English Parliament in the hands of the SNP

Letter printed in Glasgow Herald 18th May

Many of your correspondents quite rightly point out that there are many more "English" MPs in Westminster than Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish ones, and therefore they could create an English parliament whenever they like. Technically, that is true, but as everyone knows, MPs invariably follow party lines.

Labour does not want an EP as its devolution system is, in its eyes, perfect and, if one were created, it might break up the Union, putting many of its top people out of a job. The

Conservatives, for reasons best known to themselves, are also obsessed about preserving the Union and do not want to do anything that might lose them their "fingertip" presence in Scotland.

The LibDems, to be fair, might well support the idea, but then anything that gives them the faintest whiff of power appeals. Their long-standing policy, however, has been to integrate fully the UK into the Euro superstate as assorted regions.

Although the SNP and Plaid Cymru are seen as nationalists, any similar party pursuing similar aims in England would have many people squealing "racists", a word some of your readers have already used.

Therefore, the creation of an English Parliament is, ironically, probably in the hands of the SNP. If it does well in May 2007, then the Scottish-led Labour government in Westminster will be left facing stark choices which naively it thought would never occur under its devolution settlement.

Letter: Shropshire Star

Growing Scottish influence on cabinet

I had the misfortune to see Labour's party election broadcast the day before the local elections.

The broadcast talked about how well Britain was doing under Labour and finished with the strapline "Britain is moving forward - vote Labour".

Bearing in mind that these were the English local elections, I wonder how many people were left wondering what Labour were planning to do for England and how many votes they lost as a result of Labour's continued denial of the existence of our country.

Can you imagine what would happen to Labour's all important majority in Scotland and Wales if they used the word "Britain" in a local electon broadcast there?

The cabinet reshuffle that follwed Labour's humiliating loses at the local election had both positive and negative sides.

The positives were the sacking of Chalres Clarke and John Prescott being stripped of all his powers. These two men were possibly the biggest threat to freedom and democracy in this country.

On the downside, there are now 5 MP's with Scottish constituencies in top ministerial positions running departments that are rarely permitted to do anything that affects their own constituents.

This is a clear message from Tony Blair - if England can't be trusted to vote Labour then he will have to bring in people we can't vote out of office. There are only two ways to get anywhere in this Labour government - you either have to be incompetent or Scottish.

Stuart Parr
Telford

Scottophobia

Letters pubished by the Glasgow Herald


The Herald is almost unique in the Scottish press in that it not only understands the discrimination against England as a result of devolution but, unlike the cowardly "English" press, it actually dares to report it. But your editorial, Scottophobia lives on today (May 15), certainly falls short of your usual balanced reporting.The opposition by English people to a Scottish MP becoming prime minister is nothing to do with a phobia or even dislike of the Scots. It is simply the case that, since devolution, Westminster now spends roughly 80% of its time dealing solely with England. It is not unreasonable for the people of England, representing 85% of the population of the (dis)United Kingdom, to want somebody who is accountable to the English electorate as prime minister.Were Gordon Brown to become the British prime minister, he would have a free rein over England but would be almost incapable of introducing any legislation that would affect his own constituents. He would be safe in the knowledge that no matter how unpopular a piece of legislation was, nobody in England could vote him out of office as he is elected in Scotland. Westminster has become largely irrelevant in Scotland since devolution so the diehard Labour constituents, most of whom would vote for a chimpanzee if it wore a red rosette, are very unlikely to vote him out based on what he has done to the auld enemy south of the border.I have no problem with a Scottish MP becoming prime minister of the UK once a fully-devolved government, with at least the same powers as the Scottish Parliament, has been introduced in England. Until this happens, increasing numbers of English people will refuse to submit to minority rule by unaccountable Scottish politicians.

Stuart Parr, Telford, Shropshire.

THE growth in Scottophobia was inevitable. The idea of devolution might have been to strengthen the Union, but only fools could have thought that a manifestly inequitable system, that Labour created, could possibly achieve that aim. Gordon Brown or John Reid have every constitutional right to be prime minister but neither will have any electoral mandate for the bulk of that job. Post-devolution, the duties have changed dramatically. Besides going on lots of holidays and prancing about the world saying how they are going to save it, the PM's main function is to oversee the administration of England.Brown/Reid are, however, elected to Westminster to represent their constituents on non-devolved matters. So they have no mandate from either Scottish or English electors to deal with things like health, education, law and order, etc. That is why they should not be PM of the UK until England has a devolved parliament of its own. Constitutionally, there is no reason why an English MP representing an English constituency should not be secretary of state for Scotland, but if any such person were appointed there would be a big protest from Scotland.

Edward Higginbottom, Rea Bank, Weir Road, Hanwood, Shrewsbury.

Letter: Shropshire Star

City proposal will mean more tax

I wonder how many residents of Telford know anything about the West Midlands city region that Michael Frater has sold us to?

It took me about a month, many phone calls and e-mails and I ended up speaking to Birmingham City Council but I finally managed to get some information on the proposal.

I didn’t get a copy of the proposal as that is to be kept secret for the next few months, presumably so that members of the public can’t give their councillors reasons to object to it.

The city region, Messrs Frater and Austin tell us, will bring us economic benefits and help us attract investment.

The blueprint for city regions produced by the UK government suggests that city regions will be able to levy business taxes. Extra taxation will encourage investment in Telford?

The economic benefits will be in the form of extra money from the UK government and EU in return for complying with regional policy.

This is nothing short of bribery and, in the case of the EU, they are bribing us with our own money!

The city region will mean higher taxes, less democracy and accountability, move more control of our daily lives away from our own democratically elected local representatives to unelected regionalists in Birmingham and the “economic benefits” are little more than bribes paid out of our own pockets.

Stuart Parr, Telford

Shropshire Star: Fiasco sparks farmer suicide fears

This was in the Shropshire Star a few days ago. Since this story, Margaret Beckett has been promoted to the Foreign Office as reward for her incompetence in charge of DEFRA.

Debt-ridden farmers across Shropshire have contemplated suicide as the only escape from the government’s single payment fiasco, it was revealed today.

The Rural Stress Network, founded during the foot and mouth crisis in 2001, said financial pressures were intolerable for farmers who have been waiting months for subsidies.

Many were battling with banks over sky-high charges. Others had no money to feed their families, while “three or four” in the last week said they had thought about suicide.

The Single Payment Scheme, which provides support payments to farmers for the environmental work they carry out, has descended into chaos with 70 per cent of claimants still unpaid. Now it could take until November to clear the backlog.

Helen Williams, for the Rural Stress Network, said many farmers were on the edge.

Tories take control of Shrewsbury & Atcham

Labour's humiliating defeat at the English local elections included losing control of Shrewsbury & Atcham, previously a Labour safe seat.

Job Cuts at Shropshire Hospitals

Nurses and medical staff were protesting outside the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital yesterday over 300 job cuts at the hospital and its sister site, the Princess Royal in Telford.

This is the same Royal Shrewsbury Hospital that is giving Welsh women the breast cancer drug Herceptin for free and is charging £43k per course of treatment for English patients.

Shropshire's contribution to the subsidy of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is in the region of £100m per year but the only way anyone can come up with of plugging a £31m budget deficit is to cut jobs and services. I've got a suggestion - stop subsidising the rest of the UK so that they can have free presecriptions, free dental and eye care, expensive drugs, etc. and spend our own taxes on ourselves.

Letter to Shropshire Newspapers

Some people in Monmouthshire are evidently up in arms as they have to pay £6.65 NHS prescription charges. They are registered with a doctor in Herefordshire, if however they were with one in Wales they would only be paying £3. From 2007 prescription charges are due to be abolished in Wales.

In Scotland, eye and dental check-ups will also be free next year.

You might ask yourself how this can be. Well, we no longer have one NHS we have separate ones, for Scotland, for Wales, for England. England of course gets the basic service, the Celtic regions the enhanced. What is even better for them is that it is English taxpayers who are providing the massive subsidies to finance them.

This is not likely to change as there is no one standing up for England. We are governed by a UK parliament that’s filled with MPs from the Scottish orientated Labour Party, the Scottish led LibDems and Conservatives who appear to be terrified of upsetting the Scots in case they get the sulks and break up the Union.

And, by the way, there are a couple of new breast cancer drugs that will be available in Scotland. England’s Scottish government however apparently has no plan to provide them to English patients.

Letter to Glasgow herald

Ian Macwhirter’s article (May 3rd) was very interesting. However, I do not agree with him when he says: ‘no sign of Middle England is unhappy with the devolution settlement, or that it wants its own separate parliament. All evidence is that English people feel no animosity towards Scots.’

Well, there are plenty of rumblings. As he is no doubt aware, in democracies the majority are usually silent, its minorities who agitate and thereby get their way. We in England are basically law abiding and are probably the most tolerant people on Earth so we rarely give a public display of our true feelings. Be assured, animosity towards every public office seemingly being filled by Scots is growing down here south of the border, we are just too polite to take to the streets.

Labour has managed to get away with their con-trick on the English, in part, because of our adherence to the rule of law and, in part, because a surprisingly high proportion of the people still do not realise that Tony Blair is Scottish. The dour, miserable, Gordon Brown is however patently Scottish, Menzies Campbell obviously a Scot, so expect the antipathy to grow if they, God forbid, end up running the UK as neither has any mandate to administer England.