Lord Nelson
01-06-2008, 03:23 AM
At some stage — perhaps very soon — the English Question will explode into British politics, and will decisively change the political landscape.
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.
Failure by Labour to act decisively will again feed the BNP vote
It is no longer a matter of whether this will be addressed, but of what course the issue will take.
Will it unify the Kingdom or split it? Are we witnessing the strange death of Labour England?
What happens will depend largely on the party leaders, who have so far been noticeably reluctant to face up to the tremendously unfair hand the English were dealt under successive devolution proposals.
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.
The question is: with a further large chunk of the Labour vote vulnerable to the BNP, how will Gordon Brown react? So far, the PM has made it hard to get a fag paper between his position and Cameron’s. But such attempts to close down debate on the English Question will fail, just as party leaders’ attempts to prevent discussion of immigration collapsed under public protest at the polls.
Indeed, the issues are linked in two significant ways. Both are still no-go areas for most major British politicians. Both feed the BNP vote. Slowly, but determinedly, the white English working class – and I guess some black Britons too are voting against unlimited immigration by embracing the BNP.
Gordon Brown must answer English Question - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/06/01/do0104.xml)
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.
Failure by Labour to act decisively will again feed the BNP vote
It is no longer a matter of whether this will be addressed, but of what course the issue will take.
Will it unify the Kingdom or split it? Are we witnessing the strange death of Labour England?
What happens will depend largely on the party leaders, who have so far been noticeably reluctant to face up to the tremendously unfair hand the English were dealt under successive devolution proposals.
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.
The question is: with a further large chunk of the Labour vote vulnerable to the BNP, how will Gordon Brown react? So far, the PM has made it hard to get a fag paper between his position and Cameron’s. But such attempts to close down debate on the English Question will fail, just as party leaders’ attempts to prevent discussion of immigration collapsed under public protest at the polls.
Indeed, the issues are linked in two significant ways. Both are still no-go areas for most major British politicians. Both feed the BNP vote. Slowly, but determinedly, the white English working class – and I guess some black Britons too are voting against unlimited immigration by embracing the BNP.
Gordon Brown must answer English Question - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/06/01/do0104.xml)