cassie

They are official figures and can be gleaned from the official HM Treasury website!

We do very much agree here! The pity of it all is that those exercising power in and over England are alienating the very people they need to support the Union they profess to want.



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Richard the Lionheart

There is also the issue of national identity. I see myself as English and not British. The Scots and Welsh see themselves as Scots and Welsh while the English have Britishness foisted upon them.

I want to see our parliament representative of the English nation with full sovereignty. The Scots and Welsh were allowed to choose their own forms of governments and are now demanding even more power to be devolved to them. Of course, Westminster will allow them to have those powers in order to keep the union intact. In the meantime the English are denied the opportunity of choosing its own system of government. This denial is not only unique to the Labour party, but runs right through the big three parties in Westminster. Our parliamentary system is a joke. Our claim of living in a democracy is a sham.

Any serious politician from Scotland and Wales, with a few notable exceptions are not going to want to build a career in Edinburgh or Cardiff. The real action is in Westminster. There are opportunities there which are not to be found in their homelands. Devolution has limited the powers they have in their own constituencies, but have not been curbed on English matters.

It is my belief to put an end to this nonsense, and start thinking about the serious issues which affect England. The overcrowding because of mass immigration, the threat from terrorism, the evergrowing power of the EU, increased taxation, the breakdown of our society. A devolved English parliament will do nothing to address these issues. Successive British governments have done nothing to stop any of this, and indeed, have added to it. It is time to think about a new direction. It is time to sweep away the failures of the past and to build a new nation state of England.

__________________
The Free England Party - England's Premier Nationalist Party
www.freeengland.com .....Serious about England

cassie

This is at the heart of the present situation. Either we have Britishness which everyone adopts or we have our own nationality.

The first has been tried for over three hundred years now rightly or wrongly, wisely or unwisely. With the more autocratic style of government in 1700, it worked more or less given the odd uprising. The Scots have always resented the much more numerous English. Like Wales (and the borders of Pakistan with Afghanistan), Scotland was never governed entirely from the centre until imposed by English conquest. The British political system was vastly different to what it is today.

In 1874 the first major change in the franchise was effected under Disraeli, followed by successive increases in the electorate and the payment of MPs in 1911. 1928 marked a major turning point with the 'universal franchise' of not only all women but all men of twenty one and older.

The Scots in liaison with the Welsh have contrived to 'regionalise' their respective countries, not on the basis of area or population or a combination of both but, quite simply, nationality! One rule for them, and another for England. Indeed, there is no obvious rationale or wisdom to the actions taken by Blair, Dewar, Davies, Prescott & co other than to spite England and the English. The GLA has an electorate which, at 5.4 million, is greater than the total population of Scotland. The total GLA population is therefore around 7.2 million! Given that the population of the GLA area will increase to around 10 million (perhaps even more) by 2015 and exceed that of Scotland and Wales combined, one is driven to wonder what is the point of the whole, unbalanced, arbitrary regionalisation policy if other than to destroy England as a national entity!

The bottom line (to coin a phrase) is why should England as a nation be denied devolved powers and an accompanying organisation, when the minnow nations of Scotland and Wales have been afforded theirs! UKIP please note! Note also that the genie will not be returned to the bottle!



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Smidgey

The Barnett Forumula needs to end now. It helps nobody.

Each area should raise and use its own taxes. Decentralised government works best in this regard. The central government should not be handing out money like it does.

__________________
How vain is man, who boasts in fight the valour of gigantic might!

-Georg Friedrich Händel

Northumbrian

[quote=Unionist;498190]You have selected only one out of my several points, Andrew, which hardly constitutes a decisive rebuttal.

As regards the argument you did pick up, the significance of that particular point is that over a long period of time the Scots and English have effectively intermingled a lot and moved freely across Britain, thus lots of English people have a Scots heritage and the Union is a demographic fact as well as a political fact.

QUOTE]

Lots of Australians have English and Scottish heritage, yet Australia is an independent country. Ditto Canada and New Zealand.

Half of my family is from Scotland but I want English independence. The demographics mean sweet FA!

Unionist

Maybe so. It is not a big deal to me but it is to some people. I merely pointed out that we have been through much together with such an intertwined history, in so many ways, including living together on this one island, that advocating separation has to have a compelling reason. I have not discovered what that compelling reason is yet.

As it happens, I went to the theatre this evening and saw a play by the National Theatre of Scotland about the Scottish regiment, the Black Watch (performed in England, I hasten to add). It was not only a stunning play but also a nice reminder of the great contribution that one part of our union has made in our common struggle over three centuries.

OK, if you don't think that is important I won't persuade you otherwise, but I don't share this English 'national identity' that you seem to think is so important. I don't actually think the idea of national identity, British or English, should be the driving force behind political life, so I am not going to get into a 'British' vs 'English' debates. I simply think that the Union has some merits and has served us well over the years - that's about it.

Northumbrian

Let's rephrase that statement:

'I don't actually think the idea of national identity, British or European, should be the driving force behind political life, so I am not going to get into a 'British' vs 'European' debates. I simply think that the European Union has some merits and has served us well over the years - that's about it.'

If you not bothered about national identity, then the two statements are very similar, don't you think?

Unionist

Nice try.

Actually, I do not oppose the EU on grounds of national identity. However, the second part of that statement - "has served us well..." - would certainly not apply in the case of the EU. If the EU had served us well it might be a different matter. Is that not reasonable?

Northumbrian

I'm afraid over the last ten years it's a toss up which has treated England worse - the British State or the EU, to be honest.

BonnieDundee

In this case you are a neo-fascist with a hard-on for emotional appeal to abstractions. I can tell you are just awaiting your English fuehrer. Now **** off.

And what is crazy about thinking you should have the greatest feelings for where you grew up and live. In that case Edmund Burke was definitely crazy and you revile in the fascistic, worship of abstractions over what is natural and human. Life is lived locally.

__________________
"It is poor civic hygiene to install technologies that could someday facilitate a police state."
-Bruce Schneier

How to Overthrow the System: brew your own beer; kick in your TV; build your own cabin and p*ss off front porch whenever you bloody well feel like it.
Edward Abbey

Leopold Kohr.