Martin Rosenbaum of the BBC has been following one of the long-standing Freedom of Information Act requests – about the establishment and introduction of the Sewel Convention, which requires Westminster to obtain the consent of the Scottish Parliament, and now National Assembly for Wales and Northern Ireland Assembly, if it proposes to legislate on devolved matters.  He first discussed the  protracted delays in the Information Commissioner’s response to this request (initially made in early 2005!) here.  In his most recent post, here, he discusses what is revealed by the (small number of) papers on the Sewel convention that have been disclosed following the Commissioner’s ruling.  The Commissioner had largely upheld the refusal of the  Scotland Office to disclose much of the documentation requested but ordered some further disclosures, so what has come into the public domain is only a small part of what exists in the UK Government’s files.

Nonetheless, this disclosure suggests that the introduction of the convention was a more difficult affair than many  (myself included) believed, with considerable reluctance on the part of Whitehall departments to alter their practices, and unease about Whitehall’s readiness to use the Convention.

There are several stories here.  One is the continuing culture of secrecy and non-disclosure in Whitehall, even when it’s hard to see what harm might be done by publishing the material sought.  Another is the problems which Whitehall departments had in coping with even the first steps of devolution, and the role civil servants played in fighting the battles (a term that’s only slightly an exaggeration) in making it happen.  A third is the way that a convention about inter-parliamentary relations became something first and foremost of concern to governments, and about how executives relate to each other.  While that has been reshaped by the new procedures introduced following the inquiry of the Scottish Parliament’s Procedures Committee in 2005 (available here), the leading role remains with governments not legislatures.  Each of these issues deserves attention – and the second and third have been particularly overlooked so far.

Back in early October I posted a link to a survey seeking views about whether services should have democratic oversight at all and if so, whether that oversight should come at council, regional or national level.

I am very grateful to so many people for taking the time to complete the survey and I have put together the slide pack below which summarises the results. 

town hall or whitehall

While (as might be expected given most of the respondents are from the world of local government) there is a general sense that there are a number of public services where accountability should switch from Whitehall to townhalls, it’s a more mixed picture.

Significant numbers of respondents feel that a number of more administrative functions such as electoral registration, registration, managing car parks, housing benefits and council tax collection, don’t require democratic oversight at any level.  And for some of these services where respondents felt some kind of role for politicians was appropriate, a large number favoured it being at a national level.  There was also strong support for regional oversight of some services such as transport, emergency planning and waste disposal.

And when it comes to social care the survey suggests that most people continue to see an important role for national politicians.

My tentative conclusions?  Perhaps the debate about devolving power from central to local government tends to get stuck because:

• some things are better done at a regional level but in most parts of the country there are not regionally elected politicians
• belief in the need for national oversight of personal social services is strong and probably reflects our cultural belief in uniform outcomes (this was something the Lyons report highlighted that compared with other European states we seem to have less tolerance of regional variations)
• potentially councils could seek to move out of some of the more administrative functions they perform which might align with a stronger focus on councils as community leaders
• it would be interesting to run a similiar survey of elected representatives to see how their views match up

• The UK Government white paper responding to Calman is due, and appears from the pre-spin to be pretty positive.

The next question is how the Conservatives respond, given the very unenthusiastic signals sent by Tory front-benchers about the financial proposals.

UPDATE: The Scotland Office’s news statement on the white paper is here.  Jim Murphy’s statement is here.

FURTHER UPDATE: The white paper is now available here.

• Peter Hain is to appear before the National Assembly (his ‘Queen’s Speech’ appearance), following yesterday’s shenanigans and the knot in which Rhodri Morgan managed to tie himself, and Welsh Labour.

UPDATE: The headline is that a row didn’t break out in the Assembly, and that Hain said that (like David Cameron) he would not reject a request for a referendum if the Assembly were to make one.  More interesting to my ears, though, in the light of the white paper on Calman discussed above, was Hain’s promise of a Commons statement on Thursday responding to the Holtham Commission’s first report.

(For those  who managed to miss Tuesday’s row – and it moved very fast – the story has been best told on Betsan Powys’s blog: start here and follow it through the next 6 posts.  See also coverage from the Western Mail here and here.)

Having castigated David Cameron for failing to pay attention to constitutional issues and the division of powers enshrined by devolution, the Queen’s Speech requires a similar criticism.   Although there was some mention of devolution, including a general promise to ‘work closely’ with the devolved administrations, most of the bills were for England (or England and Wales) only – not that you’d know that from the Speech she delivered (available here).

Many of the commitments made in the Speech have devolution implications.  Key among them are:

• A commitment to ‘take forward’ recommendations from the Calman Commission.  As no bill is included for consideration in the new session, positive action looks highly unlikely this side of a UK General Election.  It will be for the new government – whatever its composition – to implement whatever comes out of the UK Government’s consideration of the Calman proposals.  (Interestingly, this was not included in the version posted on the No 10 website immediately after the speech – suggesting it was a late amendment, presumably following extensive argument within government.  It only appeared about 30 minutes after the speech was first posted.)
• A commitment to ‘devolve more powers’ to Wales, discussed further in a separate post.
• A commitment to ‘complete the devolution of policing and justice [in Northern Ireland] and to ensure its success’
• a commitment to legislate to ‘halve the deficit’ (over how long a period?), which is likely to have serious effects on any grant funding for the devolved administrations.
• A commitment to ‘publish draft legislation on proposals for a reformed second chamber of Parliament with a democratic mandate’.  Will that elected second chamber have a territorial dimension – a recommendation of the Wakeham Commission back in 2000?

In total, there are 15 bills, though two are draft bills so won’t need time on the floor of either chamber.  Three more are carried over from the last session, so presumably need less time than a wholly new bill but are priorities to be passed before Parliament is dissolved.  The full list is:

Bribery Bill

Children, Schools and Families Bill

Cluster Munitions (Prohibitions) Bill

Crime and Security Bill

Digital Economy Bill

Energy Bill

Financial Services Bill

Fiscal Responsibility Bill

Flood and Water Management Bill

Personal Care At Home Bill

Child Poverty Bill – carried over from the 2008-09 session

Equality Bill – carried over from the 2008-09 session

Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill – carried over from the 2008-09 session

International Development Bill – draft

House of Lords Reform Bill – draft

There aren’t many novelties here.  All but two of the bills were trailed in the Draft Legislative Programme the Government published before the summer.  Those two are the most blatantly political – the Fiscal Responsibility bill and the Personal Care at Home bill.  However, several of the draft bills mentioned in the Draft Legislative Programme – dull but important measures like the Antarctica, Immigration simplification, Civil law reform and Animal health responsibility and cost sharing bills – have been dropped.  And of course with limited Parliamentary time before a dissolution, it’s questionable whether any of the new bills will in fact get through both Houses.

Of the new bills, only one – the Cluster Munitions (Prohibitions) Bill – appears wholly free of devolution implications, as it appears to relate wholly to reserved/non-devolved matters.  The same may apply to the Energy, Financial Services and Digital Economy bills, though it’s common for bills on such matters to stray into ‘devolved’ areas and so raise questions of legislative competence motions for Scotland and perhaps consultation and framework powers for Wales.  The Bribery bill will almost certainly need a legislative competence motion, if it’s meant to apply across Great Britain.  The Crime and Security bill probably will too, as the outline given in the Draft Legislative Programme suggested that some provisions would apply in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and these appear to relate to matters like DNA registers which are not UK-wide.

The Flood and Water Management, Personal Care At Home and Children, Schools and Families bills (as well as the carried-over Child Poverty and Equality bills) all have clear devolution implications.  They raise the question of what sort of powers they will imply for the Welsh Assembly Government and National Assembly.  They may well also trigger ‘West Lothian’ questions if Scottish MPs vote on them – although they will all have financial implications for public spending in England, so have indirect effects for Scotland and Northern Ireland as well as England and Wales.

In constitutional terms, this is a pretty conservative Queen’s speech, in much the same vein as other Queen’s speeches for  the last few years.

UPDATE: The Scottish Government has issued a news release about the Queen’s Speech, available here.  The Minister for Parliamentary Business, Bruce Crawford, says that eight of the new bills will need legislative competence motions (as do all three carried-over bills, though these have already been lodged).  That’s the maximum number identified in the post above, though what exactly triggers the need for such a motion (or is treated as triggering a motion) depends heavily on the detailed content and drafting of a bill.

An interesting point about the Queen’s Speech is the way it has been used for some pretty blatant campaigning for the constitutional status quo in Wales. The speech itself was studiedly neutral, with only a commitment to ‘devolve more powers to Wales’.  However, the following statement appeared on the Number 10 website:

This Government introduced devolution and has steadily transferred an increasing number of law making powers to the National Assembly for Wales. In the three years since the Government of Wales Act (2006) powers have been devolved to the Assembly in 45 different areas, with many more in the pipeline. The Assembly is getting the powers it needs for the people of Wales. The fifth Session will continue our commitment to devolution and delivering for Wales.

This of course appears on the same day as the All Wales Convention report is published, criticising the clarity and comprehensibility of the present arrangements.  Peter Hain’s position  is, of course, now well known – he thinks that the present arrangements deliver devolved powers in an adequate way, and he’s taken advantage of this opportunity to repeat it.

Moreover, since the 2006 Act very carefully talks of general ‘fields’ in which matters are devolved, for particular specific ‘matters’, talking of devolving powers in 45 ‘areas’ is highly confusing – and it’s hard to resist concluding that that is deliberate.

Today’s Western Mail reports on an interview with Dame Gill Morgan, permanent secretary of the Welsh Assembly Government, published in the winter 2009 issue of the Institute of Welsh Affairs‘ magazine Agenda.  She criticises arrogant and patronising attitudes in Whitehall, toward the Assembly Government and indeed toward Welsh devolution more generally.  Dame Gill explains that the recently-completed reorganisation of the Assembly Government was designed to counter this, by making it clearer who in Wales was the opposite number of whom in Whitehall.

This isn’t new in itself; these attitudes have been common in Whitehall since 1999, if not earlier.  (The Welsh Office didn’t stand highly in Whitehall esteem.) Nor is Wales an exception here – the Scottish Government/Executive has long suffered from similar behaviour, though to a lesser extent. Speaking out in this way will come as quite a shock to many UK Government officials, though.  It may be just the sort of shock needed to drive home the fact that Wales and Scotland are different, and that the informality of the present arrangements has relied too heavily on shared attitudes and mutual goodwill which has been persistently undermined at the devolved end.  Any decentralised system needs mutual respect from those involved in intergovernmental relations; the UK Government’s shortcomings in this area have ramifications for constitutional matters, not just day-to-day policy making.

Later this week the All Wales Convention will publish its report, widely expected to argue in favour of a move to primary legislative powers for Wales – by bringing Part 4 of the Government of Wales Act 2006 into force.  The key players in this debate will be from Wales: the Assembly Government, the National Assembly, the political parties in Wales, the Secretary of State, Welsh MPs, and ultimately the Welsh electorate.  But there are strong reasons for those concerned with the UK level of government to favour a ‘yes’ vote in a referendum too.

The most powerful political factors apply to a Conservative rather than a Labour government – we’ve seen how the present system, deeply flawed as it is, can be made to work by a Labour UK Government, and it has strong defenders within Labour (Peter Hain, in his Cardiff speech, being only the most public).  But the logic of the situation is quite different if the Conservatives are in office in London.  It’s clear that the political preferences of Welsh voters are some way away from those in England, wanting more social-democratic policies and solutions than English voters do.  ‘Progressive universalism’ is a phrase with powerful appeal in Wales, no matter who is First Minister or which parties are in government, and even if its meaning is unclear.  Devolution means that politically it’s very hard for them to impose their will on Wales in the way that John Redwood or even Nicholas Edwards did as Secretaries of State.  If they try, they forfeit democratic legitimacy in a way that would be especially damaging now that Wales is a happy hunting ground for Tory seats for both Westminster and Cardiff Bay.

Institutionally, the present situation means that policy for England and Wales is entangled so that what’s done in England has an effect on Wales. Take a bill on something like health care reform; even a decision to exclude framework powers for Wales from a bill like that making policy in England requires a set of political decisions which, thanks to Parliamentary processes, will become highly public.  Party-political differences will magnify that.  What’s at present a largely private process of bargaining will become much more public, and much more the subject of contention and dispute.  How LCOs might work if each one was seriously disputed is pretty clear in a constitutional sense (they wouldn’t get passed), but has unclear and very grave political implications.  Would it boost the standing of Plaid Cymru and Welsh Labour (assuming they’re still in government)?  What would Conservative MPs do, and how would their party colleagues in the Assembly respond?  What about Welsh Labour MPs?  It’s hard to see how anyone would gain.  The only certainty in that is that this immobility would further damage the standing of politicians and politics in general.

Implementing Part 4 of the 2006 Act offers a way around these problems, by decoupling policy in England and Wales and creating a degree of political insulation for a Conservative UK Government.  It lets Wales be social-democratic, rather than making the Tories seek to micro-manage the policies of a distinct elected legislature.  And it also minimises the scope for embarrassment to flow back across Offa’s Dyke, as Welsh choices are clearly both Welsh and democratic.  In such circumstances, a Conservative UK Government can show how tolerant of pluralism and diversity it is.  (As an aside, what a devolved government and legislature can do with that autonomy is pretty limited even with the powers Part 4 offers, particularly if the Assembly remains financed by a block grant from Westminster. If expectations of a very tough public spending regime do materialise, that provides a very effective way of getting Wales to make cuts that London wouldn’t dare impose otherwise.)

None of this will be news in Conservative Central Office.  It clearly underlies David Cameron’s recent decision to support a request for a referendum if the National Assembly makes one, even if the way that’s been presented to the public is slightly different.

An added advantage for Tories is that it helps to clear the way to reducing Wales’s over-representation at Westminster.  Conservative ambitions to reduce the size of Westminster by at least 10 per cent (which is 65 MPs, making a house of 581, though there’s been talk of an even small House of Commons) are clear.  Reducing Welsh over-representation to parity with England, which has already happened for Scotland, is much easier if Wales possesses an extensive degree of autonomy.  (There is a knock-on problem for the size of the National Assembly, though, discussed here.)

For Labour, the advantage is that it offers a way to protect a particular sort of social democracy that its Welsh voters clearly prize – and think they already have.  If it turns out that the legacy of 12 or 13 years of Labour rule is to weaken that sort of policy, which it was thought to have been strengthened, it won’t do Labour any good either.

Political insulation is not the only attraction of primary legislative powers, however.  Devolution in the UK is deeply asymmetric, meaning different things in different parts of the UK.  Managing the implications of that asymmetry is hugely difficult within the government machine in Whitehall, and all my research suggests that there are huge difficulties in dealing with it.  (See Devolution and Power, particularly chapter 8; or my reports on health or higher education.)  While there are plenty of instances of good practice and getting things right, there are also a large number of examples of getting it wrong; the picture is at best inconsistent and patchy.  This creates particular problems for Wales, which is the ‘outlier’ in the sense that it’s the form of devolution least like what happens in the other devolved territories.  Even those broadly supportive of the status quo have had to acknowledge this, and the wider political and constitutional nature of what are often administrative mistakes.  Examples abound in the reports that have come from the Commons Welsh Affairs Committee’s large inquiry into Cross-Border Public Services for Wales.  These problems are acquiring increasing political salience, but fixing them without constitutional change is going to be very hard indeed – it requires the sort of thorough-going change that Whitehall has deliberately avoided over the last decade, despite a generally supportive environment for such changes.

Part 4 does not offer ‘Scottish-type’ powers, but it’s closer to them.  It reduces the need for constant liaison with Whitehall, and so the danger of Whitehall misunderstanding how Wales and Welsh devolution work.  It means that the UK moves closer to having a single template for devolved government, which is adjusted to reflect particular circumstances in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.  That will make devolved government easier not just for the general public to understand, but also politicians and civil servants.  From a Whitehall point of view, constitutional change is probably easier to handle than a cumbersome set of managerial changes (which will come when Whitehall faces a set of hugely difficult challenges in other fields).  Part 4 fixes a lot of problems for the centre, whatever its impact in Wales.

DANNII Minogue has beaten sprawl-comers to be named Ultimate TV Personality of the Year.

The Aussie, 38, pipped X Factor rival Cheryl Cole, 26, to win the title at Cosmopolitan magazine’s annual bash last night.

Dannii said she felt “euphoric” after picking up the award at Banqueting House in London’s Whitehall.

XposureAnd she thanked boyfriend Kris Smith, saying: “When you’re having a good time at work and in your love life, I guess it shows on your face.”

She also said she was “amazed” at her good fortune after enduring some “difficult situations last year” amid stories of a rivalry with Cheryl, a claim she denies.

Her older sister Kylie, 41 – who has helped mentor Dannii’s acts this year – said: “I’m so proud of my sister. She has worked really hard and is shining right now.

“Doing The X Factor with her this year made me appreciate how hard her job is, and how great she is at it.”

Other stars to pick up Women of the Year awards included Holly Willoughby, who was named Ultimate TV Presenter, while Gavin and Stacey star Ruth Jones picked up the Ultimate Funny Woman crown. The awards were picked by a panel including Fearne Cotton and Alesha Dixon.

Source

Mike Russell used his speech at the Constitution Unit on Monday night formally to launch the Scottish Government’s response to the Calman Commission’s report.  The response is available here, and a press release summarising Russell’s speech is here. A video podcast will be available on the Constitution Unit’s website, probably early next week.

The response is largely unsurprising.  The Scottish Government is critical of the narrowness of remit of the Commission because of its refusal to consider independence, and of the limited scope of its recommendations for fiscal autonomy.  It is more welcoming of its practical proposals to extend the scope of devolved powers, limited as they are.  It does not welcome the small number of cases where the Commission recommended ‘un-devolving’ powers and returning matters such as the definitions of ‘charity’ and ‘charitable purpose’, or regulation of some health professions.  There is a cautious welcome for proposals to enable adaptation of Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit to Scottish circumstances.

Perhaps more interesting than what the Scottish Government has said is the fact that it has bothered to say it.  The Calman Commission, after all, reported to the bodies that set it up – the UK Government and the Scottish Parliament.  This response is a convenient way for the Scottish Government to take the debate forward and to identify more clearly areas of disagreement between the Scottish Government and the Commission.  However, that cautious welcome may also increase the perception in unionist circles, particularly in London, that any embrace of the Calman recommendations is simply a further concession to ‘the Nats’ and therefore to be resisted.  (Given the strength of support in Scotland for more devolution not less, that position is wrong and indeed counterproductive, but it has a lot of supporters on both Conservative and Labour sides of the divide in London.)

Moreover, the Scottish Government has published its response ahead of the UK Government’s formal response, promised for this autumn. The UK Government has similarly yet to respond to the report of the Lords Select Committee on the Barnett Formula (published in July) or the Justice Committee’s report on Devolution: A Decade On (published in May).  There’s normally a two-month deadline for such responses, so the Government is running seriously late on both.  The smaller government has been able to outpace a larger one by quite a margin.

今日11月8日はRemembrance Sunday（休戦記念日曜日）、Remembrance Day（リメンバランス・デー／戦没者追悼記念日）の記念式典が行われた。Poppy Day（ポピーの日）、Armistice Day（第一次大戦の休戦記念日）、Veterans Day（退役軍人の日）とも呼ばれるRemembrance Dayは、第一次世界大戦とその後の戦争の死者を追悼する日で、1918年11月11日に連合国とドイツ帝国の間で休戦協定が締結されたことに因み、11月11日と定められている。当日11月11日にも2分間の黙祷が捧げられるが、通常、Remembrance Sundayと呼ばれる11月の第2週目の日曜日に、ロンドンのWhitehall（ホワイトホール）にあるCenotaph（慰霊碑）前で、王室関係者や政府要人が参加して行われる国の追悼式典のほか、各地の戦争記念碑（war memorials）で慰霊祭が行われる。

今日の追悼式典では、小雨まじりの曇り空の中、20分の宗教儀式の始めに、コモンウェルス（イギリス連邦）高官、首相、世界の宗教代表、軍隊のリーダーたちが見守る中、エリザベス女王を筆頭にポピーの花輪が次々と捧げられた。そして午前11時に2分間の黙祷。その後7500人もの退役軍人と1600人の一般人が、慰霊碑前でパレードを行った。→BBCニュース

この時期、イギリスでは、胸に紙製の赤いポピーの花をつけている人を多く見かける。これは、1921年にRoyal British Legion（英国在郷軍人会）が、戦没者への募金を集めるために赤いポピーを売ったのが始まりで、第一次世界大戦の激戦地・西部戦線（フランドル戦線）のあった、フランダース地方に多く生えている赤い芥子の花（フランダース・ポピー）に由来しており、赤い色は戦争で流された血を意味する。この紙製のポピーは、退役軍人によって作られており、英国在郷軍人会の名の下で、街角での募金活動やスーパーなどの店頭で販売され、収益は退役軍人のサポートに当てられる。上の写真はオックスフォード・サーカスの街角での募金活動。下の写真は、Angel（エンジェル）の街角で、赤いタータンチェックのキルトに身を包んで、道行く人と楽しそうに話しながら募金活動していたおじいさんをスーパーで発見、こっそり撮影させていただきました。

Today is Remembrance Sunday and the Remembrance Day national commemoration was held in London’s Whitehall. The remembrance day, also known as Poppy Day, Armistice Day (the event it commemorates) or Veterans Day, is a day to commemorate the sacrifices of members of the armed forces and of civilians in times of wars since the First World War. It is observed on 11 November to recall the end of World War I on that date in 1918, when German signed the Armistice. Although two minutes of silence are observed on 11 November itself, but on Remembrance Sunday (the second Sunday of November), ceremonies are held at local war memorials nationwide, and the national commemoration is held at Cenotaph in Whitehall to remember those men and women who have died in action serving their country.

Under the gray sky at the this year’s national commemoration in Whitehall, the Queen Elizabeth laid the first wreath of poppy flowers at the start of a 20-minute religious service, in front of the prime minister, military leaders, representatives of the world’s religions, and Commonwealth representatives. After two-minute silence at 11 am, 7,500 ex-service personnel and 1,600 civilians marched past the Cenotaph. →BBC news

Around the Remembrance Day, you see many people wearing red poppy flower made of paper, as a sign of remembrance. The poppy emblem was chosen because of the poppies (Flanders poppy) that bloomed across one of the worst battlefields of Flanders in World War I, with their red color which is an appropriate symbol for the bloodshed of trench warfare. This artificial poppies are made by veterans and are sold on behalf of the Royal British Legion on the street by volunteers or at the stores. The sale go towards supporting former soldiers. The photo above is the fund raising at the junction of Oxford Circus. The photo below is the old gentleman in red tartan kilt, who sold the poppies at the street corner of Angel and enjoyed chatting with a passerby. I happened to have a chance to take a picture of him (secretly) at the Waitrose supermarket.

Story from the Daily Mail. (H/T Weasel Zippers via ECM)

Excerpt:

Four in ten households in some parts of the country have their rent paid for by the state, Whitehall figures revealed yesterday.

They showed, on average, one in five homes is supported by housing benefit, the taxpayer handout which covers the rent for those on low incomes.

And in London, the figures revealed nearly a quarter of households are now reliant on the benefit.

The figures, disclosed in the Department of Work and Pensions’ spending tables, also show that in the North-East, the North-West and Scotland around one in four receive the benefit.

The payout, which was first introduced in 1992 to bring clarity to state rent payments, cost £14.7billion when Labour came to power in 1997.

That figure has since risen by 18 per cent to £17.4billion and is expected to reach almost £21billion next year.

I’m currently reading Theodore Dalrymple’s “Life at the Bottom”, which describes how the UK government promotes irresponsibility and immorality among the poor. I think we really need to be careful about moving in the same direction as the British. Things don’t seem to be working out to well for them. They seem to believe in taxing people who work hard and live morally in order to reward the most irresponsible people in society.

One question that David Cameron will have to resolve on his first day as Prime Minister (assuming he wins the UK general election) is what to do about the representation of Scotland and Wales (and maybe later Northern Ireland) in the UK Government.  Even after devolution in 1999, the offices of Secretary of State for Wales and Scotland were left intact.  The Scottish Secretary had famously little to do – remember Helen Liddell’s daytime French lessons? – and the Wales one not an awful lot more.  The political sensitivities of abolishing the posts outright were such that neither Tony Blair nor Gordon Brown took the opportunity at numerous reshuffles, despite repeated chances to do so.  In doing so, they probably went against internal civil service advice; they certainly went against various outside recommendations, including the Lords Constitution Committee (which I advised).

Instead, they tried to cope with the diminished role in various ways.  One was to combine it with other jobs – Douglas Alexander and Alistair Darling both doubled Scotland with Transport, Des Browne with Defence, while Peter Hain combined being Welsh Secretary with representing the UK Government on the European Constitutional Convention, then being Northern Ireland Secretary and Work and Pensions Secretary. Some of these combinations worked better than others.  In reality, much of the more routine work – including most of the Parliamentary and legislative business – falls to the junior minister in the Scotland and Wales Offices.

The key to the Secretary of State’s role is doing a small amount of work with great effect.  Underlying the understanding of what the role involves that has prevailed since 1999 is the need for a politician with weight both in Scotland or Wales and around the Cabinet table, to intervene when important Scottish or Welsh interests are in danger of being overlooked.  At that point, she or he needs to be able to convince their colleagues of the need to ensure Scottish/Welsh concerns are taken into account, but for most of the time it’s holding a watching brief and setting a general strategic direction for officials to follow.  For that, it has helped if the Secretary of State has a clear plan for how they think relations between ‘their’ devolved administration and the UK Government should work.

As the Scottish or Welsh interests involved are usually about domestic policy, what’s needed is someone who is already on the main domestic policy Cabinet committees (or more to the point, reading those committees’ papers) to do the job.  That’s part of the reason why Des Browne found it hard to get a grip – there’s practically no overlap between the domestic and security/foreign policy committees.  But the heavy hitter hasn’t actually had much to do; even Welsh Secretaries have usually committed only 10-15 per cent of their time to the job, despite a more complex constitutional relationship with the UK institutions than Scotland, and in particular much more legislation to get through Parliament.

Since 2007 first the Scottish, then the Welsh Secretary have become ‘full-time’ posts.  Perhaps work has expanded to fill the time available, in accordance with Parkinson’s Law.  Certainly there has been much activity on the constitutional front in Scotland, after what one comment on this blog calls a ‘phoney war’ for the first eight years.  But a lot of what each now does is a campaigning job – in principle, for the UK Government, though when dealing with an SNP government in Scotland it’s hard for it not to assume a clear party-political dimension as well.

The choice Cameron will have to make is whether to keep the separate Secretaries of State or combine them more structurally in some way.  Keeping them will appease certain Scottish and Welsh interests, though not the Scottish Government (which has been calling for abolition of the Scotland Office practically since it came to office) – so it would run contrary to the ‘respect’ agenda.  As there isn’t that much business for such a Secretary of State to do, keeping such a minister would be at odds with the Tories’ general commitment to slim down government (and Parliament).  But there’s also the question of personnel.  With, probably, only a small handful of MPs from Scotland, and more but inexperienced ones from Wales, keeping the Secretaries of State would gravely limit the possibilities open to Cameron in making or changing his Cabinet.  Finding suitable MPs is clearly problematic; the Herald recently reported that a Secretary of State for Scotland might be a Conservative MSP, who would receive a peerage and sit in the House of Lords, rather than the party’s sole current Scottish MP.  Another idea doing the rounds is to appoint an MP of Scottish origin sitting for an English seat, but that would not go down well in Scotland.  (Would an MSP give up his or her seat at Holyrood?  Given the general commitment to abolishing dual mandates, one would expect so.  If not, there could be some interesting debates at Holyrood.  But would it be appropriate for a member of the Lords to be Secretary of State, given the criticisms of Peter Mandelson for doing that?  If this is the path the Conservatives want to go down, they need to think through such issues.)

So what to do?  A single Secretary of State for all devolution-related issues would solve a number of problems.  It would give the Prime Minister greater flexibility, and a wider pool of MPs to choose from. It would reduce the problem of a lack of focus in Whitehall – where not just the Scottish and Welsh Secretaries, but the Justice Secretary also and the Prime Minister have direct interests in devolution issues.  The job would probably take about half the time of a senior minister (assuming she or he had support from junior ministers), so it would be a good post for a senior figure who combined it with other cross-governmental responsibilities.  Junior ministers could deal with specifically Scottish, Welsh or even Northern Ireland issues.  As each set of devolution arrangements is quite different from the others, there are strong practical reasons for that.  The essential point is that in overall charge is a senior minister with a clear responsibility for devolution, who is untrammelled by departmental functions.

If there were to be a single department supporting that Secretary of State, what form should it take?  The best option is probably still that recommended by the Lords Constitution Committee – a separate ‘department for the nations and regions’ or ‘for the Union’.  That could bring together the various offices and groups of officials presently scattered across government.  On the official side, there are not just the Scotland and Wales Offices to take into account, but also separate teams in the Ministry of Justice and the Economic & Domestic Affairs Secretariat of Cabinet Office. It would be a very small department; the Scotland Office had 65 staff in 2009, the Wales Office 56, and there are about a dozen in MoJ and Cabinet Office combined, so it would have about 130-140 people.

There are hazards in brigading such an office with other departments – certainly, the way the Scotland and Wales Offices have been incorporated since 2003 in the Department for Constitutional Affairs and now Ministry of Justice has not broken down the barriers to a general view of territorial issues.  One possibility would be incorporation with Cabinet Office, which might be resisted as it involves work that is different to much of the rest of its work supporting Cabinet and its committees.  A parallel, though, is perhaps the Office of Parliamentary Counsel, which has only 85 staff, forms part of Cabinet Office, but whose head has own Permanent Secretary rank. That would resemble what happens in Canada, where the federal government’s Intergovernmental Affairs Office has its own Cabinet minister but is part of the Privy Council Office, which works to the Prime Minister.

Linking devolution to other departments with policy responsibilities is more problematic.  Making it part of an engorged Department for Communities and Local Government, for example (as suggested by IPPR a couple of years ago), would risk crowding out one set of complex but strategic issues with the minutiae and detailed mechanisms (of inspection, targetry and so forth) commonly associated with English local government. Departmental cultures and policy techniques tend to spread across the whole of a department, but those used for local government are inimical to building and maintaining good relations with the devolved institutions or handling the constitutional issues devolution now presents. And symbolically it would be very dangerous, as it would imply that devolved government in Scotland and Wales was on the same footing, and of the same importance, as an English district council.

Another option would be incorporation with the Ministry of Justice, which is sort-of what happens now.  There is more in common with the MoJ than other departments, given the general constitutional remit of that department – although the MoJ’s operational responsibilities for (English and Welsh) courts and prisons, and their legal system, might hinder that.  The essential point is to have devolution at or near the centre of government. On that level, MoJ is a better home for the official side as it’s more of a ‘central’ department than CLG, though it’s far from perfect.

This is an area where Labour Prime Ministers ducked a radical step, preferring to stick with what was known and comfortable even if it had outlived its purpose.  Cameron could show the boldness of his approach to managing government by doing something Labour didn’t dare to.

I liked how the light and dark were contrasted in this photo with the antiques backlit…

I think I promised not to post this photo of Wendy in her pajamas but even though it is out of focus…it truly depicts the hard work of a landowner one minute you think you have a guest and can relax with a morning cup of coffee and the next moment you are feeding hay to the animals not even taking the time to get dressed…then its throw a load in the laundry get dressed and finish painting the outside of the house before winter hits…hard. She did get the house painted outside but only finished by a day or two before a hard freeze came.

I’m a REAL photographer in that way….never put down the camera to join in the work!! God forbid you injure yourself don’t expect any help from me until I’m done taking a picture of your pain!!!

Angels at the fence…no trespassing…..

Angel disguised as a daredevil!!!

I loved this empty chair on the lawn…I can quite imagine it being used by the unidentified guest.

Of course being the fairly confirmed bachelorette I grab my camera and run outside…my friend Wendy being the true hero of the story makes coffee, gets her little angels up…makes breakfast….gets their teeth brushed….their clothes on…lunches packed….back packs and homework and library books due….has to find their shoes….I HIDE OUTSIDE!! Wendy then walks with the little angels to the top of the driveway to see them off returning to a house being remodeled and 4 loads of laundry a day!!

I did do the dishes…

This is my friend Wendy (we went to school from kindergarten to graduation) and her 3 angels…who were so kind to provide me with good food, good laughs and a pretty princess bed!!

One of the questions apparently put to Peter Hain after his lecture at Cardiff University on Thursday was that a referendum about something other than bringing Part 4 of the 2006 Act into force.  Hain apparently replied that this might be ‘looked at’.  (I wasn’t there and so am relying on second-hand reports of the discussion.)  Part 4 of the Act provides for the Assembly to have ‘primary legislative powers’ over 20 specified fields, set out in Schedule 7 to the Act, including such matters as health, education, local government or the Welsh language.

It’s worth being very clear about this.  A referendum – any referendum – requires statutory authority to be held.  The 2006 Act provides for a referendum on whether Part 4 should come into effect or not.  (For those interested, it’s set out in sections 103-5 of the Act.) It doesn’t provide authority for a referendum on any other matter.  While the Secretary of State has power to decide the wording of the question to be put in a referendum, the only issue at stake is ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to Part 4.  Wider powers for the Assembly will not be on the agenda then, nor will be increasing the size of the Assembly, nor abolishing it, nor any idea of independence.

It might be appropriate to hold a referendum on some of those.  Given that establishment of the Assembly was approved by a referendum in 1997, abolishing it would seem to need wider approval.  It’s hard to see how Wales might, hypothetically, become independent without at least one referendum.  (I’ll be writing in due course about referendums about Scottish independence.)  But the only referendum that can be held under the 2006 Act is about Part 4.

Any other subject for a referendum would require specific statutory authority – a new Act of Parliament.  So would any other question.  That applies to another idea aired by Hain, of going back to the situation before 2007.  That would not need a referendum, but it would need a new Act of Parliament.  And that means finding Parliamentary time for it, among many other priorities at Westminster.  Peter Hain will remember only too well how tricky it was to get a slot for the 2006 Act – securing one was a major achievement in itself.  Does he really want to seek another one to unpick his handiwork?

Although the All Wales Convention is not due to publish its report for nearly three weeks, Peter Hain has in effect already given his response. In his lecture at the Wales Governance Centre at Cardiff University, he argues that Wales already is getting meaningful (and adequate) legislative powers.  The text of his speech is here, and the Wales Office’s press release is here. It’s doubtful that many Assembly Members will share such a sanguine view of the status quo.

Discussion of this will follow later. But it’s not the first time Hain has tried preemptively to set the terms of debate about Welsh devolution.  He did so when giving ‘evidence’ to the Richard Commission in 2004, telling the Commission that the standard for deciding whether constitutional change was appropriate was whether it improved public services in Wales. The Commission then paid little heed to that criterion, and instead produced the clearest and fullest blueprint there has been for the development of devolution in Wales.

Whitehall is a little town about 17 miles from Butte. It is considered the “banana belt” it is supposedly much warmer there. On this day the temperature had dropped from the  high 70’s to the low 30’s but the walk warmed me up

As I said Whitehall is a town that is quite small and with a one sided main street, the other side has the train tracks…

The poor petunias where huddled together from the cold

The train tracks

This is a very cute quilt store with a nice selection of fabrics for such a small town. I loved it and stayed awhile trying to pick out some fabrics. I try to buy most of my fabrics from the little independent store owners but sometimes resort to shopping at Jo-Anns.

And this little coffee shop was a God send! Its not really a gallery or gift shop but the man who owns it frames pictures and has an espresso bar with some comfortable chairs…and a wood stove that was burning!!

Well I’m not a poker player or a loose woman but they should still beware….

Wheat made the plantation pay. This was big business, with a good year’s harvest producing from 1,200 bushels (1790) to 1,382 bushels (1802). Prices paid for wheat varied, but in the years around 1790 the Chews received an average of £0/8/9 (0 pounds, eight shillings, nine pence) per bushel, resulting in gross income in the area of £400 to £500.

A view of the dock at Whitehall. This is where the wheat would be shipped off after harvest.

The farm produced most of its own food, but it did need to be supplied with salt, coffee, rum, and numerous other articles and services. The Chews also bought and provided the enslaved peoples’ shoes and clothing. Add to this state taxes, medical bills and the overseer’s share of the wheat, and about £100 of the gross profits disappear.

Bad weather was a constant threat to the profitability of the crops, particularly at harvest time, as wet or moldy grain was not saleable. Additionally, in December of 1797 a boat laden with wood and corn sank on the way to Philadelphia, and in 1780 the Delaware government imposed a property tax of £260 to support the war effort, wiping out much of the farm’s profit for the year.

So what did £300-£400 mean to the Chews? With a full exploration of the family’s finances, a rough idea of Whitehall’s income versus the Chew’s spending is attainable. In 1790, Whitehall sent 926 bushels of wheat to market which netted £366/16/9. Plantation expenses for 1790 are missing, but rarely topped £60 in a year. So let’s estimate £310 income from Whitehall in 1790.

The Whitehall Plantation fields, where approximately 60 enslaved children and workers cultivated wheat.

Spending can be estimated by digging into the receipt books, which both Benjamin Chew and Benjamin Chew Jr. carried with them. During 1790 the elder Benjamin Chew laid out £534/8/7, almost half of which was for a purchase of bills of exchange, presumably for payment of a foreign debt. His son netted nearly £395/9/7. Together they spent £989/19/0, which means that just over 31% of their cash outlay for the year was covered by Whitehall’s income.

Today Britain’s postal workers are going out on a 24 hour strike in protest about pay, working conditions and plans to transform (in other words privatise) the service. Naturally enough it is front page news and will no doubt be covered by all the national news bulletins. Public opinion does not seem as divided as might be expected in such circumstances as the majority of people seem to feel that the strike is unlawful, disloyal, almost unnatural somehow.

The strike has been ordered by the Communication Worker’s Union, which automatically means there is not actually anything illegal about it. If talks between an organisation and the representative union of that organisation’s workers do not reach agreement it is the right of the union to order a walkout as a sort of last-ditch attempt to make themselves heard. Workers, it must be remembered, are on much smaller scale salaries than the CEOs and upper scale management who make decisions concerning their industry and their minions entire working future. When talking fails to impress the workers’ needs upon the fat cats, should they then just lie down and meekly accept whatever corporate decisions are being made? Doesn’t every worker have the right to withdraw their labour if they feel they are being ridden roughshod on and badly paid?

In the earliest days of the Industrial Revolution workers were worked to death by unscrupulous factory owners. Over the course of the nineteenth century working conditions were gradually improved as fledgling unions began to be formed. At first they had to fight to be legally recognised as legitimate voices of the workers, not because working people in Britain denied them that status but because the industrialists resisted any unifying structure amongst the workers which would force them to improve conditions and therefore eat into their own profits. By the beginning of the twentieth century unions were universally recognised as the representative voice of the working person.

Of course there have been times when specific unions have been under the control of fairly unscrupulous persons themselves but on the whole unions have been there to ensure fair working conditions and decent levels of pay for workers whenever corporations have tried to keep profits high by keeping wages low. Enter Margaret Thatcher and the coal industry in the mid nineteen eighties. The leader of the National Union of Mineworkers at that time was Arthur Scargill, unloved by Conservatives and moderate Labour supporters alike because of his radical Socialist politics and his use of illegal flying pickets during the Miner’s strike. More than anyone, Scargill damaged the reputation of unions in this country because of his underhand and often aggressive strike tactics. Some might argue that, as the coal industry was facing wholesale closure in the face of Thatcherite policies, they had no option but to take the fight to the enemy. Others say that the industry would have died of its own accord anyway, with little help from Thatcher and that Scargill and his followers were tilting at windmills.

Whatever the truth of the matter, the illegality of Scargill’s tactics and the widespread media obsession with the conflict – the closest we’d come to civil war in three centuries, some observers called it – gave the government enough public support for them to usher in various measures which crippled the unions as a political force in this country. Civil servants in Whitehall were no longer allowed to join unions. If they did so they could lose their job! And across the country measures were taken, union influence curbed and controlled so that the unions of Britain were effectively castrated. The only voices still loudly attempting to champion worker’s rights were the voices of extremist groups such as the Socialist Worker’s Party, whose rhetoric and aggression provided ample evidence for the case against trades unions altogether.

In recent years some unions have remembered that the people they are answerable to are not politicians but the workers they represent. Strike action has once again become part of the process, usually as a threat when unions feel workers are being unfairly treated. But the lack of widespread support for the postal workers proves that Thatcher’s legacy thrives to this day, proves that the majority of people in this country seem to believe strike action is somehow unethical. The ones complaining most loudly are those who claim their businesses or aspects of their personal life depend upon the delivery of the mail. All I can think is, if a daily mail delivery is so important to them they ought to support the postal workers in their fight for better working conditions and improved pay. The alternative is to see the Royal Mail wither and die, much like the coal industry did twenty odd years ago. Deliveries will then be handled solely by private companies and anyone who believes that private industry can deliver a better service than Royal Mail has not been paying attention to the after-effects of privatisation on other key service industries in Britain over the past three decades. British Gas, for example, have increased their profits by hiking up their prices again and again but can anyone truthfully say the service they provide is superior to the one they offered before privatisation?

Those arguing that the postal workers ought to be grateful to have a job in today’s climate should perhaps consider the unsociable hours and poor pay most of those postal employees experience in order to make sure that letters and parcels arrive on your doorstep every day. Would the complainers want to do the job for the same rewards currently offered to Royal Mail frontliners? The simple fact of the matter is, in this country we do not pay those at the front line of vital service industries enough – nurses, firemen, the police, schoolteachers are all undervalued and underpaid while upper management types, bank directors, stock brokers and the like award themselves huge bonuses on a whim, on top of the disproportionately high salaries they receive in the first place..

The future of privatisation?

That it should be a Labour government overseeing what are potentially the last days of nationalised postal services is ironic in the extreme, given that they were once the party most dedicated to ensuring workers’ rights were at the forefront of British politics. Just more proof that Thatcherite politics did not end with the last Conservative government twelve years ago. So personally I am rooting for those men and women who have taken strike action today, if only because a successful outcome for them would prove that the working classes still have a voice in this country, and that some unions still possess a pair of testicles

I piled off to London yesterday morning looking forward to a busy day of meeting new people and old friends , meeting with a garment printers for promotional stuff for this blog and having a general potter about doing my own thing…

Invites were made to various people and for the most part, the people I wanted to meet were unavailable and the rest of the day was more a question of business, need and total indulgence.

In a little over 2hrs the TWBrit Car of Character (CofC) delivered me to Ealing and after paying only £1 per hour for parking , I was very pleased to find the car park was in very close proximity to Ealing Broadway tube station.

Making reasonable time to Green Park, I strolled through the park to The Mall. A quick picture of part of Buckingham Crib and on to the ICA and the Tuttle Club.

The Tuttle Club; To be honest, I really wasn’t sure what to expect. The Café area is quite small and was quite busy. Getting a well needed coffee I spoke to a couple of guys, this ended really in a serious conversation about the merits and pitfalls of the new Stargate Universe which ended in ‘none’ and ‘many’ respectively. After they moved away, I really didn’t know what to do or who to talk to as everyone was heavily engrossed in conversations and pawing their laptops. After a few minutes  I simply finished my coffee and left.
I don’t know what conclusions I have of Tuttle,  The people I met were nice enough, but I can’t say it was the most welcoming environment or anything really. But at the same time, I’m not so sure what contribution I could have made, so I don’t think I shall be returning.

Coming back out into the Mall, I strolled across to Horse Guards Parade where the Blues and Royals seemed to be facing off as ever and then walked through to Whitehall, I stopped and took a pic of the memorial to the women of WW2 and Downing street before making to Parliament.

As time progressed, it was back on the underground and off to my London home from home and a complete shock – Denmark Street aka Tin Pan Alley.
Getting off the tube at Tottenham Court  Road, I really wasn’t prepared to see so many shops completely closed down and to be honest – the ones that had remained open seemed to have the some seriously over priced guitars!! One shop (Rose Morris) actually had the Taylor acoustic guitar I most covert – but instead of it being price at £3500 – it was priced at £4319! I was not impressed!!
Then it was time to step into the 12 bar café were I was due to meet my old buddy Mark Bickmore aka Sonic. The thing was, the 12 bar café had changed and to be brutally honest – it is for the worse. When Mark turned up, we simply legged it to a Starbucks instead.
After a bite to eat and copious consumption of what Starbucks attempts to call coffee, we went back to try to find a guitar I even wanted to have a play of – yet sadly, there were none!
One guitar I truly wanted to play was the new-ish Taylor Solidbody, yet no one had one. Rose Morris said they had two, but had so much trouble selling them that they had to reduce the price to the point they made no money by the time they did sell – as such they’re not looking to restock them.
In fairness to Taylor, the guys praised the playability of them – even stating that they hadn’t known anything like them, especially with regards to the strings relation to the fret board.
Mark and I spent a while catching up, then it was back the work of the day, Mark returning to work and myself to the East End to meet with Indigo printing.
After the meeting I did a few other things before finally returning to Ealing Broadway and setting off towards Oxford to visit both my mother and sister.

Sadly a long day that bore no fruit at all. What did go well was the TWBrit  CofC which preformed admirably - so much so, it actually impressed me… If the question was ‘Did I enjoy myself?’ then the answer would be a resounding YES!!

This post is dedicated to all the kids who live in some shitty place like Lancaster or Whitehall. Why don’t you make finding a lame, 15-to-20-hour-a-week job your full-time job and move to Columbus?

(More naked Neuman pictures pending permission by our censor)