls as being merely a whinge.
Let’s all do what James wants everybody. No no no no no!
Phil McCavity // 9 May 2007 at 6:55 pm |
James Graham,
I can only assume by your statement about the demand for an English parliament that you must be a Scottish unionist? I’m all for strong local and regional government but it should be under the jurisdiction of a national parliament independent from the UK government. My loyalties lie with my home town (Hendon) my county (Middlesex) and my country (England) rather than with the London Borough of Barnet (a town in Hertfordshire) the Greater London Regional Assembly and certainly not the United Kingdom. The 39 historic counties of England and the traditional parishes within them should form the basis of local and regional government, not the artificial bodies that we have at present and I believe that we require a government that puts the needs of England and her people first (something that the UK government is incapable of doing) in order to achieve this and put some civic and national pride back into our country.
andershanson // 10 May 2007 at 11:11 am |
Having only just logged back in after two days of debate, I will now respond on a few points.
As I said in my piece, an English Parliament is not ideal from my point of view, and does not achieve all that I want from a devolved parliament. But I still think the current situation is unfair on England and is too big an anomaly to be left as it. An English Parliament is not ideal, but should we ignore it as a way of at least making things a bit better?
We have a problem in England of how we devolve power. Yorkshire is an identifiable region that people associate with, and the correct level in the South and Midlands is probably the traditional county. The problem there is, do you therefore resurrect Middlesex even though a lot of it probably more associates with London now, and what do you do where a county is so small that giving it the same powers of the Scottish Parliament would be incredibly expensive? We may need to devolve to a variety of different bodies, but that is a long and complicated process to work out.
Perhaps the SNP having power in Scotland will make some things easier, as at least you can’t say Labour is doing one thing in Westminster and another in Scotland. As they won’t have power in Scotland and may not have power at Westminster soon.
James – I agree that setting up an English Parliament is not exactly the priority of most people. But then neither is PR and as Lib Dems we would probably agree that it is very important. What I do believe though is that the issue is becoming more mainstream and is seeping in the consciousness of the average voter more. For that reason I think it will be a bigger political issue than previously and parties need to look at how they will tackle it.
CEP News Blog » Lib Dems set to swing behind an English parliament? // 10 May 2007 at 12:21 pm |
[...] seems as though the Lib Dem bloggers are warming to the idea – see Anders Hanson, Nick Barlow and Liberal [...]
Phil McCavity // 10 May 2007 at 5:40 pm |
Anders,
I don’t think that we need to have counties with the same powers as the Scottish parliament, that would be the job of the national parliament. I agree that some counties are huge compared to others but that need not be an obstacle to their use as administrative units as the larger counties already have ancient sub-divisions (e.g. the Ridings in Yorkshire and the Parts of Lincolnshire) so I can’t really see that being a problem. As for your point regarding the “reserection” of Middlesex, yes there is a problem with the substitution of “London” followed by a post code in place of the name of an actual locality in postal terminology, but if the Post Office were to use traditional place names and counties instead then people would soon get used to using the term Middlesex (and of course Essex, Surrey and Kent)once again in places where it has died out. It is also worth remembering that The City of London itself is in Middlesex so rather than Middlesex being a part of London, the reverse is in fact the case!
Greg Laing // 13 May 2007 at 7:00 pm |
I doubt very much that most English people relate with the so called `regions` some politicians seem determined to impose by hook or by crook. In my part of the country people identify very strongly with their county, Suffolk. We are not a part of something called the `east of England ` and never will be. That said we do feel ourselves to be English. It seems peverse that successive governemnets have denuded existing tiers of local government of their powers and `devolved` them upward to remote regional assemblies. You cannot impose such loyalties by bureacratic dictat.
I think we do need to strengthen genuinely local democracy but it is frankly arrogant and patronising to ignore the growing self awareness of the English. Yes , there is a change of mood taking place, we have seen university top up fees and NHS hospital trusts imposed by what are in constitutional terms, foreign MPs. Such controversial legislation would not have occured without their intervention. When Gordon Brown speaks of making the NHS a priority he means the NHS in England, yet whatever proposal he wishes to push through will not affect his constituents. This is more than grumbling, it is a glaring democratic deficit and to dismiss campaigners for an English Parliament as obsessing about the National Anthem is nothing short of ignorance.
Liberal Democrat Voice » Top of the Blogs: the Golden Dozen #12 // 14 May 2007 at 9:45 am |
[...] ‘Why we now have to back an English Parliament’ on Anders Hanson’s blog. An answer to the West Lothian question? Or a Pandora’s Box? Tom [...]
Greg Laing // 14 May 2007 at 12:55 pm |
` Pandora`s Box` was opened almost a decade ago when Scotland and Wales were granted a measure of autonomy over many day to day issues. `Assymetric devolution` discrimates against anyone living in England. An English Parliament may cause constitutional problems, tough , you were warned at the time.