By Vivienne Russell | 16 January 2012
Almost eight out of ten English voters want Scottish MPs barred from making laws that only affect England, according to a survey published today.
Polling commissioned by the Institute for Public Policy Research and Edinburgh and Cardiff universities shows widespread public support for dealing with the ‘West Lothian Question’. This is the constitutional anomaly that allows MPs representing Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish constituencies to vote on matters restricted to England although neither they nor English MPs can vote on devolved Scottish, Welsh or Northern Ireland affairs.
Of the 1,500 voters in England surveyed, more than half (53%) said they strongly agreed with restricting the scope of Scottish MPs’ voting rights, while a further 26% said they ‘agreed’.
In September, the government announced that it would establish a commission, led by independent experts, to look at the West Lothian Question.
But constitutional experts are warning that this could be too little, too late.
Guy Lodge, associate director of the IPPR, said a narrow focus on the West Lothian Question alone would not be enough to satisfy public opinion.
‘A strengthening of English identity, combined with growing interest in how England is governed, post an important challenge for the centre-Left in particular, which has so far failed to engage with these important developments in England.’
Richard Wyn Jones, professor of politics at Cardiff University, added: ‘We underestimate the current mood of the English electorate at our peril. In the 1980s, the perceived unfairness of a system which allowed Left-leaning Scotland and Wales to be governed by a party without a mandate in those countries led to the generation of an unstoppable head of steam leading directly to the devolution reforms of the late 1990s.
‘It is not hard to imagine how a different set of territorial anomalies could create a similar response in England. Indeed, it might already be happening.’
Later this month, the IPPR will publish a report looking at changing patterns of national identity within England and what the English think about devolution, the union and the way they are governed. This is part of research collaboration between the Wales Governance Centre at Cardiff University and the Institute of Governance at Edinburgh University.
