Treachery

This wasn't going to be a political blog but some people just make me so angry......

Take these two for example

They look like fine upstanding fellows don't they? Honest, dependable, straight-talking......you'd have thought so wouldn't you?

Well, you'd be wrong because it would appear that they are nothing less than a couple treacherous toads.

Steven Uncles (of the English Democrats Party) has received this email:

Iain Dale is the chap on the right of the photo, he was the failed prospective parliamentary candidate that the English Democrat candidate stood down for in Norfolk during the UK general election. Mr Dale was also a participant in the English Constitutional Convention, the stated aim of which is "To draft a plan for a Parliament for the People of England, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in furtherance of both the proclamation in the United Nations Charter of the sovereign right of the self-determination for nations and peoples and the precedent set by the United Kingdom (UK) government's Devolution Acts for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland."

The chap on the left of the photo is David Davis who, in 2001, wrote:

If each of the other nations of the United Kingdom is going to have its own parliament , then England's choice should be no less. If Labour truly believes that this is the proper future for the people of Scotland and Wales, their logic must mean the same for England. This means equal treatment in all respects. Not just financially, although we should have funding equality for England, Scotland and Wales. Nor just in Westminster representation - although we should have that equalised from the next election, not in fifteen years time as Labour propose.

The people of England deserve no less than the same choice as the peoples of Wales and Scotland last September: a referendum on whether they want a parliament of their own. In their own words, Labour should trust the people - in this case the people of England. An English parliament, on the same basis as the Scottish one, will be the minimum that the English people are likely to be satisfied with.

Anything less will lead to disaffection and discontent, to a belief that the English are being treated as second class citizens in their own land. If Labour wanted to bring about the dissolution of the United Kingdom, that disaffection would be the way to do it.

This was consistent with David Davis' support of the 1998 English Parliament referendum bill during which debate he said:

My argument concerns what would happen if there were not an English Parliament, but an English Grand Committee, or English-designated legislation or English-designated days. In those circumstances, the UK Government could propose a health Bill which, because it would be an English health Bill, would be defeated. The Executive would be defeated time and time again on principle planks of their manifesto. How long would this Government put up with that situation? Straight away we would have a major constitutional crisis.

[...]

We must have an English Executive. If we have anything other than that, we cannot solve the problem. That is why I arrive at my position--not by emotion or sentiment, but by the elimination of the other possibilities. If we choose the other possibilities, we will have a constitutional crisis, and then we really will have a problem with English nationalism. At that point, the English will feel badly treated.

I have one minute to deal with some of the canards, so I shall be brief. It is argued that such conflict does not happen very often, but we are legislating for centuries. If it happens once, it is a problem, and in centuries it will happen much more often.

Some argue that an English Parliament would accelerate the break-up of the Union. My argument is based on my experience in Canada, which has a similar federal system. There are much greater tensions between Quebec and Ontario than there ever are between Scotland and England, yet the federal system has withstood the pressures.

So what has changed in the intervening years? Not a lot, other than the urgency with which the issue of English representation needs to be addressed. The apparent about turn of Mssrs Davis and Dale must be seen as a cynical ploy to deceive the Conservative Party voters. Sadly it looks as if Alfie the OK was correct when he said that Davis would forget his principles in his bid to become Tory leader. And it also looks like the English Democrats have been led a merry dance by Iain Dale too.

The new found belief in 'English Votes on English Matters' in preference to an English parliament and executive may make Davis a Conspiracy-of-the-Toads-monger because it looks very much to me as if he is going back on his strongly held beliefs in order to garner support from his electorate - in this case the parliamentary Conservative Party.

Read Wonko's take on this