The left-wing case for an English parliament

Though I am not English, I believe that England does deserve the right to have its own Parliament/Assembly. I look forward to observing the discussion on this important issue.

This is a good idea. The debate on this topic that involved Billy Bragg and Pat Kane on Newsnight Review (sic) was much of a higher quality than much of that on Newsnight. All I would say is that there needs to be much more regional responsiveness from any centre that is created. Here in Scotland, this is a real problem and there are many regions that are languishing, becoming commuter areas for Edinburgh and Glasgow which makes it hard for local people trying to remain where they want to be. I would also suggest that there needs to be some thought put into making links between border areas. These imaginary lines are quite real to those living on either side.

Thank god the left have finally woken up to this one.

We need to encourage a sense of civic national identity for England and answer the English Question. We cannot ignore it any longer.

(BTW you need an anti spam duberry)

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The last thing anyone needs is another layer of bureaucrats and an even bigger State.

England already has representation: MPs.

In line with this, Scotland should combine MP and MSP elections and the winner sit in Holyrood during Scottish matters and come to Westminster for UK-wide matters. The same should happen with the MAs in Wales.

Lot’s of your own party members disgaree with you Roger, just take a gander at the Libertarian Party membership of the English Free Press.

In any case you’re constructing a Straw man argument if your arguement against an English parliament is based upon “more politicians and more bureaucrats”. Unlike devolution to Scotland and Wales we don’t need to create a new English civil service, we just make parts of Whitehall responsible to the English Parliament, English Government and the English public. The UK Parliament can be drastically reduced in numbers to reflect it’s drastically lower workload, and the Lords can be reformed to reflect the new federal framework by scrutinising both reserved and devolved matters (at present Scotland, Wales and NI have unicameral systems). Alternatively the Commons could be an English parliament with 400 members – the number it was originally designed to accomodate – and the Lords could be the federal parliament with powers of recall over the legislation of the national parliaments.

“Scotland should combine MP and MSP elections and the winner sit in Holyrood during Scottish matters and come to Westminster for UK-wide matters”

You’re in the wrong party because this is UKIP policy, and also the policy of certain Tories (who get sacked for it). The reason James Gray had to ‘step down’ is because the Scots don’t want to abolish their MSPs in favour of dual mandate MPs, and the Welsh don’t want to abolish their AMs either. Abolishing the Assembly Members at Stormont could undermine the peace process with terrible results. It’s all very well proposing a dual mandate system, but the time to do that was pre-1997 when there was a possibility, however remote, of you persuading people that it was a preferable system (personally I think it’s a moronic idea because a politician cannot serve two masters and be elected on a Scottish and UK manifesto – conflict of interest – but it doesn’t much matter because it is going to happen).

I may be in favour of devolution, but not that in favour of devolution.

The EDL want black and white to unite. It is unfair to label them as racists.
If they were campaigning against extreme christian fundamentalism they would be cheered on by the left. let’s have an English Parliament for all in England.stop this nonsense by politicians and the media that England does not exist.However, I strongly believe that the issue of an English Parliament should be put to the people of England by referendum. An English Parliament should not come about as a last resort of defeated unionist politicians.

The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward http://cli.gs/5YbtT

This election the people of Scotland will be voting for a fellow Scot to continue making laws for the English but not for the Scottish ! The Scots will be laughing all the way to the ballot box….

The Labour party (if that is what is meant by ‘the left’) has first to overcome its irrational fear that any expression of an English national political will immediately cause the Scots, Welsh & N Irish to take flight and bring about the end of the Union. People in the devolved nations are perfectly relaxed on the issue and indeed many are amazed that the English are not more vocicerously demanding their own assembly. More rationally the LP fears that it will not be able to win an outright majority in an English Parliament, which might, initially, be dominated by Tories.
Faced with the reality however, the left would coalesce into a new group and England would not be a ‘one-party’ state for very long, if at all. Meanwhile, attempting to address the English Question by fiddling about with unwanted regional select committees, whose meetings have so far been farcical, leaves the party without any realistic policy to encompass the natural desire the people of England to determine their own policies.

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“More rationally the LP fears that it will not be able to win an outright majority in an English Parliament, which might, initially, be dominated by Tories.”

I think that’s called democracy. However, like you say, it wouldn’t remain like that for long, just look how Labour have lost power in their Scottish heartland. There’s no benefit to England in constantly electing a blue government, not to mention the fact that it would be nigh-on impossible under proportional representation – which would be another benefit of an English parliament.

Why doesn’t England have its own parliament? Because it is in the United Kingdom.

However, Scotland being in the UK was the argument for Scotland, uniquely, having its own parliament.

Barry,

I agree the people of England should be asked first whether they want devolution. Peter Facey of Unlock Democracy has suggested an English Devolution Enabling Bill. If the people of England say “Yes”, then the discussions about what form devolution should take can occur. If “No”, it may be back to seeing how local government can be strengthened.

Whatever form of devolution for England comes about, proportional representation is the logical approach to electing the bodies. The voters would not stomach FPTP anymore, especially with the shenanigans at Westminster. What from of PR should be used is open to debate: I would prefer Single Transferable Vote as it puts more power in the hands of the voter rather than the party machines. Others may prefer the Additional member System as it gives smaller parties a chance of representation. All options for discussion.

Ian, there are still people in the Labour Party who would consider themselves to be on the Left, even if the New Labour leadership seems anything but. But my network is not just aimed at Labour: it’s aimed at anyone on the Left, be they socialists, social democrats, liberals, greens etc. I personally am not a member of any party, with the establishment of this network I aim to remain impartial while a consensus amongst the broad Left can be achieved.

I do agree that there is this irrational fear that English devolution will spend the end of the Union. Federalists seem to have the more level-headed approach to this issue. There’s no point setting up an Englsih Left party, maybe the best approach is for the parties of the British Left to become federal parties and have part of the federal party being an England-based party. I know the Lib Dems claim to be federeral, but there isn’t a Lib Dem England party, only a Lib Dem Scots Party and a Lib Dem Welsh Party…

Left Foot Forward/Dave Dyke – The left-wing case for an English parliament http://bit.ly/9QlGUQ

“Lib Dem England party”

Oh yes there is.

The left-wing case for an English Parliament @leftfootfwd http://bit.ly/9QlGUQ

“”Lib Dem England party”

Oh yes there is.”

Apologies if I’ve misunderstood how the Lib Dem party is made up. Probably because I could never find a page for England on the site, though it was always possible to find contact details for a regional party or a local party.

Take a look at the Lib Dem Constitution, there is an English Party. It even has an address, but sadly no website.

One of the drawbacks of relying on the Internet for a lot of information searching, not everything is there at your fingertips!

Thanks for that, I’ll pop and have a look.

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“Peter Facey of Unlock Democracy has suggested an English Devolution Enabling Bill. If the people of England say “Yes”, then the discussions about what form devolution should take can occur. If “No”, it may be back to seeing how local government can be strengthened.”

Sounds great. But how likely is it that it will happen? Unfathomably unlikely I would say, unless the English rise up and take it. You’re basically asking the three main parties to agree to popular sovereignty for England, in an echo of the Scottish Claim of Right:

We, gathered as the Scottish Constitutional Convention, do hereby acknowledge the sovereign right of the Scottish people to determine the form of Government best suited to their needs, and do hereby declare and pledge that in all our actions and deliberations their interests shall be paramount.

This Scottisg claim to popular sovereignty was agreed to because of the threat of Scottish separatism. The Scottish Claim of Right went on to declare and pledge that “our actions and deliberations shall be directed to…agree a scheme for an Assembly or Parliament for Scotland” because they understood that the threat was a nationalist threat, not a demand for localism or regionalism. Popular sovereignty for Scotland was delivered on that basis, under that (nationalist) threat.

Like Scottish nationalism in the 80s, today it is English nationalism that carries the biggest threat to Westminster sovereignty. Not English regionalism or English localism, but English nationalism. It’s only English nationalism that will deliver popular sovereignty for England (which may well result in Peter’s enabling act) because it is only that which has the potential to challenge the sovereignty of Westminster.

I think an English parliament is the correct body to devolve power within England, and I can see how a committee system in a new English parliament could bring in local politicians, and bring together MPs of certain regions, to work together on local/regional interests. There’s not much time in the present Parliament because of the sheer weight of British Government business, and Westminster MPs are precious about their privileges and sovereignty to the extent they they won’t tolerate local politicians at Westminster, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

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[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

It was claimed earlier in the thread that;

“More rationally the LP fears that it will not be able to win an outright majority in an English Parliament, which might, initially, be dominated by Tories.”

This “fear” is born of a myth perpetuated by those who believe England would have had no Labour govts if not for the Scots imposing them on it. This is not actually true.

Since WW2, only three times has England voted Tory only to have a Labour govt installed that Scotland voted for. The first time was in 1950 and that govt lasted 1 year before another election was called and a Tory govt elected. The second time was in 1964 and that govt lasted 2 years before Labour was re-elected with an English mandate in 1966. The last time was in Spring 1974 and that govt lasted about 6 months before another election was called and Labour were again re-elected with an English mandate. ALL other Labour govts have been elected with an English mandate. (House of Commons records)

In summary, England has had a Labour govt “imposed” by Scotland a grand total of 3.5 years since WW2. England has had a Westminster Labour govt it voted for a total of 27 years. It is simply a myth to claim England is a one Party state. By contrast, Scotland has endured decades of Tory govt despite having massively rejected that Party at the polls.

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[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

Hmmm. Not so much a discussion as a spam fest

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

I agree that England would not be One Party state for long but the opposition would not be the Labour Party in any recognisable form .It would be more like the Liberal Party or perhaps the Democrats,.The next fear for Labour is that Scots and Welsh collectivism will turn out not to be an expression of the racial inferiority of the English but simply the side their bread is buttered.
Labour in the Celtic dependencies ,unable to bribe with English money, would not last for long either. There would be a left of course but the overall effect would be a final end to the socialist experiment of the 20th century which only perists in ossified outlying areas
On the voting system in England I doubt you could sell PR which coud only be imposed and when the implications were clear I doubt the English would
want any more elections.
On the Conservative side finding it self in a more cultural war than a doctrinal one a reinvention would be required bearing some resemblance to the Cameron project but a far deeper and truer shift into tune with the country. Scotaolnd may love its hand outs but it is nothing like as progrssive as England

I like the sound of this new Nation but it is rightly feared by the Labour Party which could not survive

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[...] The left-wing case for an English parliament | Left Foot Forward [...]

Labour shouldn’t fear an English Parliament. Labour would have won the last three elections, including 2005 when the Tories won the popular vote. See here …
http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/area/uk/ge05/seats.htm

In terms of popular vote, Labour got 58,000 less votes in England than the Tories (due to turnout being low in safe Labour seats and because lots of previous Labour votes went to Respect).

If you went for PR (ie equality with Scotland and Wales) tactical voting would unravel and Labour support would rise. More importantly the Tories would never get an overall majority – they’d be forced into coalition mode and to do that, they’d have to move to the centre.

“Hmmm. Not so much a discussion as a spam fest”

Yes, it does give rather a false impression. There’s me thinking the discussion is going well due to the number of comments, but it’s just spam filling up the comments page.

Any chance of getting an anti-spam duberry fitted?

“If you went for PR (ie equality with Scotland and Wales) tactical voting would unravel and Labour support would rise. More importantly the Tories would never get an overall majority – they’d be forced into coalition mode and to do that, they’d have to move to the centre.”

And, of course, the beauty of PR is no more safe seats as we currently know it under FPTP…

“Scotaolnd may love its hand outs but it is nothing like as progrssive as England”

Scotland does not receive handouts. It’s gets a portion of the money it sends to the Treasury back as a block grant. Treasury figures show that the money spent in Scotland is less than the revenue collected. Especially when you remove the money counted as having been spent in Scotland that has never got so much as a whiff of heather (eg London Olympic spending).

According to Treasury figures, Scotland has about 8.5% of the UK’s popln, accounts for about 9.2% of UK expenditure while contributing about 11% of UK revenue. The “subsidy junkie” line is yet another myth that misinforms the debate in England concerning devolution. Despite politicians best efforts to portray Scotalnd as a “beggar nation” with completely manufactured “deficits” (which magically become “public sector borrowing requirements” when talking about the UK as a whole), the actual figures show Scotland in fiscal surplus far more often than the UK manages to achieve. Even in the few years Scotland goes into deficit, the level of deficit is more often than not less than the share of the UK deficit she has to share in shouldering.

Don’t let myth colour the debate over an English Parliament. It should not be based on any anti-Scottish sentiment but on a pro-English/democracy platform.

PS What do you mean by “progressive”? I’d say Scotland was very progressive in many areas. I’m not sure why you think England is more “progressive”.

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Hi, I come here for the first time as a previously Conservative voting, current-government hating, non LibDem/UKIP/BNP, independently-minded person who has emigrated due to what I see as the blatant collusion of big business and big government acting against the individual in our society, surely not something that the left can be that proud of.

Why come here and risk the flames that I expect to get?

Because there is a case for an English parliament. It was first posited by one of your lot, Tam Dalyell, as the West Lothian question, though named so by one of my lot, Enoch Powell.

I did not agree with everything that either of them said and, possibly, many of you will concur with that, probably for different reasons. But they were both very perspicacious on this particular subject and I would urge those who have not read either of them, in this matter, to go the extra mile and read both.

The issue, for example, of Scottish MP’s voting on English affairs when MSP’s vote otherwise (e.g. tuition fees) is one which, if you fail to acknowledge it, you undermine your own position, both rationally and morally.

But if Scotland and Wales can have their own parliaments, which address their own interests (the whole point of such enterprise, surely) then England must be afforded the same.

The issues of whether a United Kingdom can survive, of whether the parliaments of each will have a permanent majority, or whether they are of predominantly a left or right wing composition are, I would suggest, rather secondary. They are the ebb and flow of life. The UK was created because a Scottish king ascended to the English throne after all. Subsequent history has taught us that once great parties can shrink to irrelevance. The current focus seems to be so short term.

What subsists now, in terms of voter support, may not still be the case for each of the Kingdom’s components within your lifetimes. So I urge everyone to think beyond tactical considerations and more towards our mutual longer-term needs. I do not see any current party’s dogma achieving this.

Remember Bob Dylan’s words, “I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now.”

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Nice to see the left actually acknowledging this issue for once.

However, don’t confuse nationalism and patriotism with the far right. Don’t confuse the BNP with the far right, either. It is perfectly possible to have a strong national pride in England, it’s history and culture, without being a fascist. And the BNP have nothing to do with nationalism – especially not English nationalism. They’re authoritarians, and England has always been at its best when championing individual freedom.

A vision of England should be nationalistic, because England is a nation – but that doesn’t mean it has to subscribe to the ‘we-are-Eng-er-land-get-out-you-darkies’ school of thought. For me, England means individual freedom, equality of opportunity (but not equality of outcome), and a fair and just society based on the rule of law. It means I should be able to put up a St. George’s flag in my garden and not be called a racist. It means I should have a government and a parliament that will listen to me. It means that I should not be treated as a second-class citizen, just because I wasn’t born in Scotland or Wales.

@jdennis_99

Thanks for the insight. Some of us on the left have always acknowledged this issue. Unfortunately the leadership of the left hasn’t…

You ascribe to a civic nationalist vision, akin to the ones envisaged and successfully articulated by the SNP in Scotland and Plaid Cymru in Wales? The problem for those of us on the left who acknowledged the issue has been that even if we’d argued the civic nationalist vision of England, we’d have been accused of being racist.

I can see where you’re coming from with the BNP argument. On the Political Compass website, the x-axis (left – right) relates to your economic viewpoint, whereas the y-axis is your social viewpoint. On the UK Parties 2008 page:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/extremeright

The BNP’s economic policy is on the left, but socially they are strict authoritarians.

When I took the test, my result came out slap bang in the middle of the libertarian left quadrant, around the same point as the Greens.

I am a Scot, who has some doubts over whether the Holyrood parliament was a good idea constitutionally. Yes it has given us a more powerful say in our affairs, which was a demand which grew exponentially under Thatcher and her economic policies over heavy industry, and it is a good forum for debate on purely scottish matters. It has done a lot of good, free personal care for the elderly, smoking bans, much needed modernisation of some areas of Scots law and helping Scotland regain a form of civic confidence it has been lacking. I do not subscribe to any notions of independence, the majority of Scots are loyal to the union in and see it’s benefits, in contrast to the view put across by the elected SNP administration (elected by a promises on education and universities and the NHS in Scotland which had nothing to do with Independence). But I do see a fatal flaw in it’s founding, the constitutional basis. It and the welsh assembly fail to notice the effect on creating constitutional in-balance between us and the English.

In that case an English parliament, or what ever form of representative body chosen, would be able to address this by establishing a federal Britain. 4 Constituent Nations, each with equal powers to each parliament and a federal government controlling matters of national (fed.) tax, macro-economic matters, foreign affairs (defence esp.) and co-ordinating the judicial, educational and health services of the 4 Union states. This would quell nationalism in Scotland and England and prevent the break up of a very effective union. I do stress this as a Scottish Unionist’s opinion, but it would be such a progressive move forward that it could help address matters like the West-Lothian/English questions and establish a modern co-operative union based on mutual respect and assistance to one another.

Through in proportional vote elections for all bodies (already existing in Scotland, Wales and NI) especially at Westminster, a constitutional document and reform of the House of Lords and the English question could give a UK wide answer to solve the constitutional mess of devolution and help create a fairer Union.

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An English Parliament is a terrible idea. The main purpose of devolution is to decentralise power. An English government would not be noticeably any more decentralised than the UK government — which is far too centralised in my view. Also, with the possible exception of football teams, there is no clear emotional entity called “England”, unlike Scotland and Wales. When people say “England” they means all sorts of different things. The basis for equivalence with Scotland and Wales must be the English regions.

The bizarre way in which the UK is organised politically makes it hard for those of us who were born and live in England to feel a part of any entity apart from a county. Few foreigners could understand how Scotland and Wales have their own Government but England does not (apart from Brussels of course) I can never understand why Scottish sports results are trotted out on the BBC as if those of us in England are any more interested in them than those from France or Azerbaijan.

There are obvious theoretical reasons why there should be an English tier of government to sit alongside the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish assemblies – but there are practical considerations which make this problematic within the context of the current UK arrangement.

England constitutes five sixths of the UK population, so an English assembly would dominate any federal arrangement that paid any attention to democratic proportionality. You’d end up with England playing Prussia to the UK’s North German Federation.

To bell the English cat, you either have to go with putting in extremely strong ‘small state’ counterweights for the non-English components of the federal structure or breaking down the English component of the federal structure into several chunks that are approximately co-equal with Scotland (ie the English regions). I don’t think the first option is politically or theoretically sustainable, whilst the second option suffers from the lack of appetite that exists for these regional assemblies; also I suspect that London, SE and E would stitch things up at the federal level using a combination of their demographic weight (one third of the voter base) and their hegemonic position in the economy. So I am doubtful that either option would be a stable solution in the long term.

I think therefore that English devolution implies the eventual dissolution of the UK.

Note I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with that end state (I haven’t thought about it enough to have an opinion on the matter), but I think we should be mindful that this is a likely outcome.

Regards
Luke