The Conservative Party spent many years telling those of us who wanted an English parliament that an English parliament was not required because English Votes on English Laws (EVEL) was the answer. Any time we raised the issue of England’s lack of representation or the West Lothian Question we were informed that EVEL was the answer. It was their get out of jail card for anything concerning the English Question. And with their media presence and reach, the Tory party managed to persuade the nation that EVEL was the answer.
In 2005 Ken Clarke was appointed head of the ‘Democracy Task Force’ and was tasked with restoring trust in politics and coming up with a workable proposal for EVEL. The Tory grandees he assembled then took three years to publish a proposal that allowed English MPs a veto over England-only legislation while allowing non-English MPs to continue to vote on that legislation. The much heralded result was the 2008 ‘Democracy Task Force’ paper ‘Answering the West Lothian Question‘. Even after that was published, the deliberations went on with Malcolm Rifkind publicly objecting to the official proposal. It didn’t instill much confidence.
The Campaign for an English Parliament told them it was flawed. Various constitutional experts and politicians from other parties told them it was flawed. Not only did it fail to provide England with a voice (its own democracy, parliament, government and first minster), it didn’t even answer the West Lothian Question. Non-English MPs could still vote on English legislation. Also, due to their unwillingness to reform the Barnett Formula, EVEL would prevent Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish MPs from voting on stages of English legislation that had budgetary implications for the devolved nations. It was creating a democratic injustice rather than solving one.
The Mckay Commission, composed of ‘independent, non-partisan experts’, was set up by the coalition government, and proposed a form of EVEL in March 2013. The report noted that ‘Evidence suggests that people in England feel unhappy with present arrangements, which take too little account of their grievances. A response is necessary.’
By this time the Tories were coming under increasing pressure from various sides to address the English Question. Sir Merrick Cockell, Chairman of England’s Local Government Association, suggested creating a single England Office by merging six Government departments and scrapping the Barnett Formula. Frank Field, called for a debate on the English Question and, in defiance of his party, kept speaking up for England. Nigel Farage agitated from the side lines with his own bizarre solution. While an IPPR press release announcing their ‘England and its two unions‘ paper noted that 62 per cent said that they do not trust the UK government to work in the best long-term interests of England and 81% thought that Scottish MPs should be barred completely from voting on English legislation (not just at certain stages). It’s co-author, Charlie Jeffery, commented:
“One of the most striking features of these findings is the sheer strength of feeling uncovered among the English. Among those with a strong sense of English identity, the feeling that England is getting a raw deal in the post-devolution UK is nigh on universal. There appears to be a reluctance in some quarters to talk about England for fear of how it might play in Scotland in the run-up to 2014. But it is surely mistaken to allow the debate in Scotland to inhibit a discussion about England’s place in a reformed union.”
Coalition with the Lib Dems, along with the Scottish Independence Referendum, made action on EVEL problematic, but finally – in 2014 after the Scottish Independence Referendum had been won, 15 years after William Hague had first proposed EVEL – David Cameron pushed the red button:
“I have long believed that a crucial part missing from this national discussion is England. We have heard the voice of Scotland – and now the millions of voices of England must also be heard. The question of English votes for English laws – the so-called West Lothian question – requires a decisive answer.”
This, he calculated, was the quid pro quo for England. If England was to accept ‘The Vow‘ of more powers for Scotland, England at the very least deserved EVEL.
The Tories began a campaign priming the public for EVEL and whipping up support. Not that it was required. It was full on. Emails from party headquarters, social media posts from backbenchers and senior members of the party. And a petition on the party website. Various petitions were even presented to Parliament as evidence of demand.
EVEL finally became a reality in July 2015, a measure that infuriated Labour and the SNP.
But fast forward a few years to April 2020 and EVEL was suspended for reasons of efficiency related to the working of Parliament during the pandemic. Fifteen years in the making, it had lasted just 5 years from implementation to suspension and had achieved nothing.
The Times then broke a story in June 2021 that Michael Gove in the Cabinet Office had been drawing up plans with the Leader of the House, Jacob Rees-Mogg, to abolish EVEL standing orders entirely. The Times quotes Gove:
“Ultimately, it’s a convention which arose out of a set of circumstances after the 2014 referendum, where you had a coalition government and so on,” Gove said. “We’ve moved on now, so I think it’s right to review where we are on it . . . My view is that the more we can make the House of Commons and Westminster institutions work for every part of the UK and every party in the UK, the better.”
This was an unfortunate and accidental admission that EVEL was a political strategy (to prevent Scottish Labour MPs holding the balance of power? To prevent UKIP mobilising English grievances?) rather than a sincere attempt to answer the West Lothian Question and address the asymmetry which left England without a voice. It was certainly not their intention to let the millions of voices in England be heard.
EVEL was formally abolished on 13th July 2021, with smug satisfaction from Jacob Rees-Mogg. There ended the Conservatives’ attempt to address a fundamental issue of fairness.
Previous Tory leaders, William Hague, David Cameron and Boris Johnson had all supported EVEL. The Tories had spent years telling us it was the answer to the West Lothian Question and that it would address the injustice that England felt about asymmetric devolution. They had rubbished claims that an English parliament was required and used their immense media reach to convince the English public that they had the answer.
They didn’t. And they still have no answer.
But they don’t like to talk about that. After years of complaining about the injustice of the West Lothian Question and Labour’s asymmetric devolution, and getting us to sign petitions, they have now completely shut up about it. They simply don’t mention the injustice any longer. There was not a squeak from them about Scottish and Northern Irish MPs voting on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill for England and Wales. All those Tory MPs who told the English public that EVEL was the answer, all those Tory MPs who voted for it, now have absolutely nothing to say on the matter. We’ve had three years of silence. They have taken Labour Peer Lord Irvine’s advice that the best answer to the West Lothian Question is not to ask it. The conspiracy of silence over the West Lothian Question and the English Question has spread from Labour to the Conservatives. Now neither party talks about England’s disadvantaged place in the Union. Or about England at all, come to think of it. Unless we’re in a football tournament of course
The second and closely related anxiety is the anxiety of silence, an anxiety that explicitly or implicitly involves suspicion of conspiracy and this anxiety can be found in even the most sober commentaries. For example, one judicious and non-ideological assessment of England’s place in the devolved United Kingdom contained a rather revealing line: ‘Until and if it becomes inescapable, England’s role in the UK may well remain bound by the same virtual conspiracy of silence as for most of the twentieth century’. The conspiracy here is intent either on keeping the ‘English question’ out of political debate or confining it exclusively to ‘issues of efficiency of government’ precisely in order to avoid raising the issue of national identity (Sandford 2002: 790). This is an argument of long standing, and some have argued that it was actually the efficient secret of the United Kingdom’s stability.
…
The CEP understands its task to be (like Weight and Scruton) that of confronting not only a Government unsympathetic to claims of English nationality but also an intellectual establishment hostile to popular expressions of Englishness. It has identified a political conspiracy (like Sandford) that keeps the ‘English question’ out of political debate and confines it exclusively to issues of administrative efficiency (for example, regionalism) or
cultural expression (as with Lee, football is the most frequently used example).– Arthur Aughey, Anxiety and injustice: the anatomy of contemporary English nationalism, 2010
At best the debates leading up to EVEL and its short implementation can be seen as an interregnum when the Tories broke Westminster’s conspiracy of silence. It achieved no more than that. England is once again missing from the conversation. But those of us who feel English and want to be represented as such can take heart. We English do not need football to qualify our patriotism, we are a political nation too, and we will force the English Question back into the political debate where it once was to the bedevilment of the hapless Tories.
English Commonwealth 