Professor Vernon Bogdanor appears to support the balkanisation of England to save the Union. A letter in The Week.

In a letter which first appeared in The Times Professor Vernon Bogdanor  appears to support the balkanisation of England as a way of saving The Union.  It seems he is among those who believe in suppressing any political entity which exclusively represents English nationhood.

I reproduce below his letter to The Times which I came across in The Week (24 October).  I find it a disappointing read from someone so distinguished.  He gives powerful ammunition to those who argue against the establishment of an English parliament in order to discourage Scottish separatism and preserve the 1707 Union.

To The Times.

John Kampfner is right to call for further decentralisation “to the localities”, but an English parliament would not achieve this.  Whether situated in Manchester, Liverpool or York, it would appear just as remote to most as Westminster which would be reduced to a debating chamber for the discussion of foreign and defence policy and macro-economic management, while the quasi-federal UK which resulted would be so dominated by England as to be unbalanced, and an encouragement to Scottish separatism.  There is no democratic federation in the world in which one of the units represents more than 80% of the population. 

The right course is to build on the combined authorities with directly elected mayors by strengthening their powers, and by devolving on a similar basis to those areas of England outside the city regions.  That entails a unitary system of local government in those areas, as recommended more than 50 years ago by the Royal Commission on Local Government, in place of the present two-tier system.  That is the path that I hope the Government will follow in its forthcoming white paper.

 

Vernon Bogdanor, professor of government, KCL

Robin Tilbrook, Chairman of the English Democrats, highlights how British Government spending discriminates against England.

I have just come across a tweet from the Scottish Conservatives lauding the “Union Dividend”.  The tweet proclaims: “This week we once again saw the benefit of being in the UK.  Thanks to the Union every Scot received an extra £1,576 above the UK average . . . .”  Do not the Scottish Conservatives wonder how these words will be received by the English and Welsh? 

In such circumstances it is timely of Robin Tilbrook, Chairman of the English Democrats, to have just written an article on his blog, using figures from a House of Commons research paper, highlighting how British Government spending discriminates against England.

Here are the basic facts given in the first three paragraphs of Robin Tilbrook’s article.

“The House of Commons Library published a paper in November last year which was brought to my attention recently.  The report has the figures for the financial year 2016/17 of the Barnett Formula.  The Barnett Formula determines that differential spending on UK citizens depending on which of the UK countries those citizens live in. 

The summary of the House of Commons research paper shows that England has the lowest national average spent on every man, woman and child.  This was £8,898 in 2016/17.  In Northern Ireland by contrast, it was £11,042. 

If you live in the English “Regions” of the South East, East of England, East Midlands, South West or West Midlands you get less spent on you than even the average of England.  It is only in London that British Government spending is more than even one of the other Nations of the UK.  It is slightly more than Wales.  London has £10,192 for every man, woman and child, instead of the Welsh average of £10,076!”

The entire article is well worth reading, here is a link:

http://robintilbrook.blogspot.com/2018/08/england-discriminated-against-by.html

The Labour Party's reluctance to talk about England makes it sound "out of touch with millions of voters".

In a recent post on his blog Robin Tilbrook, chairman of the English Democrats, drew attention to an article by John Denham, former Labour Cabinet Minister and now the Professor of English Identity and Politics at Winchester University.  In the article entitled Why does our Labour Party refuse to talk about England?  Mr Denham bemoans the fact that the Party appears extremely reluctant to even mention the word “England”.  Below are a couple of paragraphs from the article:

“The 1997 Labour government did not make a serious attempt – despite John Prescott’s best efforts – to shift power and resources out of London. England saw no constitutional change (except, ironically, in London). England needs devolution today because the last Labour government, of which I was a part, failed. Labour members should be asked about the governance of England as a whole: how power and resources will be devolved, how laws for England are made, and about England’s relationship with the rest of the UK.

The party must stop talking as though England and Britain are the same thing. This lazy confusion feeds nationalist propaganda in Scotland, discourages party members from thinking about England’s needs and makes us sound out of touch with millions of voters.”

Here is a link to the entire article:

https://labourlist.org/2018/04/john-denham-why-does-our-labour-party-refuse-to-talk-about-england/

After reading the whole article I am tempted to think that nothing much has changed in the 78 years since George Orwell wrote the following words in his essay The Lion and the Unicorn: 

“In left-wing circles it is always felt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman and that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution, from horse racing to suet puddings.  It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during ‘God save the King’ than of stealing from a poor box”.

Viewing the "Letters" columns. Devolution in the UK; "We poor saps the English are just the mugs who pay for it."

I came across a letter, from a Peter Burns, which was published in the Bath Chronicle on 25th January this year.  Although I am not familiar with the views on devolution held by Wera Hobhouse, the Liberal Democrat MP for Bath, I fully sympathise with the tone of Mr. Burns' comments.

We supposedly live in a United Kingdom where one would assume all are treated equally, but we are not!

I reproduce Mr. Burns' letter below.

We English are treated as second class.

We read many reports in the Chronicle from our MP Wera Hobhouse, especially on her blatant anti-Brexit views, but when does Ms Hobhouse ever mention us poor downtrodden English? 

The rest of the UK has forms of devolution; we poor saps the English are just the mugs who pay for it.

Why is it fair that English university students have to burden themselves with huge debt and the Scottish student gets away with it (excuse the pun) scotfree? If we are a United Kingdom of equals, how can this be? Ms Hobhouse is an English MP and never once have I heard her mention the rights of us English. Does Ms Hobhouse consider we English have any rights? Or is she one of those MPs who considers herself to be a member of parliament for the whole of the United Kingdom?

Thereby lies the anomaly; we English have no representative body to represent our interests yet English wealth predominantly gives the Scots the opportunity for their own parliament to give such perks as free university education and free prescriptions. This is simply not fair. What is Ms Hobhouse’s view on we English being second-class citizens and what is the Liberal Democrat policy on bringing England equal status with the rest of the United Kingdom?

Peter Burns, Lower Weston.