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 [...]

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, [...]

Comment about John Major’s speech from the IfG blog

Following the censorship of a comment of mine about Englishness on the Labour Hame website, here is another comment that’s been stuck in the limbo of ‘awaiting moderation’ for several days. It refers to an article on the Institute for Government website discussing John Major’s recent contribution to the Scottish devolution max versus independence debate. [...]

36% of English people support independence – for England

A ComRes opinion poll commissioned by BBC Radio 4, published yesterday, found that 36% of the English-only people questioned felt that “England should become a fully independent country with its own government, separate from the rest of the United Kingdom”. By any account, this is an extraordinary finding. However, if all you had heard about [...]

The ‘English Majority Lock’ (EML): A simple solution to the West Lothian Question

Many questions that appear intractable often admit of a simple solution if you can find a better way of posing the question. The West Lothian Question is one such conundrum. In its original form, in the parliamentary question raised by MP Tam Dalyell in 1977, it asks: “For how long will English constituencies and English [...]

Can we expect more progress on the WLQ Commission after the Scottish and Welsh elections?

Doh! It suddenly struck me that that must be the reason – or at least one of the main reasons – why the Con-Dem government has been so cagey about the timing of the promised Commission to look into the West Lothian Question: they don’t want to give Labour and the Nationalists in Scotland and [...]

DPEV: absolutely the best single-member voting system for the UK and England – honest

OK, I admit it: I’m a voting-system geek, if not obsessive. I really dislike AV, for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it leaves England short-changed: nothing done to address the West Lothian Question or the broader English Question, to say nothing about the unaccountable nature of executive power in [...]

The Welsh powers referendum, the West Lothian Question and the AV referendum

Yesterday’s resounding ‘yes’ vote in the referendum about the Welsh Assembly taking on primary-legislative powers is good news for English nationalists. The change will be another nail in the coffin of the idea that the UK is a unitary state across which the Westminster parliament’s writ applies uniformly. Welsh Assembly Members (AMs) will now be [...]

Alternative alternative voting systems, part five: AV+, or denying (proportional) representation to England

The Alternative Vote Plus (AV+) is the system for UK-parliamentary elections recommended in 1998 by the Independent Commission on the Voting System (the Jenkins Commission) appointed by the New Labour government. That government then reneged on its 1997 manifesto promise to hold a referendum on whether to adopt the recommendations of the Commission. AV+ is [...]

South-East Cambs candidates’ views on the Power 2010 pledge

I’ve had a couple of replies from my local candidates on the Power 2010 Pledge, which I wrote to them about on St. George’s Day. Their responses are basically in line with their parties’ manifestoes, which I suppose is no surprise. First, the incumbent Tory MP, Jim Paice: “My Party is a Unionist party – [...]