Calls for devolved powers for the North of England are rooted in the economic and political dominance of London and the South-East. Paul Salveson argues that an English Parliament would serve only to consolidate these exisiting inequalities and a diverse Council for the North may be needed.
The political shape of the United Kingdom is changing rapidly. The debate over Scottish independence is only the most obvious sign of a major shift, together with last year’s overwhelming vote for more powers to be given to the Welsh Government. In addition to Scotland and Wales, both Northern Ireland and London have substantial devolved powers. Which leaves the English regions. Some cities are having referenda on elected mayors, and police commissioners are to be voted for later this year. But it leaves some very big gaps and the continued dominance of centralised ‘London’ government.
As well as a democratic deficit, there is increasing evidence that the ‘North-South Divide’ is back with a vengeance. Research by IPPR North has shown a widening social and economic divide within England. The North is experiencing higher unemployment, more business failures, lower life expectancy and less investment in basic infrastructure such as transport.
A new organisation – the Hannah Mitchell Foundation – has been formed to campaign for elected regional government for the North. It has excited mixed views; some politicians who supported calls for regional devolution in the last Labour Government have yet to recover from the disastrous 2004 referendum in the North-East which sent a very clear ‘No thanks’ to Tony Blair and John Prescott. It was seen as another layer of bureaucracy with little power. Devolution in Wales and Scotland was still in its infancy and had yet to prove itself.
The Foundation intends to draw lessons from the 2004 experience. There are good arguments to look at ‘the North’ as a whole and include Yorkshire, the North-East and North-West in a ‘super-region’ which could have powers similar to those enjoyed by the Scots. This should emphatically not be about taking power away from the local level, but gaining a range of powers from Whitehall and Westminster. The slide into serious economic decline will not be reversed by under-resourced local authorities on their own, and there is a desperate need for strategic intervention at the regional level – on transport infrastructure, economic development and other areas, to develop a vibrant Northern economy. The regional development agencies have been abolished by the Coalition Government leaving regions like the North even more vulnerable.
Nobody would under-estimate the difficulty of moving towards regional government for the North, or for that matter other English regions. Yet the need to counter, on the one hand, the economic and political dominance of the South-East, and the increasingly confident and autonomous Scots and Welsh, is becoming increasingly clear. An ‘English Parliament’ is not the answer to the North’s problems, since it would only reflect and consolidate existing inequalities. The North needs its own voice, as part of a more democratic England within the United Kingdom.
The Hannah Mitchell Foundation has been formed primarily to campaign within the Labour Movement for a new approach to regionalism which learns the lessons from past campaigns and moves forward. As the momentum for regional devolution gathers momentum, we recognise that a wider, cross-party and more widely representative organisation will be needed. Scotland had its ‘Constitutional Convention’ which brought politicians, business leaders, voluntary and faith organisations together. In due course the North will need something like this – perhaps ‘A Council for the North’?
In the meantime, we see our role as gathering support within the centre-left. We are becoming a forum for the development of a distinctive democratic socialism in the North, rooted in our ethical socialist traditions of mutuality, co-operation, community and internationalism. Our focus will be to build the case for directly-elected regional government for the North of based on the principles of democracy and subsidiarity, social equity and justice, and sustainable development.
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About the author
Paul Salveson is the General Secretary of the Hannah Mitchell Foundation and a visiting professor in Transport and Logistics at the University of Huddersfield. He was awarded an MBE in 2008.
I’m really not convinced about Labours support of devolution. We in Cornwall handed Tony Blair a petition of 50,000 signatures calling for a Cornish Assembly as proof of our desire for devolution to the Duchy and he chucked it in the bin.
Cornwall would have been a sure winner for devolution but Labour couldn’t let go of the devolution process and tried instead to impose the South West region on us.
Read more on you mistakes here:
The Dark Side of DevolutionTop Down vs. Bottom Up Regionalism in England Cornwall and the North East Compared: http://www.scribd.com/doc/55381705/The-Dark-Side-of-Devolution
To many English people, Labour is now known as the “anti-English Labour Party”. This is because Labour did the following:-
1. Denied England recognition and keeps on trying to partition England into unwanted regions for political power;
2. Enforced mass immigration and unwanted multiculturalism on England against its wishes;
3 Any attempts to define positive Englishness are wrongly called ‘racists’, ‘little englanders’ and so on.
4 will not allow England its own Parliament.
‘The slide into serious economic decline will not be reversed by under-resourced local authorities on their own’
Agree that some regional coordination is probably needed and know there are doubts as to whether either Local Enterprise Partnerships or ‘city deals’ / elected mayors can deliver it. But surely the solution to local authorities being under-resourced is to empower them to raise more of their own revenue, before setting up an additional tier of governance above them?
Labour’s devolution plan was never in the spirit of localism. This policy was based upon the belief that Labour would have a more or less guaranteed mandate to rule Scotland/Wales from Edinburgh/Cardiff indefinitely. The Tories would never get in power at Holyrood and the nationalists would lose support by most Scots (who cared) being placated by devolution.
It was a disaster. Labour lost control of both and now Scotland may be lost forever!
Don’t repeat this nonsense with the North. Those of us who come from there don’t want it, so why won’t you listen?
“An ‘English Parliament’ is not the answer to the North’s problems, since it would only reflect and consolidate existing inequalities”.
I totally disagree. An English Parliament elected by PR would help get rid of any unfairness. Artificial regional assemblies are not the answer.
“The Hannah Mitchell Foundation has been formed primarily to campaign within the Labour Movement for a new approach to regionalism which learns the lessons from past campaigns and moves forward”.
So will the Foundation also be campaigning to get rid of the Welsh Assembly and replace it with directly-elected regional government for North Wales and South Wales? After all, inequalities exist in Wales as much as they do in England. The BBC found that there is a north-south divide in Wales, with the North of Wales generally more resilient to government cuts than the South of Wales:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-11513689
For those who don’t realise it (or would rather not acknowledge it), Labour has everything to gain from an English parliament. Why? In nearly every general election since WWII, Labour has gained the largest number of votes cast in England, sometimes, I believe, an outright majority of votes cast. If there were an English parliament with the same voting system as the Scottish Parliament, Labour would be in power more often than not. This destroys the myth that England is completely conservative, not to mention Conservative. Why Labour people keep peddling that myth, I just don’t know. The party should try acting positively for all of England, instead of simply relying on votes from its traditional fiefdoms in Scotland, Wales and the north of England. Try being positive about England, because you have nothing to fear except your misplaced fear of the English people. As a working class person, I don’t want Labour to be known as the racist Anglophobic party, but that’s how they appear to many English people.
Well said Alex Asher I was one of the many who campaigned against the Assemblies in the North of England,
The Labour Party threw every thing it had at the good people of the North and because they lost it has been itching them for years.
Nothing else but a Parliament for England is good enough for the English and no amount of spiteful divide and rule will change that.
A re-established English parliament spending English taxes on England would be better for the whole of England. I’d suggest it would be best placed outside London and in the midlands somewhere.
Devolution within England should be to the existing county, town council and parish levels. The country system is recognised, identified with and even loved. IPPR put support for northern regionalisation at 10% and for an English parliament at 35%ish iirc. Before IPPR survey after survey has shown majority support for an English parliament. There is little desire in England for the balkanisation of England into regions – why would there be? Also the north east assembly was rejected by a massive 78% of voters. Never the less the left keeps on bringing back the regions as a solution to it’s own desperate performance in England.
It need not be the case however – the English didn’t vote Conservative out of love but out of desperation to get rid of anti England, Scot run Labour. Since getting into power the Conservatives have been no better for the English in fact things have got even worse – on England there’s not a cigarette paper between the parties all of them are happy to see the English funded less and denied recognition and representation.
If Labour wants to return to favour in England it should create an English Labour Party to go along with their Welsh and Scottish versions and develop an English manifesto that puts England first. It should also offer the English the same courtesy shown to the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish in giving the English the opportunity to vote for an English parliament.
Mr Salveson seems keen to point out differences within England, these pale into insignificance when compared to the differences between home nations. Everyone in England (outside London) gets a raw deal on funding. Everyone in England gets a raw deal on recognition and representation. The English are united in being shafted by the UK parliament.
The answer to England’s problems is not to split England up into ‘regions’ but to give the English back an English parliament that works in the interests of the English people as a whole.
Sadly anglophobia seems so ingrained inside the Labour party that they’re not able to get past their own anti-English brainwashing.
And what about the differences within the other nations? Welsh-speaking north Wales versus English-speaking south Wales; Catholic versus Protestant in Northern Ireland (and I suspect Belfast and Derry have a fair old rivalry); and in Scotland you’ve got the Highlands versus the Lowlands, Glasgow and the west/central vs Edinburgh and the east, Dundee, Aberdeen, the Western Isles, Orkney, Shetland all with their own identities. Then there are the separate languages (Scottish Gaelic, Doric and Scots) and, not least, the same sectarian problems as Northern Ireland. At least we in England all speak the same language, and don’t give each other a hard time over religion.