Tories offer DUP £1bn bribe for Northern Ireland

Theresa May has caved in to demands from the DUP for yet more English money to subsidise their spending in return for supporting the Tories at Westminster.

Labour politicians up in arms about the £1bn bribe have short memories since it was a Labour government that introduced the Barnett Formula which guarantees extra spending per head of population in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland compared to England and successive Labour governments have used the Barnett Formula to buy Scottish and Welsh votes.

The Barnett Formula currently gives a subsidy of £1,623 per head to Scotland, £1,180 per head to Wales and £2,347 per head to Northern Ireland. This comes to £4.25bn for Northern Ireland with the Tories now promising to add another £1bn on top to secure the DUP's 10 votes.

A Labour government introduced the Barnett Formula in 1979 which was conceived by Labour MP Joel Barnett (who now campaigns against the use of his own formula). Successive Labour governments have abused the Barnett Formula to buy votes in their former Scottish and Welsh strongholds. The Labour government led by Tony Blair introduced devolution for Scotland and Wales, deliberately leaving out England and successive Labour (and Tory) governments have blocked access to the minutes of the Cabinet meetings where that decision was made. Labour courted the DUP in both 2010 and 2015 with the offer of more money for Northern Ireland. Whilst still a Labour MP, Jack Straw said "the English as a race are not worth saving". Former (Scottish) Labour Lord Chancellor for England, Charlie Falconer, said that there would never be an English Parliament. Labour have consistently fought any attempts to give financial or political equality to England.

The Labour Party never has and never will be the party that represents English interests. The same goes for the British nationalist Conservative Party. UKIP is the only mainstream party that is calling for an English Parliament, the abolition of the Barnett Formula and an end to the institutional discrimination against England. We are the only party that represents English interests and the hypocrites in the Labour Party complaining that the Tories are copying their ideas should hang their heads in shame for their past and present actions.

Prescription charges in England go up to £8.40, still free in Scotland, Wales and NI

Regular as clockwork the British government puts up prescription charges in England every year on 1st April.

The yearly increase in the sickness tax falls on April Fools Day and we must be fools to continue to put up with it. The Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish governments have all abolished prescription charges over the past few years but the British government has no desire to do the same in England.

Prescription charges are just one of many examples of the British government ignoring English public opinion and a symptom of the democratic deficit arising from the refusal to devolve power to an English Parliament. It's time the British government did the honourable thing and put it right.

Let's get behind an English Parliament on St George's Day

Back in September last year, after the result of the Scottish independence referendum had been announced, I wrote about an English Parliament. I've written about an English Parliament - or more specifically, about English devolution - a lot over the years.

I'm no academic but it's made me somewhat of an expert on the subject. I was a National Council member of the Campaign for an English Parliament for quite a long time and I advised Paul Nuttall on his Union for the Future policy proposal. When I had more time on my hands I even won awards for English political blogging and have been in most newspapers and on many national and local radio stations talking about English devolution.

I find the level of unintentional ignorance about devolution and an English Parliament incredibly frustrating. Hearing the same baseless arguments and incorrect claims about breaking up the union, increasing costs and more politicians does nothing for my blood pressure. So instead of addressing the nonsense I'm reading on social media in support of the unworkable, unacceptable constitutional fudge that is English Votes on English Laws in a piecemeal fashion, I've reposted below what I wrote last year ...

[ Click here to expand ]

Portsmouth shipyard closure may well prove to be the fatal blow for the union

Yesterday's political motivated closure of HM shipyard at Portsmouth was a desperate attempt by the British government to scupper pro-independence sentiment in Scotland but may well prove to be the fatal blow for the union.

The comments from the sacked workers, from the local MP and from the local council have all been pretty consistent: this is English jobs for Scottish people. The British government has sacrificed Portsmouth to protect jobs in Scotland because closing the  Clyde shipyards in Glasgow would hand Alex Salmond a big propaganda coup in the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum.

The Scottish independence people don't have a problem with the union per se, they have a problem with England. Most of them would stay in the UK if England was no longer part of it and it's because of this that the English will forever be the British sacrificial lamb. The price of Scottish unionism is denigration and discrimination against the English and it's a price the British are happy to pay.

UKIP's had a record Scottish by-election result in Aberdeen Donside in June - Otto Inglis came fifth with 4.83% of the vote, losing his deposit. The party put a lot of money into the campaign and the membership in Scotland worked like troopers but we will never see a breakthrough in Scotland because UKIP doesn't represent the views of the majority in Scotland who are left wing, pro-independence europhiles. It doesn't matter that declaring independence from the UK and then joining the EU is like a woman leaving one abusive partner to move in with another, that's what they want and that's what wins votes.

UKIP has nothing to gain from Scotland and everything to lose by not standing up strongly enough for the interests of the English people who do share UKIP's vision of the future - the UK (or rather, England and whoever tags along) out of the EU and back in control of our own destiny. The party needs to be campaigning strongly for a radically reformed British union that provides enough benefit to each member state of the UK or for Scotland to declare independence and leave England, Wales and Northern Ireland to get on with things. There will be no justice or fairness for the English whilst the union remains in its current form.

The only viable long term future for the British union is to reorganise it as a confederation with all four member states becoming sovereign nations and joining a British union by consent rather than compulsion. There's a great definition on the CIA factbook of a confederation:

Confederacy (Confederation) - a union by compact or treaty between states, provinces, or territories, that creates a central government with limited powers; the constituent entities retain supreme authority over all matters except those delegated to the central government.

In effect, the member states of the confederation are independent, sovereign nations voluntarily pooling sovereignty on limited matters whilst retaining the right to act in their own interests in all matters. It turns devolution and federation on its head - instead of the central (ie. federal of quasi-federal in the case of the UK) government having sovereignty and the right to legislate on all matters, the member states of the union have this status and the central government is limited in its powers. It's not dissimilar to how the EU, UN, NATO and other intergovernmental organisations are constituted. I wrote the case for a British confederation back in 2011 and it's still absolutely valid today - more so after what happened in Portsmouth yesterday.

The alternative is that the UK breaks up and as more discrimination is meted out at the English it is increasingly likely that it is the English who will bring down the union, not the Scots. Opinion polls already show that more people in England want Scotland to declare independence than people in Scotland do and the last major survey into devolution and independence in the UK showed that as many people in England want English independence as people in Scotland want Scottish independence. This is a direct result of the discriminatory policy of allowing Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to run their own domestic affairs whilst refusing to allow England the same right and the British government's willingness to discriminate against England to benefit the Scots (and to a lesser extent the Welsh and Northern Irish).

UKIP's equivocation on reform of the British union is costing the party votes. The last policy agreed by the NEC - still to be made public a year after being agreed - would have the unintended consequence of resulting in a confederation of the type described above to provide democratically accountable government. This is a good thing but the policy is gathering dust on the "to be announced" shelf which means it will probably be revised yet again - another policy agreed in principal that never sees the light of day.

As a party we support an English Parliament - the only serious party to do so - and Nigel Farage publicly confirms UKIP's commitment to equality for England on a regular basis but there's no meat on the bone. We need a full, coherent policy on how we're going to reform the British union put into the public domain and a commitment for a high level campaign to accompany it.

The union in its current form seriously disadvantages England and any mainstream party that promises comprehensive reform of the union so that everyone benefits and not just the relative few will undoubtedly be rewarded at the ballot box.

IPPR: UKIP is the party of the English

Left wing think tank, IPPR, has produced a follow-up to the one released in January 2012 which documented the rise in English identity and warned that ignoring the disadvantages that England faces as a result of asymmetric devolution would threaten the union.

This time, though, they have included questions on the EU and the correlation between euroscepticism and the English identity and made a surprising (for them) discovery: the party that most people believe will stand up for England's interests is UKIP.

The latest report finds that the rise in English identity at the expense of British has held up against the onslaught of state-sponsored British nationalism during the Olympics and the royal wedding.  English remains the dominant national identity in England.

The correlation between euroscepticism and national identity is very interesting - over half of people who identify as English more than British are in favour of leaving the EU but only a third of those who identify as more British than English are similarly minded.

There is also a direct link between euroscepticism and dissatisfaction with England's treatment in the British union post-devolution.  A massive 91% of people who think we should leave the EU think that MPs elected in Scotland shouldn't be allowed to vote on English matters and 71% think that the British government can't be trusted to look after England's interests.  21% of English people think that UKIP is the party that can be most trusted to stand up for England's interests - the first time none of the above hasn't topped the poll.

Only 1 in 5 English people support the current form of government and 78% of English people (eurosceptic or not) think that Scotland should pay for services out of their own taxes.

More UKIP supporters identify themselves as English more than British than any other party - 55% of those polled.  They are also the most dissatisfied with the status quo with 49% supporting English independence.  Surprisingly, only 90% of UKIP supporters want to leave the EU.

Given the choice of local government, Westminster and the EU, 31% of English people think the EU has the most influence over the way England is run.  This is by far the highest percentage anywhere in the EU - Brittany, Upper Austria and Galicia are joint second with only 9%.  England , as opposed to the UK, is without doubt the most eurosceptic country in the EU.

It's time for UKIP to accept that the majority - in fact, almost all - of the party's support is in England.  Almost every elected representative the party has was elected in England.  The Scots aren't eurosceptic -only a third of all Scots are in favour of leaving the EU and some of those are pro-independence so would never vote UKIP.  We are the party most trusted by the English to represent English interests.

You don't have to be a genius to realise that UKIP's future is in England and leading the call for fairness and equality for the English.  The first step should be to finally draw a line under the ridiculous anti-devolution policy that has been losing us votes for years and start promoting an English Parliament.

New UKIP policy on devolution: an unintended confederation

During the UKIP conference in Birmingham I was slipped a piece of paper with details of UKIP's new devolution policy and some notes confirming that the NEC had approved it and it had the blessing of UKIP Wales who have been a pain in the ass over devolution for some time, considering it the work of Satan (or worse, the French).

When I first joined UKIP there was no policy on devolution other than a "Britishness" policy that said that much like the Tories in the late 90s, UKIP opposes devolution and wants a return to a unitary state but would tolerate Grand Committees of British MPs.  Over the years I, along with others, have managed to talk some sense into the leadership (and membership) which culminated in a policy proposal written by Deputy Leader, Paul Nuttall, for an English Parliament and converting the House of Lords into a federal British Parliament.

Paul's policy was well received in England but less so in Wales where a tiny group of Big Britishers vocally argue against devolution based on an irrational and inaccurate belief that devolution is a plot by the EU to destroy the UK.  It was Paul's policy that resulted in so many members of the English Democrats (the good ones, not the nutters and racists) abandoning that sinking ship and joining UKIP.

A new policy proposal was written and was given the seal of approval by UKIP Wales who think it's a rehash of the half-backed Grand Committee idea where British MPs elected in England, Scotland, Wales and NI would come together for a few days a month and make British laws for their own countries under a gentleman's agreement that they won't interfere in each others' affairs.  The policy is somewhat further reaching than that and I suspect that nobody who's seen it so far truly understands the (positive) unintended consequences.

The new policy turns the Grand Committee idea on its head and instead of creating English, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish Grand Committees to make British laws for their respective countries, the national governments of the member states of the UK would be directly elected and the English, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish MPs would appoint representatives to the British government.  The British government would be "indirectly elected" (ie. appointed) like the hated regional assemblies were.  Clearly this creates something of a democratic deficit which is where the unintended consequences come into play.

It's difficult to see how you could give an indirectly elected British government parliamentary sovereignty rather than a directly elected national government.  The only option is to make the national governments sovereign which would create a confederation.  A confederation is a union of sovereign states and by virtue of that sovereignty, they would have the legal and constitutional power to secede from the union in their own right rather than relying on the Montevideo Convention (effectively restated by the EEC's Badinter Arbitration Committee so it doesn't matter that the UK didn't sign up to it) which is the usual way a state gets its independence.

The alternative is that you have an appointed and therefore less accountable body with the ability to over-rule or even abolish the national governments that appointed them.  If you wouldn't give, for example, the Parliamentary Standards Committee the lawful right to unilaterally sack MPs, appoint its own government and prevent elections then you shouldn't entertain the idea of giving an appointed federal government parliamentary sovereignty.

Now, I'm more than happy with the idea of a confederation and it's something I've advocated for some time as the form of government that will prolong the union the longest as it is a consensual union rather than a prescriptive one which should be palatable to both unionists and separatists alike.  On paper it makes the union weaker although in practical terms it makes it stronger because it puts it on a footing that should be acceptable to separatists.

I was asked for an opinion on how to deal with the gap in accountability that would arise from abolishing the House of Lords when Paul Nuttall was writing his policy proposal.  The answer I came up with was a constitutional court along the lines of the German Bundesverfassungsgericht which would have the authority to choose what legislation it wants to rule on and its ruling would be binding.  The same gap in accountability would also be present under a confederation and I maintain that a constitutional court is still the answer.

This policy is a bold move - literally reinventing the union in a way that no political party has ever proposed.  Even the English Democrats who claim to be the English version of the SNP (they're not but everyone needs an aspiration, no matter how fanciful) haven't gone as far as this.  A confederation is the best of both worlds for both unionists and separatists.  The member states of a British Confederation would be sovereign nations able to leave the confederation at any time but they would still be in a British union, albeit voluntarily rather than because the law says they have to be.  I, for one, am looking forward to UKIP announcing this policy formally and campaigning for this radical new form of government that finally brings equality and fairness to all the member states of the UK.

How you can help to get cabinet devolution minutes released

Cross-posted from Wonko's World

The SNP have asked the British government for the minutes of the 1997 cabinet meeting on devolution in which it was decided that the Scots and Welsh would be allowed self government whilst England would not.

This important document has been requested a number of times under the Freedom of Information Act and blocked every time.  The Information Commissioner has ruled that release of the minutes is in the public interest and ordered their release but they were blocked by the Attorney General, Dominic Grieve.

What are these traitors so desperate to hide?

Vetoing FOI requests requires the unanimous agreement of the cabinet.  When Jack Straw and Dominic Grieve vetoed their release in 2009 and 2012, these people conspired to keep the minutes secret:

Jack Straw	Dominic Grieve
The Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP	The Rt Hon. David Cameron MP
The Rt Hon Harriet Harman QC MP	The Rt Hon. Nick Clegg MP
The Rt Hon The Lord Mandelson PC	The Rt Hon. William Hague MP
The Rt Hon Alistair Darling MP	The Rt Hon. George Osborne MP
The Rt Hon David Miliband MP	The Rt Hon. Kenneth Clarke QC MP
The Rt Hon Jack Straw MP	The Rt Hon. Theresa May MP
The Rt Hon Alan Johnson MP	The Rt Hon. Dr Liam Fox MP
The Rt Hon Hilary Benn MP	The Rt Hon. Philip Hammond MP
The Rt Hon Douglas Alexander MP	The Rt Hon. Dr Vince Cable MP
The Rt Hon John Denham MP	The Rt Hon. Iain Duncan Smith MP
The Rt Hon Ed Balls MP	The Rt Hon. Chris Huhne MP
The Rt Hon Ed Miliband MP	The Rt Hon. Edward Davey MP
The Rt Hon Andy Burnham MP	The Rt Hon. Andrew Lansley CBE MP
The Rt Hon Shaun Woodward MP	The Rt Hon. Michael Gove MP
The Rt Hon The Baroness Royall of Blaisdon PC	The Rt Hon. Eric Pickles MP
The Rt Hon Tessa Jowell MP	The Rt Hon. Philip Hammond MP
The Rt Hon Jim Murphy MP	The Rt Hon. Justine Greening MP
The Rt Hon Yvette Cooper MP	The Rt Hon. Caroline Spelman MP
The Rt Hon Liam Byrne MP	The Rt Hon. Andrew Mitchell MP
The Rt Hon Peter Hain MP	The Rt Hon. Owen Paterson MP
The Rt Hon Bob Ainsworth MP	The Rt Hon. Danny Alexander MP
The Rt Hon The Lord Adonis MP	The Rt Hon. Michael Moore MP
The Rt Hon Ben Bradshaw MP	The Rt Hon. Cheryl Gillan MP
The Rt Hon Nick Brown MP	The Rt Hon. Jeremy Hunt MP
The Rt Hon The Lord Malloch-Brown KCMG PC	The Rt Hon. David Laws MP
The Rt Hon John Healey MP	The Rt Hon. Danny Alexander MP
The Rt Hon Pat McFadden MP	The Rt Hon. The Lord Strathclyde PC
The Rt Hon The Lord Drayson PC	The Rt Hon. The Baroness Warsi PC
The Rt Hon Jim Knight MP	The Rt Hon. Francis Maude MP
The Rt Hon The Baroness Scotland of Asthal PC QC	The Rt Hon. Oliver Letwin MP
The Rt Hon Dawn Primarolo MP	The Rt Hon. David Willetts MP
The Rt Hon Rosie Winterton MP	The Rt Hon. Sir George Young Bt MP
The Rt Hon Sadiq Khan MP	The Rt Hon. Patrick McLoughlin MP
	The Rt Hon. Dominic Grieve QC MP

The minutes are really of more interest to the English than the Scots as they got what they wanted and we got shafted so we shouldn't be leaving it to the Scots to get these minutes into the public domain.  If every English person interested in seeing what decisions were made at the cabinet meeting that have resulted in over 15 years of institutional discrimination against the English made a Freedom of Information request for the minute, it would be extremely damaging to the British government if they tried to block their release to hundreds or thousands of people.

If you want to help force the release of these minutes, you need to send an FOI request for them to foi.team@cabinet-office.gsi.gov.uk.  My request is as follows:

Under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, I am requesting a copy of the minutes of the 1997 Cabinet meetings on devolution. I am also requesting a copy of the Terms of Reference for the cabinet committee headed by Lord Irvine that the minutes relate to and any legal or departmental advice provided to the cabinet in relation to these meetings.

Update:
Kev has started an e-Petition on the British government's website.

See also:

• The Illusive Man
• English Patriot
• English Standard
• The Blog of Kev
• England Exists

Ed Miliband says the “E” word

Ed Miliband has broken with decades of tradition and spoken positively about English identity and even mentioning an English Parliament.  Ok, he dismissed it out of hand because he says there isn't support for one but he's the first LibLabCon leader to follow UKIP's lead and take the subject seriously.

Labour has been struggling in England in recent years, despite a revival thanks to the ineptitude of the ConDems and has been navel gazing for some time trying to figure why the country they milked for over a decade to buy votes in Scotland and Wales might not be so keen on voting for them.  It has recently occurred to them that describing English people as "a race not worth saving" and suggesting that people describing themselves as English is worrying and is about race, not culture unlike Britishness might be a contributing factor to their unpopularity.

While Ed Miliband is now apparently comfortable with us describing ourselves as English (as long as we say we're British as well) he isn't happy with the idea of an English Parliament.  He says that an English Parliament means more politicians and that there isn't support for an English Parliament so instead we should make do with more powers for local authorities.

Where to start?  The "more politicians" myth is as good a place as any.  There are 650 British MPs, 117 of which are elected in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland where they have less than half the workload of an MP elected in England because their devolved representatives have more responsibility in their constituencies than they do.  If an English Parliament takes away most of the British Parliament's work, why on earth would we keep all 650 British MPs?  The number of British MPs could easily be halved and it's a pretty damning indictment of the British political class that the thought of reducing their number doesn't even cross their minds.

As for there being no support for an English Parliament - what he means is there is no support for an English Parliament in his own party.  An Ipsos Mori/British Futures poll in January found that 52% want an English Parliament.  An ICM/Power 2010 poll last year found that 68% want an English Parliament.  A YouGov/Jury Team poll in 2009 found that 58% want an English Parliament.  A Populus/The Times poll in 2009 found that 41% want an English Parliament.  An ICM/Telegraph poll in 2007 found that 45% want an English Parliament or to ban MPs not elected in England from voting on English matters.  An ICM/CEP poll in 2007 found that 67% want an English Parliament.  A YouGov/Sunday Times poll in 2007 found that 72% want an English Parliament.  There are more but that's enough to make the point - all of them show a majority in favour of an English Parliament.

His suggestion that giving local authorities in England more power would be equivalent to the Scottish Parliament or Welsh Assembly is frankly insulting.  A town council could never compete with a national government and it certainly couldn't represent the local population and businesses on the internationals stage.  It's a ridiculous suggestion and a half baked idea motivated by political greed, not a desire to do what's right by the English.

Cross-posted from: Wonko's World

Paul Nuttall MEP: Save the Union

Paul Nuttall on Channel 4 tomorrow

Paul Nuttall MEP is on The Political Spot on Channel 4 tomorrow at 6:55pm talking about the Union for the Future policy.

There has been a great deal of interest in the policy which calls for a renewal of the union on a federal basis with effective and equal devolved government for all four member states of the UK.  That interest has resulted in a number of new members and defections from other parties, mostly from the English Democrats.

I'm told that the policy has a couple of gaps that need addressing before it is published in full and that it will definitely be for devolved government with a devolved executive (ie. an English Parliament) and not a Grand Committee of British MPs elected in England as claimed by one of the English Democrats' main financiers.

IPPR confirms support for English Parliament

The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) have released a report on the English Question with some very interesting results which show UKIP, once again, ahead of the curve on public opinion.

The report concludes that there is unhappiness with the status quo viz the way the UK is governed and the way government has changed in light of devolution has resulted in an increasingly political representation of Englishness.

Now, before I delve into the contents of this report I will recap on where UKIP stands on the subject of Englishness, Britishness, the union, devolution, the West Lothian Question and the English Question.

UKIP has traditionally been a British nationalist party.  There's a clue in the name: "United Kingdom Independence Party".  However, there is a UKIP Scotland, UKIP Wales and UKIP NI so like the other parties, there is an acknowledgement that the UK isn't a nation in the traditional sense and that a federal structure of sorts is required to properly represent the electorate or at least to fit into the way that politics works practically.

For a long time, UKIP policy has been to oppose devolution and promote the idea of Grand Committees of British MPs legislating for the nations they were elected in.  In itself this demonstrates the somewhat incoherent and inconsistent British nationalism that has driven policy thus far - the belief that devolved national governments undermine the concept of Britishness and so should be replaced with British Grand Committees representing exactly the same geographic area.

There is the EU element of course (well, it wouldn't be UKIP if there wasn't an EU conspiracy theory!) - there is still a prevalent belief that devolution is the work of the EU who want to break up the UK to more easily assimilate us.  There is no doubt that the EU wants the UK to be broken up and they have worked hard to ensure regional administration puts down deep roots.  However, the fact that Scotland, Wales and NI are both nations and euroregions has muddied the water understandably giving credibility to the theory that the EU was behind their devolution settlements.  If the EU were involved in the devolution settlement for Scotland, Wales and NI it was to give consent, not as architects.

So UKIP has, for many years oppose devolution based on the belief that it will undermine Britishness to the extent that the union will fall apart.  Until, that is, Paul Nuttall's recent policy paper that outlined a new policy of supporting devolved government for all four member states of the UK.  Which brings us more or less up to where we are now.

The IPPR report is the first major investigation into English (as English, not a subset of British) politics, national identity and English opinions on devolution and governance.  So what did they find?

Firstly, the English have changed their minds on the impact of Scottish and Welsh devolution on how the UK is governed from ambivalence to believing it has made it worse.  IPPR attribute this change of attitude to the perception of disadvantage for England in a post-devolution UK.  The opinion of around half of all English people polled was that Scotland benefits most from the union financially with the other half being unsure, thinking that both England and Scotland benefit equally and a very small minority thinking that England benefit most.

Secondly, the proportion of people in England who think that Scotland should be independent from the UK has risen to 22%, equal to those who think it should be governed by a devolved parliament with more tax-raising powers and who think it should be governed directly by the British government.  19% think that it should stay as it is and 15% don't know.  The number of people in England who think Scotland should have its own government with tax-raising powers - what is planned for Scotland - has nosedived from a high in 2001 of 53% with independence and don't know accounting for most of the difference.

The number of people in England supporting a ban on Scottish MPs voting on English laws now that Scotland has its own government has increased remarkably since 2007.  The number disagreeing remains very low.  The report is reporting these figures as support for English Votes on English Laws which it isn't - the question specifically asks "Now that Scotland has its own parliament, Scottish MPs should not be allowed to vote in the House of Commons on laws that only affect England".  Supporters of an English Parliament and elected regional assemblies would also express the opinion that MPs elected in Scotland should be banned from voting on English laws.

English people are quite unequivocal in their opinion of whether the British government looks after the interests of all parts of England equally - between roughly two thirds and three quarters of English people think that they don't.  Even in London, which most English people think gets too much attention from the British government, 58% of people thought that the British government didn't treat all parts of England equally.

An interesting statistic is the number of people who trust the British government to work in the long term interests of England.  42% have "not very much" trust in the British government to work in England's interests, 17% "not at all".

On the preferred form of government for England, just over a third think that "English MPs" in the British government should govern England.  24% support the status quo, 20% support an English Parliament, 9% support regional government and 14% don't know.  While this does appear to show support for an English Parliament quite low, the option for "English MPs" is misleading for most people.  They aren't "English MPs", they're British MPs elected in England - an important distinction because "English MPs" implies an English mandate.  More on this in a moment.

When excluding an English Parliament, an overwhelming number of English people believe the British government has and should have the most influence over the way England is run.  27% of English people believe the EU has the most influence over how England is run yet only 1% think that is right.

The report compares the number of people in England who think the EU has the most influence against other "regions" of the EU as a measure of euroscepticism which shows that England is by far the most eurosceptic - far more eurosceptic than Scotland where only 8% think the EU has most influence over their country.  However, this isn't really a measure of euroscepticism, it's a measure of how many people think the EU has most influence over their "region".  It is natural that such a large number of people in England would think that the EU has most influence for two reasons: English people are generally more eurosceptic than most and because every other "region" in the list has its own devolved government which makes most of the decisions that affect their day to day lives (notwithstanding the fact that most of those decisions are covered by EU regulations, a fact that is sadly lost on most people).

Going back to the preferred method of government, there is an inconsistency in public opinion depending on the question asked.  Asking for an outright choice of a form of government produces a markedly different outcome to asking who should have most influence over the way England is run when the answer is an English Parliament.  This shows how important the question asked is - people are turned off by politics and not many people really understand the often subtle differences between different forms of government.

When forced to choose a national identity between England and British, English is now the majority choice and the trend over the last couple of years is for a very rapid increase in the English identity.  Last year's royal wedding saw the country draped in British flags and the British Olympics are almost permanently in the news.  The British government and the BBC in particular have used both these events to try and promote their Britishness agenda yet English national identity has gone through the roof.

More people in England identify with England rather than Britain than the other way round, 17% of people consider themselves English but not British but only 7% consider themselves British and not English.  The number of people who consider themselves English to some extent is overwhelming.

English national identity is the third strongest "regional" identity in the EU.  Scotland tops the table, unsurprisingly, followed by Catalonia (no surprise there) and fourth place goes to Wales.

Despite the persistent campaign of denigrating the English identity by the British government, the BBC, the left wing press and others, there is an overwhelming sense of pride in being English.  A similar proportion of English people feel proud of being British as being English but that pride is less equivocal with more people being "very proud" to be English compared to "fairly proud" to be British.  48% are very proud to be English and 31% are fairly proud.  38% are very proud to be British whilst 39% are fairly proud.  More people are proud to be English than British.

Similar to the national identity question above, the degree of attachment to England is higher than to the UK.  English people are less equivocal about attachment to England than they were in the national identity question with a very similar proportion of people "very attached" and "fairly attached" but combined they show that 85% of English people feel an attachment to England against 76% for the UK.

An overwhelming number of people think St George's Day should be a public holiday.  74% of people agree strongly or tend to disagree, only 12% disagree - 1% less than "don't know".  A 2009 Freedom of Information request found that the British government has spent just £230 in five years on promoting St George's Day, including the £114 cost of a flag to fly once a year over the Department for Culture, Media and Sport's offices - a British government department with an English-only remit.  More money is spent by the British government promoting St Patrick's Day than St George's Day.

The report helpfully lists the responses of non-white English people to their national identity.  The number of non-white people describing themselves as "English not British" has gone from 1% in 2007 to 9%.  The number describing themselves as more English than British has gone from 3% in 2007 to 13%.  The number describing themselves as equally English and British has gone up from 18% in 2007 to 23%.  The number identifying themselves as more British than English or only British has declined, as has the number identifying themselves as something other than English or British.  More on this shortly.

When asked which party best stands up for English interests, the majority said none.  Bizarrely, the Labour Party which introduced devolution for Scotland, Wales and NI but refused to do so for England and installed a Scottish MP as Prime Minister who presided over a number of controversial English-only laws that no English person could judge him on at the ballot box, came top with 21%.  The Conservatives, whose leader proudly boasts of the Scottish blood coursing through his veins, who has gone to Scotland a number of times to slag off the English and who has said more than once that he doesn't want to be Prime Minister of England, came second with 20%.  UKIP came third with 9% of people thinking that we would best represent England interests.  More people thought that British National Party would represent England's interests better than the English Democrats - a damning indictment of that party's failed leadership that they come bottom of a poll of political parties that would best serve English interests when that was the sole reason for the party being set up in the first place.

It is interesting to note the year the decline started.  2007 is the year the Scottish MP, Gordon Brown, was installed as the heir of Blair and the agressive promotion of Britishness started in earnest.  The increase in sense of Englishness might be a reaction to the enforced Britishness agenda, it might be a reaction to a Prime Minister elected in Scotland who is unaccountable to the voters whose lives he most influenced, it might be a reaction to the increasing rights and privileges of the Scots and Welsh or it might just be a natural phenomenen.  My money is on all of them combined and any number of other factors but it's not important, the shift in the national psyche has already happened and what needs to happen now is for the political establishment to catch up with the views of those they are supposed to represent.

It is interesting that there is a large increase in the proprtion of non-white people identifying themselves as English.  Minorities in England are encouraged to be British, their interaction with the state from day one is with all things British.  In Scotland a newly-arrived immigrant's interaction will be mostly in a Scottish context.  The British government encourages immigrants to be British (in a half-hearted manner) whereas in Scotland they are encouraged to be Scottish not just by the Scottish government but by their Scottish peers.  By encouraging immigrants to identify with the British identity, the British government are creating a barrier to integration and simply replacing one minority identity with another one.

The message coming out of the IPPR report is that the English identity has finally replaced British as the dominant identity in England, that Englishness is rapidly gaining and as yet unrealised political aspect and that the English are dissatisfied with the way their country is governed.  The IPPR report would seem to suggest, based on one set of figures, that most English people want the constitutional fudge most commonly known as English Votes on English Laws to replace the current situation where British MPs from all four member states of the UK vote on laws only affecting England.  This is more or less what UKIP's current/outgoing policy is.

However, as I pointed out above, the question - Now that Scotland has its own parliament, Scottish MPs should not be allowed to vote in the House of Commons on laws that only affect England - doesn't actually ask for opinions on English Votes for English Laws, it asks whether Scottish MPs should be banned from voting on English laws which also encompasses an English Parliament, independence and regionalisation.  The number of people who came out in favour of banning Scottish MPs from voting on English laws is almost exactly the same as the combined support for an English Parliament, English Votes on English Laws and regionalisation.  You have to look further down the report to find a more relevant measure of support for a particular form of government in the question of who should have most influence over decision making in England where the majority were in favour of a devolved English Parliament.

The British government will surely have to take notice of this report, the likes of which they have been diligently avoiding commissioning themselves.  The results are unequivocal and the conclusions are pretty damning.  It shows that UKIP has been on the wrong track opposing devolution but also shows that we are once again ahead of the curve as the first mainstream party to come out in favour of an English Parliament to balance the assymetrical devolution already in place.

UKIP now supports devolution

The big thing to come out of UKIP's conference in Eastbourne this weekend for me was the release of a policy paper entitled "A Union for the Future".

The policy paper, written by Paul Nuttall MEP, is a complete rewrite of UKIP's badly written, unworkable devolution policy which basically involved abolishing the devolved governments in Scotland and Wales (but not NI) and replacing them with Grand Committees of British MPs.

This new policy paper has no such retrograde suggestions in it.  The current British House of Commons would be replaced with an English Parliament with English MPs, an English Executive and an English First Minister.  The House of Lords would be replaced by the British Parliament with British MPs, the British Executive and the British Prime Minister and will scrutinise legislation for all four home nations.

There are a couple of gaps in the policy paper but then it is only a two-page précis.  One question I would like answered is what changes would be made to the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly and Northern Irish Assembly?  Will the powers they have be equalised with that of the Scottish and English Parliaments?  The policy is very anglo-centric so some questions need answering about how it will affect Scotland, Wales and NI when the policy paper is expanded upon.

Since this policy was announced there have been a few threads on the UKIP members' forum on it with the usual suspects scaremongering about devolution, claiming that it's the same thing as devolution, expensive, creates more politicians, etc.  So here is a list of devolution myths peddled by Big Britishers (the opposite to Little Englanders) debunked:

• Devolution means breaking up the union
  Breaking up the union would be independence. Devolution is inherently unionist because you can't devolve power from the union government if the union doesn't exist to have a government. Devolution can only exist for as long as the union exists.
• Devolution means more tiers of government
  The policy paper written by Paul Nuttall sees the regional tier of government in England being abolished when the English Parliament is created.  The two tiers of the British government would also be replaced by one.  That's a net reduction of one tier of government.
• Devolution means more expense
  Paul Nuttall has clearly used the paper Chris Gill submitted to a House of Lords committee when he was Conservative MP for Ludlow as a base for his policy paper.  In that paper Chris detailed the basic cost savings that could be realised by making these changes.  Adjusted for current salaries and numbers of peers, the cost savings amount to almost half a billion a year.
• This is playing into the EU's hands
  The EU has divided the UK into 12 euroregions.  Three of them coincide with national borders - Scotland, Wales and NI - but the other 9 are a dismemberment of England.  Establishing a national Parliament for the whole of England and doing away with the EU's regional government goes against what the EU wants.
• There is no support for devolutionIndependent opinion polls consistently put support for either banning MPs not elected in England from voting on English laws or for creating an English Parliament at 7 out of 10.  As the former is an unworkable mess that doesn't actually address the core problem of having no politicians elected to represent English interests, the latter is the only option.
  
• We already have an English Parliament: Westminster
  Westminster is home to the British government which is made up of British MPs elected in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.  Being elected to an English constituency doesn't make a British MP an English MP.  There hasn't been an English Parliament since 1707.
• There's no votes in it
  Being the only party opposing membership of the EU hasn't got us an MP elected but it doesn't mean there are no votes in it, it means that voters think their vote will be wasted if they vote for UKIP or we don't offer enough policies they can support.  The reason the English Democrats haven't seen any real electoral success is because they are a tiny party crippled with debt and an ineffectual and toxic leadership and are being over-run with BNP members, not because their core message doesn't resonate with voters.
• It will alienate Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish voters
  How could anyone object to making England equal to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?  If it does then that says a lot about the people we're supposedly united with and UKIP has never retained a deposit in any Westminster or devolved election, should we discriminate against the 50m people who vote for us in large enough numbers to retain deposits so as not to upset the 10m who don't?
• Our current policy is good enough
  No, really it's not.  There are so many reasons why it's wrong.  Here are a few ...
• The Scots would declare independence if you tried to take their government away from them.
• A Grand Committee of British MPs elected in British constituencies in Scotland and Wales to the British government is several retrograde steps back from Scottish and Welsh politicians elected in Scotland and Welsh constituencies in Scotland and Wales to a Scottish or Welsh government.
• What happens if a British MP elected in England votes on something good for Britain and bad for England when they're sitting as the British Grand Committee and then it comes up when they're sitting as the English Grand Committee?  Do they denounce themselves and censure their own vote?
• What happens when a bill is presented to the British Grand Committee that requires a change to the law in England, Scotland, Wales and NI?  As the British MP introducing it will also be a member of one of the national Grand Committees it's highly likely it will occur.  Will part of it be voted on by the British Grand Committee and then part of it be voted on by each of the four national Grand Committees who may suggest amendments that contradict each other?  That type of bill would take years to steer through all five Grand Committees, if ever so all that will happen is that the British Grand Committee would exercise its prerogative to vote on "devolved" issues and ride roughshod over themselves with their English/Scottish/Welsh/Northern Irish hats on.  And presumably complain to themselves about it to themselves over their boiled eggs.
• Will the Chair of the British Grand Committee be banned from being Chair of one of the national Grand Committees?
• Will the whip apply to both the British and national Grand Committees?  Will the whips be the same people or will the parties have whips that are whips one week of the month and not the next three?
• The value of devolution is that it allows priorities and needs to be met when they are different to those of the other home nations.  Parties will impose the same policies across the UK on "devolved" matters because that's what they believe in nationally.
• Grand Committees will only exist for as long as the British Parliament decides to tolerate their existence. They will have no constitutional basis, no executive powers, no dedicated politicians, no real legal basis.
• Without a clearly defined (in law) list of what is and isn't devolved to another executive, MPs elected in one country will be able to claim an interest in a bill appearing to affect only one of the other county's if it involves spending money on the basis that money spent in one home nation means less to be spent in another.  An MP elected in Scotland made this claim the same day the Tories originally announced their (now abandoned) English Votes on English Laws policy.

If this policy paper makes it into the manifesto (and I would hope and expect it to do so) then it's not going to be a magic pill that suddenly gets UKIP into government but it's another string to our bow and another reason for people to vote for us.  Almost every supporter of devolution that I know is a eurosceptic but until this policy paper was announced, most of them wouldn't vote for UKIP because of our anti-devolution policy.

We won't get elected based on one core populist policy of leaving the EU - we have to offer more in exchange for peoples' votes.  The Hansard Society Audit of Public Engagement a couple of years ago showed that "Scottish MPs" voting on English matters was the biggest complaint voters had.  The EU came surprisingly low down the list of complaints (most likely because they don't understand how many of the things that annoy them are because of EU directives).  We have a flat tax policy with increased personal allowances - a great policy but how many people understand it or are turned on by it?  Not many.  We have a policy of Swiss-style Referenda which is another great policy but only two petitions on the British government's ePetitions site have achieved 100,000 signatures which suggests people either aren't motivated enough or don't think it will make a difference.

Devolution is different though - the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish already know how it works and the English are increasingly aware of it as well.  It's expressed as dissatisfaction with the way "Scottish MPs" vote on English laws and the amount of money "they" get compared to us but it's an awareness nonetheless.  An English Parliament is something that people rarely ask for until you ask them if they want it and then they get passionate about it and passion = votes.

The genie is out of the bottle where devolution is concerned and it's not going back in.  Devolution is here to stay so it has to be made to work.  Since devolution was introduced in Scotland and Wales support for independence in those countries has decreased but over the same 13 year period it has increased from basically zero to 36% in England.  What does that tell you?  It shows that devolution delivered (as unexpected as it may have been) on its promise to kill separatism in Scotland and Wales.  It has also, as predicted, resulted in a backlash against the union and in particular the Scots, in England.

The union will break up within my lifetime, it's a matter of timing now.  I'm not anti-union, I'm agnostic towards it - I won't shed a tear when the union breaks up but then I probably won't throw a party either.  It would be fair to say most people in UKIP are unionist and I think that on balance most of the population of the UK is too and that's why UKIP should support devolution.  If we carry on as we are the union will have broken up in less than a decade.  If power is devolved equally and meaningfully to national parliaments then it will last a lot longer.  Big Britishers and Little Englanders alike should support UKIP and this policy.

Finally, I would like to say well done to UKIP's Paul Nuttall, Annabelle Fuller and Gawain Towler for dragging UKIP's stance on devolution kicking and screaming into this millennium and to Eddie Bone and Scilla Cullen from the Campaign for an English Parliament for making sure the new policy doesn't end up a constitutional abomination.

Yes, it's time to change UKIP's devolution policy

UKIP member, Chris Palmer, is calling for a change of UKIP policy on devolution over at Independence Home.

Chris favours a federal UK with all four home nations having equal powers to each other and a unicameral federal British government for reserved matters.  Like most supporters of an devolution, Chris believes that support for devolution amongst the electorate means it is now impossible to return to direct British rule and that extending and equalising devolution across all four home nations is the only way to protect the union.

To be honest, I can't really fault what Chris says other than the suggestion that London should be governed separately from the rest of England.  For me, the idea that England's capital should effectively secede from England is just not acceptable.  Some people might point to Washington DC as a precedent but it's not the same situation.  Washington is the capital of the United States, not one of the states.  Washington isn't even in one of the states, the District of Columbia is administered by the federal government directly with only a city council between residents and Congress.

I digress.  Like I said, I can't really fault what Chris says but there is a problem with the idea of a federal British government and the idea of a federal court.  The English constitution says that no parliament can bind its successor - that means a British federation could be dismantled by the British government and they could overrule a constitutional court because an Act of the British Parliament creating either of them could be repealed by the British Parliament at any time.  The constitutional court might rule it unlawful but the Parliament makes laws, not courts.

Don't get me wrong, I am 100% committed to the creation of an English Parliament but I don't want one constitutional abomination to be replaced with another one.  I don't want a devolution settlement dictated by the British government and that can be abolished on a whim by this or any future British government.  That's why I favour a British confederation rather than a federation.

But regardless of personal preferences on the form that devolution and the evolution of the union should take, it is immensely reassuring to see so many UKIPpers these days pulling apart David Campbell Bannerman's ridiculous Grand Committee policy and advocating a common sense policy of supporting devolution for all four home nations.  It's a common sense policy, it's a vote-winning policy and it's the right policy.  It's what the policy committee proposed before they were overruled by DCB.  It's what most of the voting public wants.  Screw what the backward Big Britishers who oppose devolution say, we won't win elections by ignoring what voters want!

Just one final comment on Chris Palmer's article: we won't attract thousands of members from the English Democrats by adopting the right devolution policy because they don't have thousands of members to lose and there are so many ex-BNP members in the party.  But we would mop up most of their membership who only support them because they're the only party that advocates an English Parliament and the voters who vote for them for the same reason.  We might even be able to plunder the SNP- and Plaid-voting masses in Scotland and Wales who vote for the europhile nationalist parties even though they're eurosceptics because they're the only parties that support greater separation from Westminster.

Pledge your support for the UKIP 1997 Group's call for UKIP to adopt a sensible devolution policy and make the party electable!

Wales says yes, UKIP says no

The Welsh voted for more powers for the Welsh Assembly today.

At the moment, the British government has to pass a law to allow the Welsh government to pass a law.  It's a ridiculous way of doing things and the Welsh have rightly voted to stop the buggering about and just let the Welsh government pass its own laws.

In all, 63.49% of those who took part in the referendum (36.5% of registered voters) voted for more devolution for Wales.  Which shows up exactly how utterly ridiculous it is to contest the Welsh Assembly elections this year with a policy of abolishing it!

And before any anti-devolution UKIPpers point to the low turnout and suggest it's not representative of public opinion, the turnout in Barnsley yesterday was also 36.5%.

UKIPpers who want UKIP to adopt a sensible policy on devolution might want to check out the 1997 Group.

Election 2011: put our resources into areas where we have known support

This year UKIP will be contesting local elections in England and elections to the devolved executives in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

UKIP will be putting a fair bit of money into this year's elections but is it going to be spent where it's most likely to be turned into electoral success?

Cards on the table, I'm an English nationalist.  It's no great secret and anyone who reads this blog regularly, reads the Bloggers4UKIP Twitter feed, reads my own blog or the UKIP members' forum will know that I am an active campaigner for an English Parliament and have spent the last year or two debating (sometimes rowing) with fellow UKIPpers about devolution.  I even set up the 1997 Group for like-minded UKIPpers.

UKIP's policy on devolution is wrong and a lot of members agree with this and support a change in the current policy of abolishing the devolved executives and establishing Grand Committees of British MPs to replace them - an extension of the Tories' now-abandoned English Votes on English Laws policy to establish Scottish Votes on Scottish Laws, Welsh Votes on Welsh Laws and Northern Irish Votes on Northern Irish Laws instead of democratically accountable devolved executives.

But it's not just UKIP members that our policy makers should be listening to - they should be listening to the general public.  Only a fool would think that the Scots could ever be convinced to give up their parliament and the Welsh will cement the tenuous 51% yes vote for devolution in 1997 with a reasonable majority in favour of the Welsh government being given primary law making powers in this year's referendum.  And of course the Northern Irish Assembly was part of the Good Friday and couldn't be abolished without seriously damaging relations with the Republic of Ireland and risking a return to violence in the province.  That just leaves England unrepresented - the last colony of the British Empire.  Seven out of ten people want an English Parliament or at the very least a ban on MPs not elected in England voting on English laws according to four independent opinion polls in four years commissioned by three different organisations.

So with devolution quite obviously here to stay and supported by most voters, UKIP is going to contest elections in Scotland and Wales this year on a platform of abolishing the devolved executives.  This is lunacy.  We will be lucky to finish above the Monster Raving Loony Party in Scotland (just ask the English Democrats how embarrassing that is) and there is the very slightest chance we might get an AM elected in Wales thanks to the elections there being held under PR (an EU directive, naturally) and a very marginal shift to the right in Wales after decades of mismanagement by the rancid left.

In England, however, we stand a real chance of gaining from the distrust of the LibLabCon parties, the implosion of the Lib Dems, the displeasure at the ConDem "cuts" (in reality, just reductions in the increase in spending) which are primarily targeting England and the inherent conservatism (small "c") of England.  But how much of the election money will be left for English election campaigns once the Scottish and Welsh campaigns have been paid for?

UKIP is clearly going to be pushing hard for votes in Wales, judging by the addition of welsh party descriptions for UKIP to the register at the Electoral Commission.  Names such as "Abolish Assembly UKIP"  and "UKIP Scrap Assembly" will be appearing on ballot papers for elections to the Sennedd, presumably signalling an intention to mount a large and expensive campaign in Wales.  UKIP Scotland and UKIP Wales have been registered but no UKIP England or UKIP NI (more on Northern Ireland at the end).

Now clearly I'm biased on the subject of devolution - I could hardly claim to be impartial on the subject when I'm on the National Council of the Campaign for an English Parliament - but let me put it to you another way.  Is it a reasonable way of ensuring our money is well spent in the election to establish the principle that central party funds are only put into areas where we retained a deposit in the last general election, that money should be put into areas where branches put in the effort and where there was support for the candidate and that money shouldn't be frittered away on areas where we have no active branch and where there is demonstrably very little support for UKIP?  Does that sounds reasonable?  To me it does and the fact that we didn't retain a single deposit - didn't even come close to retaining a deposit - in Scotland or Wales is just a happy co-incidence.

I will be standing in the local election this year in my own ward but I don't expect and won't ask for any money from the central party.  Our branch has enough money in the kitty to fund all our candidates so I have no vested interest in how much money the party puts in to English elections - I just want to see UKIP do well in this year's elections and we are only going to do that by putting our resources into winnable elections.

I said I'd mention Northern Ireland at the end and I deliberately left it out of this argument because for UKIP it's a special case.  The NI branch is new and covers the whole of the province.  It has only one councillor who predates the branch's formation.  UKIP has never contested Northern Irish elections and Northern Ireland doesn't really feature in any of the discussions about the EU because politics there is so different to the mainland.  We have nothing to lose by dipping our toe into Northern Irish politics (particularly as UKIP NI is ignoring UKIP's daft devolution policy and supporting Stormont) as long as it's not a half-arsed affair with no money or effort put into it.

So, in a nutshell what I am saying is this: put our resources into areas where we have known support evidenced by retained deposits at the last election and not into unwinnable elections for devolved executives that we are committed to abolishing against the wishes of the electorate.

7 out of 10 want an English Parliament - who will they vote for?

Via the Campaign for an English Parliament, the Power 2010 campaign has commissioned an opinion poll on devolution which reinforces previous opinion poll results over the last few years that have shown that 7 out of 10 people want an English Parliament.  The results of the poll and Power 2010's press release can be found on the English Parliament Online website.

Cameron's general election campaign is tanking and the Tories have failed to attack Labour and the Lib Dems on their favoured policy of balkanising England into euroregions.  The 'nuclear option' of supporting an English parliament may be the Tories only chance to avoid a fourth term in the wilderness.  UKIP should stop flogging the dead horse that is abolishing devolution in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and come out in support of an English parliament.

Paul Nuttall says that UKIP is calling for a public holiday for St Georges Day in England, why not go a step further and do what the majority of the electorate wants and commit to a referendum on an English Parliament?  It's not too much to ask is it?

Any fellow UKIPpers who want an English Parliament or who just want the party to stop ignoring public opinion and losing votes because of its daft anti-devolution policy can put their name to the UKIP 1997 Group.

Wales Online: New MEP’s Welsh faux pas

New MEP’s Welsh faux pas

WITH the UK Independence Party meeting for its annual conference in Southport this weekend, we’ve had our first insight into the thinking of our new MEP, John Bufton.

You could be forgiven for wishing he had stayed quiet.

Confidently predicting that Ukip would win seats in the National Assembly at the next general election, he described it as “a system of regionalisation forced upon us by Brussels”.

Right you are, then – the Assembly was forced on us by evil foreigners, rather than, say, being voted for in a referendum.

Paranoid? Tick.

“The ‘yes’ vote won with the narrowest of majorities. Only one in four people actually voted for the Welsh Assembly.

“What kind of a mandate is that?”

Well, it depends. It’s certainly a much bigger mandate than that of, say, John Bufton, who gained 12.8% of the vote in this year’s election on a 30.4% turnout.

Hypocritical? Tick.

He opposed the building of three new Assembly Government offices in Merthyr Tydfil, Aberystwyth and Llandudno Junction, describing them as “mini parliaments”.

They’re not mini parliaments – they’re civil service offices, built to decentralise government work from Cardiff. Mr Bufton shows he doesn’t know the difference between the National Assembly and the Assembly Government.

Uninformed? Tick.

Given that one of Ukip’s two councillors in Wales is still under investigation for allegedly posting inappropriate messages on web forums, it’s not been the brightest of starts for the party’s push into Wales.

Making UKIP unelectable in Wales? Tick.

Like I said yesterday (and several times before), UKIP's devolution policy is out of step with public opinion and is costing us votes. Devolution was brought to Wales following a referendum in which only 25% of the population bothered to vote and only 51% of them voted for it. It was, however, a binding national referendum and the majority voted for devolution. The referendum in 1997 might not have been an overwhelming vote for Welsh home rule but contesting the next election in Wales on a policy of abolishing it will be a referendum on UKIP's devolution policy.

UKIP will be the only party opposing devolution in Wales

From the news section of the UKIP website:

THE UK Independence Party will be the only main party opposing further powers for the National Assembly at a referendum, its Wales MEP had said.

John Bufton told UKIP’s annual conference: “I am confident we will take up our first seats in the Welsh Assembly following the elections in May 2011.

“We are the only major party to oppose the Welsh Assembly.”.

Genius. I can see devolution policy soon becoming being the UKIP equivalent of Tory EU policy - the party leadership being out of step with the electorate and their own members.

UKIP members who accept that devolution is here to stay and that opposing it is costing us votes rather than winning them can register their support for the UKIP 1997 Group which advocates equalising devolution in the UK so that all four home nations have devolved parliaments with the same powers as the Scottish Parliament.

UKIP for an English Parliament

Back in July I wrote a fairly lengthy post on why UKIP's devolution policy is wrong. The relatively few comments it attracted belies the number of UKIP members and sympathisers that hold the same views - I received many more comments away from the blog and through the UKIP members' forum.

This prompted me to look at setting up a group within UKIP for members who support devolution and disagree with UKIP's policy of abolishing devolution and setting up grand committees of dual mandate British MPs to do the job.

I am pleased to announce that, along with Maidstone branch chairman, John Botting, enough UKIP members have pledged their support for the group to make it worth the effort of applying to the National Executive Council (NEC) for official recognition.

Don't let the title of this post mislead you though, this group - the UKIP 1997 Group - isn't just about an English Parliament. The aim of the group is to influence UKIP's policy on devolution so that the party supports devolved government in all four home nations on an equal basis.

For more information on the UKIP 1997 Group, click here. There is also a Facebook group related to the UKIP 1997 Group.

Edit:
Just to clarify, the UKIP 1997 Group is not a Bloggers4UKIP project.