The more I've thought about it, the more I think an English parliament would be better than EVfEL. There's basically two options for EVfEL: a single UK administration approach and a dual administration approach.
If we had the single administration approach, during periods of different majorities, we would have UK ministers trying to pass legislation through an English committee they didn't have a majority in. That's fine for blocking legislation, but it means England is still at a disadvantage in legislation they want not being passed because of the blocking majority in the UK parliament. This seems to be unfair on England vis a vis the other home nations.
If we have a dual administration approach, with a separate English administration, I can imagine politics would be dominated by competing Prime Ministers and would lead to a very noxious political environment, with the two of them constantly at each others throats, fighting over which majority should vote on which piece of legislation and mass confusion among the public. This seems to be a mistake in preserving the union.
With a separate English parliament, however, we could have a clear difference between the two levels of government. It would be easier for the public to understand, and the divide of powers would be clearly defined. I think this is what we need.
That only works if you have the same level of devolution to all 4 home nations. Otherwise it is impractical.
More important is that DevoMax will mean the majority of issues debated and voted on in the Commons would not apply to Scotland. It's indefensible to have MPs voting on matters which are devolved and would not affect their constituents.
Given Blair's majority wouldn't that have passed even if no Scottish MP's had voted?
The West Lothian question is a problem that exists largely in theory, not in practice. Given that (as things stand) Westminster retains the right in theory to legislate on devolved matters or even to abolish Holyrood I cannot see how non-english MPs voting rights can reasonably be restricted.
The best solution would actually be a Scottish Tory recovery at Westminster (perhaps not impossible given some of the referendum results) removing the incentive to play the "english card".
No, there was a major rebellion and the government's majority was cut to five. 46 Scottish Labour MPs voted with the government with the 5 SNP and 10 Liberal Democrat MPs representing constituencies in Scotland voting against. The 1 Scottish Conservative abstained.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
Lol. I mean, just, what??!!
"But Your Honour, even if I did murder the guy, he was going to die anyway."
The city that best represents the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish strands of the British Isles is Liverpool. The new British Parliament should be seated in Liverpool in a 21st century architectural masterpiece. The English Parliament in Westminster. The Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh but not not in the current monstrosity. The Welsh Parliament in Cardiff. The Irish Parliament in Dublin.
God no, politics is depressing enough without basing anything in that dump of a city. I propose, entirely coincidentally to my heritage, the traditional second city of England, and Adolf Hitlers choice to administer Nazi occupied Britain, Norwich, with it's beautiful city hall, Norman castle and cathedral and medieval guildhall. Norwich, capital city of federal UK, it just feels right ;-)
Nothing wrong with Scousers, far from it, but I'd suggest Kendal. Geographical centre of the UK and with excellent communications - and at least one wartime airfield not too far away.
Not much right with them either. Kendal is a good call, but I prefer Norwich. Possibly the greatest city in the world. No, definitely.
but am a fan of regional parliaments and governments. There's no need for it to extend the number of politicians - reductions could be made at UK and local level (regional governments could easily mean county councils are no longer required but local government should be left for each region to decide).
I admit to not favouring Regional Assemblies because they just seem to be Councils but bigger. We already have enough Councils and the advantage of smaller, more focused councils is that they can be more focused on local issues.
However, your final quote is spot on. While I favour regional governments, it's clear that there's no great groundswell of support for them at the moment. By contrast, resolving the WLQ is a pressing matter and if there's a good quick fix which commands public support - which EV4EL does, that'll satisfy for now.
Actually my EV4EL-Max solution is much more drastic - abolish all devolved assemblies and only allow MPs to vote on issues affecting their country so that Scottish acts can only be voted on by Scottish MPs, ditto for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. UK-wide matters affect all the countries and therefor all MPs could vote. That seems much simpler to much but the pragmatist in me knows that too many political empires would have to crumble and therefore it would never happen.
I think that it is vital to make progress on this issue. The Scots have been promised progress and I think that the rest of us, whilst not losing too much sleep over it, would like equality of representation.
Your solution is very elegant, and could have been a good one at the start, but politically impossible now. The Scots and the Welsh are not going to be happy to have their parliaments changed back to FPTP electoral systems, or, having been able to vote differently at home nation/UK levels, now having just one vote.
The problem is that the mere fact that legislation extends to England and Wales only does not stop it from being a reserved matter were it to apply to Scotland. For instance, legislation on firearms or the misuse of drugs could be passed which extended only to England and Wales.
That could be changed. It could be devolved and left up to each country to set its policy. Perhaps they might form a committee to agree common standards, or maybe not, but it would be their choice. Devolving power only works if things are allowed to be different.
.... what a mess we are in. That is not to say it is insoluble, merely that it will be very difficult to address.
I think it is one of those things that if we attempt to fix it a solution will present itself. We British can be very practical and adaptable. It is one of our better features.
More important is that DevoMax will mean the majority of issues debated and voted on in the Commons would not apply to Scotland. It's indefensible to have MPs voting on matters which are devolved and would not affect their constituents.
Given Blair's majority wouldn't that have passed even if no Scottish MP's had voted?
The West Lothian question is a problem that exists largely in theory, not in practice. Given that (as things stand) Westminster retains the right in theory to legislate on devolved matters or even to abolish Holyrood I cannot see how non-english MPs voting rights can reasonably be restricted.
The best solution would actually be a Scottish Tory recovery at Westminster (perhaps not impossible given some of the referendum results) removing the incentive to play the "english card".
No, there was a major rebellion and the government's majority was cut to five. 46 Scottish Labour MPs voted with the government with the 5 SNP and 10 Liberal Democrat MPs representing constituencies in Scotland voting against. The 1 Scottish Conservative abstained.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
I am sure that is comforting news for all those students who had to pay tuition fees for 12 years because of Scot's MPs.
12 years? The vote was in 2004. Try dividing by 2. Bear in mind, of course, that tuition fees already existed at the time; the vote was to increase them.
It's also a deep counterfactual to suggest that had a Conservative govt been in power (presumably without a Scottish contingent), the fees would not have increased - look at what happened in 2010 as soon as they took power!
Another thread about this EV4EL drivel , where is the thread on Cornish V4CL or Manchester V4ML or taking it to its extreme 26 Acacia Ave V4 26 Acacia Ave laws .
I sometimes wonder if you are actually as thick as you pretend to be Mark. If you cannot see the basic inequality in the current system then you clearly have no interest in democracy, only in your petty party concerns.
Mind you almost every post you have ever made on here confirms that.
I will try not to answer for Mark. But of course everyone realises that if you set up devolved bodies, that this will present a democratic issue in a central parliament.
The question is whether it is right to muck around with the UK parliament at Westminster. It cannot be right to restrict what MP's can vote on. If the English want to have their own parliament, then that is their choice. Labour won't sign a party agreement stopping non English MP's voting on English only issues. If the Tories want to do this, then they have to follow a democratic process to achieve the change they want.
MPs already have restrictions on what they can vote on. Devolution is one area, the EU is another. Technically, both could be overridden by repealing or amending the relevant Acts but then that's also true of EV4EL.
If Labour want to campaign against it then that's their privilege but their doing so shouldn't stop the other parties from going ahead anyway.
As far as I know MP's can vote on any vote called in the HOC or HOL. There is no restriction.
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
The more I've thought about it, the more I think an English parliament would be better than EVfEL. There's basically two options for EVfEL: a single UK administration approach and a dual administration approach.
If we had the single administration approach, during periods of different majorities, we would have UK ministers trying to pass legislation through an English committee they didn't have a majority in. That's fine for blocking legislation, but it means England is still at a disadvantage in legislation they want not being passed because of the blocking majority in the UK parliament. This seems to be unfair on England vis a vis the other home nations.
If we have a dual administration approach, with a separate English administration, I can imagine politics would be dominated by competing Prime Ministers and would lead to a very noxious political environment, with the two of them constantly at each others throats, fighting over which majority should vote on which piece of legislation and mass confusion among the public. This seems to be a mistake in preserving the union.
With a separate English parliament, however, we could have a clear difference between the two levels of government. It would be easier for the public to understand, and the divide of powers would be clearly defined. I think this is what we need.
That only works if you have the same level of devolution to all 4 home nations. Otherwise it is impractical.
Yes, I think we would have to do that. I don't see why that is a problem.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The "regional assemblies as a form of English devolution" idea is a distraction from the West Lothian question. No one is seriously proposing that these assemblies should have the power to make primary legislation or to levy any major tax. ...
I am.
Granting these regions the same degree of powers as we're about to give Scotland would effectively break up the UK into being a highly loose confederation. These regions - which people do not identify with in half the country - would have more powers than German lander, Canadian provinces or US states. It would really break up our country.
And again, the regions are terrible regions. The South East of England, hugely integrated around the economy of London, is separated from London for governance. Bedfordshire, Essex and Herts, essentially metropolitan commuter areas of London, are thrown in stupidly with East Anglia, a much more rural place. Lincolnshire is carved in half. Cornwall and Devon, who don't like each other at all, are thrown in together.
Devon and Cornwall suffer from the Dumnonia problem, the Cornish are Celts but the other half of the old kingdom was conquered by, and stuffed full of, Wessex Saxons. St Pirian would like Devon back.
The city that best represents the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish strands of the British Isles is Liverpool. The new British Parliament should be seated in Liverpool in a 21st century architectural masterpiece. The English Parliament in Westminster. The Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh but not not in the current monstrosity. The Welsh Parliament in Cardiff. The Irish Parliament in Dublin.
God no, politics is depressing enough without basing anything in that dump of a city. I propose, entirely coincidentally to my heritage, the traditional second city of England, and Adolf Hitlers choice to administer Nazi occupied Britain, Norwich, with it's beautiful city hall, Norman castle and cathedral and medieval guildhall. Norwich, capital city of federal UK, it just feels right ;-)
Nothing wrong with Scousers, far from it, but I'd suggest Kendal. Geographical centre of the UK and with excellent communications - and at least one wartime airfield not too far away.
Not much right with them either. Kendal is a good call, but I prefer Norwich. Possibly the greatest city in the world. No, definitely.
The city that best represents the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish strands of the British Isles is Liverpool. The new British Parliament should be seated in Liverpool in a 21st century architectural masterpiece. The English Parliament in Westminster. The Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh but not not in the current monstrosity. The Welsh Parliament in Cardiff. The Irish Parliament in Dublin.
God no, politics is depressing enough without basing anything in that dump of a city. I propose, entirely coincidentally to my heritage, the traditional second city of England, and Adolf Hitlers choice to administer Nazi occupied Britain, Norwich, with it's beautiful city hall, Norman castle and cathedral and medieval guildhall. Norwich, capital city of federal UK, it just feels right ;-)
Nothing wrong with Scousers, far from it, but I'd suggest Kendal. Geographical centre of the UK and with excellent communications - and at least one wartime airfield not too far away.
What have you got against Kendal. I always have found it a rather nice town, I don't see why it should have a load of politicians and their hangers on dumped on it. Liverpool or Birmingham would be better options, with the practicalities favouring the latter.
Mr. Taffys, that's a crazy notion! We could have the amusing situation of the SNP saying to scotland in 2015....look, vote for whoever you want, but just don't vote labour. We can do a deal with anybody else....
The voting dynamics for GE 2015 in Scotland do look very fluid in a 4 party situation. With the decline of the SLDs their vote was up for grabs by SLAB and the SNP, less so for the SCONs. After this referendum, we have the SNP dining on 45% of the vote whereas SLAB, SLD and SCON mainly have to split the 55% 3 ways. SLAB have clearly lost a large part of their working class support to the SNP, the SCONs will have gained (through No) some "tartan tories" from the SNP and the SLDs are still on a reduced diet. Quite how that plays out in the GE with 4 party politics is probably impossible to accurately model, but we could see a massive shift in seats. Such as a guess of SLAB 25, SNP 23, SCON 6 SLD 5?
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
I don't support dual executives in Westminster. My view is we have EV4EL with the UK government serving as the executive for England as it does now.
This is slightly messy I acknowledge but fairer than now.
- Ultimately English MPs represent 85% of the UK Parliament so they dominate. - You could have a convention that an English constituency MP can only be SoS for devolved areas. - Even without the former, a government can ultimately be ousted by the voters.
More important is that DevoMax will mean the majority of issues debated and voted on in the Commons would not apply to Scotland. It's indefensible to have MPs voting on matters which are devolved and would not affect their constituents.
Given Blair's majority wouldn't that have passed even if no Scottish MP's had voted?
The West Lothian question is a problem that exists largely in theory, not in practice. Given that (as things stand) Westminster retains the right in theory to legislate on devolved matters or even to abolish Holyrood I cannot see how non-english MPs voting rights can reasonably be restricted.
The best solution would actually be a Scottish Tory recovery at Westminster (perhaps not impossible given some of the referendum results) removing the incentive to play the "english card".
No, there was a major rebellion and the government's majority was cut to five. 46 Scottish Labour MPs voted with the government with the 5 SNP and 10 Liberal Democrat MPs representing constituencies in Scotland voting against. The 1 Scottish Conservative abstained.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
Lol. I mean, just, what??!!
"But Your Honour, even if I did murder the guy, he was going to die anyway."
The point is that the only actual example from 15 years of the "unfairness" of the WLQ that you have managed to dredge up is not even relevant today.
Incidentally, has anyone had their indyref wagers settled by The Union Divvie?
IIRC he owes me £100.
I can understand he is probably a bit sore, and sobbing under the duvet, but he needs to man up fairly soon. He certainly didn't strike me as a welcher and it would be very disappointing if that is the case.
Did you register the bet with PtP in which case he might have TUD's e-mail address? Or you could contact him directly via vanilla.
I have two with MalcolmG which I know he will settle on return from holiday.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
Should Scottish MPs and Cornish MPs get a vote on HS2 ?
Cornwall will certainly be contributing towards the cost because public transportation in England is paid for by English taxes.
Transport is devolved to Scotland. However, it can be argued that HS2 will partly be paid for by the VAT raised across the whole of the UK. So all MPs should get a vote.
Also whilst HS2 plans do not currently reach as far as Scotland, it has the potential to be extended to Scotland (but not Wales, NI or Cornwall).
HS2 is planned to be driven through the countryside, farms and homes of people in North Buckinghamshire, where they will not have the benefit of an HS2 station. However, the people of N. Buckinghamshire do not get a vote in the matter since their MP (the Speaker) is not able to vote or even debate the issue in parliament.
Mr. Taffys, that's a crazy notion! We could have the amusing situation of the SNP saying to scotland in 2015....look, vote for whoever you want, but just don't vote labour. We can do a deal with anybody else....
The voting dynamics for GE 2015 in Scotland do look very fluid in a 4 party situation. With the decline of the SLDs their vote was up for grabs by SLAB and the SNP, less so for the SCONs. After this referendum, we have the SNP dining on 45% of the vote whereas SLAB, SLD and SCON mainly have to split the 55% 3 ways. SLAB have clearly lost a large part of their working class support to the SNP, the SCONs will have gained (through No) some "tartan tories" from the SNP and the SLDs are still on a reduced diet. Quite how that plays out in the GE with 4 party politics is probably impossible to accurately model, but we could see a massive shift in seats. Such as a guess of SLAB 25, SNP 23, SCON 6 SLD 5?
Excellent post, with the proviso (if I may) that a new socialist party (to reclaim Keir Hardie, basically) could split the SLAB vote and - further on - possibly get some seats in its own right in the former core SLAB areas.
I don't support dual executives in Westminster. My view is we have EV4EL with the UK government serving as the executive for England as it does now.
This is slightly messy I acknowledge but fairer than now.
- Ultimately English MPs represent 85% of the UK Parliament so they dominate. - You could have a convention that an English constituency MP can only be SoS for devolved areas. - Even without the former, a government can ultimately be ousted by the voters.
But then if you have a Labour government with a UK majority, but not an English majority, even English Labour MPs being Education Secretary or Health Secretary are still getting in their positions of power based on non-English majorities. Seeing that much of education and health policy is done without legislation, this seems highly unfair on England still. We would still be being governed based on Scots and Welsh votes. And it's not just a few areas any more: with new powers for Scotland, most domestic policy will be devolved.
More important is that DevoMax will mean the majority of issues debated and voted on in the Commons would not apply to Scotland. It's indefensible to have MPs voting on matters which are devolved and would not affect their constituents.
Given Blair's majority wouldn't that have passed even if no Scottish MP's had voted?
The West Lothian question is a problem that exists largely in theory, not in practice. Given that (as things stand) Westminster retains the right in theory to legislate on devolved matters or even to abolish Holyrood I cannot see how non-english MPs voting rights can reasonably be restricted.
The best solution would actually be a Scottish Tory recovery at Westminster (perhaps not impossible given some of the referendum results) removing the incentive to play the "english card".
No, there was a major rebellion and the government's majority was cut to five. 46 Scottish Labour MPs voted with the government with the 5 SNP and 10 Liberal Democrat MPs representing constituencies in Scotland voting against. The 1 Scottish Conservative abstained.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
I am sure that is comforting news for all those students who had to pay tuition fees for 12 years because of Scot's MPs.
12 years? The vote was in 2004. Try dividing by 2. Bear in mind, of course, that tuition fees already existed at the time; the vote was to increase them.
It's also a deep counterfactual to suggest that had a Conservative govt been in power (presumably without a Scottish contingent), the fees would not have increased - look at what happened in 2010 as soon as they took power!
So it was 6 years rather than 12. That is only two generations of students rather than 4 who have Scots MPs to thank for their debts.
The city that best represents the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish strands of the British Isles is Liverpool. The new British Parliament should be seated in Liverpool in a 21st century architectural masterpiece. The English Parliament in Westminster. The Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh but not not in the current monstrosity. The Welsh Parliament in Cardiff. The Irish Parliament in Dublin.
God no, politics is depressing enough without basing anything in that dump of a city. I propose, entirely coincidentally to my heritage, the traditional second city of England, and Adolf Hitlers choice to administer Nazi occupied Britain, Norwich, with it's beautiful city hall, Norman castle and cathedral and medieval guildhall. Norwich, capital city of federal UK, it just feels right ;-)
Why would you think the UK Parliament will be located elsewhere than in Westminster, where the HOC & HOL are? It would be the English Parliament that might be located elsewhere.
but politically impossible now. The Scots and the Welsh are not going to be happy to have their parliaments changed back to FPTP electoral systems, or, having been able to vote differently at home nation/UK levels, now having just one vote.
I agree that it could never happen which is why I moved to an English HoC and a UK parliament of some sort for handling only the UK-wide issues.
Should Scottish MPs and Cornish MPs get a vote on HS2 ?
Cornwall will certainly be contributing towards the cost because public transportation in England is paid for by English taxes.
Transport is devolved to Scotland. However, it can be argued that HS2 will partly be paid for by the VAT raised across the whole of the UK. So all MPs should get a vote.
Also whilst HS2 plans do not currently reach as far as Scotland, it has the potential to be extended to Scotland (but not Wales, NI or Cornwall).
HS2 is planned to be driven through the countryside, farms and homes of people in North Buckinghamshire, where they will not have the benefit of an HS2 station. However, the people of N. Buckinghamshire do not get a vote in the matter since their MP (the Speaker) is not able to vote or even debate the issue in parliament.
Any one have a solution?
Isn't HS2 formally excluded from the Barnett calculations anyway? Or has that been changed? If not, then Scottish MPs have a clear legitimate right to vote on it, for that reason alone (the VAT one is a new one to me).
Isn't HS2 formally excluded from the Barnett calculations anyway? Or has that been changed? If not, then Scottish MPs have a clear legitimate right to vote on it, for that reason alone (the VAT one is a new one to me).
This is a perfect an example of the murky disputes that would emerge under the simplistic "kick out the non English MPs" solution being advocated by some.
Should Scottish MPs and Cornish MPs get a vote on HS2 ?
Cornwall will certainly be contributing towards the cost because public transportation in England is paid for by English taxes.
Transport is devolved to Scotland. However, it can be argued that HS2 will partly be paid for by the VAT raised across the whole of the UK. So all MPs should get a vote.
Also whilst HS2 plans do not currently reach as far as Scotland, it has the potential to be extended to Scotland (but not Wales, NI or Cornwall).
HS2 is planned to be driven through the countryside, farms and homes of people in North Buckinghamshire, where they will not have the benefit of an HS2 station. However, the people of N. Buckinghamshire do not get a vote in the matter since their MP (the Speaker) is not able to vote or even debate the issue in parliament.
Any one have a solution?
Two possible solutions:
1. Dictator.
2. Accept democracy is messy and fails in many ways, but when we have the opportunity to improve it (e.g. via EV4EL) we should go for it.
Not sure I agree with Socrates about the regional press. There many not always be one paper covering a region, but the regional press are surprisingly strong.
Councillors in Cambridgeshire seem to be far more scared of the Archant Group papers and the Cambridge Evening News than they do of the electorate.
The EDP is strong as is the Western Morning News.
Also, if we accept that nature abhors a vacuum surely a strong regional press would arise?
My experience of local papers is that whilst most of them are free, their revenue stream seems to be strong and they can be far more rationally critical (as opposed to populist) than the national media.
Also, regional television is quite strong with both ITV and BBC having half an hour of regional news per night.
Ask the question. Has Boris been held to account by the regional press. The Scottish Assembly and the Welsh Senedd? I think so.
Another thread about this EV4EL drivel , where is the thread on Cornish V4CL or Manchester V4ML or taking it to its extreme 26 Acacia Ave V4 26 Acacia Ave laws .
I sometimes wonder if you are actually as thick as you pretend to be Mark. If you cannot see the basic inequality in the current system then you clearly have no interest in democracy, only in your petty party concerns.
Mind you almost every post you have ever made on here confirms that.
I will try not to answer for Mark. But of course everyone realises that if you set up devolved bodies, that this will present a democratic issue in a central parliament.
The question is whether it is right to muck around with the UK parliament at Westminster. It cannot be right to restrict what MP's can vote on. If the English want to have their own parliament, then that is their choice. Labour won't sign a party agreement stopping non English MP's voting on English only issues. If the Tories want to do this, then they have to follow a democratic process to achieve the change they want.
MPs already have restrictions on what they can vote on. Devolution is one area, the EU is another. Technically, both could be overridden by repealing or amending the relevant Acts but then that's also true of EV4EL.
If Labour want to campaign against it then that's their privilege but their doing so shouldn't stop the other parties from going ahead anyway.
As far as I know MP's can vote on any vote called in the HOC or HOL. There is no restriction.
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland.
but politically impossible now. The Scots and the Welsh are not going to be happy to have their parliaments changed back to FPTP electoral systems, or, having been able to vote differently at home nation/UK levels, now having just one vote.
I agree that it could never happen which is why I moved to an English HoC and a UK parliament of some sort for handling only the UK-wide issues.
I think we're on the same page. EVfEL is definitely superior to what we have now, but an English parliament is the only way for England to be fairly governed. We can't have domestic policy that is devolved for the Celtic fringe being set by a government put in with their votes.
The basic division here is between the four nations of the UK.
It has 4-5 times as many people living in it as Scotland, why shouldn't it be treated as such? The historical boundaries of England, Scotland and Wales are as arbitrary as any other.
The point it, it's silly to claim that the outcome of a UK-wide election is "unfair" because an arbitrary subset of the seats is not representative of the overall results.
The city that best represents the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish strands of the British Isles is Liverpool. The new British Parliament should be seated in Liverpool in a 21st century architectural masterpiece. The English Parliament in Westminster. The Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh but not not in the current monstrosity. The Welsh Parliament in Cardiff. The Irish Parliament in Dublin.
God no, politics is depressing enough without basing anything in that dump of a city. I propose, entirely coincidentally to my heritage, the traditional second city of England, and Adolf Hitlers choice to administer Nazi occupied Britain, Norwich, with it's beautiful city hall, Norman castle and cathedral and medieval guildhall. Norwich, capital city of federal UK, it just feels right ;-)
Why would you think the UK Parliament will be located elsewhere than in Westminster, where the HOC & HOL are? It would be the English Parliament that might be located elsewhere.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
Those proposals were a nonsense though. The question put was essentially 'do you want to pay £10m+ a year for a group of people to sit around and perhaps oversee the fire service?'. Had the assemblies been offered real power, the outcome might have been different.
The basic division here is between the four nations of the UK.
It has 4-5 times as many people living in it as Scotland, why shouldn't it be treated as such? The historical boundaries of England, Scotland and Wales are as arbitrary as any other.
If you really want your party to run a policy platform on the basis that England is entirely arbitrary, and has no national merit to it more than the North of England, than good luck to you.
Presumably you also support splitting Scotland into several regions, given that it has 2.5 times the population of Northern Ireland? Or is it only England that's an arbitrary base that should be split up?
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
But Socrates any party with a UK and not English majority would not be able to pass their legislation impacting on England without the support of English MPs.
So while in a sense you are right to say we would be governed by the Scots and Welsh in executive terms, there is an insurance blanket there in legislative terms.
Moreover the fact that England represents 85% of UK MPs means, by sheer weight of numbers, that any party seeking to exploit its executive functions over England would suffer at the ballot box next time.
I think we're on the same page. EVfEL is definitely superior to what we have now, but an English parliament is the only way for England to be fairly governed. We can't have domestic policy that is devolved for the Celtic fringe being set by a government put in with their votes.
Indeed. Right now however, it appears I will have to devolve into domestic duties....
Westminster can remain largely as it is, acknowledging the fact that England is so preponderant that Scots do need a say in what England does. However, if Scots are allowed to vote on English laws, there should be an English committee which is able to veto the same English legislation, if most English MPs do not support the proposed law.
The problem with this proposal is that it concedes that the illegitimacy of non-English MPs enacting English legislation on education, health, local government and the environment against the wishes of English MPs, yet allows Ministers of the Crown administering that legislation to continue in office, but only on the basis of the votes of Scottish and Welsh MPs. It is an incoherent half-measure, and will fall as soon as one party has a majority in the House of Commons, but another has a majority of English MPs.
Probably, but the UK itself is an "incoherent half measure", and it has survived 300 years. Mine might give it another few centuries.
And I do not believe it would fall, because no Labour government would ever bring in legislation that could be vetoed by the English Grand Committee. EVOEL would, in other words, make Labour slightly less left wing or idiotic, and more thoughtful, about twice a decade, which is a good thing.
A good thing ?
We did,it was called new labour,look where that got us.
Another thread about this EV4EL drivel , where is the thread on Cornish V4CL or Manchester V4ML or taking it to its extreme 26 Acacia Ave V4 26 Acacia Ave laws .
I sometimes wonder if you are actually as thick as you pretend to be Mark. If you cannot see the basic inequality in the current system then you clearly have no interest in democracy, only in your petty party concerns.
Mind you almost every post you have ever made on here confirms that.
to do this, then they have to follow a democratic process to achieve the change they want.
MPs already have restrictions on what they can vote on. Devolution is one area, the EU is another. Technically, both could be overridden by repealing or amending the relevant Acts but then that's also true of EV4EL.
If Labour want to campaign against it then that's their privilege but their doing so shouldn't stop the other parties from going ahead anyway.
As far as I know MP's can vote on any vote called in the HOC or HOL. There is no restriction.
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland.
But why rush? There is very little legislation in the remains of this parliament, so EV4EL will be pretty much in name only. Properly thought proposals could be in party manifestos and debated at GE time.
The Eastern Daily Press covers much of the region and as I say might take the opportunity to expand their coverage into Essex. Anyway, as I say, nature abhors a vacuum... Archant dominate the local free press and might jump in too. BBC regional news is very strong and ITV has a half an hour a day.
The East Midlands? No idea. Not even sure where that is exactly.
This is a perfect an example of the murky disputes that would emerge under the simplistic "kick out the non English MPs" solution being advocated by some.
In Scotland its democracy, it England its 'simplistic'.
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
MalcolmG is on holiday. Not sure where Stuart Dickson is.
The basic division here is between the four nations of the UK.
It has 4-5 times as many people living in it as Scotland, why shouldn't it be treated as such? The historical boundaries of England, Scotland and Wales are as arbitrary as any other.
If you really want your party to run a policy platform on the basis that England is entirely arbitrary, and has no national merit to it more than the North of England, than good luck to you.
Presumably you also support splitting Scotland into several regions, given that it has 2.5 times the population of Northern Ireland? Or is it only England that's an arbitrary base that should be split up?
This isn't about splitting England up into anything. I was merely making the point that within a set of 650 constituencies, it will always be possible to select a subset that is a majority for either party and complain that it is "unfair." Of course, if we didn't have FPTP...
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
And unless there is a separate English Parliament, the Prime Minister basically has to be an English MP otherwise the vast majority of the policies he/she could not vote for or against.
I suppose Foreign Affairs and Defence will be populated mainly by Scots, Welsh and the Northern Irish.
So why try and keep the Scots in the UK if one of them could never be PM ? So much for caring and sharing !
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
Given that HEIPR currently stands at around 49% I suspect you might want to rethink that claim.
Another thread about this EV4EL drivel , where is the thread on Cornish V4CL or Manchester V4ML or taking it to its extreme 26 Acacia Ave V4 26 Acacia Ave laws .
I sometimes wonder if you are actually as thick as you pretend to be Mark. If you cannot see the basic inequality in the current system then you clearly have no interest in democracy, only in your petty party concerns.
Mind you almost every post you have ever made on here confirms that.
to do this, then they have to follow a democratic process to achieve the change they want.
MPs already have restrictions on what they can vote on. Devolution is one area, the EU is another. Technically, both could be overridden by repealing or amending the relevant Acts but then that's also true of EV4EL.
If Labour want to campaign against it then that's their privilege but their doing so shouldn't stop the other parties from going ahead anyway.
As far as I know MP's can vote on any vote called in the HOC or HOL. There is no restriction.
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland.
But why rush? There is very little legislation in the remains of this parliament, so EV4EL will be pretty much in name only. Properly thought proposals could be in party manifestos and debated at GE time.
"But why rush?"
It is not a rush. It's just the IndyRef and the leader's vows have brought this to the fore.
The timeframe for Scotland has become the timeframe for all of us. Which is fair.
The Scotsman says 'As early as 1999 William Hague, then party leader, was insisting that “English MPs should have exclusive say over English laws”'. It may be not so much as a fudge...
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
That's due to the happenstance of results since 1997. If the GE result reflects current polling, Labour would form a government with a majority of 16, according to UKPR. Do you not think more than a few new examples would arise in that situation?
"Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland"
I am not sure it would be legal to pass such legislation to restrict voting rights of members. May well be against Erskine May. Legal opinion would be required on this.
The answer to West Lothian is separate national assemblies and a federal parliament.
No reason why a Scottish or Welsh MP cannot be PM. The PM is the individual who the Queen believes can command a majority in the House of Commons. As long as that person can command a majority in the Commons they don't technically need to ever vote at all.
So even if they are head of an executive for policies that don't directly impact on their constituents they will head a cabinet of members for whom the policies do have an impact, they will have to win support for legislation from a group of MPs who represent England or England/Wales and finally, if England is not happy with that they elect another party at the next General Election.
Imperfect and messy but better than what we currently have.
Right off to watch Burnley play Sunderland now. We clarets need our first win!
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
Given that HEIPR currently stands at around 49% I suspect you might want to rethink that claim.
HEIPR was lower at the time. And as stated before only people who went to University in 2004-2010 were really affected. 49% of perhaps 13% of the working age population (assuming a 45 year career) is about 6.5% which is a pretty small proportion.
I'd be far more worried by those who have had their fees hiked to £9k by a Conservative government if I were you.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
Those proposals were a nonsense though. The question put was essentially 'do you want to pay £10m+ a year for a group of people to sit around and perhaps oversee the fire service?'. Had the assemblies been offered real power, the outcome might have been different.
It would be useful if any constitutional convention costed all the options, and was tasked to come up with cost-neutral options.
Personally, I would prefer the sort of constitutional convention that I could vote for, and which deliberated in public.
The Eastern Daily Press covers much of the region and as I say might take the opportunity to expand their coverage into Essex. Anyway, as I say, nature abhors a vacuum... Archant dominate the local free press and might jump in too. BBC regional news is very strong and ITV has a half an hour a day.
The East Midlands? No idea. Not even sure where that is exactly.
The East Midlands contains Leics, Notts, Derbys, and generally includes Northants Lincs and Rutland.
We have a population similar to Scotland, but some of the lowest numbers of percapita spend in the country on health and education. Nonetheless while functioning as a region for some purposes, we are not for others. The folk of Rutland and East Leicestershire are more like the home counties than North Derbyshire, and the folk of Skegness more like the folk of Margate.
The East Midlands is a region. England is our nation.
I sometimes wonder if you are actually as thick as you pretend to be Mark. If you cannot see the basic inequality in the current system then you clearly have no interest in democracy, only in your petty party concerns.
Mind you almost every post you have ever made on here confirms that.
to do this, then they have to follow a democratic process to achieve the change they want.
MPs already have restrictions on what they can vote on. Devolution is one area, the EU is another. Technically, both could be overridden by repealing or amending the relevant Acts but then that's also true of EV4EL.
If Labour want to campaign against it then that's their privilege but their doing so shouldn't stop the other parties from going ahead anyway.
As far as I know MP's can vote on any vote called in the HOC or HOL. There is no restriction.
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland.
But why rush? There is very little legislation in the remains of this parliament, so EV4EL will be pretty much in name only. Properly thought proposals could be in party manifestos and debated at GE time.
1. Because a promise has been made to the people of Scotland which may well have significantly influenced the result of the referendum and it needs to be seen to be kept. If nothing happens before the election, they may well suspect bad faith and that nothing will happen afterwards, particularly as two of the three parties will probably have new leaders then.
2. Because the time to consider how to rebalance the constitution for England (and Wales and NI) is at the same time as new powers are being passed to Scotland, not afterwards.
The point it, it's silly to claim that the outcome of a UK-wide election is "unfair" because an arbitrary subset of the seats is not representative of the overall results.
Yet that is precisely what we've listened to for how ever many years from Scotland.
Four nations (not regions) was the dividing line that was chosen back in the late 1990s.
I realise that the architects of that plan don't like the look of it now they've come to understand what the full repercussion of it is and why they are hastily trying to promote regions.
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
MalcolmG is on holiday. Not sure where Stuart Dickson is.
They've suffered a blow of immense proportions. They'll be out for the count and then in dazed incoherence for a good while yet.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
It appears that the extent of devolution in the UK is quite complex. For instance Northern Ireland only can change its drink driving limit, and Scotland only could abolish stamp duty? If voting was limited to matters that affected particular area some MPs would likely get confused and vote by mistake when they were not supposed to. However would it be possible for the committee stage of a bill to have a committee composed according to the MPs in the area that it affected, so that if a bill affected only England, and the Conservatives had a majority in England, they would have a majority on the committee?
Mr. Taffys, that's a crazy notion! We could have the amusing situation of the SNP saying to scotland in 2015....look, vote for whoever you want, but just don't vote labour. We can do a deal with anybody else....
The voting dynamics for GE 2015 in Scotland do look very fluid in a 4 party situation. With the decline of the SLDs their vote was up for grabs by SLAB and the SNP, less so for the SCONs. After this referendum, we have the SNP dining on 45% of the vote whereas SLAB, SLD and SCON mainly have to split the 55% 3 ways. SLAB have clearly lost a large part of their working class support to the SNP, the SCONs will have gained (through No) some "tartan tories" from the SNP and the SLDs are still on a reduced diet. Quite how that plays out in the GE with 4 party politics is probably impossible to accurately model, but we could see a massive shift in seats. Such as a guess of SLAB 25, SNP 23, SCON 6 SLD 5?
Excellent post, with the proviso (if I may) that a new socialist party (to reclaim Keir Hardie, basically) could split the SLAB vote and - further on - possibly get some seats in its own right in the former core SLAB areas.
Are the SNP not already that new Scottish Socialist party? Slamond was once expelled from the SNP because he was too left wing and their next Leader is said to be more socialist than Salmond.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
Given that HEIPR currently stands at around 49% I suspect you might want to rethink that claim.
HEIPR was lower at the time. And as stated before only people who went to University in 2004-2010 were really affected. 49% of perhaps 13% of the working age population (assuming a 45 year career) is about 6.5% which is a pretty small proportion.
I'd be far more worried by those who have had their fees hiked to £9k by a Conservative government if I were you.
I am worried about lots of things - not least how many future laws will be imposed on England with the votes of Scots MPs. Something you would be worried about as well were you not more concerned about party politics.
More important is that DevoMax will mean the majority of issues debated and voted on in the Commons would not apply to Scotland. It's indefensible to have MPs voting on matters which are devolved and would not affect their constituents.
Given Blair's majority wouldn't that have passed even if no Scottish MP's had voted?
The West Lothian question is a problem that exists largely in theory, not in practice. Given that (as things stand) Westminster retains the right in theory to legislate on devolved matters or even to abolish Holyrood I cannot see how non-english MPs voting rights can reasonably be restricted.
The best solution would actually be a Scottish Tory recovery at Westminster (perhaps not impossible given some of the referendum results) removing the incentive to play the "english card".
No, there was a major rebellion and the government's majority was cut to five. 46 Scottish Labour MPs voted with the government with the 5 SNP and 10 Liberal Democrat MPs representing constituencies in Scotland voting against. The 1 Scottish Conservative abstained.
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
Lol. I mean, just, what??!!
"But Your Honour, even if I did murder the guy, he was going to die anyway."
The point is that the only actual example from 15 years of the "unfairness" of the WLQ that you have managed to dredge up is not even relevant today.
How about 2006?
An anti-Catholic English education bill was scuppered by Catholic West of Scotland MPs, thank God.
It was after this that the BBC and Guardian turned virulently anti-Catholic.
The Eastern Daily Press covers much of the region and as I say might take the opportunity to expand their coverage into Essex. Anyway, as I say, nature abhors a vacuum... Archant dominate the local free press and might jump in too. BBC regional news is very strong and ITV has a half an hour a day.
The East Midlands? No idea. Not even sure where that is exactly.
I've never heard of that newspaper, having spent much of my life in Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. The fact you're having to include a half hour of ITV and a newspaper that doesn't cover the whole area shows how much you're scraping the barrel.
"Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland"
I am not sure it would be legal to pass such legislation to restrict voting rights of members. May well be against Erskine May. Legal opinion would be required on this.
The answer to West Lothian is separate national assemblies and a federal parliament.
It's perfectly legal. Primary legislation his no higher authority (ignore the EU red herring; that authority in the UK still rests upon the Act of Parliaments incorporating the various treaties into law).
There's also precedent. Parliament has repeated legislated to restrict the powers of the House of Lords which was, until 1911, a co-equal branch of parliament.
On England's relative size: surely this is less of a problem in a federal system? English votes will, by definition, not determine domestic policy in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, because by definition England will have no locus of authority there. Whereas, in a unitary system, or even in a unitary-system-with-devolution, there is always the opportunity for the votes of 85% of the population to be used to determine local issues in the other countries (the votes of English MPs could repeal Scottish devolution, as an extreme example).
Where it is a problem is on the "bringing Government closer to the people" dimension, where it is difficult to see how you can do that while recognising English nationhood but not creating two new tiers of government. Answers on a postcard, please.
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
MalcolmG is on holiday. Not sure where Stuart Dickson is.
They've suffered a blow of immense proportions. They'll be out for the count and then in dazed incoherence for a good while yet.
MalcolmG seemed to be in fairly robust form yesterday morning, though necessarily disappointed.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
As long as you have a separate English Parliament, that will work. But you Tories want to be cheapskates. You want the MP to also be the MEnP ?
I am not aware that US Congressmen are also Reps for Maryland and Virginia or even Washington DC.
"Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland"
I am not sure it would be legal to pass such legislation to restrict voting rights of members. May well be against Erskine May. Legal opinion would be required on this.
The answer to West Lothian is separate national assemblies and a federal parliament.
It's perfectly legal. Primary legislation his no higher authority (ignore the EU red herring; that authority in the UK still rests upon the Act of Parliaments incorporating the various treaties into law).
There's also precedent. Parliament has repeated legislated to restrict the powers of the House of Lords which was, until 1911, a co-equal branch of parliament.
Did not realise you were an expert on Erskine May. The HOC is looking for new clerk !
Regardless of what happened, the 2010 tuition fees changes passed by the Coalition did so without Scottish MPs support. So, at worst, Scottish MPs accelerated the introduction of Tuition Fees in England by a few years.
It won't be the 2010 fees that matter. People will ignore that on the rebuttal leaflet and just look at:-
England has tuition fees Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
I think you over-estimate the importance people will attach to an event that occurred 10 years ago that only adversely affected a small segment of the population.
Given that HEIPR currently stands at around 49% I suspect you might want to rethink that claim.
HEIPR was lower at the time. And as stated before only people who went to University in 2004-2010 were really affected. 49% of perhaps 13% of the working age population (assuming a 45 year career) is about 6.5% which is a pretty small proportion.
I'd be far more worried by those who have had their fees hiked to £9k by a Conservative government if I were you.
I am worried about lots of things - not least how many future laws will be imposed on England with the votes of Scots MPs. Something you would be worried about as well were you not more concerned about party politics.
He's just resorting to whataboutism now. I've heard Scientologists use the same argument against anti-Scientology activists: "Why are you worried about our abuses when there are starving children in Africa?" The argument was as stupid then as it is now.
Thinking about Ev4el I think we are trying to be too clever and not thinking constructively.
Currently we have a House of Commons which creates laws and a House of Lords that sanity checks them. The plan is to reform the Commons without any thought on anything else when we can use the logic already in Parliament to resolve a lot more.
What I would suggest is to create 4 "country" governments (NI Assembly, Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament, (House of Commons/ English Parliament) all of whom have similar powers. All laws created there go to the (House of Lords / National Parliament) to be sanity checked.
Then we do the same in reverse and reform the House of Lords to be a national parliament populated by means unspecified. This is would be where whole United Kingdom Law would be initiated and created before going to the "country" parliaments to be sanity checked. It would also be where the whole Government departments report to (Defence, Foreign…).
The rules for sanity checking would be the same as what the house of Lords does now. The system allows for suggestions to be made and slight delays (for rethink) to be added but won't stop the law becoming law.
By doing the above we will end up with an English Parliament doing its tasks correctly and a national parliament that would actually have to listen to all 4 countries as laws were passed.
Mr. Taffys, that's a crazy notion! We could have the amusing situation of the SNP saying to scotland in 2015....look, vote for whoever you want, but just don't vote labour. We can do a deal with anybody else....
The voting dynamics for GE 2015 in Scotland do look very fluid in a 4 party situation. With the decline of the SLDs their vote was up for grabs by SLAB and the SNP, less so for the SCONs. After this referendum, we have the SNP dining on 45% of the vote whereas SLAB, SLD and SCON mainly have to split the 55% 3 ways. SLAB have clearly lost a large part of their working class support to the SNP, the SCONs will have gained (through No) some "tartan tories" from the SNP and the SLDs are still on a reduced diet. Quite how that plays out in the GE with 4 party politics is probably impossible to accurately model, but we could see a massive shift in seats. Such as a guess of SLAB 25, SNP 23, SCON 6 SLD 5?
Excellent post, with the proviso (if I may) that a new socialist party (to reclaim Keir Hardie, basically) could split the SLAB vote and - further on - possibly get some seats in its own right in the former core SLAB areas.
Are the SNP not already that new Scottish Socialist party? Slamond was once expelled from the SNP because he was too left wing and their next Leader is said to be more socialist than Salmond.
Salmond's left-wingery was always fraudulent as his friendships with Murdoch, Goodwin, Trump, Souter and Matthewson revealed. His one abiding passion was a hatred for the British state.
All different, in the UK, there are four countries, in Switzerland four 'ethnic' regions divided by language.
Taxes are paid at the local, state and federal level.
I discussed Indyref with some Swiss the other night, none of them could understand it but anyone familiar with Switzerland will know that a Swiss German in Swiss Romand (French region) has to speak French, no one will speak to them in German. A Swiss Romand in The Schweizerdeutsch region has to speak German, no one will speak French to them.
I explained to them that if they extrapolated that stupidity they would begin to understand. And the English fund the Scots even more than the Swiss Germans fund everyone else, at the end I think they got it.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
That's because USA, Germany, Canada and Australia etc. have no one constituent state that dominates. Federations such as Yugoslavia and USSR where Serbia and Russia dominated, respectively, did not last.
It appears that the extent of devolution in the UK is quite complex. For instance Northern Ireland only can change its drink driving limit, and Scotland only could abolish stamp duty? If voting was limited to matters that affected particular area some MPs would likely get confused and vote by mistake when they were not supposed to. However would it be possible for the committee stage of a bill to have a committee composed according to the MPs in the area that it affected, so that if a bill affected only England, and the Conservatives had a majority in England, they would have a majority on the committee?
I think we need to move to all 4 countries of the Union having the same powers. In fact, I would go as far as to say we should recognise their (limited) sovereignty and for the UK to be the result of a treaty between all four nations.
If the Welsh don't want that much freedom, they can choose between that and becoming part of England-and-Wales again.
On England's relative size: surely this is less of a problem in a federal system? English votes will, by definition, not determine domestic policy in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, because by definition England will have no locus of authority there. Whereas, in a unitary system, or even in a unitary-system-with-devolution, there is always the opportunity for the votes of 85% of the population to be used to determine local issues in the other countries (the votes of English MPs could repeal Scottish devolution, as an extreme example).
Where it is a problem is on the "bringing Government closer to the people" dimension, where it is difficult to see how you can do that while recognising English nationhood but not creating two new tiers of government. Answers on a postcard, please.
Right. Given the extent of devolution on offer to Scotland, they do not need to worry about English domination any more.
The Eastern Daily Press covers much of the region and as I say might take the opportunity to expand their coverage into Essex. Anyway, as I say, nature abhors a vacuum... Archant dominate the local free press and might jump in too. BBC regional news is very strong and ITV has a half an hour a day.
The East Midlands? No idea. Not even sure where that is exactly.
The East Midlands contains Leics, Notts, Derbys, and generally includes Northants Lincs and Rutland.
We have a population similar to Scotland, but some of the lowest numbers of percapita spend in the country on health and education. Nonetheless while functioning as a region for some purposes, we are not for others. The folk of Rutland and East Leicestershire are more like the home counties than North Derbyshire, and the folk of Skegness more like the folk of Margate.
The East Midlands is a region. England is our nation.
Derbyshire's an interesting one. I was born in the south of the county, by the T&M canal, and was brought up in that area. When I was a teenager I spent vast amounts of time in the Peak District, which was a different world from south Derbyshire. Then I went to Glossop, and realised that it was different again. Accents, lifestyle, agriculture; there was little commonality.
Most importantly, the populations gravitate towards different places. People in northeastern Derbyshire gravitate towards Sheffield; those in the south Derby, Nottingham and Birmingham. Those in the north Manchester.
Derbyshire's a hodgepodge; yet most people saw themselves as Derbyshire folk.
However any regional splitting of the country would really have to split Derbyshire asunder because of those differences. How could a town just a few miles from Manchester be in the East or West Midlands?
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
MalcolmG is on holiday. Not sure where Stuart Dickson is.
They've suffered a blow of immense proportions. They'll be out for the count and then in dazed incoherence for a good while yet.
MalcolmG seemed to be in fairly robust form yesterday morning, though necessarily disappointed.
MalcolmG's true loyalties were more than a little ambiguous.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
As long as you have a separate English Parliament, that will work. But you Tories want to be cheapskates. You want the MP to also be the MEnP ?
I am not aware that US Congressmen are also Reps for Maryland and Virginia or even Washington DC.
I am not a Tory :-) and I think EV4EL is only practicable as a short term fix (the rest of this Parliament and possibly the next).
I support symmetric devolution - real federalism - although I am worried about creating too many tiers of government for England.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
The Bundestag is an even better example. The members are not members of the Berlin Assembly or any other State assembly as far as I know.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
That's because USA, Germany, Canada and Australia etc. have no one constituent state that dominates. Federations such as Yugoslavia and USSR where Serbia and Russia dominated, respectively, did not last.
The most separatist part of the UK has just decided it is fine with remaining part of a state where another part has domination on issues like macroeconomics and foreign policy. It's thus not an issue, other than in the minds of left-wingers that want to deny England home rule.
Socrates, you seem determined to have an argument about the regional press. There isn't one. I don't particularly disagree with you. However, as I've pointed out before the media owners are sufficiently fly to fill a vacuum if it exists.
This is not an argument against regional government, I'm afraid. As soon as France went for regional governments the regional press was quick to take advantage of the situation and evolved very quickly to meet the new situation. I suspect the English regional press will do so even more rapidly.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
No bloody way am I being ruled by those in Nottingham. Or Derby for that matter. They will have to accept the Iron hand of Leicester or be crushed!
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
As long as you have a separate English Parliament, that will work. But you Tories want to be cheapskates. You want the MP to also be the MEnP ?
I am not aware that US Congressmen are also Reps for Maryland and Virginia or even Washington DC.
I am not a Tory :-) and I think EV4EL is only practicable as a short term fix (the rest of this Parliament and possibly the next).
I support symmetric devolution - real federalism - although I am worried about creating too many tiers of government for England.
Too many tiers ? I am tired of hearing this. How many tiers do we have ?
Let's take a Londener:
He/she elects a Councillor, an MP, London Assembly Rep, the Mayor [ I am not counting 2/3 councillors because they are not different tiers ]. An MEP.
Let's take a New Yorker:
He/she elects a NY Councillor, the Mayor .[ I do not know if they have Boroughs like we do or if that falls under the Mayor ], State Representative, State Senator, Governer, House Rep, Senator, President.
I am not counting the Police Chief, Chief Dog Pooh collector etc.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
These are incredibly arbitrary though: who identifies with "the north home counties"? Some of the areas are so tiny, it makes welfare and taxation arbitrage destructive between the places silly. Cumbria is connected north south, not to people with different accents the other side of the Pennines. Mercia and the Midlands were traditionally the same place. Devon and Cornwall hate each other! etc etc
And lived in Herts & Beds, if asked which region of England I was in, I probably would have said "the South East".
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
No bloody way am I being ruled by those in Nottingham. Or Derby for that matter. They will have to accept the Iron hand of Leicester or be crushed!
Ratae was the Oppida for central Eastern England so there would be some (pre) historic justification for it. :-)
Thinking about Ev4el I think we are trying to be too clever and not thinking constructively.
Currently we have a House of Commons which creates laws and a House of Lords that sanity checks them. The plan is to reform the Commons without any thought on anything else when we can use the logic already in Parliament to resolve a lot more.
What I would suggest is to create 4 "country" governments (NI Assembly, Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament, (House of Commons/ English Parliament) all of whom have similar powers. All laws created there go to the (House of Lords / National Parliament) to be sanity checked.
Then we do the same in reverse and reform the House of Lords to be a national parliament populated by means unspecified. This is would be where whole United Kingdom Law would be initiated and created before going to the "country" parliaments to be sanity checked. It would also be where the whole Government departments report to (Defence, Foreign…).
The rules for sanity checking would be the same as what the house of Lords does now. The system allows for suggestions to be made and slight delays (for rethink) to be added but won't stop the law becoming law.
By doing the above we will end up with an English Parliament doing its tasks correctly and a national parliament that would actually have to listen to all 4 countries as laws were passed.
Interesting, but fatally flawed in that the Sanity House would end up bigger than the present HoC as the people inside struggled to keep up with the amount of work flowing from the 4 countries Assemblies. They would also have to keep up with the amount of work from the cross border trade and business agreements.
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
No bloody way am I being ruled by those in Nottingham. Or Derby for that matter. They will have to accept the Iron hand of Leicester or be crushed!
Ratae was the Oppida for central Eastern England so there would be some (pre) historic justification for it. :-)
And if the North of England ruled itself, it would have had a large Labour majority. So what? In a GE I am voting for who I want to be running the whole United Kingdom, not an arbitrary subset of constituencies.
The North East was offered that. And even with Tony Blair (a local MP) selling it we totally and utterly rejected it. The problem is that while many people here hate their local councillors they really hate the ones next door. 50 years of bad management doesn't encourage people to vote to give them more powers.
The other problem with regional government is that there isn't a regional media to cover it in most places. That is a recipe for unaccountable politicians and bad government.
Another issue is that apart from Yorkshire, many of the other regions are artificial creations cobbled together with no shared identity, in particular the SE monstrosity which stretches all the way from Banbury to Dover with little common interest. If you had to have regional government then I would suggest regions as follows:
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury? South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone? London - 8 million - London North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage? East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
No bloody way am I being ruled by those in Nottingham. Or Derby for that matter. They will have to accept the Iron hand of Leicester or be crushed!
Don't worry, we'll help you Leicesterians get treatment for your inferiority complex once we rule you from Derby.
And then use you as cannon-fodder in our eternal battle with Nottinghamshire ... ;-)
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
That's because USA, Germany, Canada and Australia etc. have no one constituent state that dominates. Federations such as Yugoslavia and USSR where Serbia and Russia dominated, respectively, did not last.
The most separatist part of the UK has just decided it is fine with remaining part of a state where another part has domination on issues like macroeconomics and foreign policy. It's thus not an issue, other than in the minds of left-wingers that want to deny England home rule.
Oh, it will be fine for a while, until either the English decide that a Scottish PM is unacceptable, or the Scots work out that a Scot can never be UK PM again.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
As long as you have a separate English Parliament, that will work. But you Tories want to be cheapskates. You want the MP to also be the MEnP ?
I am not aware that US Congressmen are also Reps for Maryland and Virginia or even Washington DC.
I am not a Tory :-) and I think EV4EL is only practicable as a short term fix (the rest of this Parliament and possibly the next).
I support symmetric devolution - real federalism - although I am worried about creating too many tiers of government for England.
Too many tiers ? I am tired of hearing this. How many tiers do we have ?
Let's take a Londener:
He/she elects a Councillor, an MP, the Mayor [ I am not counting 2/3 councillors because they are not different tiers ]. An MEP.
Let's take a New Yorker:
He/she elects a NY Councillor, the Mayor .[ I do not know if they have Boroughs like we do or if that falls under the Mayor ], State Representative, State Senator, Governer, House Rep, Senator, President.
I am not counting the Police Chief, Chief Dog Pooh collector etc.
You're wrong about Londoners. We elect both local borough councillors and London Assembly members. And Londoners are some of the people with fewest layers of government in England. Others have parish, district, county, national and European.
The US local municipality system is a complete mess in many players, and famous for being local corrupt party machines. We do not want to aspire to what they have in Chicago, New Orleans or Baltimore.
If EV4EL really comes in with an English Parliament, then I predict the UK will indeed break up in 25 years.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
Well, that's a bit of a damn fool question. What is the point of the USA? The Bundesrepublik Deutschland? Both have a federal system with significant powers devolved to their states, and still have a strong national government.
That's because USA, Germany, Canada and Australia etc. have no one constituent state that dominates. Federations such as Yugoslavia and USSR where Serbia and Russia dominated, respectively, did not last.
The most separatist part of the UK has just decided it is fine with remaining part of a state where another part has domination on issues like macroeconomics and foreign policy. It's thus not an issue, other than in the minds of left-wingers that want to deny England home rule.
Oh, it will be fine for a while, until either the English decide that a Scottish PM is unacceptable, or the Scots work out that a Scot can never be UK PM again.
In a proper federal system with an English parliament, the English would be fine with a Scottish PM.
Mr. Taffys, that's a crazy notion! We could have the amusing situation of the SNP saying to scotland in 2015....look, vote for whoever you want, but just don't vote labour. We can do a deal with anybody else....
The voting dynamics for GE 2015 in Scotland do look very fluid in a 4 party situation. With the decline of the SLDs their vote was up for grabs by SLAB and the SNP, less so for the SCONs. After this referendum, we have the SNP dining on 45% of the vote whereas SLAB, SLD and SCON mainly have to split the 55% 3 ways. SLAB have clearly lost a large part of their working class support to the SNP, the SCONs will have gained (through No) some "tartan tories" from the SNP and the SLDs are still on a reduced diet. Quite how that plays out in the GE with 4 party politics is probably impossible to accurately model, but we could see a massive shift in seats. Such as a guess of SLAB 25, SNP 23, SCON 6 SLD 5?
Excellent post, with the proviso (if I may) that a new socialist party (to reclaim Keir Hardie, basically) could split the SLAB vote and - further on - possibly get some seats in its own right in the former core SLAB areas.
Are the SNP not already that new Scottish Socialist party? Slamond was once expelled from the SNP because he was too left wing and their next Leader is said to be more socialist than Salmond.
Point taken, but no, I really [edit] do judge it's too centrist for that (at the moment) and remember Mr Swinney is still holding the crucial position of finance.
Definitely plenty of room on the left of the SNP. Political Compass website has a very interesting analysis of party manifestoes for the 2010 or 2011 election (I forget which). One piece of evidence of that [edit] room to the left is the Radical Independence Consortium which included lefties and Greens, and was well to the left of the SNP.
Comments
"But Your Honour, even if I did murder the guy, he was going to die anyway."
Kendal is a good call, but I prefer Norwich. Possibly the greatest city in the world. No, definitely.
I think it is one of those things that if we attempt to fix it a solution will present itself. We British can be very practical and adaptable. It is one of our better features.
It's also a deep counterfactual to suggest that had a Conservative govt been in power (presumably without a Scottish contingent), the fees would not have increased - look at what happened in 2010 as soon as they took power!
I am not sure this coalition could pass a bill through the HOC/HOL that would deliver EV4EL, before the election. At a 2015 election there will be many more important issues for people to be worried about.
The proper way of dealing with this is to have an English parliament, with the current HOC/HOL being the federal parliament.
St Pirian would like Devon back.
This is slightly messy I acknowledge but fairer than now.
- Ultimately English MPs represent 85% of the UK Parliament so they dominate.
- You could have a convention that an English constituency MP can only be SoS for devolved areas.
- Even without the former, a government can ultimately be ousted by the voters.
I have two with MalcolmG which I know he will settle on return from holiday.
England has tuition fees
Scotland don't
Scottish Labour MPs voted it through when it had nothing to do with them.
As I stated yesterday additional facts won't help Labour escape that argument. Simple statements are the things that win elections and that is a simple thing that will annoy people when remembered about it..
Cornwall will certainly be contributing towards the cost because public transportation in England is paid for by English taxes.
Transport is devolved to Scotland. However, it can be argued that HS2 will partly be paid for by the VAT raised across the whole of the UK. So all MPs should get a vote.
Also whilst HS2 plans do not currently reach as far as Scotland, it has the potential to be extended to Scotland (but not Wales, NI or Cornwall).
HS2 is planned to be driven through the countryside, farms and homes of people in North Buckinghamshire, where they will not have the benefit of an HS2 station. However, the people of N. Buckinghamshire do not get a vote in the matter since their MP (the Speaker) is not able to vote or even debate the issue in parliament.
Any one have a solution?
The basic division here is between the four nations of the UK.
Two possible solutions:
1. Dictator.
2. Accept democracy is messy and fails in many ways, but when we have the opportunity to improve it (e.g. via EV4EL) we should go for it.
Councillors in Cambridgeshire seem to be far more scared of the Archant Group papers and the Cambridge Evening News than they do of the electorate.
The EDP is strong as is the Western Morning News.
Also, if we accept that nature abhors a vacuum surely a strong regional press would arise?
My experience of local papers is that whilst most of them are free, their revenue stream seems to be strong and they can be far more rationally critical (as opposed to populist) than the national media.
Also, regional television is quite strong with both ITV and BBC having half an hour of regional news per night.
Ask the question. Has Boris been held to account by the regional press. The Scottish Assembly and the Welsh Senedd? I think so.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland.
The point it, it's silly to claim that the outcome of a UK-wide election is "unfair" because an arbitrary subset of the seats is not representative of the overall results.
Presumably you also support splitting Scotland into several regions, given that it has 2.5 times the population of Northern Ireland? Or is it only England that's an arbitrary base that should be split up?
What press is there for the East of England that could give any real scrutiny to a regional assembly? What about the East Midlands?
Well those are indeed radical numbers. I would love to know what a Scot nat like Malcolm thinks, they don;t seem to be around at the moment. I know that Malcolm thinks SLAB is holed below the waterline anyway.
Wonder what the numbers might be if 'the vow' isn't implemented before 2015 (or should I say 'when').
So while in a sense you are right to say we would be governed by the Scots and Welsh in executive terms, there is an insurance blanket there in legislative terms.
Moreover the fact that England represents 85% of UK MPs means, by sheer weight of numbers, that any party seeking to exploit its executive functions over England would suffer at the ballot box next time.
Byee!!
And of course devolution isn;t a matter that should be considered lightly, for labour. It should be considered by Great Panjandrums over many years.
Unless of course its for Scotland, in which case it should be arbitrarily promised and rushed through immediately.
We did,it was called new labour,look where that got us.
The East Midlands? No idea. Not even sure where that is exactly.
In Scotland its democracy, it England its 'simplistic'.
For a simple reason, if all the 4 countries does everyting more or less on their own, what will be the point of the Union ?
And unless there is a separate English Parliament, the Prime Minister basically has to be an English MP otherwise the vast majority of the policies he/she could not vote for or against.
I suppose Foreign Affairs and Defence will be populated mainly by Scots, Welsh and the Northern Irish.
So why try and keep the Scots in the UK if one of them could never be PM ? So much for caring and sharing !
It is not a rush. It's just the IndyRef and the leader's vows have brought this to the fore.
The timeframe for Scotland has become the timeframe for all of us. Which is fair.
"Perhaps the current Commons couldn't pass the legislation before April; that's no excuse for not trying. The two governing parties have a majority in their own right and I can't see any reason why some smaller parties wouldn't support the proposals as well, the SNP for one.
Aspiring to an English parliament is fine for those who want it but couldn't be delivered until the back-end of the decade at the earliest. EV4EL doesn't stop that aspiration and may well be a step on the road towards it. By contrast, EV4EL could be in place at the passing of the legislation and at the same time as delivering on the leaders' pledge to Scotland"
I am not sure it would be legal to pass such legislation to restrict voting rights of members. May well be against Erskine May. Legal opinion would be required on this.
The answer to West Lothian is separate national assemblies and a federal parliament.
So even if they are head of an executive for policies that don't directly impact on their constituents they will head a cabinet of members for whom the policies do have an impact, they will have to win support for legislation from a group of MPs who represent England or England/Wales and finally, if England is not happy with that they elect another party at the next General Election.
Imperfect and messy but better than what we currently have.
Right off to watch Burnley play Sunderland now. We clarets need our first win!
I'd be far more worried by those who have had their fees hiked to £9k by a Conservative government if I were you.
Personally, I would prefer the sort of constitutional convention that I could vote for, and which deliberated in public.
We have a population similar to Scotland, but some of the lowest numbers of percapita spend in the country on health and education. Nonetheless while functioning as a region for some purposes, we are not for others. The folk of Rutland and East Leicestershire are more like the home counties than North Derbyshire, and the folk of Skegness more like the folk of Margate.
The East Midlands is a region. England is our nation.
2. Because the time to consider how to rebalance the constitution for England (and Wales and NI) is at the same time as new powers are being passed to Scotland, not afterwards.
Four nations (not regions) was the dividing line that was chosen back in the late 1990s.
I realise that the architects of that plan don't like the look of it now they've come to understand what the full repercussion of it is and why they are hastily trying to promote regions.
labour are having a giant, giant brainf8rt over EVEL
1) If it's a lower level of devolution than what Scotland will get, it doesn't solve the problem
2) If it's the same level of devolution as what Scotland will get, then why not do it for Glasgow and Cardiff too?
An anti-Catholic English education bill was scuppered by Catholic West of Scotland MPs, thank God.
It was after this that the BBC and Guardian turned virulently anti-Catholic.
Relevant enough for you?
There's also precedent. Parliament has repeated legislated to restrict the powers of the House of Lords which was, until 1911, a co-equal branch of parliament.
Where it is a problem is on the "bringing Government closer to the people" dimension, where it is difficult to see how you can do that while recognising English nationhood but not creating two new tiers of government. Answers on a postcard, please.
I am not aware that US Congressmen are also Reps for Maryland and Virginia or even Washington DC.
Did not realise you were an expert on Erskine May. The HOC is looking for new clerk !
Do not forget that many (most?) Cities have rejected elected mayors.
Politicians do not seem to realise that no-one wants more of them, apart from other politicians.
Pass "the Vow" legislation, but with a condition that Scots MP's support a form of resolution to the WLQ.
Currently we have a House of Commons which creates laws and a House of Lords that sanity checks them. The plan is to reform the Commons without any thought on anything else when we can use the logic already in Parliament to resolve a lot more.
What I would suggest is to create 4 "country" governments (NI Assembly, Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament, (House of Commons/ English Parliament) all of whom have similar powers. All laws created there go to the (House of Lords / National Parliament) to be sanity checked.
Then we do the same in reverse and reform the House of Lords to be a national parliament populated by means unspecified. This is would be where whole United Kingdom Law would be initiated and created before going to the "country" parliaments to be sanity checked. It would also be where the whole Government departments report to (Defence, Foreign…).
The rules for sanity checking would be the same as what the house of Lords does now. The system allows for suggestions to be made and slight delays (for rethink) to be added but won't stop the law becoming law.
By doing the above we will end up with an English Parliament doing its tasks correctly and a national parliament that would actually have to listen to all 4 countries as laws were passed.
Switzerland is a good example to follow.
4 Nations / Regions
All different, in the UK, there are four countries, in Switzerland four 'ethnic' regions divided by language.
Taxes are paid at the local, state and federal level.
I discussed Indyref with some Swiss the other night, none of them could understand it but anyone familiar with Switzerland will know that a Swiss German in Swiss Romand (French region) has to speak French, no one will speak to them in German. A Swiss Romand in The Schweizerdeutsch region has to speak German, no one will speak French to them.
I explained to them that if they extrapolated that stupidity they would begin to understand. And the English fund the Scots even more than the Swiss Germans fund everyone else, at the end I think they got it.
If the Welsh don't want that much freedom, they can choose between that and becoming part of England-and-Wales again.
Most importantly, the populations gravitate towards different places. People in northeastern Derbyshire gravitate towards Sheffield; those in the south Derby, Nottingham and Birmingham. Those in the north Manchester.
Derbyshire's a hodgepodge; yet most people saw themselves as Derbyshire folk.
However any regional splitting of the country would really have to split Derbyshire asunder because of those differences. How could a town just a few miles from Manchester be in the East or West Midlands?
I support symmetric devolution - real federalism - although I am worried about creating too many tiers of government for England.
Devonwall - Devon+Cornwall - 1.6 million people - Assembly in Plymouth
West Country - Bristol, Somerset, Gloucs, Wilts - 2.8 million - Bristol
South Coast - Dorset, Hampshire, IOW - 2.6 million - Southampton
Thames Valley - Berks, Bucks, Oxon - 2.3 million - Aylesbury?
South East Coast - Surrey, E&W Sussex, Kent - 4.4 million - Maidstone?
London - 8 million - London
North home counties - Beds, Herts, Essex - 3.4 million - Stevenage?
East Anglia - Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambs - 2.4 million - Norwich
East Midlands - As is - 4.8 million - Nottingham
West Midlands - West Midlands county - 2.7 million - Birmingham
South Mercia - Worcs, Hereford, Warks -1.3 million - Worcester
North Mercia - Shropshire, Staffs - 1.6 million - Stoke
Yorkshire - Yorkshire - 5 million - Leeds
Northern England - Northumberland, Durham, Cumbria, T&W - 2.8 million - Newcastle
North West - Lancashire, Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside - 6.4 million
This is not an argument against regional government, I'm afraid. As soon as France went for regional governments the regional press was quick to take advantage of the situation and evolved very quickly to meet the new situation. I suspect the English regional press will do so even more rapidly.
Let's take a Londener:
He/she elects a Councillor, an MP, London Assembly Rep, the Mayor [ I am not counting 2/3 councillors because they are not different tiers ]. An MEP.
Let's take a New Yorker:
He/she elects a NY Councillor, the Mayor .[ I do not know if they have Boroughs like we do or if that falls under the Mayor ], State Representative, State Senator, Governer, House Rep, Senator, President.
I am not counting the Police Chief, Chief Dog Pooh collector etc.
And lived in Herts & Beds, if asked which region of England I was in, I probably would have said "the South East".
And then use you as cannon-fodder in our eternal battle with Nottinghamshire ... ;-)
The US local municipality system is a complete mess in many players, and famous for being local corrupt party machines. We do not want to aspire to what they have in Chicago, New Orleans or Baltimore.
Definitely plenty of room on the left of the SNP. Political Compass website has a very interesting analysis of party manifestoes for the 2010 or 2011 election (I forget which). One piece of evidence of that [edit] room to the left is the Radical Independence Consortium which included lefties and Greens, and was well to the left of the SNP.