Guy Aitchison (London, OK): Paul Kingsnorth makes the case for an English Parliament over at Comment is Free:
The reality is that Britain is dying, and the government knows it. An institution which was clumsily welded together from four distinct nations in order to service a global empire has today, that empire gone, lost its point and purpose. Westminster politicians of all stripes regularly talk in hushed tones about "the breakup of the union" as if it were the worst thing in the world. Yet the breakup of the union is probably inevitable - and if the government doesn't like it, it only has itself to blame.
Britain is under assault from many quarters - but the biggest threat, perhaps counter-intuitively, comes from the English. When Labour created a Scottish parliament, and assemblies in Wales and Northern Ireland, it claimed they would strengthen, not weaken, the British state. But the devolution process was incomplete because the largest British nation - England - was not included. Today's constitutional settlement brings almost daily reminders of why this is an injustice - and the English are waking up to it. As they do, they threaten not only the future of the union but the future of Gordon Brown, Michael Wills and the government of which they are a part.
