The scandal provoked by MPs’ dodgy expenses claims earlier this year led to unprecedented professions of interest in constitutional reform on the part of the three main parties. In a single week, as I recall, all the party leaders lined up to set out their priorities and proposals in this area. However, none of these proposals and very little of the overall discussion addressed the so-called English Question: the issue of how England should be governed as a nation, taking into consideration the impact on England and the Union as a whole of devolution in the three other constituent parts of the Kingdom.
I personally favour the establishment of an English Parliament to deal with the work of government and areas of legislation that are now almost exclusively England-focused, including the ‘big three’ of education, health, and justice and policing. Such a parliament, which could comprise considerably fewer MPs than the present tally of UK-parliament MPs representing English constituencies, would probably require or lead to the creation of a federal or even confederal UK of four national communities (or five if you count Cornwall), with a greatly slimmed-down UK-federal parliament dealing with what are presently referred to as ‘reserved’ matters and perhaps replacing the House of Lords in some of its scrutiny functions.
However, I’m not expecting even the more modest proposal of ‘mere’ devolution for England, and the establishment of an English parliament with functions akin to those of Holyrood, to be adopted by the three main parties as manifesto proposals at the next general election. But what I would be extremely disappointed to see – but, I have say, what I actually expect to see – would be if those manifesto proposals that do relate mainly or exclusively to England continue to be presented and described as if they affected and would be implemented across the UK as a whole.
The parties and, it has to be said, most of the mainstream media have carried out a vast deception of the English people in the period since devolution by continuing to refer to England-only or England-mainly policies and legislation as if they were ‘British’. I say ‘continuing to refer’ because, prior to devolution, legislation on education, health and justice was enacted on a genuinely UK-wide basis by all the MPs of the UK Parliament, even if the specifics varied to some extent country by country, with separate criminal law and a distinct education system in Scotland, for instance. Now, in the wake of devolution, bills in these areas – along with those in other policy areas that have been devolved – almost exclusively affect England only, the most prominent exception being justice, law and policing, which England shares with Wales. But politicians and the media continue to discuss these matters as if they affected all the people of the UK, which is simply untrue. Indeed, putting it uncharitably, this is a lie.
This practice is so widespread, so all-pervading and – as the BBC itself has called it– so ‘instinctive’ that one sometimes has to make an effort and pinch oneself to force oneself to be aware of it. Take the recent row about the parties’ respective financial and moral commitments to the NHS sparked off by Tory MEP Dan Hannan’s dismissive remarks towards the NHS in a US talk show in the midst of the controversy over there regarding Barack Obama’s health-care reforms. Not one of the many articles on the controversy I came across on TV, radio or online – and I mean not a single one – referred to the fact that the NHS that the present Labour government and a prospective Tory government were or would be in charge of was not the British NHS but the English NHS: national-UK governments are no longer responsible for ‘the’ NHS throughout the UK but only in England. In fact, as a result of devolution, there is no single ‘British NHS’ but rather four NHS’s run by each of the bodies responsible for the government of the UK’s constituent countries. But the ‘E’ word – England – was conspicuously absent from any of the parties’ protestations about their commitment to the NHS, even though it was England that was effectively being talked about.
When you draw this sort of thing to people’s attention, there’s often a sort of embarrassed silence, which in a way mirrors the silence to which the word ‘England’ itself is subjected in presentations and debates about policy issues that affect her. This embarrassment is associated almost with a sort of incredulity and sense of outrage that one should dare to suggest that weighty ‘British’ matters are in fact no such thing but are, rather, merely domestic English concerns. And this unwillingness on the part of politicians, parties, the media and ordinary people to acknowledge English matters as English, not British, also involves denial, in the psychological sense of the term: a refusal to acknowledge and consciously articulate a painful truth. That painful truth, for us in England, is that the old unitary UK is gone, dead; and that, like a child that grows up and painfully has to separate itself from its parent, England must now manage its domestic affairs on its own.
Except, of course, that separation of its identity and assumption of control over its own life from an overweening parent has yet to be completed in England’s case. We’re stuck in a sort of transitional state – indeed, to continue the psychoanalytical metaphor, England’s continuing attachment to Britain and unwillingness to be separated from it is akin to that of an infant’s attachment to a ‘transitional object’: reflecting an identity not yet fully differentiated from that of its parent. So we blunder on, with England’s affairs being ‘managed’ for her by a parent that is too scared to let go; a parent from which we, the English, are also still too scared to separate in case we feel too little and powerless in the big wide world without our powerful protector behind us.
It’s time to abandon this infantilism. English matters – those areas of governance that relate to England only – are already distinct from UK-wide matters: devolution has brought about that divide. Let’s acknowledge that fact as a first step towards enabling the people of England to take charge of their own affairs.
And that, essentially, is where the main parties have a big role to play. They, we, must stop the denial and start honestly referring to policy and legislation that relates to England as English. A failure to do so means continuing to be dishonest to the English electorate. And that body of voters does really matter to the parties, as they need to win in England – albeit that ‘winning’ is defined only in terms of gaining the majority of English parliamentary seats, rather than the majority of English votes – in order to be able to claim any kind of democratic mandate to govern the UK as a whole. But the recent constitutional crisis of confidence on the part of the main parties was a reaction to the evidence of widespread disenchantment on the part, mainly, of English people with the British politicians and parties that are supposed to represent them. It’s English people that the Westminster elite has mainly become disconnected from; and perhaps the greatest single contributory factor behind this is the fact that the political class and the big-three parties have themselves lost the English connection: the fact that in domestic, social policy, the country for which they have to propose and implement a credible and realistic vision is England, and no longer Britain.
Once we begin to acknowledge this fact, we can begin the long road to recovery. By which I don’t mean merely economic recovery but also social, political and psychological recovery: reconnecting politics to the people, and restoring the faith that politicians and people can be partners in a common enterprise to fashion a better future for ‘the country’. But that country is– can now only be – England. There no longer exists a common British social fabric for which the Westminster parliament is solely and exclusively responsible. Separate administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are charting separate courses for their respective countries, and Westminster has equipped them with the legal responsibilities and the administrative tools to implement a social vision for their nations. For England, it is still the UK parliament that remains responsible for social policy for England. But unless and until Parliament acknowledges its responsibility in the social domain as being towards England, it will not be able to re-establish itself as a parliament for England, even if it is the de facto parliament of England.
But the parties, clearly, are unwilling, indeed afraid, to speak the name of the country for which they will be proposing solutions and remedies at the next general election. Why? Because they are afraid of breaking up the UK-wide power base they currently aspire to take command of by seeking, instead, to derive their authority from the people of England: from their needs, their priorities and their hopes for their country. But power and authority do stem from the people; the power and authority of Westminster governments derive, in particular, from the assent of the English people. The only way that assent can be genuine is if the parties now start to be honest about which of their policies are actually for the people of England, so that the votes of the English people can be based on a true and fair reflection of what English voters actually want for their country. Anything else is simply a denial of ‘English votes on English matters’ in the true sense: the right of the English people to be democratically consulted on the matters that affect them.
If, for a change, the parties finally do explain to the English people which areas of UK-government action and policy relate only to England, the people may indeed start to ask themselves why there is not a separate English parliament to deal with such concerns. Why, indeed? But that is no reason for the parties to deny them that choice by doing their utmost to even suppress the thought. Psychological and political repression cannot last for ever. Sooner or later, the people of England will wake up to the realisation that the parties have deceived them for so long. Better for the parties to ‘fess up’ before that time and accompany the English people on their road to recovery and a new democratic future. Who knows where that road will take us? But it’s up to the parties to determine whether they want to be party to the ‘us’ – the English – in question.
And that’s because England matters, and the parties cannot for ever take the votes of the English for granted.