English Votes for English Laws: Northern Ireland

(asked on 8th July 2015) - View Source

Question to the Northern Ireland Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what assessment she has made of the effect on the role of hon. Members from Northern Ireland of the proposed Standing Orders governing English votes on English laws; and if she will make a statement.


Answered by
Theresa Villiers Portrait
Theresa Villiers
This question was answered on 14th July 2015

As the Conservative manifesto on which the Government was elected states, ‘We will work to ensure a stable constitution that is fair to the people of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.’

Ensuring that legislation affecting only England, or England and Wales can only be passed with the consent of MPs from England, or England and Wales, is a key part of that.

Under our proposals, MPs from Northern Ireland will, like all MPs, continue to debate and vote on every piece of legislation in the Commons. The proposed Standing Orders will, however, give English and Welsh MPs the opportunity to give their explicit consent to legislation that only applies to those nations and is devolved elsewhere. This has similarities with the system of legislative consent motions in devolved assemblies.

All MPs will continue to approve Departmental spending together through the Estimates process, which also sets out the level of funding for the devolved administrations. MPs from Northern Ireland will be able to give their explicit consent to tax measures which apply to England, Wales and Northern Ireland but relate to matters devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

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