Dual Mandate Band-Aid

Yet another Conservative idea to answer the West Lothian question. This time it comes from John Redwood, MP for Wokingham, and former Secretary of State for Wales.

Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland all have their own parliaments. Similar to Mark Field’s model the English parliament would be Westminster.

All MPs elected to their national parliaments are dual-mandate MPs – they sit both in their own parliament e.g. Holyrood and in Westminster. Thus, Westminster holds both the English parliament and the UK parliament.

An MSP would also be a UK MP etc.

The UK parliament decides those non-devolved matters not covered by the national parliaments.

It would then be up to the elected English MPs to decide on which office holders they wanted for the UK parliament.

For me, this is another sticking plaster solution. A Dual Mandate Band-Aid.

It may save costs on the English side without having to build a separate English parliament, but I think the English may just view it as Westminster and demand a separate parliament anyway.

And what of the numbers of MSPs and AMs going to Westminster?

There are currently 129 MSPs. The Scottish Parliament needs about that number to function effectively – As there is no second chamber, most of the actual detailing of bills is done by committees made up of all of these MSPs. If the Scottish Parliament had to survive on 59 MPs based on the Westminster model it couldn’t cope.

Given that the Scottish people voted for such a model based on Proportional Representation, I don’t think any external reduction of our MSPs number would be favourable to the Scottish public. Nor constitutional without a referendum. A referendum that Mr. Redwood would lose handsomely.

I expect that would also apply to Wales and Northern Ireland.

In short this Dual Mandate Band-Aid would be unworkable in practice.

A sticking plaster won’t work twice.

Field of Dreams

Another Conservative proposal on solving the West Lothian Question is that of Mark Field, MP for the Cities of London and Westminster.

His proposal is a simple federal system. Each country has its own Parliament handling devolved issues. In this case, the English Parliament would be the House of Commons.

The House of Lords would be scrapped.

Then each parliament sends representatives to the UK Parliament to discuss the non-devolved issues; for instance defence and foreign policy.

These representatives meet in the old House of Lords.

Mr. Field’s proposals seem logical and sensible. However I think they would fall apart in the detail.

A Field of Dreams then?

The Commons has been slow to change the House of Lords. I do not think that the House of Lords is in danger of being abolished any time soon.

If the Commons (the new English Parliament) has no second chamber than its EMPs must be prepared to do more work at committee level to scutinize the proposed legislation, as the Scottish Parliament already does.

If the new House of Lords (the new UK Parliament) receives EMPs from the English Parliament, MSPs from Scotland, and AMs from Wales and Northern Ireland – won’t these members be needed by their own Parliaments and parties in their own parliament? It may be a simple matter of walking for the EMPs but those members outwith England are at a disadvantage.

Who would be Prime Minister of the UK in such a setup? How many members does each country get to send?

These and many more details would need to be addressed for Mr. Field’s plans to be accepted. Whilst each detail could be eventually agreed on by the countries, I would be surprised if the political will is there for this Field of Dreams to ever materialise.

The Kent Invent

In the light of Ken Clarke’s English Pauses for English Clauses and Malcolm Rifkind’s East Lothian Answer, I thought I would reflect on some other Conservative plans that would try and answer the West Lothian Question.

This time the proposal comes from Roger Gale, a Conservative MP for North Thanet in Kent.

As both Ken Clarke’s and Malcolm Rifkind proposals have memorable names, I feel I should give Roger Gale’s proposal such a name too.

Judging by its hitherto unfavourable reception I think it should be named the Kent Invent. Even Roger Gale himself admitted: “When I first put forward my proposals, … I was regarded as at best eccentric and more probably as plain bonkers.”

Roger Gale wants to abolish the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Then an English Parliament set up, and the Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies given more powers to become Parliaments similiar to the Scottish model.

Each parliament would elect a First Minister and send two representatives to a UK senate. From these 8 senators a Prime Minister would be picked.

The UK senate would have control over macro-economic taxation, foreign and defence matters. All other matters would be devolved to their respective parliaments.

Personally I don’t see the English in particular buying this. In a UK population of around 60 million they have around 50 million people or 5/6. To reduce their UK representation to 1/4 might suit the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish but is hardly fair.

I don’t actually see the Scots buying it either. Scots – and the current Scottish Parliament – has diverged from Westminster on Trident and the War on Iraq, for example. One of the benefits that independence would bring Scotland is that we could decide on all those issues ourselves. Of course the same would be true for Wales, Northern Ireland and England.

The Kent Invent may have its drawbacks but it fully answers the West Lothian Question but its UK senate idea may prove unworkable.

At best I feel it will just be sticking plaster trying to save the Union. It would only be a temporary measure. Once the parliaments knit in, we’ve always better ripping the plaster off for full independence.

East Lothian Answer

With all the fuss regarding solutions to the West Lothian Question – English votes for English matters and Ken Clarke’s English pauses for English clauses – I thought I’d return to a favourite solution proposed by Sir Malcolm Rifkind.

Dubbed the ‘East Lothian Answer’ as Malcolm Rifkind has a home in Inveresk, actually in Midlothian but east of Edinburgh, it proposes an English Grand Committee.

This English Grand Committee will consider English only bills at the Committee stage and propose amendments. Similarly to Ken Clarke’s ‘English pauses for English clauses’ an English majority at the third stage will pass the bill.

So Scottish MPs will not be banned from voting at the final stage, but their votes will simply be ignored! What difference is that to banning a Scottish MPs vote? None! It amounts to the same thing!

The Prime Minister Gordon Brown has already said that banning Scots from voting on English laws at Westminster would damage the Union. Simply ignoring their vote would do the same!

There have been other objections to this plan:-

First of all, will England be appeased by a Grand Committee when Scotland has a Parliament, and Northern Ireland and Wales both have Assemblies?

Second, similarly to ‘English clauses for English pauses’ it demeans the Scots as second-class MPs, and as I suggested with that plan will damage the Union.

Third, as the Liberal Democrat Lord Tyler pointed out if some amendments affected Scotland would another committee be set up. It also makes the speaker’s job that much harder trying to figure out which legisation had an impact on Scotland.

Interestingly, whether Malcolm Rifkind has predicted that the outcome of the East Lothian Question will lead to two-tiers of MPs or not, he certainly is of the persuasion that two-tier MPs would damage the union.

The Telegraph reported Malcolm Rifkind’s agreement with Gordon Brown on the damage caused by Scots not voting on English laws:-

‘It would create two classes of MPs and added, pointedly: “That really would be the first step towards the end of the United Kingdom.”

However, that was as close as Sir Malcolm got, and he went on to claim that Mr Brown’s attitude on the unfairness of the issue was “spineless and indefensible.”‘

Much like the Union itself, then.

English pauses for English clauses

The former Chancellor of the Exchequer, Ken Clarke, has headed the Democracy Taskforce; a Conservative think-tank designed to propose solutions to outstanding problems. The idea would then be that these solutions may become Conservative policy for the next Conservative Government.

One of the outstanding problems Ken Clarke has been looking at is the West Lothian Question; since the creation of the Scottish Parliament, MPs from Scotland can vote on English laws but MPs from England cannot vote on Scottish laws. This is because it is the Scottish Parliament and its MSPs now pass the majority of Scottish laws, not the Westminster MPs. Only the non-devolved powers like defence and foreign policy are retained by Westminster.

Ken Clarke’s solution is that although Scottish MPs can vote on English only legislation, they are barred from voting at the committee stage and amendments can be made by English MPs; everyone can once again vote in the final third stage with an undertaking from the Scots that they won’t vote on the English amendments.

It has been dubbed ‘English pauses for English clauses’.

One of the main drawbacks of this plan is that it in effect creates a two-tier class of MP; the Scottish MPs being the lower class. How long the union could last in such an arrangement remains to be seen.

It would lead to a situation where Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, could no longer vote on English matters. Fair enough you might say. But what are the chances that a Scottish MP could ever become Prime Minister of the UK in the future under this arrangement? That a UK political party would elect a Scottish leader knowing that he would be removed from legislation affecting England? Chances: nil.

In such a situation, it would thus make such a democratic deficit for the Scots that the Union would have to end. It would effectively say to the Scots, well you could stand as MP in an election or you can vote for whatever MP you want but you or they will never become Prime Minister. Not only would our MPs be treated as second-class MPs at Westminster, but our vote and our citizenship of the UK would also be second-class.

Ken Clarke’s Democracy Taskforce proposes to limit our democracy!

There are many objectors to the proposal though. Fellow blogger Iain Dale saysthis:-

“The phrases ‘half baked’ and ‘dog’s breakfast’ come to mind. This is not a long term solution to something which even Scottish politicians recognise is a problem and it’s not even a half way house. It reeks of a measure designed to placate rather than solve. And as usual with these things it won’t even do that.

Those of us – and there a growing number – who believe that England deserves parity in the constitutional settlement will think it decidedly odd (and wrong) that Scottish MPs will retain ANY say in English only legislation. To trumpet the fact that they won’t be able to vote on the Committee Stage of a Bill or reverse any amendments on Third Reading is a sop.”

To my mind, there are only two ways forward. For England to receive parity in the constitutional settlement, there must be an English Parliament.

The other alternative is of course independence for Scotland, and if they want it the other nations of the UK.

‘English pauses for English causes’ will create two-tiers of MPs, and make Scots second-class citizens of the UK.

If the Conservatives do adopt this as policy, the Union will be all but over when the Conservatives win the next Westminster election as predicted.

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Political truths

Frank Field, former UK Minister of Welfare Reform, has issued this dire warning to Gordon Brown and the British Labour Party in today’s Sunday Times.

“Unless Gordon Brown wrongfoots [Alex Salmond] by addressing the English question, and by holding a UK-wide referendum before Salmond has the chance to build up a head of steam, the break-up of Britain and indeed of the Labour party looks certain.”

His solution is for Westminster to hold a referendum on the Union. Not only does he want Scottish independence and more powers for the Scottish parliament but he wants England to have a say on whether the Union is to be ended and an option for an English parliament.

Having said all this he admits at the end of the piece:-

“The complacent view on Labour benches is that this question will simply go away. Such a laid-back attitude is unlikely to be reflected by English voters, who recognise the reality that the devolution settlement was never properly thought through. This halfway house was never going to work.”

The idea that the devolution settlement was never properly thought through is an erroneous one.

It was thought through. It initially achieved its purpose. Perhaps without it the Union would be in greater risk.

Labour had been the largest party in Scotland for years. It intended that to continue. To stop the SNP’s charge, it even allowed the Liberal Democrat idea of Proportional Representation to be used in the new Scottish Parliament. It knew that in a four party state, the SNP would be unlikely to get 50% of the vote; and that the unionist parties could always join up to stop the SNP gaining power. It held back the main Treasury controls to Westminster.

Hence it was a confident George Robertson who declared as Shadow Scottish Secretary:- “Devolution would kill nationalism stone dead”.

That statement has proved to be one of the most inaccurate and foolish quotes by a politican anywhere.

Labour won in 1999 and the SNP became the official opposition.

And led to one of Alex Salmond’s quotes being one of the most perceptive and easily seen:- “Oppositions have a habit of becoming governments”.

In a democracy that is the nearest thing to a political truth.

It is also why George Robertson’s assertion must also be inherently false. Any opposition in a democracy will have the chance to govern. It is in the nature of Governments to eventually make mistakes or become tired. That will always give the opposition a chance to govern.

In 2007, the SNP became the new Government.

And similarly an opposition that demands independence, must therefore eventually succeed. Eventually that party, at some stage, will have enough of the popular vote to push through its policy.

It is also in the nature of Governments not to cede sovereignty once it is achieved. Thats why no-one has heard of an independent nation or parliament voting for its non-existence without threat or bribe. That would never be in its national interest.

(The Scottish Parliament did so in 1707 after it MPs were bribed by the English. That gave rise to the lines by Robert Burns:-

We’re bought and sold for English gold-
Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!

The Treaty of Union joined the nations of Scotland and England (with Wales and Ireland), notionally a partnership, but one overwhelmingly run by England. Scottish sovereignty by right and tradition lies with its people, and although it has never been ceded, is usually ignored by Westminster as it holds England’s sovereignty. The UK’s (i.e England’s) national interest is paramount.

Sometimes though, our sovereignty is ascribed:-In the case of MacCormick v Lord Advocate 1954 (1953 SC 396), Lord Cooper stated that “The principle of the unlimited sovereignty of Parliament is a distinctively English principle which has no counterpart in Scottish constitutional law.”

Even arch-unionists like Michael Forsyth, then the Secretary of State for Scotland, ascribe to this view:-”we are sovereign within the Union and we can walk out any time we want”.)

Although I fully expect Westminster to throw all its might and dirty tricks to prevent Scottish independence – Gordon Brown has chillingly warned “I will do whatever is necessary to ensure the stability and maintenance of the Union” – once Scotland becomes independent I don’t expect bribery again.

The idea that Scotland once independent would willingly want to rejoin the UK must then be extremely unlikely to the point of being fanciful.

And that political truth shows another.

Independence must be in the best interests of Scotland.

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Westminster clouds the issue

Brian Donohoe, the Ayrshire MP – who controversially wants even more rain in the West of Scotland! – quoted here, has been recently explaining his views on why a list MSP should get less money than a constituency MSP in the Scottish Parliament.

Speaking on STV’s Politics Now show he argued that it seemed to him that the list MSPs do less work than their constituency colleagues, and there should be a two-tier system of MSPs in all but name.

One thing is striking about these comments. Mr. Donohoe has never been a Member of the Scottish Parliament; either as a list or constituency MSP. He is in no position to give an informed comment on these matters.

Gradually the conversation was brought round to Scottish MPs in Westminster.

Michael Crow asked him why he should get the same pay as an English MP. After all, he argued, English MPs represent their constituents for everything; in Scotland a great deal of the Westminster Parliament’s responsibility has been devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

Ah, Mr. Donohoe replied but the recent boundary changes have meant that my constituency has increased and so my workload has also increased. This obviously implied that the constituency increase compensated for the reduction of responsibility.

Besides, he argued, if a “wee wummin” mistakenly wandered into his MP office, instead of an MSP office, and complained about housing – a devolved matter – he would still write a letter to the council or whoever.

I’m sure MSPs similarly deal with any mistaken constituents’ non-devolved issues in the same way. That argument hardly stands up to scrutiny. They wouldn’t use that to justify their payscale.

Alas, Michael Crow left it at that, not bothering to argue.

He missed the obvious point that the Westminster boundary changes in 2005 meant that the Scottish constituencys were increased to bring them into line with those in England. (Previously Scottish constituencys were smaller due to the lower population density, otherwise causing very large geographical constituencys; and to compensate for Scotland being so remote from Westminster. The creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 changed this thinking.)

Now all Scottish Westminster constituencys have around the same population has their English counterparts. We are comparing like for like, no matter what Brian Donohoe says.

So, an English MP is responsible for all matters of its constituents, while the Scottish MP is only responsible for those matters not devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

Of course, Brian Donohoe and the other unionist Scottish MPs would always accept this as part of the devolution settlement, but it is hardly fair to the English MPs.

How to sort this anomaly?

A two-tier system of MPs? Less money for the Scottish Westminster MPs? That would be an option.

In practice though, that wouldn’t work. It would cause resentment and virtually guarantee the breakup of the Union. Scottish MPs could also argue that they have much greater travelling distances to Westminster and need the extra revenue.

It suggests Brian Donohoe should keep out of the debate over two-tier MSPs at the Scottish Parliament, if he wanted to keep his salary intact at Westminster. A two-tier system would be unacceptable both in Holyrood or Westminster.

What about reducing the number of Scottish MPs again? This time the extra constituency population would compensate for the reduced responsibility that the Scottish MPs have.

I doubt that would work either. Not only would it again fuel resentment and probably break the Union, but it would make a mockery of the last boundary changes implemented so recently.

Also under the Treaty of the Union, Scotland is guaranteed at least 45 MPs; any number below that would break the treaty and end the union. The 45 Scottish MPs granted were in comparison to the 486 English MPs, 27 Welsh Mps and 100 Irish MPs in 1707.

Since 1922 when the Republic of Ireland left leaving Northern Ireland, the no. of MPs for England has risen from 492 to 529 (533 next election); for Wales 36 to 40; for Northern Ireland 13 to 18; only Scotland has decreased 74 to 59.

Only 59 MPs out of a total of 646 MPs (next election 650) at Westminster is already straining the Union now. Scotland’s influence in the Union has been greatly diminished and any further reduction would negate Scotland’s role being part of it.

An English Parliament would be an alternative, handling devolved issues just like the Scottish Parliament; leaving Westminster for non-devolved matters. This would be a neat solution, ending the call for English votes on English matters, and solving the West Lothian Question. Whether the union could survive a powerful English Parliament remains to be seen, however. It is struggling to survive the devolved governments it already has.

Less powerful parliaments? Federalism as argued by the Liberal Democrats, splitting England into devolved regions. The northeast of England was seen as most favourable to the idea, and was seen as a test case before extending the concept to the rest of England. A referendum was held in 2004 for a northeast Assembly. The No vote was 78%. Federalism is not wanted by England any time soon.

The neatest solution would be independence for all countries in the UK. The Westminster parliament would just become the English Parliament and all those political grievances throughout the UK towards our separate Parliaments would instantly end. We’ll all stop moaning at each other and behave like good neighbours again.

Who needs the rain?!!

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