Why We Need an English Parliament

“English people are routinely discriminated against!” This may seem like an outrageous statement, but at least in terms of the United Kingdom government, the statement is undeniably true.

 We have one of the oldest and best established parliaments in the world but there is a serious problem with UK democracy. This is a problem which has ben introduced into the UK government with the establishment of the Scottish parliament, and the assemblies in Wales and Northern Ireland. Each of these new governing authorities has rights and powers relating to a number of important areas of government devolved to them, and their elected members may vote on any of these maters without any reference to the rest of the United Kingdom.

 The problem with this system is that each of these governing authories has slightly different powers, and control over different issues of government. Issues outside their control are still decided at the UK parliament at Westminster to which each constituency continues to send its representatives exactly as they did before the establishment of their local parliament.

 All the members of the UK parliament can continue to vote on leglislaton on all issues, including issues which will not affect them or their constituents as in their area that issue is decided by their local parliament.

 This problem is most keenly felt in England which has no national parliament of its own but continues to be subject to MP’s from Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland passing leglislation which will have power only in England.

 There are various ways this clear discrimination could be remedied bjut the fairest approach, and the simplest to implement would be the establishment of an English parliament that would have indentical powers to the parliaments in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

 This approach would then provide an opportunity to significantly reduce the number of Westminster MP’s in the United Kingdom parliament as this parliament would then only have to deal with leglislation relating to the whole of the United Kingdom.