Why doesn't England have its own assembly?
The overall political map shows a 62 seat majority for Tories in England, and a 12 seat majority for Labour in Wales. You can see LibDems are more prominent in Scotland along with SNP, yet we have a UK parliament, and Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland assemblies and nothing for England.
Despite Conservatives have most of England, we have a Scottish MP running the country with a minority Labour government, which defies any sense of democracy.
England has no proper representation.
The argument for an English assembly has brewed for years, and I can remember hearing politicians talk of proportional representation for as long as I was old enough to watch the telly.
I remember former Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe seeking PR back in the 60's with various leaders who found it difficult to form a proper government even then, and there can really be no doubt that a system of proportional representation would be more democratic.
But PR alone is not enough. We need an English assembly so English democracy can be served in fair proportion to the Scots, Welsh and Irish who all have their own assemblies.
In a democracy of the 21st century, we need to have adequate measures in place which give people a voice in the politics of their country, but instead we have bitter rivalry which turns our democracy into a complete farce.
Example: Margaret Hodge, in a bitter, rude and highly inflammatory attack on opponent Nick Griffin who stood fairly for election, said this vote shows his politics isn't wanted in Barking and he should pack his bags and leave, yet Nick Griffin defeated all other opposition bar Tories and Labour.
Why is Hodge not telling LibDems and UKIP to leave?
Her outburst also shows a complete lack of any inclination on her part to represent or to take account of the views of all of the constituency despite she is aware and has admitted they have real concerns about the tide of immigration there and the prospect they could become a minority in their own country very soon.
Proportional representation would have allowed a BNP MP elsewhere to address issues concerning the people of Barking and elsewhere even if no BNP MP had actually been elected in that constituency, and bitter attacks like those of Hodge could have been made within a political forum which would give the BNP leader a chance to reply.
Further, I doubt given the rules of the house, that such common language would actually be tolerated as if Hodge had said that within a political forum there is hardly much doubt that she would now be under suspension and forced to apologise.
England is not being served and nor is democracy, and unless the English people are given a voice, then England will have ongoing political difficulties as leaders simply refuse to discuss many of the questions concerning 80% or more of the population.
This is why the EU, immigration, university fees, illegal wars and even hospital parking fees and prescription charges are never debated, because the English are unable to talk about England, we have a Scottish prime minister running the country with a party that doesn't have any mandate to govern us, and we have no English assembly to talk about England.
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