When I first entered the Commons, the Father of The House (its longest serving member) was Ted Heath, who was followed by Tam Dalyell, one of the most independent minded and effective members. I remember him once rising after a particularly long and vapid ministerial answer and simply saying “why?” leaving the minister floundering. Tam was one of the few Scottish members opposed to devolving powers to a Scottish parliament. It was he who framed what became known as the “West Lothian Question” (he was the Member for West Lothian when he framed it though he was subsequently the Member of Linlithgow).
Basically, at issue in the question was, if having once devolved Scottish educational matters to a parliament in Edinburgh, the fairness of the Member for Linlithgow voting in Westminster on educational matters in England which would have no effect in his own constituency.
The matter came to a head in the election campaign of 2015 because of the collapse of Labour support in its former Scottish Heartlands: Labour’s only prospect of getting into Government was believed to be, on the basis of polling, by relying on the support the Scottish nationalist MPs. Under such a scenario, England representing 80 of UK would have been governed at the will of Scottish MPs voting on matters whose own laws were devolved to an exclusively Scottish Parliament.
To the surprise of many it didn’t happen: a majority Conservative government was elected. One of its manifesto pledges however, was to address the issue with ‘English Votes for English Laws’ (EVAL). So, we changed the Standing Orders of the House of Commons (the nearest thing to a written constitution that we have) to exclude Scottish MPs from detailed stages of legislation not affecting Scotland and for the House to sit as an English Grand Committee in which Scottish MPs would not vote. The procedure was clumsy but effective.
Out of the blue last week the Government introduced a motion to remove the procedure and to return to the status quo ante. I am at a loss as to its motive. The Covid-secure Westminster was empty and utterly ineffective. There were a handful of us there to vote against the measure, but to divide the House you need to supply two tellers, one for the ‘Aye’ Lobby and one for the ‘No’ lobby. Alas, so many of us have been persuaded not to act as ‘supper-spreaders’ by crowding the lobbies and instead to accept the innovation of voting by proxy. But if you are voting by proxy you cannot be a teller. So, when it came to the vote we couldn’t find anyone amongst us to be our second teller: Accordingly, English Votes for English Laws was ditched without a single recorded dissenting vote.
Democracy?
Sir Desmond Swayne TD
