Scotland: Independence

Lord Tyler Excerpts

Tuesday 24th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler (LD)]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Judd, because I agree so much with his peroration, and I shall come back to that point in a moment.

The committee report outlines, quite rightly, the very considerable constitutional implications of a yes vote. It certainly places in sharp focus the profound and shocking effect that it would have on both the continuation state of the UK and the successor state of Scotland. However, I am an optimist. As a fellow Celt, a Cornishman, I hope very much that our Scottish cousins will firmly vote no. I believe that we should plan for that every bit as much as we prepare for the stark reality of yes. A number of colleagues in all parts of the House have been referring to the possibility that we have to do something very serious indeed even if there is a no vote. What the noble Lord, Lord Judd, has just said echoes that.

We were given a lead earlier in this debate from the noble Lords, Lord Strathclyde and Lord Richard, to the effect that we should be looking very firmly at the implications for the whole of the United Kingdom. Indeed I am repeating a phrase that I think the noble Lord, Lord Lang, made in introducing his committee’s report.

Many of today’s contributions have understandably focused on the challenges for Scotland on 19 September. However, how does this Parliament, and the parties in it, deliver on the promise that a no vote will not mean that there will be no change?All the leaders say that they are committed to more devolution and that Scotland must be assured that it will happen. My noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness reiterated that promise at the start of today’s debate.

It is in that context that I am disappointed—though it is perfectly reasonable—that the committee did not look at the constitutional implications of a no vote. Perhaps it needs to return to that, even before 18 September. That is because, as devolution takes another step forward, after the referendum, both in Scotland and in Wales, we cannot forget that the largest part of the United Kingdom is England. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, in a debate on the gracious Speech said:

“We clearly recognise in Scotland and Wales the distance and resentment towards Westminster-dominated decisions. We need to recognise that the same instincts apply in Newcastle, Norwich, Cumberland and Cornwall”. —[Official Report, 11/6/14; col. 460.]

Colleagues on all sides of the House, on these Benches and throughout, have spoken in similar terms.

The Chancellor spoke about this only yesterday in Manchester. Naturally enough he expressed it in terms of giving an economic boost to the north of England, and he suggested doing so by getting the big northern cities to work together. In that speech, however, he acknowledged something vital, which is that real economic powerhouses must possess real political power too.

In that context we have to examine the whole issue of local democratic accountability. To take a rather more parochial example, yesterday the Government took a big step: finally devolving to Cornwall the right to allocate the latest tranche of EU structural funds, some £450 million, and that is where the power should be, rather than in those artificial regional development agencies that we all suffered from.

However, that should only be the start. More power should be devolved to a democratically accountable Cornish assembly, or whatever it may be in different parts of the country. That is subsidiarity. There were quotes from my erstwhile leader, Jo Grimond, about the concept of subsidiarity. I do not think that he invented the term, but the concept is quite clear: that decisions should be taken as close as practicably possible to those whom they affect. Colleagues from all parts of the country and all parts of the House have made a similar point. Different arrangements will suit different parts of England–we should be relaxed about that. Dr Andrew Blick, a highly respected academic in this field, has written an excellent pamphlet detailing how this model could work—a model of devolution on demand. This will be relevant whatever the outcome of the referendum of 18 September, to both Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom. We must build on the new city deals so that the new powers, along the lines offered to Wales in 1998, can be available as of right to institutions which mean something to the people they affect. This concept of devolution on demand, which we Liberal Democrats have been advocating, is very well examined by Dr Blick’s paper. It would mean getting councils to come together to form the new institutions; and in return for working together they would be entitled to power, initially on the scale offered to Wales in 1998, and then on a greater scale, with more responsibility for finance eventually following thereafter.

As the Chancellor said yesterday, Wales has its own parliament and can pass its own laws but the economies of Manchester and Leeds are each bigger than that of Wales. So I conclude, as he does, that there is no reason why parts of England cannot take power on a similar scale to the Welsh Assembly if the will is here in this building to make that happen. There is no reason why Kent, Cornwall, Manchester or Leeds cannot take on responsibility and have proper accountable governance. They would be more strategic and powerful than local authorities but not as centralised and clumsy as control from Westminster.

I very much agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Soley, said about an English parliament and I invite him to look at the effective debunking of that idea in Dr Blick’s pamphlet, which I quoted in Grand Committee last week. It would be incredibly unbalancing and centralising to invent an all-England parliament at this stage. Incidentally, if there were a yes vote in Scotland then an English parliament would be even more disruptive to the British constitution. That is because it would of course be representing 92% of the remaining United Kingdom, with Stormont and Cardiff Bay representing 3% and 5% respectively. That would surely be impossible to sustain for any period.

The second option, which is equally undesirable, is that of English votes for English laws. This has been examined and examined again but even the year-long work of the McKay commission raised more questions than it answered and, sadly, it ended up being rubbished on all sides.

Thirdly, the idea of some top-down imposition of regional government, as was attempted in the north-east of England, has also been dismissed and seen as irrelevant. Those artificial regions that were created for a different purpose just do not meet the needs and aspirations of people in England. I take as an example the northern end of the south-west region that is dear to my heart, which is nearer to Scotland than it is to Land’s End. The idea that that region has a natural unity is just not true.

The noble Lord, Lord Judd, emphasised just now—as the noble Lords, Lord Crickhowell and Lord McFall, did previously—that 19 September is as much a constitutional opportunity or threat as 18 September. We have to grasp the fundamental asymmetrics of the demand for devolution in England—the fundamental messiness of England—and the essential asymmetrical reality of the United Kingdom, and then go with the grain. Once people have devolution they tend to like it and their neighbours will then demand it too. We can move toward a more devolved United Kingdom—the whole of the United Kingdom—without imposing artificial boundaries, in the way so eloquently described just now by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and without unbalancing the whole union by pitching England against the rest. The next Parliament must make that happen.