Most gratifying to see Cameron, Gove, Shapps, Hague and co
taking such a statesmanlike approach to these constitutional issues. “How can we use this to screw Labour at the
next election and secure our own jobs, whilst not upsetting the money-cart?” Thomas Jefferson would be proud of them!
‘English votes on English laws’. Well, leave aside for a moment the fact that,
according to Will Hutton in yesterday’s Observer, citing the McKay commission, a)
there has been a total of just two-and-a-half years since 1919 when House of Commons
arithmetic would have made any difference to any vote, and b) the question
would hardly ever arise in practice anyway – there is remarkably little actual solely
‘English’ legislation.
Leave that aside. The
obviously false assumption is that ‘England’ in any way equates or is
comparable to Scotland (or Wales, or Northern Ireland). Quite apart from differences of landmass and
population, none of these political constructs is in any way homogeneous. (The referendum voting breakdown clearly
proves this for Scotland; and I know neighbouring villages in Wales that’d be
separate countries if they could.) Least
of all ‘England’.
No, England needs breaking down before any of this stuff
makes any sense. I haven’t worked out
the details yet – can I safely leave that to Mr Hague? – but to kick off the
negotiations I suggest revisiting the ancient Kingdoms of the Anglian Heptarchy. In case you’d forgotten, these were, in about
700 AD: Mercia; Northumbria; East Anglia; Wessex; Essex; Sussex; and Kent. There’ll
be some mergers, demergers and acquisitions along the way, no doubt; but it’s a
start point.
P.S. Sorry, I’ve
temporarily reinstated the dreaded WV, in the hope of seeing off a particularly
persistent idiotic Chinese spamhead. I’ll take it off again after a few more posts.
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