Saturday 7 April 2007
"Old and Angry" becomes first visitor to comment on my Blog
Thanks to Old and Angry for posting comments here. I hope you are the first of many; I ought to have done this years ago, but I am not yet very accomplished with this, so I will need to learn more. I have been away with my family for a few days break down in Wales - what struck me was how clean the place not only looks, but actually is. Plenty of public toilets, roads and verges kept clean; good road conditions etc. Seems like the Welsh Assembly knows how to run things. Can we have our own English Parliament, please? What about elected Regional Assemblies? Thoughts, please.
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4 comments:
Not too keen on regional assemblies,they end up as another unnecessary layer of government, and we have quite enough big government as it is!.
But an English parliament is another matter.
It's time has come!
The West Lothian question still has not been addressed.
Why should Scottish MPs, in their devolved Parliament, be allowed to vote on English matters , when there is no recipricol arrangement!
We have quite enough scots in our English Parliament, as it is.
Brown, Darling,McCartney, Reid etc, etc,.
I'm not usually a Lib Dem supporter, but any party willing to address this issue gets my vote!
I was going to suggest you have a word with Mingis about this, but perhaps not, he's Scottish too!
The people of England must have control over their affairs and the establishment of an English Parliament with powers at least equal to those of Scotland's is long overdue. The lack of the same is wholly indefensible but the abundant provision of services and amenities in Wales is attributable not so much to the existence of a devolved assembly as to the embarrassment of English riches with which the British government endows it. So rich is the Welsh Assembly in English money that on the day that prescription charges were increased by twenty pence in England they were abolished in Wales.
The disgraceful disparity in per capita funding is a consequence of deliberate decisions taken by a British government dominated by Scotch and Welsh politicians,and while an English Parliament could not do other than to work with what money that British government was inclined to allow it, it could at the very least make forceful arguments for a more equitable arrangement.
Regional assemblies would not be able to do this since a) they would have no national remit; b) they would not have the powers of the Scotch parliament or Welsh Assembly; c) they would be fighting each other for a share of the lower English allocation and would thus have little or nothing in common with which to oppose British government decisions.
Notwithstanding any of the foregoing, who now can doubt that a British parliament ruled by the whip system and composed of parties led by non English MPs is highly unlikely to put the interests of England first and who can doubt that an English Parliament is highly unlikely not to. We must have an English Parliament with powers at least equal to those of Scotland to represent the interests of the people of England, and we must have it sooner rather than later.
Councillor Rob
I am very angry that thanks to a Scottish Parliament abetted by a Scots dominated UK parliament people in Scotland get many benefits denied to the people in England. We are denied the best cancer and Alzheimers treatments. Our old people receive far worse care and have to sell their homes to fund care. We get less tax spend as mote is given to Scotland. This cannot go on, there will be a big outburst iver this.
I suspect that the funding arrangements for the Welsh National assembly, are similar to the Barnett Formula that is used in Scotland.
More spend per head goes on Scottish People than for English people.( An inspired political formula to "lock them in " to the Labour majority)
Which, incidentally, looks like it's going to backfire, when Scots vote for full independance soon.
( i trust that the Barnett formula will be scrapped, instantly, should the Scottish Nationalists, take power)
The generous funding must also apply to Wales, on the day Wales scrapped prescription charges, ours, in England, went up again!
As for the cleanliness of the place,perhaps we could take a leaf out of their book,as it is, Scarborough borough council rely on folks "reporting" dumped rubbish,rather than cleansing teams routinely spotting fly tipping.
Public toilets open?, there's a novelty, we have seen their demise in Whitby, and even Sleights Council had to resort to rigging the vote to get a precept loaded on parishioners to pay for the upkeep of Eskdaleside public loo's.
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