Of all the column inches devoted to the renewed debate about devolution in England, isn’t it remarkable that there has been almost no discussion about devolution for England?
How England is subdivided and which powers rest with which administrative bodies is, of course, a matter for colleagues south of the border, just as devolution within Scotland is rightly the responsibility of elected representatives at Holyrood. But the constitutional relationships between the nations of the United Kingdom are a matter of profound interest to all of us in Scotland.
I have no objection whatsoever to what Andy Burnham is proposing, and more power to his bucket-hatted Manchesterism. But, so far and quite rightly, this remains an agenda for England alone, betrayed by the rather bizarre geography at its heart. The proposed “Number 10 North” would, rather absurdly, be located somewhere in south-central UK.
Attempts to present this as a UK-wide constitutional vision have felt rushed and poorly thought through. From describing Dundee as somehow “remote” from Holyrood to suggesting the devolution of Scotland’s already publicly owned water service, the understanding of Scotland has, at best, been incomplete. More worryingly, Andy appears to stray into the worst kind of Tory territory by suggesting he could bypass and undermine the Scottish Parliament in pursuit of his ambitions.
That would be a terrible mistake, instantly destroying any prospect of genuine partnership.
If Andy is serious about constitutional reform across the United Kingdom, he should lift his sights beyond England’s internal structures and consider how England itself might sit more comfortably within the constitutional framework of the UK. The real challenge is not simply how power is distributed within England; it is how power is shared across the United Kingdom.
Others have already pointed out the contradiction of advocating greater democracy and devolution for England while continuing to deny Scotland the democratic right to determine its own constitutional future. Any hope that Andy would take a more enlightened approach and respect our democracy seems to be disappearing fast.
But there are other practical reforms that he could look at that could improve relations across the UK. The obvious place to begin is with the repeal of the Internal Market Act.
Few pieces of legislation have done more to poison relations between Westminster and the devolved governments. Imposed without consent, it has become one of the greatest obstacles to genuine intergovernmental cooperation. Rather than treating devolved administrations as constitutional partners, it reserves the final word for Westminster in almost every dispute. Partnership was replaced by hierarchy; consensus by imposition.
The problems exposed by the Internal Market Act reveal a deeper constitutional flaw that has existed since devolution began and has become even more pronounced since Brexit. Westminster continues to perform two fundamentally different—and increasingly conflicting—roles. It serves simultaneously as the Parliament of the United Kingdom and as England’s domestic legislature. Those two responsibilities are growing more unsustainable.
The only serious attempt to address this contradiction was the ill-fated experiment of English Votes for English Laws. EVEL correctly identified the problem but arrived at entirely the wrong solution. By excluding Scottish MPs from voting on legislation certified as England-only, it effectively created two classes of MPs. Members elected to the same Parliament suddenly possessed different constitutional rights, with signs over division lobbies that might as well have read: “Scots Keep Out.”
Having led the opposition to EVEL as our Shadow Leader of the House, I witnessed first-hand some of the most extraordinary parliamentary procedures ever devised before the policy was quietly abandoned.
Yet EVEL inadvertently exposed the real answer.
England needs its own democratic institutions, just as Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have theirs.
The growth of English regional government and directly elected mayors has already demonstrated that England is capable of embracing devolution in ways that reflect its own identities and traditions. Those institutions should continue to develop, acquiring greater powers, stronger fiscal responsibility and enhanced democratic legitimacy.
The fashionable idea is to construct an asymmetric assembly of “nations and regions”—a patchwork of English regional authorities sitting alongside Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. That would fundamentally diminish the constitutional status of the devolved nations. Countries with their own parliaments, legal systems and national democratic traditions would be placed on the same footing as administrative regions of England, some of them little more than recent Whitehall creations. That is not a settlement Scotland should ever accept.
What is required instead is a genuinely devolved England with its own Parliament, responsible for legislation applying solely to England. England would then take its place alongside Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as an equal national legislature.
Once that distinction is made, the next step becomes obvious. The United Kingdom should become a genuine federal state.
A federal UK would comprise four equal national legislatures, each exercising full responsibility over its own domestic affairs. Health, education, transport, housing, justice, taxation, economic development and almost every aspect of internal government would rest with the national parliaments.
A much smaller federal Parliament would concern itself only with genuinely federal responsibilities: defence, foreign affairs, international treaties and those matters that can only sensibly be exercised collectively.
Such an arrangement would finally replace parliamentary supremacy with constitutional partnership. It would create the collaborative United Kingdom that advocates of the Union so often describe but have never quite managed to build. Rather than one Parliament dominating the others, governments would meet as constitutional equals, sharing sovereignty where necessary while governing themselves where it mattered most.
For those of us who support Scottish independence, federalism is not the destination. Independence remains Scotland’s democratic future. But constitutional politics has spent the past twelve years trapped in a weary stalemate. A genuinely federal United Kingdom would not replace independence as our ultimate ambition, but it would represent meaningful constitutional progress on our route to our final destination. It would create a more balanced Union, a more democratic England and a more equal relationship between all four nations. Surely this is exactly what unionists want?
If constitutional reform is ever to move beyond the familiar cycle of refusing another referendum, unionist politicians must begin offering an alternative vision and solutions rather than simply saying
No. A truly federal UK could provide exactly that: a constitutional settlement that allows all four nations to work together as equal partners in a shared enterprise without compromising long held constitutional positions.
More devolution—or devo max—continues to command substantial public support in Scotland. There are signs that a more imaginative constitutional conversation is beginning to emerge among parts of Scottish Labour, while the Liberal Democrats have long advocated federalism. It is a solution to this logjam in which everyone wins.
One thing, however, is certain. We cannot continue as we are. Scotland cannot endure another full parliamentary term with no meaningful constitutional progress.
So come on, Andy. We now know what you’re against. What are you for?