An English parliament is often portrayed as a right-wing issue but support comes from across the political spectrum.
“the most effective solution to the political dilemma of Englishness would be a more dramatic change: the creation of an English parliament.” – Caroline Lucas
“Surely, if we create Welsh, Northern Irish and Scottish Parliaments or Assemblies, the least we can do is create an English Parliament, and make the upper House a House of representatives of the four constituency Parliaments.” – Derek Wyatt
“I believe that there should be an English Parliament and that there should a referendum, which should have two questions, so my cards are on the table.” – Simon Hughes
“An English parliament, on the same basis as the Scottish one, will be the minimum that the English people are likely to be satisfied with.” – David Davis MP
“We’re a nation too, you know, not just a collection of regions.” – Linford Christie
“The constitutional treatment of England is shameful. Scottish MPs, still massively over represented, can vote on matters that affect only English people in education,transport , health, planning and industrial development. The case for an English Parliament at Westminster grows stronger all the time. The voters of England need a Parliament with powers at least equal to that of Scotland. It is a political need that cries out for a voice. I believe this is the only way we will in the years ahead hold together the federation of the United Kingdom” – Kenneth Baker
“I would like to see an English Parliament, like the Scottish one, and a small federal senate. And we need a proper constitution.” – Tony Benn
“The flowering of English consciousness will grow alongside the well developed Welsh and Scottish consciousness. It will play an important part in our sense of British national identity. But if we have learned anything from the experience of Scotland over the last two decades, then we must provide this English consciousness with a legitimate political outlet.” – William Hague
“I think we can maintain the union but we should embrace people’s natural desire in our different nations to have more autonomy over their own affairs and give voice to the different cultural identities in the UK, whilst maintaining the benefits that the pooling and sharing of resources across the constituent parts of the UK brings. This is why I believe we need a more federal structure for the nations of the UK with a new English Parliament to sit alongside bodies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. We need a federal Labour Party too which recognises the unique character of each nation.” – Chuka Umanna
“…new institutions must fit the reality of English pluralism – an English Parliament for the English people as they are – not as we feel they should be, or once were.” – Anthony Painter
“If English MPs don’t like that [Scottish MPs participating in English policy matters], the rational answer is a federal constitution with an English parliament as well as a United Kingdom one.” – House of Commons Research Paper 95/131.
“The English can have an English Parliament whenever they want to as far as I’m concerned. Believe me, if it comes before parliament, I’ll happily put up my hand for it.” – Robin Cook
“The only way to treat England in the same way as Scotland is to set up an English parliament.” – Philip Johnston
“The rise of the SNP makes the case for a fully-fledged English parliament stronger than ever.” – Frank Field
“The call for an English parliament seems unexceptional. I support it and want the idea to be put to a referendum.” – Anthony Barnett
“The time has come, however, to treat the English fairly by creating an English Parliament and putting England on a par with Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.” – David Campbell-Bannerman
“The obvious solution is a strong English parliament, alongside Scotland and a strengthened Welsh legislature; all part of a reformed and renewed and healthier union – United Kingdom.” – Canon Kenyon Wright
“Who says there is no appetite for an English parliament? I see and hear interest all around.” – Mary Dejevsky
“I think there should be an English parliament or an English assembly because I believe the devolution of the 1990s was incomplete.’ – Linda Colley
“My own feeling is that you don’t have to be English and you don’t have to be a nationalist to support the case for an English parliament. You just have to be a democrat.” – George Monbiot
“Rather than seeking to wrap itself in the Cross of St George in the hope of looking patriotic, the Labour Party should show us that they really do believe in this country by raising the flag over a parliament for England.” – Billy Bragg
“What the English need is their own parliament; one that matches Scotland’s in power and purpose. At a stroke, this would transform the landscape. The English would have somewhere to turn, and an institution that reflected their concerns.” – Paul Kingsnorth
“We have to contain the sense of grievance which is growing in England and I think the only way to do that is to create a constitutional settlement that gives England equal status.” – Peter Luff
“English votes on English laws” does not resolve this issue. And there can be no return to the unitary state of old. The only sustainable remaining solution is an English parliament and English government within a federal UK, supported by a political culture that respects and cherishes pride in England and shows a more serious commitment to the government of England’s regions.” – Nick Timothy
“EVEL should be scrapped. Turning the Westminster Parliament into an English Parliament for certain votes sends an awful message, and makes it all too easy for the Nats. If there is a need for an English Parliament, then it would be better to set one up than to co-opt Westminster.” – James Forsyth
“Increasing the powers of English local government bodies is similarly hopelessly inadequate. We English should refuse to accept anything short of our own parliament, with internal self-government at least equal to what is now promised to Scotland; and that inevitably requires, in turn, the extensive safeguards against English domination that only a full federal system can provide.” – Brian Barder
“Mr Blair acknowledged that if people in England were asked if they wanted a Parliament like Scotland’s they would overwhelmingly agree.” – Yorkshire Post
“An English Parliament could provide a positive outlet for an English national consciousness that currently often defines itself – politically speaking – in negative terms.” – Andrew Blick
“We should create an English parliament with real democratic power inside a federal United Kingdom. For too long, the English have – in contrast to the Scots, Welsh and Irish – been denied their national identity and political representation. This lack of empowerment has deepened a sense of alienation and resentment among the English.” – Paul Embery
“England, in a spiteful act of ignoring its nationhood, was neither given a parliament nor a government of its own, but remains governed by the British state. The only real alternative offered to England is to be broken up into nine EU-defined artificial regional bits, and therefore effectively binned as a nation.” – Colin Copus
“Campaigning for an English parliament is an issue that goes across parties, and includes people from the left of centre like myself.” – Andy Newman
“Gordon Brown has seized every available opportunity to deflect demands for devolution to an English Parliament at Westminster by continually trying to convince the English that their political identity must be British alone, and they should not demand the equivalent political and citizenship rights as their compatriots within the British Union.” – Simon Lee
“The great question facing the English – namely, when can we have a Parliament of our own, like the Scots, the Welsh and the Northern Irish? – will press continually for an answer.” – Roger Scruton
“England has attained a special place in Europe: as the largest nation without its own political institutions.” – Robert Tombs
“Following devolution we now have the bizarre and unbalanced situation whereby 50 million English are governed by a parliament in which Scottish and Welsh MPs can vote on issues that concern only England, even though they cannot vote on the same issues in their own constituencies. For how much longer will the English put up with being treated as second-class citizens by Labour? Whenever we discussed this on my radio programme the demand from listeners was for the establishment of an English parliament.” – Jimmy Young
“The problem is not English identity but a failure to provide the democratic, institutional and political voice the English deserve…“English votes on English laws” does not resolve this issue. And there can be no return to the unitary state of old. The only sustainable remaining solution is an English parliament and English government within a federal UK, supported by a political culture that respects and cherishes pride in England and shows a more serious commitment to the government of England’s regions.” – Nick Timothy
“No one had said, “Do you want an English Parliament?” No one had said, “Do you want a special forum in which Englishness can be a big part of the debate and could be the sole consideration?” That didn’t happen…I felt not just that I was being denied an identity. I felt that I was being denied proper participation in what was now a reconstituted democracy on these islands.” – Simon Heffer
“Whatever happens in the longer term, for now there should be an English parliament. Far too much time in the British parliament is spent on English affairs. The British Parliament should deal with pan-British issues; national parliaments in the four nations should deal with devolved business.” – Jenny Turner
“Not until there is a separate English parliament, giving England at last the distinctive political identity it has shunned for 300 years, will the delusions that led the country to Brexit finally be dissipated by contact with reality.” – Nicholas Boyle
“Sooner or later England will need its own assembly, either inside or outside the ambit of the Westminster Parliament.” – Simon Jenkins
“You can’t have Scotland with a self-governing parliament and England not. England has a great history.” – Maurice Glasman
“England also lacks its own Parliament, government and First Minister, unlike Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and therefore England is at a great disadvantage when faced with the rest of the UK when it comes to a distinct English voice in the competition for resources from the UK government. It is a disadvantage that no type of local government or sub-regional entity can overcome no matter how local government may be reorganised.” – 2018 Democratic Audit
“Whatever they brought the English in the past, the institutions of ‘Britishness’ are now largely a conspiracy against England and the English. A way to keep them disenfranchised and identity-less” – Mark Simpson
“England is also entitled to its own cultural and political identity.” – Tony Benn and Andrew Hood
“I would locate this English parliament in Manchester, Sheffield or Leeds. It would force a London-centred political and media class to think more about the North and the regions.” – Tim Montgomerie
“There is an England which is pluralist, tolerant, decent, diverse, creative and forward-thinking. Why can’t that democratic, progressive England be reborn? Why not Home Rule for the English?” – Alan Leaman
“Regional assemblies would not solve the English Question. You cannot turn a nation into a collection of regions until you have first allowed it to become a nation again.” – Richard Weight
“A solution would have to include a codified constitution, with an English Parliament alongside the existing legislatures in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and an elected Senate in place of the swollen and quintessentially anti-democratic House of Lords.” – David Marquand
“A distinct, progressive and patriotic Englishness cannot mature while there are no democratic forums or systems of democratic government to provide the focus and crucible of debate. An English parliament – whether directly elected, part of Westminster or some form of super EVEL – is now an essential Labour movement demand.” – John Denham
“Many English nationalists want a separate English Parliament to mirror the Scottish one. I see the English Parliament as being at Westminster. Westminster is the sacred plot of English democracy, predating the Union Parliament. Westminster Hall is the scene of many important dramas in English as well as in Union history. The English Parliament should remain or be refashioned at Westminster. We do not need expensive new buildings with no traditions and history in the walls.” – John Redwood
“I think we should have an English parliament and I think we should have an English parliament within the United Kingdom.” – Albert Owen
“Federation solves the West Lothian question and is fair to the English, but would mean the end to parliamentary sovereignty and would politicise the judiciary. What is needed is a solution which retains the basic idea of devolving legislative powers to English and Welsh assemblies, but which works with the grain of the existing constitution by retaining parliamentary sovereignty. The answer is to use the Scottish devolution as the template for devolution to England and Wales; Britain’s Parliament should legislate to create full-scale English and Welsh parliaments.” – Jocelyn Ormond
“A parliament for England, with a proportional system and modern procedures, could fix the anomaly whereby England is the largest nation in Europe without its own parliament and inject some accountability into the way England is governed. These conversations have already started, with the Constitution Reform Group recently publishing a Union Bill that would establish a directly elected English Parliament.” – Liz Saville Roberts
“if you have all three of those countries having what’s called ‘devo max’ then there is an unanswerable case for an English Parliament, and for the whole structure of the United Kingdom to be changed into a federal one, with each of the four countries having their own parliaments with very considerable devolution of powers.” – Roger Godsiff
“Ultimately a mutual respect between equal parts of an essentially federal United Kingdom might require an English parliament, an English first minister, with ministers accountable to English MPs. This would happen ideally in the context of significant powers being devolved to local and regional government.” – David Aaronovitch
“What would be so outlandish about having an English parliament with the same powers as those that are enjoyed in Edinburgh?” – Roy Hattersley
English Commonwealth 