Barnett, West Lothian, etc.

This has been rumbling on for some time now and is the result of the law of unintended consequences and some foolish moves by Labour.

Did they honestly think that in devolving power to the other countries of the UK that the English might not notice? The Barnett formula was supposed to go the way of all flesh with the establishment of the Scottish Parliament but it's vile, maggot ridden body still slouches on arm in arm with the rough beast of the West Lothian question. It is true that constitutional changes require careful consideration but the inequity of the current arrangement requires speedy repair.

It seems that our political leaders, both in the UK and the EU have little love for England with their ridiculous "regional assemblies", (washes mouth out with soap), that would have taken power not from the UK parliament down but from local councils up. This is hardly surprising, most of our executive has been Scottish for some time, (I have no issue with this other than with the current political set up they are in charge of England but with little motivation to look out for it), and being on average rather anti the EU, England can look for no assistance across the Channel.


So what is to be done? Firstly we should have equal representation in the UK Parliament per head of population, (see table below).

Country Average constituency population

England 92,890

Scotland 85,797

Wales 72,577

Northern Ireland 93,626

This shows Scotland and Wales are over represented despite having devolved powers.

The West Lothian question has a simple temporary solution: Stop non English MPs voting on England only matters.

However the whole thing is an imbalanced mess and I can only see it being resolved with either the break up of the Union or an English Parliament. The latter is the solution that I would prefer but if that never appears then we may end up with the second.