Those who can’t break the law shouldn’t make the law

So it looks as though some form of lifting of the ban on UK prisoners voting in elections will effectively be imposed on the UK by the European Court of Justice. However, what I’m wondering is whether any eventual legislation allowing this would create a legal precedent for banning non-English-elected MPs from voting on English [...]

It’s time to address the Westminster Question, not the West Lothian one

The extremely modest terms of the West Lothian Commission were announced yesterday: “To consider how the House of Commons might deal with legislation which affects only part of the United Kingdom, following the devolution of certain legislative powers to the Scottish Parliament, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the National Assembly for Wales.” Well, I’d like [...]

Fame at last (for five minutes)! Recognition for my design talents . . .

I’ve always been c*** at drawing and design. So imagine my surprise when my semi-spoof design for the flag for a new ‘United Kingdom of England, Wales and N. Ireland’ (which I came up with in May last year following the SNP’s victory in the Scottish-parliamentary election) was included in a blog by Dan Hannan [...]

Unionists need to find reasons for England to remain in the Union, as well as Scotland

As it was reported this morning that several leading Scottish-elected Westminster politicians were up in Scotland campaigning in favour of a pro-Union vote in the Scottish referendum on Scottish independence – whenever it happens – the Daily Telegraph reported that a majority of those in England who expressed a preference in a new ICM poll favoured [...]

If Cameron doesn’t want to be “Prime Minister of England”, he should resign as PM for the UK

In his ‘playing hardball on Scottish independence interview’ with the Sunday Telegraph yesterday, David Cameron repeated his oft-quoted, infamous remark: “I don’t want to be Prime Minister of England, I want to be Prime Minister of the whole United Kingdom”. Of course, what Cameron is alluding to is a scenario for when Scotland has gained its [...]

West Lothian Question: Don’t hold your breath waiting for an answer

We were told this week that the West Lothian Commission would finally begin its work in February 2012 and would report in spring 2013. But I would caution people not to expect any answer to be put into effect until after the next UK general election in 2015 at the earliest. There are two main [...]

The nightmare scenario: United Kingdom of Britain and Northern Ireland

In answer to the speculation in my last post about what the new United Kingdom, following Scottish independence, would be called, maybe we’d be looking at the nightmare scenario of a ‘United Kingdom of Britain and Northern Ireland’, instead of a possible ‘United Kingdom of England, Wales and Northern Ireland’. The Union establishment will do [...]

The constitutional morass of Scottish independence: is there ANY proper way of doing it?

There’s been something of a storm in a teacup brewing over the question of the legality or otherwise of an independence referendum legislated for by the Scottish parliament. For a summary of the legal and constitutional issues, see Alan Trench and Lalland’s Peat Worrier. From an English perspective, the crux of the matter, for me, [...]

Response to request to support 38 Degrees’ [English] NHS petition

Below is my response to an email I received yesterday from a friend asking me to support the 38 Degrees petition calling for the House of Lords to demand more scrutiny of the [English] NHS and Social Care Bill, which they’ll be voting on later today. The email was one of those automatically generated support [...]

UKIP adopts an English parliament policy: great news, but is it too late to save the Union?

I’m delighted that UKIP leader Nigel Farage announced on Friday that his party now supports the creation of an English parliament. In so doing, he’s almost certainly secured my vote at the next general election. And I’m sure that many thousands of other supporters of democratic fairness to England will now also switch their allegiances [...]