How to solve a problem like England

Tom Griffin alerts me to this from Peter Riddell (Audio: One Year On: The Performance of the New Devolved and UK Governments):

We've yet to see the Tory proposals on addressing Scotland. I'm sure there'll be talk of a further reduction in seats. I think they're very wary of now of English votes for English laws, because they see the practical difficulties of doing it. I think it's more likely to be a version of the Rifkind formula, of a grand committee which can be over-ridden at the report stage; which promises a large amount of lengthy debates and tedium on large amounts of legislation...

If there is a meltdown for Labour, curiously the pressure on Cameron to do anything on the legislative side on Scotland reduces. If he's got a clear majority, he doesn't have to worry about it. It's a notional problem. After all, the whole point of the English issue is only if there's a Labour minority government relying on Scottish MPs to carry through legislation. It doesn't arise if you've got a Conservative government. That's not to say that they won't address the financial formulas or the number of MPs.

Peter Riddell appears to think that the "English issue" is a non-issue if there is a Conservative government. I don't. True, the likelihood of Scottish MPs playing the decisive hand in English affairs is lessened if there is a government with a clear majority of English MPs, but it makes little difference whether the majority is red or blue. Neither does the colour of Scottish MP make any difference. If Labour are wiped out in Scotland then we in England face the prospect of having our laws voted on by Scottish nationalist MPs whose primary concern is Scottish self-interest and wrecking the Union. Many in England might reasonably think that it was better to have Scottish Labour MPs sticking their noses in where it wasn't wanted.

Whilst it may be true that under a Tory majority the WLQ is a notional problem for Cameron, the same should not be said of the "English issue" - The English Question. For me the English Question is: How should England be governed; by who, and for whom? At the moment the who is British politicians elected on a British mandate, and the whom is the British - not English - people: England is governed as Britain, for Britain. In essence The English Question it is a matter of sovereignty.

Reducing the number of Scottish MPs leaves Scotland under represented on reserved issues. It is undemocratic and it is not the answer, not least because it smacks of gerrymandering and will antagonise Labour and the Lib Dems who have traditionally drawn many of their MPs from north of the border. Rifkind's solution is not the answer either because it does not answer the English Question, and because it is sloppy, divisive and does not improve governance.

However, all the above objection is not to say that Riddell has incorrectly diagnosed where the Tories are at when it comes to the problem of England.

In the Sunday Telegraph the maverick English Labour MP Frank Field has fired a warning shot across Scottish bows by warning that Gordon Brown must answer English Question. Frank poses the English Question thusly:

The guts of the English Question are as follows: Scottish MPs have a say on English matters that do not usually apply to Scotland; moreover, power is devolved to Scotland and to a lesser extent Wales and Northern Ireland, but English taxpayers still pay for any differences in policy followed by the devolved governments.

Frank Field's definition of the English Question doesn't ask the sovereignty question, and like so many British MPs he fails to understand that the only people that can answer the English Question are the English people. The choice for England, according to Frank Field, is about "who will lead the change – whether it will be Gordon Brown or David Cameron". It is, of course, the English people who must lead the change. We must be consulted.

Most interesting about Field's piece, and where it ties into Riddell's analysis, is this.

David Cameron has a clear position on this — to maintain the status quo — which is brave but doomed to fail.

With only four MPs outside England, the Tory party is, whether it likes it or not, the English party.

Cameron clearly doesn’t like facing up to this. However, by continually asserting the primacy of the UK, he gives Labour much-needed breathing space.

Clearly Frank Field believes that the Conservatives are missing an opportunity to align themselves with England. And they are. That they are helping to maintain the Status Quo would appear to give credence to the view that Cameron sees the English Question as a notional problem, if luck goes his way in the General Election.

In light of this Nick Clegg's comments about David Cameron have more than a ring of truth about them:

The Cameroons have started to believe their own hype: insisting on their right to enter Number 10 without working out what they'd do once the door closed behind them. Their strategy is simple enough: why bother choosing policies when the government is shooting itself in the foot?...

Currently this incoherence is the Tory party's greatest strength: they can't be pinned to anything people don't like. But it's no serious programme for government

David Cameron, having informed us that New Labour is finished because they were relentlessly negative, "backward-looking, divisive and xenophobic", has turned his attention to the union between England and Scotland.

Cautious about playing up to a "sense of English grievance" or doing anything to damage the United Kingdom, and with Scottish blood coursing through his veins, he has hinted to his Scottish brethren that the Barnett Formula might be reformed, and that Scotland might do very well out of it.

"This cannot last forever, the time is approaching ... If we replace the Barnett Formula with a needs-based formula, Scotland has very great needs and Scotland will get very great resources."

Whoopie-fuckin-doo. Where's the policy Dave? Where's the substance? What about England, with whom the Barnett grievance lies?  You think the formula should end but you're not prepared to tell us how it should be done:

"Yes, that's right. I want this to happen in a consensual, sensible, non-inflammatory way and that's why I've been so reticent about it."

Reticent? You're an empty vessel. Kick you and you'd dong. Cameron wants to be the Prime Minister of the UK but he also wants to run England as UK Prime Minister. To do this he must try and win votes and MPs in Scotland to claim that his government has a Scottish mandate on reserved issues, and he must also give Alex Salmond absolutely no opportunity to attack him on grounds of anti-Scottishness.

"I don't want to be the Prime Minister of England, I want to be the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. There's a very strong sense in the Conservative party that the United Kingdom is bigger than all of us."

Scotland is the battleground. And if he loses in Scotland Cameron will face the prospect of a Conservative cabinet with no Scottish representation; and that means he will be heading an English government running Scotland on reserved matters. The Conservative Party will not be the Party of the Union; a Conservative government on those terms will be the final nail in the Union's coffin. It's an all-or-nothing tactic but I think it explains why Cameron is being deliberately vague on the detail of constitutional and Barnett Formula policy. It's not reticence, it's cowardly politics. Scotland must be wooed to allow a Conservative administration to govern the UK effectively, and to prevent the English Question being raised at every opportunity by Alex Salmond.

Although spot on with his diagnosis that Labour have "completely screwed up on the Union" Cameron has absolutely no intention of telling us what he and his new progressive Conservatives will do differently:

"If we succeed, we will help the Union succeed, if we fail - and in the past in Scotland we have failed - we let down the Union.

"There is a real link between making sure we are offering people a modern, successful centre-right party, putting forward progressive ideas about the future of our country, and the strength of the United Kingdom."

"If Alex Salmond thinks there's some clever game he can play about building on Scottish resentment against a Conservative government in England to help break up the Union, forget it. I will do everything I can to stop that from happening."

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And if the only way he can prevent that from happening is to discriminate against England, then so be it; after all he'll win in England regardless, England is not the battleground. So an imperfect union it is:

"I am confident it will be possible to develop an arrangement whereby, when the House of Commons considers matters that affect only English constituencies, it is English MPs who have the decisive say.

Why confident? If you are confident then tell us in England how it will be done instead of spouting placatory shite up in Scotland. Let us read the findings of the Democracy Task Force who have spent 28 months trying to solve the West Lothian Question without resorting to an English parliament because you want to govern England as UK prime minister.

"But let me say this: if it should ever come to a choice between constitutional perfection and the preservation of our nation, I know my choice. Better an imperfect union than a broken one. Better an imperfect union than a perfect divorce. My answer is simple: I choose the United Kingdom.

Oh bravo Dave. "The Imperfect Union", what a great new name for the United Kingdom; the perfect contradiction in terms to describe this constitutional mess. Either we're a union or we are not, why should we settle for imperfection?

"The Union is in danger for other reasons too. There is, of course, the question of identity. The number of people who think themselves British - ahead of Scottish or English - is in decline. People no longer look to the Union flag for their sense of belonging - they look to the cross of St.George or the Saltire … if anything at all.

"It doesn't have to be like this. Being British is one of the most successful examples of inclusive civic nationalism in the world. We can be a shining example of what a multi-ethnic, multi-faith and multi-national society can and should be. And the challenge now is to renew that sense of belonging.

I choose a perfect constitution and I choose my nation: England. So I reject Cameron's imperfect Britishness, and Brown's manufactured Britishness, because they are obstacles to a renewed civic English idenity.

Unbelievably, having offered nothing by way of policy, and having told us that imperfection is the basis for his Union, Cameron goes on to criticise Gordon Brown's vision of Britishness:

It's vital we get this right. As so often, Gordon Brown gets it wrong. He approaches the question of national identity like an advertising exec. So we have citizen's juries - focus groups - to decide what it means to be British. We have a competition to come up with a motto for Britain. And we have the attempt to replace the National Anthem.

"It all goes to show: Gordon Brown's view of Britishness is mechanical, not organic, it's something to be redesigned, repackaged and relaunched by Whitehall, not something which lives in our hearts.

Coming from anyone other than Cameron this would be fair criticism. But as Nick Clegg says incoherence is the Tory's greatest strength, and constitutional incoherence appears to be Cameron's vision for Britain.

Further Reading

Herald - Cameron: Barnett formula’s days are numbered
Conservative Party - David Cameron: Speech to Scottish Conservative Party Conference
Times - 'Kindness' and cash for Scots depends on votes, says top Tory
Brian Taylor - Substantive respect