Robert Walter: The whole question about London and the Greater London authority is a red herring. The GLA does not have legislative powers. The Scottish Parliament has legislative powers both primary and secondary. The Welsh Assembly has secondary legislative powers. The Northern Ireland Assembly will have, when it is up and running, primary and secondary legislative powers. That is not the case in respect...
Robert Walter: I hope that I can help the hon. Lady. She has strayed into the sphere of taxation and Treasury matters, which would not be affected. Those are United Kingdom matters and would continue to be so.
Robert Walter: My birth certificate states that I was born in Swansea, which is in Wales.
Robert Walter: rose—
Robert Walter: I think that the right hon. Gentleman was making my point in a slightly different way. I agreed that the preceding position on Northern Ireland was unacceptable, but we have moved on, because we have a Scottish Parliament, a Welsh Assembly and an up-and-running Northern Ireland Assembly. That is why we need the Bill.
Robert Walter: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time. This has been an important week for the provisions of the Bill, because we have had elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly, a devolved Assembly that will have primary law-making powers, secondary powers and the ability to appoint Ministers who are responsible for the government of Northern Ireland. However, this is also an important...
Robert Walter: I will certainly come on to that point, although I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising it at such an early stage of the debate. This partly explains the rather innocuous name of my Bill: the House of Commons (Participation) Bill. I tried to persuade the Clerk of the House that my Bill should be called the "Act of Union (Amendment) Bill", but I was told that all the provisions of the Act of...
Robert Walter: I regard my Bill as an entirely positive measure that would complete the process started through devolution by providing the ultimate fairness for the voters of England, particularly, and Wales.
Robert Walter: No alliance is created, because I am unashamedly a Unionist. I believe in the Union and I will continue to defend it, including in my speech.
Robert Walter: With respect, I will not give way as I ought to make progress.
Robert Walter: For the Scottish National party, of course I will.
Robert Walter: There were many debates in the House, and in Scotland and Wales, on the process of devolution, and its purpose is not to lead to independence. Devolution was just that—a devolution of powers from the Union Parliament to the Assemblies and Parliaments in other parts of the kingdom. It did not in itself begin a process that leads to independence.
Robert Walter: I give way to the hon. Lady.
Robert Walter: I thank the hon. Lady for anticipating what I will say. The English people already have 428 Members of Parliament, who sit in this House, and my Bill seeks to empower them in their consideration of English matters in the House. Later, I will make the point that it is not necessary to go to the public expense of creating the structures of a separate English Parliament, as we already have a...
Robert Walter: It is Warminster school. The date that we are really celebrating is the date of the Act of Union with Scotland. The Act was only part of a unification process, as the Act of Union with Wales had come into being some time before. The Union with Wales was achieved through a series of laws passed by this Parliament between 1536 and 1543. Wales had been under the control of the English kings...
Robert Walter: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, but in the early years of Irish separation and independence from the United Kingdom, and of the Irish Free State and the Republic of Ireland, what he says about prosperity was not the case. Many would agree that the prosperity that Ireland has experienced in the past couple of years is due to another Union—the European Union, which provided...
Robert Walter: I thank you for that, Madam Deputy Speaker. I will return to the Acts of Union referred to earlier; the hon. Member for Edinburgh, North and Leith (Mark Lazarowicz) said that I had not mentioned the Act of Union, so I am mentioning several of them now. In 1801, Ireland was joined to Great Britain in a single kingdom that became known as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The...
Robert Walter: I had not intended the debate to develop into a lengthy discourse on the history of Ireland, or any other part of the United Kingdom, or a discussion of the whys and wherefores of the implementation of various Acts. I mentioned that the Irish Parliament voted for the Act of Union; the hon. Lady may have views about the status of those who sat in the Irish Parliament as early as 1801, just as...
Robert Walter: The hon. Gentleman is right, and his point relates to the reply that I gave to our friend representing the Scottish Nationalists, the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr. MacNeil), who stated quite clearly that he thought that devolution was a process leading to independence. I do not think that independence is a natural extension of devolution. I believe that this Parliament is...
Robert Walter: I do not want to anticipate the hon. Gentleman's speech, which I am sure he will make later in the debate if he catches Madam Deputy Speaker's eye. The essence of my Bill is that the Speaker can, if he is so minded, rule that Scottish Members could participate in the passage of such legislation. It is highly unlikely that a piece of exclusively Scottish legislation would be debated in this...
