Scottish MPs must not be banned from voting in the House of Commons on major issues, including income tax rates, said former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown.
Prime minister David Cameron, in the wake of the Scottish referendum result, said demands in England for “English votes for English laws” had to be heeded. This plan to exclude Scottish MPs from votes on English laws infuriated Mr Brown and followed a pledge signed by Mr Cameron, Labour’s Ed Miliband and Liberal Democrats’ Nick Clegg before the referendum that guaranteed Scotland greater devolution.
“To be clear: in my discussions prior to the referendum, no party leader ever suggested that any further caveats, conditions or even considerations would be introduced then or later into the vow,” said Mr Brown. “In my view a vow, once written, cannot be casually rewritten or revised,” he said in a letter to his constituency organisation in Kirkcaldy.
While he had no doubt the extra powers promised would come, “the question is whether we will secure our timetable for devolution with or without strings attached”.
Mr Brown, going on the offensive against the Scottish National Party (SNP), urged 100,000 Scots to sign a petition demanding that the pre-referendum vow signed by Britain’s party leaders is honoured.
While “sympathetic” to English demands, Mr Brown said he believed “a consensual, commonsense solution can be found that meets the needs and aspirations of each nation”. However, the “central constitutional fact that England represents 84 per cent of the UK, Scotland 8 per cent, Wales 5 per cent and Northern Ireland 4 per cent” cannot be ignored, he said.
Tory trap Mr Cameron’s post-referendum manoeuvrings
pose a danger to Labour, which has 41 of Scotland’s 59 MPs, in that it might not be able to form a Commons majority, if its role is reduced. Mr Brown said Scotland should “not fall into the Tory trap” of accepting that the Holyrood parliament controls all Scottish income tax because that would reduce Scotland’s voice in the Commons.
“Even under the most radical devolution plans put forward” more than half of all the public spending in Scotland would be financed by UK taxes, he said. Control over £4 billion worth of VAT revenue should be sent directly to Edinburgh, along with control over a majority “but not all” of income tax.
Meanwhile, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson said the referendum had turned the party there from "toxic Tories" into champions of "the silent majority".
In 1955 the Conservatives won the majority of Scotland’s seats and most of the votes cast but were reduced to having no representation after the 1997 election. Today, the party has one MP. But there is now hope following a surge in the SNP’s membership that could make that party significantly more left-wing, thus losing its hold on former Tory seats.
“I think this is one of the most open general elections that I’ll have seen in my lifetime and I will be doing everything in my power to contribute to the Conservative tally,” she said.
In a joke at the expense of Scotland's Tory MP David Mundell, she said: "He has been a lonely man for far too long, in so many areas of his life, and I want to make sure he has some friends."
Meanwhile, British home secretary Theresa May vowed to curb those who advocate extremist Islamic views in Britain, but who avoid prosecution by staying just inside the law.
Unveiling election manifesto pledges for next year, she said individuals and groups could be banned if ministers “reasonably believe” that they incite religious or racial hatred, or threaten democracy.
Broadcasting bans could be imposed, and advocates could be stopped from becoming school governors. Ms May said, in a message to British Muslims, the UK offers people freedom “to practise their faith and wear whatever clothes they choose”, and to establish their own schools and mosques.
“These are the benefits of living in a pluralistic society. But the whole point of living in such a society is that there are not just rights but responsibilities too. You don’t just get the freedom to live how you choose to live. You have to respect other people’s right to do so too. And you have to respect British values and institutions. ”
