Gareth Young (Lewes, CEP): It seems that the renewed furore over the Barnett Formula and the West Lothian Question has emboldened regionalists who are now popping out of the woodwork to reassert their claims, despite the fact that the Barnett Formula doesn't actually have any bearing on funding disparities within England and the WLQ wouldn't be answered by regional assemblies. Most notable are Phil Davis in the Guardian and Sue Stirling on these very pages. I was shocked to see that Phil signed off his Guardian article by informing us that he 'chairs the Campaign for the English Regions'. Shocked because I thought we'd buried that particular organisation when we were victorious in the North East referendum, so I emailed Phil who told me:
Since a period of dormancy following the NE vote CFER officers have kept in touch. As the political context has now opened up to further work on empowered regions we are now considering relaunching the network - though regional activity outside the north has continued in any case via for example the West Midlands Constitutional Convention and SW CC
Understanding the nature of the beast he was replying to he continued:
Nationalism is not an ideology, but a disease (of the soul)...Hope you recover
Of course I did not bother to reply but had I done so I would have pointed out that such a statement shows contempt not just for the Scots and Welsh - who have recently voted for national government of their own - but also for the majority of the world's population who elect their government along national lines. For all their supposedly good intentions it is a fundamental weakness of the regionalists' argument that they seek to deny national government, and constitutional recognition of nationhood, to the people of England; to see England alone amongst the historic nations of Europe without its own national government. Earlier in the year I ran a short internet survey from my website (BiteBack.pdf) that asked respondents to agree or disagree with various statements. The largest affirmative response was to a statement cribbed from the openDemocracy website:
A contract of trust between citizens and politicians on a defined national community -- we can elect you, we can remove you -- is fundamental to a democracy
97% of those that took part agreed with that statement. A paltry 1% disagreed. The complete disregard that the regionalists have for the sense of English nationhood and feeling of national community was demonstrated most shockingly by Liberal democrat Councillor Peter Arnold who claimed, in a letter to the Independent, that "There is no need for an English parliament because there is no England". Even Regions Minister Nick Raynsford got in on the act when he claimed that the situation in England is different "because Scotland is a nation in its own right and similarly Wales". I am absolutely convinced that the majority of people in England believe that England is a nation in its own right, and I'm equally convinced that the regionalists will fail to federalise England if they attempt to do so at the expense of English national government - which, so far, is all they have attempted to do. Writing for the Constitution Unit in the aftermath of the north east referendum result the Guardian's Peter Hetherington remarked that
the romantic stirrings of Yes 4 the North East failed to resonate among a population that is probably more English - rather than British, with vague notions of Englishness - than many realise. One of the authors was struck by the number of times respondents in straw polls raised worries about the impact a partly-devolved North East would have on the unity of England
It's often said that the British are not particularly taken with overt displays of nationalism. That may have been true in the past but in recent times the Scots and Welsh (and Cornish, why not?) have shown themselves to be very adept at nationalist tub-thumping and flag-flapping. Belatedly the English are catching up and a reactionary British nationalism led by Gordon Brown is emerging in response to the threat as they see it. These British nationalists tend to favour the emasculation of England as a nation through regionalism, and Gordon Brown himself has argued that Britain should become 'a Britain of nations and regions'. Not on my watch Gordon. If Scotland has the sovereign right to determine the form of government best suited to its needs then so too does England, and it's that English nationalist claim that regionalists opposed to English constitutional sovereignty are going to encounter with even greater force than they did when we crushed them last back in 2004.
