The West Lothian question,[1] also known as the English question,[2] is a political issue in the United Kingdom. It concerns the question of whether members of Parliament (MPs) from Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales who sit in the House of Commons should be able to vote on matters that affect only England, while neither they nor MPs from England are able to vote on matters that have been devolved to the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Scottish Parliament and the Senedd (Welsh Parliament).[3] The term West Lothian question was coined by Enoch Powell MP in 1977 after Tam Dalyell, the Labour MP for the Scottish constituency of West Lothian, raised the matter repeatedly in House of Commons debates on devolution.[4][5]

In 2011 the UK Government set up the Commission on the consequences of devolution for the House of Commons, chaired by Sir William McKay, former Clerk of the House of Commons, to examine the question.[6] The commission published a report in 2013 which proposed various procedural changes, including the recommendation that legislation which affects only England should require the support of a majority of MPs representing English constituencies. This recommendation was known as English votes for English laws.[7][8] Following the election of a Conservative majority government in the 2015 general election, new parliamentary procedures and a Legislative Grand Committee were enacted to bring it into effect.[9] The measures were subsequently abolished in 2021.[10]

Background

The equivalent question was raised by the opponents of Irish Home Rule in defeating William Gladstone's first (1886) and second (1893) home rule bills. Basil Williams enumerated four schemes which Gladstone proposed at various stages:[11]

  1. Total exclusion of Irish members.
  2. Inclusion of Irish members, in reduced numbers, for all purposes.
  3. Inclusion of Irish members, in their full numbers, for certain specified purposes — the "In and Out" clause.
  4. Inclusion of Irish members, in their full numbers, for all purposes — the Omnes Omnia (all people) clause.

The "West Lothian question" itself was first posed in 1977 during a British House of Commons debate about Scottish and Welsh devolution proposals. In the 14 November sitting, Tam Dalyell, the Labour MP for the Scottish constituency of West Lothian, asked,

For how long will English constituencies and English Honourable members tolerate ... at least 119 Honourable Members from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland exercising an important, and probably often decisive, effect on English politics while they themselves have no say in the same matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?[12]

To illustrate his point, Dalyell chose the example of a member of Parliament for West Lothian who could vote on matters affecting the English town of Blackburn, Lancashire, but not on matters concerning Blackburn, West Lothian in his own constituency. The name "West Lothian question" was later coined by the Ulster Unionist MP Enoch Powell in a response to Dalyell's speech, when he said "We have finally grasped what the Honourable Member for West Lothian is getting at. Let us call it the West Lothian question."[13] The question is more commonly assumed to refer to the anomaly that came into being in 1999, with Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland members at Westminster allowed to vote upon English matters, but MPs for English constituencies having no influence on affairs which were devolved to Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.[14] Dalyell was a vocal opponent of Scottish devolution in the 1979 and 1997 plebiscites. A devolved Scottish Parliament was created in 1999 after a clear majority voted in favour of devolution in the second referendum.

The Scottish Parliament was formed by statute, the Scotland Act 1998, and is thus a creation of Westminster. No sovereign status on the Scottish Parliament is conferred, and the act has not changed the status of the Westminster Parliament as the supreme legislature of Scotland, with Westminster retaining the ability to override, or veto, any decisions taken by the Scottish Parliament. The Westminster Parliament remains the sovereign body; powers are devolved rather than transferred to the Scottish Parliament. The ability of all Westminster MPs to vote on Scottish legislation has not been legally diminished by devolution, as made clear by Section 28(7) of the Scotland Act 1998, which states that the legislative powers of the Scottish Parliament do "not affect the power of the Parliament of the United Kingdom to make laws for Scotland".[15]

Legislation relating to reserved issues such as defence, national security, foreign policy and monetary and economic issues are voted on by all the MPs at Westminster to ensure consistency across the whole of the United Kingdom. The Scottish Parliament is not able to pass laws on these issues itself, as they were not devolved. The West Lothian question is not involved in this situation, as all parts of the Union have a say roughly proportional to their population and all are equally affected.

During devolution, a convention was created to manage the power of Westminster to legislate on matters within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament. This is known as the Sewel Convention, and the related Scottish parliamentary motions are now known as legislative consent motions (previously Sewel motions).[16] These motions (of which there are around a dozen per year) allow MPs to vote on issues which, among other things, are within the Scottish Parliament's legislative competence. The Sewel Convention states that the Westminster Parliament will not normally legislate on devolved matters in Scotland without first obtaining the consent of the Scottish Parliament.

English votes for English laws (EVEL)

During the 2000s a number of pieces of legislation which affected only or mainly England were passed by the UK Parliament, although the votes cast by MPs were such that the legislation would not have been passed if only the votes cast by MPs representing English constituencies had been counted.[17] The opposition Conservative Party commissioned a report, "Devolution, The West Lothian Question and the Future of the Union", which proposed some procedural changes restricting the participation of MPs representing non-English constituencies during the passage of bills relating only to England.

While the Conservatives were in government from 2010 to 2015 in coalition with the Liberal Democrats, they set up the McKay Commission to look into the question. The Commission proposed that bills in the House of Commons which affected England solely or differently should require a majority vote of MPs representing English constituencies.[18] The Conservative manifesto for the 2015 general election included a proposal that England-only legislation should require approval from a Legislative Grand Committee prior to its Third Reading in the House of Commons.[19] Having won a majority in that election, the Conservative government used a change in standing orders in October 2015 to give MPs representing English (or English and Welsh) constituencies a "veto" over laws affecting only England (or only England and Wales).[9] Thus, a new law could no longer be imposed only on England by a majority of all MPs if a majority of English MPs were opposed. However, a proposed new law could still be vetoed by a majority of all MPs even if a majority of English MPs were in favour.

The measures were abolished in 2021, with the government saying that they had "added complexity and delay to the legislative process" and that their removal would allow all MPs to be represented equally.[10]

Other possible answers to the question

Reversal of devolution

Reversion of all devolved powers, and abolition of the devolved administrations. No voting member from one region would have power over another region, wherein the voting members of that other region do not have reciprocal rights; all regions would be treated equally.

English devolution

English parliament or assembly

The creation of a devolved English parliament or assembly, with full legislative powers, akin to the Scottish Parliament is seen by some as a solution to this problem,[20] with full legislative powers also being conferred on the existing Welsh Parliament. The Westminster (United Kingdom) Parliament would continue to meet and legislate on matters of UK-wide competence such as Defence, Foreign Affairs and economic matters with the parliaments of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland legislating locally. In the early-20th-century context of Irish home rule, the equivalent option was dubbed Home Rule All Round.[21]

Lord Falconer, the former Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, has stated that he believes that an English Parliament would "dwarf all other institutions."[22] Peter Hain, who campaigned for a Welsh Assembly, warned that creating an English parliament or trying to stop Scottish and Welsh MPs from voting on England-only matters would break up the Union.[23] Chuka Umunna suggested in July 2015 that the Labour Party should support the creation of a separate English parliament, as part of a federal United Kingdom.[24]

Regional assemblies

The Labour government of Tony Blair attempted to address part of the West Lothian question by introducing English regional assemblies with no legislative powers. Originally, it was planned that these would be directly elected. The London Assembly was the first of these, established following a referendum in 1998, in which public and media attention was focused principally on the post of Mayor of London.[25] Ken Livingstone was the first directly elected mayor of London. He started his victory speech with "As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted 14 years ago", making it clear he saw the London Assembly as a recreation of a similar London wide authority to that of the Greater London Council, which he had led before it was abolished in the 1980s.[26]

Further progress was thwarted when a referendum in the North East rejected the proposal for an elected assembly in November 2004[27] leading to the shelving of similar proposals for other English regions. The Regional Development Agencies were all scrapped by March 2012 with their powers and functions being transferred either to local government or in the case of London, the Greater London Authority.

Increased powers to English counties and cities

Douglas Carswell and Daniel Hannan have proposed that all the powers currently devolved to the Scottish Parliament should also be devolved to the English counties and cities. This would mean that the situation of Scottish MPs voting on policy which only affected England would no longer arise, because parliament would no longer be responsible for areas of policy which affected only England. Therefore, parliament would have to choose to make policy either for the United Kingdom as a whole, or not at all. Carswell and Hannan write: "All the fields of policy currently within the purview of the Holyrood Parliament should be transferred to English counties and cities (thereby, incidentally, answering the west Lothian Question)."[28]

Dissolution of the Union

Another solution might be the dissolution of the United Kingdom leading to some or all of the countries of the United Kingdom (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales) becoming independent sovereign states. The Scottish National Party (SNP), which campaigns for Scottish independence, won an outright majority in the Scottish Parliament in the 2011 Scottish election. A referendum was held on 18 September 2014, with voters rejecting independence by 55% to 45%.[29] In Wales, Welsh Nationalist party Plaid Cymru holds Welsh independence as a long-term aim, while Propel, formerly the Welsh National Party, more aggressively campaigns for independence. In Northern Ireland there are no mainstream political parties calling for an independent Northern Irish state, but parties calling for a united Ireland include Sinn Féin and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP).

Reducing the number of Scottish MPs

During the existence of the Parliament of Northern Ireland (1921–1972), the number of MPs elected from Northern Ireland to Westminster was below the standard ratio of MPs compared with the rest of the UK.[30] During periods when the predominantly unionist MPs from Northern Ireland deprived Labour of working majorities, Conservatives supported the principle that "every member of the House of Commons is equal to every other member of the House of Commons".[30] Scotland traditionally enjoyed a greater number of MPs per head of population than the rest of the UK, but this advantage was reduced significantly at the 2005 UK general election.[31][32] An argument against the idea of having a lower number of MPs, in return for more devolved powers, is that if the national parliament takes important decisions (such as waging war) then people should be fully represented.[31]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Labour rules out talks on 'English votes for English laws'". BBC News. BBC. 14 October 2014. Archived from the original on 14 October 2014. Retrieved 14 October 2014. But Mr Hague said the issue of "English votes for English laws", known as the West Lothian Question, had been talked about for nearly 20 years but nothing had been done.
  2. ↑ "Scottish referendum: What is the 'English Question'?". BBC News. BBC. 19 September 2014. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 26 April 2015.
  3. ↑ Bowers, Paul. "SN/PC/2586 - The West Lothian Question" (PDF). House of Commons Library. Retrieved 17 May 2023. The constitutional anomaly whereby Members representing Scottish constituencies (and on occasion from Welsh and Northern Irish seats) may vote on legislation which extends to England but neither they nor Members representing English seats can vote on subjects which have been devolved to the Scottish Parliament has, since the 1970s, been termed the West Lothian Question.
  4. ↑ "Now for the English question". The Economist. 27 September 2014. Archived from the original on 23 August 2017. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  5. ↑ "West Lothian commission: Sir Emyr Jones Parry joins body". BBC News. BBC. 17 January 2012. Archived from the original on 20 January 2012. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  6. ↑ "Answer sought to the West Lothian question". BBC News. BBC. 8 September 2011. Archived from the original on 8 September 2011. Retrieved 8 September 2011.
  7. ↑ Report of McKay Commission (Report). 25 March 2013. Archived from the original on 30 March 2013. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  8. ↑ "England-only laws 'need majority from English MPs'". BBC News. BBC. 25 March 2013. Archived from the original on 21 April 2013. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  9. 1 2 "English vote plan to become law despite objections". BBC News. BBC. 22 October 2015. Archived from the original on 23 October 2015. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
  10. 1 2 "Commons scraps English votes for English laws". BBC News. 13 July 2021.
  11. ↑ Williams, Basil (1911). "The Exclusion Or Retention Of Irish Members In The Imperial Parliament". Home rule problems. London: P.S. King & Son. pp. 162–177. Retrieved 29 January 2018.
  12. ↑ "SCOTLAND BILL". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). 14 November 1977. Archived from the original on 19 June 2009. Retrieved 23 February 2009.
  13. ↑ Reid, Tim (13 September 2011). "Q&A: The West Lothian Question". BBC News. BBC. Archived from the original on 18 July 2013. Retrieved 9 July 2013.
  14. ↑ "Q&A: The West Lothian Question". BBC News. BBC. 13 September 2011. Archived from the original on 11 November 2018. Retrieved 20 June 2018.
  15. ↑ "Scotland Act, section 28(7)". Opsi.gov.uk. 18 February 2011. Archived from the original on 18 May 2007. Retrieved 26 February 2011.
  16. ↑ "Sewel Motions". Scottish Government. Archived from the original on 14 October 2013.
  17. ↑ "Scots MPs attacked over fees vote". BBC News. 27 January 2004. Archived from the original on 9 March 2006. Retrieved 12 November 2013.
  18. ↑ "England-only laws 'need majority from English MPs'". BBC News. 25 March 2013. Archived from the original on 21 April 2013. Retrieved 20 June 2018.
  19. ↑ "Election 2015: PM sets out 'English votes' timetable". BBC News Online. 24 April 2015. Archived from the original on 18 October 2018. Retrieved 4 July 2015.
  20. ↑ "Campaign for an English Parliament". Archived from the original on 25 November 2009. Retrieved 6 November 2004.
  21. ↑ Kendle, J. E. (1968). "The Round Table Movement and 'Home Rule All Round'". The Historical Journal. Cambridge University Press. 11 (2): 332–353. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00002041. JSTOR 2637785. S2CID 159471230.
  22. ↑ "No English parliament — Falconer". BBC News. BBC. 10 March 2006. Archived from the original on 14 March 2007. Retrieved 10 March 2006. A possible answer to this might be an English Parliament consisting of all the 529 English MPs, a sort of 'English Grand Committee' – For the Majority Party in Parliament might not have the majority of English constituencies.
  23. ↑ "Peter Hain warns banning Welsh MPs from English votes will 'destroy' Union". Wales Online. 28 June 2011. Archived from the original on 22 January 2012. Retrieved 9 July 2013.
  24. ↑ Wintour, Patrick (22 July 2015). "Chuka Umunna calls for an English parliament and a federal UK". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
  25. ↑ 'Overwhelming vote for Mayor' Archived 30 July 2017 at the Wayback Machine, BBC News Online, 8 May 1998
  26. ↑ Paul Waugh and Andrew Grice. Ken reclaims the capital, The Independent 6 May 2000
  27. ↑ North East votes 'no' to assembly Archived 21 January 2007 at the Wayback Machine, BBC News Online, 5 November 2004
  28. ↑ Carswell, Douglas; Hannan, Daniel (2008). The Plan: Twelve Months to Renew Britain. Lulu.com. ISBN 978-0-9559799-0-3. Archived from the original on 13 August 2021. Retrieved 13 January 2021.
  29. ↑ "Scottish leader Alex Salmond quits after 'no' vote in independence referendum". CNN. 19 September 2014. Archived from the original on 20 September 2014. Retrieved 20 September 2014.
  30. 1 2 Bogdanor, Vernon (24 September 2014). "Why English votes for English laws is a kneejerk absurdity". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 23 February 2017. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  31. 1 2 Webber, Esther (19 September 2014). "Scotland votes No: How the UK could now change". BBC News. BBC. Archived from the original on 3 January 2016. Retrieved 23 October 2015.
  32. ↑ Allardyce, Jason (4 May 2014). "Cut urged for Scots MPs if No wins poll". Sunday Times. Archived from the original on 3 January 2016. Retrieved 23 October 2015.

Further reading

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