English devolution discussion

[DynamicSpirit]

Likewise regional devolution. In this case I guess I "ought", morally, to say yes but again will have to say no as I would end up being governed by the South East, which is generally a Tory area, would have the Tories nearly permanently in power, and would produce yet more unwanted Tory influence on things.

Unwanted by whom? The Tories can't get to power in the SouthEast or any other region unless enough people vote for them. And maybe I'm being naïve but it seems to me that if someone votes Tory, then they probably want the Tories to have influence.

But I'd have thought if one party having too much power in a region is a concern then the solution is obvious: Proportional Representation. There aren't that many places in the UK where support for any one party is so strong that that party could keep permanent large majorities in a regional assembly elected by PR.

 

[nw1]

Unwanted by whom? The Tories can't get to power in the SouthEast or any other region unless enough people vote for them. And maybe I'm being naïve but it seems to me that if someone votes Tory, then they probably want the Tories to have influence.

Hence my qualfication that I was answering the question on admittedly selfish grounds (I don't want a regional assembly because I live in a region with different political prefences to my own, whereas the UK government might occasionally more closely align to my own views), I freely admit that.

But I'd have thought if one party having too much power in a region is a concern then the solution is obvious: Proportional Representation. There aren't that many places in the UK where support for any one party is so strong that that party could keep permanent large majorities in a regional assembly elected by PR.

That is a fair point, as long as it was actually implemented, and given the UK government's general lack of enthusiasm for it...

 

[Noddy]

That is a fair point, as long as it was actually implemented, and given the UK government's general lack of enthusiasm for it...

The Scottish, Welsh, NI and London parliaments/assemblies all have some form of PR. Wales is currently legislating to move to a full PR system. The proposed regional assemblies in the early 2000s would have been elected with the additional-member system so would have been somewhat proportional. So I don’t think there’s reason to assume it wouldn’t be implemented in future.

 

[renegademaster]

Based on the history of voting patterns, an English Parliament would become an almost permanent Tory monopoly.

1. If that is the democratic will of the English people, it's anti-democratic to try to engineer that away.
2. I dont think that is so certain, if polling stays as it is, Kier is going to win a majority of English seats.
3. Tories tend to scare their voters away from opposition to right of them (Farage and his parties mainly) with threats of Labour getting in, if Labour cant win in England that trick evaporates

 

[Cloud Strife]

As a Scottish Nationalist, I'm very comfortable with England having its own parliament. There is absolutely no reason why the English shouldn't have devolution too, although the exact form of devolution is up for debate. Generally speaking, the best and most sensible option would be for England to take over the House of Commons as the new English Parliament, with the House of Lords becoming a new Federal Parliament with around 300 MPs, with 150 coming from England and 50 from each of the other nations, along with a handful of seats representing the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.

England having its own parliament and a federal constitution for the UK are incompatible. Just do the maths. England on its own is far bigger than Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland combined.

It doesn't have to be incompatible. With maximum devolution, federal matters would be largely limited to things like defence.

Right now, the situation that the UK Parliament is used for solely English affairs is really quite unfair on the English people.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Sep 2023 ==

1. If that is the democratic will of the English people, it's anti-democratic to try to engineer that away.

I actually think that if there was an English parliament, there's a very real possibility that there would be a new Northern Conservative party taking the place of the Tories there.

 

[Noddy]

Generally speaking, the best and most sensible option would be for England to take over the House of Commons as the new English Parliament, with the House of Lords becoming a new Federal Parliament

I don’t agree with this-the UK either with devolved parliaments or as a federal country is simply too complex. A second upper chamber is necessary as it is in most other countries of a similar nature.

with around 300 MPs, with 150 coming from England and 50 from each of the other nations,

But I do agree with this. The introduction of regional or an English whole assemblies would and should allow the reduction in size of the Commons. And obviously the Lords needs total reform.

along with a handful of seats representing the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.

Personally I think all the dependencies and overseas territories should be given the option to join the UK and have elected representatives in the Commons and Lords (a bit like Curaçao and Sint Maarten becoming constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands when the Dutch Antilles was dissolved in 2010). But I suspect none would join as the present arrangements suit them better…

 

[Meerkat]

What is the actual point of a regional assembly?
It will be another load of politicians, in a bubble far away from most of their voters (Just not quite as far away). Instead of blaming London they will blame Manchester/Newcastle/etc, and can only imagine how the parts of Yorkshire will bicker!
Better to have power at a local level people identify with, and then those authorities can flexibly cooperate on anything that is more regional - combined authorities with minimal bureaucracy etc.

 

[Noddy]

What is the actual point of a regional assembly?

Because politics in the UK is totally unbalanced on a geographical level (cf the West Lothian question), yet heavily centralised through Westminster/Whitehall. Regional assemblies reduce this imbalance and decentralise power. They would take power away from metro mayors (which promotes a two party presidential style system of politics), police and crime commissioners, (what amount to unelected) combined authorities, regional chambers and other quangos, etc etc, and replace these with one accountable body. As has been shown with Wales and Scotland once they were established, I believe they would be popular with the majority (but of course not everyone but nothing is), and further powers would be devolved to them. If set up like Wales for example funding for schools or hospitals would not be in the total and sole control of whoever was in government in Westminster.

 

[sor]

There's the classic example of Sunday trading. The UK government wanted to loosen the laws in England to match what already exists in Scotland. The SNP helped block it claiming that it would affect the rights of Scottish workers who get extra pay or perks for working on Sundays. If there was some form of English devolution then this would not happen.

1. If that is the democratic will of the English people, it's anti-democratic to try to engineer that away.
2. I dont think that is so certain, if polling stays as it is, Kier is going to win a majority of English seats.
3. Tories tend to scare their voters away from opposition to right of them (Farage and his parties mainly) with threats of Labour getting in, if Labour cant win in England that trick evaporates

on point 2 - the Tories didn't get 50+% in England, it was actually around 47%. That's when they're at their highest too. Its often painted that England singlehandedly props up the Tories but that is just not true. It is important to note that it's not a Tory hivemind just as Scotland is not all SNP.

 

[Meerkat]

Because politics in the UK is totally unbalanced on a geographical level (cf the West Lothian question), yet heavily centralised through Westminster/Whitehall. Regional assemblies reduce this imbalance and decentralise power. They would take power away from metro mayors (which promotes a two party presidential style system of politics), police and crime commissioners, (what amount to unelected) combined authorities, regional chambers and other quangos, etc etc, and replace these with one accountable body. As has been shown with Wales and Scotland once they were established, I believe they would be popular with the majority (but of course not everyone but nothing is), and further powers would be devolved to them. If set up like Wales for example funding for schools or hospitals would not be in the total and sole control of whoever was in government in Westminster.

That doesn’t explain why you need a regional assembly.
Especially if you are taking powers away from local mayors and giving them to some distant body.
Its just another layer of bureaucracy and career politicians, except this one is neither one nor the other - I just don’t believe the English have regional affiliations - it’s national, and then county/city region.
Which would lead to a lot of powerful politicians with little mandate (due to appalling election turnouts) which is a recipe for trouble.

 

[Noddy]

That doesn’t explain why you need a regional assembly.

How would you resolve the geographic imbalance in UK politics? Because something does need to happen. Labour tried to resolve it with regional assemblies and began to do this with London but after the NE result they cancelled the whole process. The Tories tried with English Votes for English Laws but that was widely regarded as disaster across to political spectrum (Left to Right, and Nationalist to Unionist), and have since cancelled it.

Especially if you are taking powers away from local mayors and giving them to some distant body.

I don’t think regional assemblies are some ‘distant body’ though. Yes it won’t be the same town or city for everyone, but they will be much closer for everyone than Whitehall.

Its just another layer of bureaucracy and career politicians, except this one is neither one nor the other - I just don’t believe the English have regional affiliations - it’s national, and then county/city region.

London already has an assembly setup, just with fairly limited scope and powers. But it is democratically accountable. Elsewhere as I noted above there plenty of layers of bureaucracy buried in layers of metro mayors (for certain but not all metropolitan areas), police and crime commissioners, and unelected combined authorities, regional chambers, local enterprise partnerships and other quangos. If you had regional assemblies these bodies would all be accountable to the assembly but in the present devolved settlement who, for example, is Transport for the North accountable to? Who pays its way? I know who Transport for London/Wales is accountable to and who controls their budget, and if they don’t like how they are being managed (cf ULEZ, or 20mph speed limits) they can vote them out.

On a historical note the modern English regions mostly sit fairly closely with the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (with the exception of historical kingdom of Wessex which is split between the SE and SW) but I absolutely accept this is an irrelevance to most. However, personally to me I don’t really care about ‘affiliations’ - I want good proportional and proportionate governance, rather than a centralised top down approach, which is why I am in favour of regional assemblies (although I’d take an English parliament over the current arrangement). Having everything controlled by Whitehall or metro mayors/combined authorities etc is neither of these things, especially if you don’t live in a metropolitan area.

Which would lead to a lot of powerful politicians with little mandate (due to appalling election turnouts) which is a recipe for trouble.

I wouldn’t describe the turnout for the Welsh, Scottish, NI or London assemblies as appalling and I don’t see why turnout would be much different.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

I think before we start thinking about regional assemblies (or even an English Parliament) we need to figure out what responsibilities are best handled at what level.

• UK Government... Defence, constitutional issues, and resolving anything that crosses regions that the regions are unable to agree on. Anything else? Keeping the UK-wide responsibilities minimal so that you can drastically shrink the Westminster Parliament/Government is probably necessary to get popular support for regional assemblies and avoid administrative bloat.
• Regional Governments... Transport. Can they make laws? (If not there's probably little point having them as they'd just be glorified councils). But in that case, are we comfortable if the SouthEast decides (say) to replace the NHS with a insurance-based health system while London keeps the NHS? Of if the West Country decides to change their road signs and the Highway Code rules within their region, or Tyne and Wear decides to abolish Universal Credit and reintroduce income support instead? If we are going to be serious about regional Government then we may have to accept those kinds of differences developing.
• Local councils.. probably need to be focused more on planning and services that are intrinsically local - like libraries and sports centres and looking after the local parks and public spaces. I'd probably shift care in particular to a regional level.

 

[Magdalia]

On a historical note the modern English regions mostly sit fairly closely with the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms

I have waited nearly a week for the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms.

The regions devised by the statisticians only bear a passing resemblance. There were 7 kingdoms after the fall of the Roman Empire, sometimes called the Heptarchy. The Angles were in East Anglia, and the Saxons were in Essex, Sussex and Wessex. The other 3 kingdoms were Kent, Mercia and Northumbria.

When the Vikings invaded they took over East Anglia, Essex and bits of both Mercia and Northumbria. It was Wessex that eventually united it all into England, not long before the Norman Conquest.

So 5 of the heptarchy were in the south, with only Mercia and Northumbria in the Midlands and North.

 

[Noddy]

Indeed, but broadly speaking:

NE=Late Northumbria
NW=Rheged/Strathclyde-Cumbriac
Yorkshire and Humberside-Northumbria (but Yorkshire has a very strong regional identity of it own)
West-Mids=English Mercia
East-Mids=Danish Mercia
East Anglia=Angles

Leaving the SW and SE split across various others. But very off topic

 

[Magdalia]

Indeed, but broadly speaking:

NE=Late Northumbria
NW=Rheged/Strathclyde-Cumbriac
Yorkshire and Humberside-Northumbria (but Yorkshire has a very strong regional identity of it own)
West-Mids=English Mercia
East-Mids=Danish Mercia
East Anglia=Angles

Leaving the SW and SE split across various others. But very off topic

I don't think that it is off topic. What that period shows is strong but rapidly shifting regional identities, impacted by internal and external migration. In those days the regional boundaries changed through wars. Now we don't do fighting but we haven't found a different way to absorb those changes.

 

[Yew]

Correct, it does not paint the whole picture. That has to be pieced together using many data sources. Have a look at the share of debt, net fiscal flows over the last 50 years, GVA per part of the Uk, FDI, there is a lot you need to trawl through.

Bottom line here is that the UK gets poorer sans Scotland, and that Scotlands significant exports dramatically improve what would be a truly shocking balance of payments deficit without Scotland. Not politics, just an appraisal of the figures.

Im not against the principle of an English parliament, its just that what exists today is to all intents and purposes, that already. Boundary and seat changes only reinforce that.

If you are going to make claims, the onus is on you to provide evidence to back them up

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 17 Sep 2023 ==

As a Scottish Nationalist, I'm very comfortable with England having its own parliament. There is absolutely no reason why the English shouldn't have devolution too, although the exact form of devolution is up for debate. Generally speaking, the best and most sensible option would be for England to take over the House of Commons as the new English Parliament, with the House of Lords becoming a new Federal Parliament with around 300 MPs, with 150 coming from England and 50 from each of the other nations, along with a handful of seats representing the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.

So that 83% of the population have 50% of the representatives, and a Welshmans vote counts 6 times as much as someone in England? I think I'll pass on that particular deal.

 

[Magdalia]

So that 83% of the population have 50% of the representatives, and a Welshmans vote counts 6 times as much as someone in England? I think I'll pass on that particular deal.

Compare with the US Senate, where each state has 2 senators, irrespective of size.

 

[Meerkat]

How would you resolve the geographic imbalance in UK politics?

Define the problem please. Is there a regional imbalance? If you just mean devolution then just go hard on the current theme - city regions/counties

I don’t think regional assemblies are some ‘distant body’ though. Yes it won’t be the same town or city for everyone, but they will be much closer for everyone than Whitehall.

Once its not your identified local area the distance to the regional centre makes little difference from the distance to London. Carlisle being run from Manchester etc.

who, for example, is Transport for the North accountable to? Who pays its way?

The local authorities. I am not a fan - another quango middle class gravy train. Cynically I think it was created to give a semblance of devolution with the knowledge that they would argue amongst themselves too much to be significant. Just have the PTEs (or whatever they are called now and let them co-operate)

I wouldn’t describe the turnout for the Welsh, Scottish, NI or London assemblies as appalling and I don’t see why turnout would be much different.

They aren't regional - they are national, representing units that their electorate strongly identify with. Though I note all the moaning about being monopolised by, and only caring about, the Central Belt and South Wales.

Compare with the US Senate, where each state has 2 senators, irrespective of size.

And look how badly that is going, particularly on things like gun control. Huge populations being held hostage by a massively disproportionate allocation of senators.

 

[Cloud Strife]

I don’t agree with this-the UK either with devolved parliaments or as a federal country is simply too complex. A second upper chamber is necessary as it is in most other countries of a similar nature.

Maybe one concept worth pursuing would be regional assemblies, but with an all-England upper house? The idea could be that the regional assemblies would be responsible for public services (police, fire, schools, etc) while the all-England upper house could take responsibility for the laws that govern those public services. The new English Senate could be indirectly elected in the same way that the Bundesrat is, that is, the members would be appointed by the governments of the regional assemblies.

Above that, you'd just need a UK House of Commons which would have roughly 317 members (150 from England, 50 from Scotland/Wales/NI, 14 Overseas Territories, 3 Crown Dependencies). The UK House of Lords would then be also elected, with perhaps 51 Lords from England, 17 from each of Scotland/Wales NI and a Senator representing the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. I'd make all elections on a 4 year cycle, with the devolved parliaments being elected halfway through the 4 year parliamentary cycle.

I think the biggest issue in England is the strange system of governance that isn't unified. I can barely make sense of all the different layers of administration there, whereas the other countries have a straightforward system of local councils and national parliament.

So that 83% of the population have 50% of the representatives, and a Welshmans vote counts 6 times as much as someone in England? I think I'll pass on that particular deal.

I think the idea is that the UK Federal Parliament would only deal with matters of UK-wide importance, with everything else being devolved. This way, you'd avoid things like the example above with the SNP voting against extended opening hours on a Sunday, because they simply wouldn't have the competence to do so. England would be conceding the right to rule over the rest of the UK, but having nearly 50% of the representatives would still be a very powerful voting bloc.

I think before we start thinking about regional assemblies (or even an English Parliament) we need to figure out what responsibilities are best handled at what level.

Yes, absolutely. There is a mess right now with responsibilities differing between devolved administrations, and I would argue strongly that each devolved administration should have the same powers. Spain has the same problem with their asymmetric devolution and differing Statutes of Autonomy.

To be honest, I think a big part of the issue with England is that it's not really viable to have a two tier system of government (local council and national parliament), but that introducing regional as well as national parliaments would mean a lot of parliamentarians. There was a model proposed for Cyprus that the state-level MPs would also serve as federal MPs, which might be a viable solution. You'd elect representatives to the regional assembly, and then the English Parliament would be comprised of all the regional assembly members. If the English Parliament made laws and then the regional assemblies implemented them, you'd retain the regional differences while only requiring a single vote every 4 years.

Perhaps the solution would be regional assemblies but with only part time parliamentarians?

 

[Noddy]

Define the problem please. Is there a regional imbalance? If you just mean devolution then just go hard on the current theme - city regions/counties

The so called ‘West Lothian question’ is the problem. As more and more powers are devolved to London, Scotland, Wales and NI the issue is only going to get worse. And as @Cloud Strife has articulated in post 79 the problem with this issue runs both ways. Going hard on Metro mayors or combined authorities isn’t going to resolve this issue. Metro mayors only really work in metropolitan areas, those in the regions are being left behind. And outside of London you are never going to be able to devolve housing, transport, health, or eduction policy and funding in any meaningful way to combined authorities because they are too small or don’t even exist. An English national parliament could possibly work but to me you would then still want and need some levels of local devolution which is where the real mess is.

The local authorities. I am not a fan - another quango middle class gravy train. Cynically I think it was created to give a semblance of devolution with the knowledge that they would argue amongst themselves too much to be significant.

My understanding is that TfN and the other 6 non-statutory sub-national transport authorities are all jointly funded by central government as well as the councils. But regardless as you point out it (and the others) is an organisation with no democratic accountability, setup as a devolution sop to the north, which the government create knowing full well it wouldn’t be able to achieve or do much. This is the reason why we need regional assemblies-so actual powers can be devolved, and that the people in charge of those powers can be held democratically accountable.

Just have the PTEs (or whatever they are called now and let them co-operate)

But these only operate in select metropolitan areas…most of the population of England don’t live in these six areas (or even a metro mayor area).

They aren't regional - they are national, representing units that their electorate strongly identify with. Though I note all the moaning about being monopolised by, and only caring about, the Central Belt and South Wales.

London isn’t national. Yorkshire has an extremely strong regional identity. I fully accept both that not all the regions do (but as I said previously I couldn’t care less about identity politics, I just want good governance), and that the system would not be perfect. No system ever is. However, as you yourself have pointed out many of the current devolved institutions in England have little or no actual powers, and some quite frankly are a waste of money. As others have pointed out the current system of governance in England is a mess. As proposed in the 2003 the assembly settlement would clean up much of this mess so you are simply left with three tiers.

A single local unitary council
A regional assembly
UK government

All bodies would sit directly below a single tier of government and be funded and democratically accountable to them. No regional bodies or other quangos floating in the ether, controlled by central government or 20 councils (cf TfN) all with different ideas, which is where the bureaucracy is.

 

[DC1989]

Real devolution is needed, I think we are one of the most centralised democracies in the world. But it must be real devolution. Not threatening to take it away when that region wants to pass a law etc that you don't like (See ULEZ, Scotland drug policy, Wales 20mph) or have London micromanage decisions made by the regions (It's always submit bids to London civil servants to review etc or Rishi Sunak personally approving which park is allowed a chess set)

In any case I can't see it happening, New Labour were big on centralisation and Starmer seems the same.

 

[Meerkat]

The so called ‘West Lothian question’ is the problem.

You don't fix that without federalism. I don't think there is any real appetite for that except in Scotland (because they think it will reduce English influence)

This is the reason why we need regional assemblies-so actual powers can be devolved, and that the people in charge of those powers can be held democratically accountable.

That doesn't really work unless the assemblies have tax raising powers, and then it is getting very messy round the edges and I just don't see the gain is worth the pain

But these only operate in select metropolitan areas…most of the population of England don’t live in these six areas (or even a metro mayor area).

I would imagine that most of the population would live in a metro area once they were fully set up, and the rest can make their own combined authorities

London isn’t national. Yorkshire has an extremely strong regional identity.

London isn't the equivalent of a region for this purpose, its a big city which logically has a metro authority.
Yorkshire may have a strong outward cultural identity, but not really in administrative terms - telling Hull, York, Sheffield etc that they will be run from Leeds would probably offend them almost as much as being run from London!

 

[Noddy]

You don't fix that without federalism. I don't think there is any real appetite for that except in Scotland (because they think it will reduce English influence)

That doesn't really work unless the assemblies have tax raising powers, and then it is getting very messy round the edges and I just don't see the gain is worth the pain

I would imagine that most of the population would live in a metro area once they were fully set up, and the rest can make their own combined authorities

London isn't the equivalent of a region for this purpose, its a big city which logically has a metro authority.
Yorkshire may have a strong outward cultural identity, but not really in administrative terms - telling Hull, York, Sheffield etc that they will be run from Leeds would probably offend them almost as much as being run from London!

Unfortunately, I think we’ll just have to agree to disagree on most of these points! But I absolutely respect your opinion.

Just one final note though on Yorkshire, in the 2021 West Yorks Mayoral election the Yorkshire Party got 9.7% and last year in the South Yorks Mayoral election they achieved 13%, only 3% behind the Conservatives who were second. So I would argue support here for a regional assembly is achieving some traction.

 

[Wynd]

You don't fix that without federalism. I don't think there is any real appetite for that except in Scotland (because they think it will reduce English influence)

Em, no, "they" think that is the route to them getting what they vote for.

For those mentioning evidence, the naievity on display is striking. If the government have a prvailing agenda, and they control the data, you need to go digging for your own evidence.

Its touching that so many have such faith in the veracity of UK Government to tell the truth, and not tell wht happens to suit the agenda.

Oh, wait... PPE, £15B written off just yesterday was it?

A good halfway house to circumvent the various issues around England and regional power, is to hand power over taxes and spend in the north of England, to the north of England.

Have a proper regional assembly in York, where they dont send their revenue to Whitehall where it will inevitably end up in the hands of the various crooks and charlatans in the tory party. Or in offshore tax havens.

 

[renegademaster]

Em, no, "they" think that is the route to them getting what they vote for.

For those mentioning evidence, the naievity on display is striking. If the government have a prvailing agenda, and they control the data, you need to go digging for your own evidence.

Its touching that so many have such faith in the veracity of UK Government to tell the truth, and not tell wht happens to suit the agenda.

Oh, wait... PPE, £15B written off just yesterday was it?

A good halfway house to circumvent the various issues around England and regional power, is to hand power over taxes and spend in the north of England, to the north of England.

Have a proper regional assembly in York, where they dont send their revenue to Whitehall where it will inevitably end up in the hands of the various crooks and charlatans in the tory party. Or in offshore tax havens.

If the polls stay like they are labour are getting most seats in England. You don't need to engineer a whole new layer of politicians just because you don't like the Tories and think they will tip scales against them

 

[Wynd]

Would that be the same labour party that has talked about reforming the house of Lords for the last 100 plus years?

The best possible result of greater devolution would be to diminsh tax funds going in to Whitehall, which only squanders the money its given anyway.

 

[Noddy]

Em, no, "they" think that is the route to them getting what they vote for.

For those mentioning evidence, the naievity on display is striking. If the government have a prvailing agenda, and they control the data, you need to go digging for your own evidence.

Its touching that so many have such faith in the veracity of UK Government to tell the truth, and not tell wht happens to suit the agenda.

Oh, wait... PPE, £15B written off just yesterday was it?

A good halfway house to circumvent the various issues around England and regional power, is to hand power over taxes and spend in the north of England, to the north of England.

Have a proper regional assembly in York, where they dont send their revenue to Whitehall where it will inevitably end up in the hands of the various crooks and charlatans in the tory party. Or in offshore tax havens.

If you state an opinion (‘I think the UK government are a bunch of charlatans’) there is no issue. But if you present a claim as fact:

England gets everything its own way already, and already gets the lions share of all funding, not to mention some of Scotland and Wales abundant resources to boot.
The fact is, England should be extremely grateful for the position it’s in, it would be a lot poorer without the significant charity of the Welsh and Scottish.

you need to be able to back it up. First you said check GERS, I looked up the figures, they don’t support what you claim and I have produced evidence and source for this. You said to look at the GVA figures. I trawled the ONS website for them and those I found don’t support what you claim, and I have produced evidence and source for this.

I note that the GERS figures are published by the Scottish, not the UK government. Do you not believe these figures? You also appear to be claiming that the ONS (as the UK government agency responsible) do not ‘tell the truth’ and are publishing data to ‘suit the agenda’, and you say you need to be ‘digging for your own evidence’. Quite frankly I think you are heading into conspiracy theory territory here-unless you can produce some evidence or sources that have done this and support your statement. So far you have not, and instead rather discourteously said

Don't be giving me that straw man patter

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Em, no, "they" think that is the route to them getting what they vote for.

For those mentioning evidence, the naievity on display is striking. If the government have a prvailing agenda, and they control the data, you need to go digging for your own evidence.

Eh? In this context, whatever you think of the UK Government is irrelevant. The point is that, if you wish to convince other people that what you say is correct, it's *your* responsibility to provide the evidence/reasoning to back up your statements. It is not the responsibility of the people you're trying to convince to do the work to prove your claims. If you're not willing to do that, then the rest of us are likely to think that you're just blustering.

If I said something like, 'England contributes far more than its fair share of wealth to Scotland. But I can't be bothered to present the statistics that prove that. Go do some research to prove that I'm right', I'm pretty sure you would (quite correctly) tell me that my claims are worthless if I won't back them up. But that (on the other side of the debate) is the logic of what you've been saying.

Its touching that so many have such faith in the veracity of UK Government to tell the truth, and not tell wht happens to suit the agenda.

And the Scottish Government doesn't have any agenda related to independence, and therefore can always be trusted to tell the truth, right....?

 

[Falcon1200]

The best possible result of greater devolution would be to diminsh tax funds going in to Whitehall, which only squanders the money its given anyway.

Whereas other administrations do not squander money? Anyone living in Scotland knows better than that!

Personally I don't expect politicians, of any hue and at any level, not to waste money; After all, they are just fallible humans like the rest of us.

 

[KashmireHawker]

In a development, Essex County Council, Southend-on-Sea City Council and Thurrock Council are in negotiations on a Level 2 Devo Deal.

This would create a Greater Essex Combined Authority, but unlike elsewhere won’t have an Elected Mayor.

Essex, Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock make up Greater Essex. The Government has confirmed that Greater Essex will work towards a Level 2 devolution deal.

Under the Level 2 deal, there would be a new Greater Essex Combined Authority. This would mean the three authorities make collective decisions about the power and budget given to them by the Government.

Essex County Council, Southend-on-Sea City Council and Thurrock Council will not merge under the deal. Each authority would remain independent.

The Greater Essex Combined Authority would include the former role of the Local Enterprise Partnership. This follows the Government’s previous decision to disband them. City, district and borough councils in Essex would also have a voice under the Combined Authority.

The deal would not establish a directly elected mayor for Greater Essex.

It will mean greater focus on improving local skills, transport planning and potentially additional funding for specific capital projects.

Level 2 devolution deal in development | Essex County Council

The deal would strengthen the local economy in Greater Essex.

www.essex.gov.uk