Tory/SNP DevoMax/boundaries deal??

[The Bishop]

May as well get this sub-section going again........

According to Mark Seddon in today's Graun, Cameron and Salmond are cooking up some nefarious conspiracy along these lines........

Discuss

[Deleted]

It would be difficult to change the referendum that close to the date, it will already have been through Holyrood and the Y/N agreed.

I hope they didn't pay him too much.

[Deleted]

and if it does then scottish MP's should be reduced

[greatkingrat]

So Scotland would be under represented on matters not devolved to Scotland, and over represented on matters that have no effect on Scotland whatsoever. I don't think that is the solution to the West Lothian Question.

[Deleted]

well what is, no one can say what it is.

you can not bar MP's from non scottish votes, the easy answer is to federalise the UK but too many would not go for that from most parties

[East Anglian Lefty]

Mark Seddon really is a paranoid cretin, isn't he?

[The Bishop]

His sole "source" seems to be an ex Tory former MEP (now a LibDem) Not the most reliable on this subject, some might say ;D

[cibwr]

Well English votes for English laws would only work if the Barnett formula was completely abolished and a different method of finance found.

[the_bullies]

Take the Northern Irish & or Scottish Mp's out of the Westminster Parliament equation as a deal done by Cameron with the DUP or SNP as unlikely as it seems, forces Wales to pursue a separtist course from England. So even though I think this is a wrong assumption it is very dangerous for the UK.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Yes, but Seddon's suggested method is completely unworkable. There are a lot more AMs and MSPs per elector than there are MPs. No way could they just be bussed in on contentious defence and foreign policy votes.

Aside from which, the SNP and the Tories don't combine for a parliamentary majority and whilst he appears to think Cameron can get Lib Dem defectors (very unlikely), he fails to consider that there are Tories who will definitely vote against.

It's a conspiracy theory, and not even an entertaining one.

[Tangent]

It'x all pointless, anyway - even if Cameron cobbles together a wheeze, I bet IDS will quietly kill the whole thing somehow, given what's likely to happen to his seat.

[The Bishop]

It appears that the Tories have backed down and agreed there can be a HoL vote on kicking these changes into the long grass for the forseeable.......

Presumably the PM hasn't had much success with his deal-making, then??

[Deleted]

nah course not and always was going to be impossible to push it through.

[The Bishop]

A memo from Tory chief whip Sir George Young has seemingly been leaked to the Times, in which he claims a Commons vote on the boundary changes would be "very close".

Just bravado? Evidence of possible deals with minority parties?? Or the same sort of delusion which led Fabricant to issue a similar forecast just before Corby?

[john07]

Jan 8, 2013 16:22:15 GMT The Bishop said:

A memo from Tory chief whip Sir George Young has seemingly been leaked to the Times, in which he claims a Commons vote on the boundary changes would be "very close".

Just bravado? Evidence of possible deals with minority parties?? Or the same sort of delusion which led Fabricant to issue a similar forecast just before Corby?

They can dream on. I just don't see the minority parties - SNP, PC, DUP, SDLP, etc) supporting a deal that will lose MPs for their part of the country and hence reduce their impact. Any promises made could prove to be illusory once the Constituencies were in place.

Can they get it through the Lords (or has that been stacked)?

[Tony Otim]

Maybe they just can't really conceive that at the end of the day, the LDs aren't going to do as they want them to

[Davıd Boothroyd]

For a 'Black Swan' deal to work, the Conservative whips have not only to get all their own MPs to vote for the boundary changes (which will be difficult), they have to get almost all of the minor party MPs on board when most dislike the principle of the changes from the first place. They would have to make the most extreme concessions to do so and I can't see it happening.

[piperdave]

Jan 8, 2013 16:33:03 GMT john07 said:

Jan 8, 2013 16:22:15 GMT The Bishop said:

A memo from Tory chief whip Sir George Young has seemingly been leaked to the Times, in which he claims a Commons vote on the boundary changes would be "very close".

Just bravado? Evidence of possible deals with minority parties?? Or the same sort of delusion which led Fabricant to issue a similar forecast just before Corby?

They can dream on. I just don't see the minority parties - SNP, PC, DUP, SDLP, etc) supporting a deal that will lose MPs for their part of the country and hence reduce their impact. Any promises made could prove to be illusory once the Constituencies were in place.

Can they get it through the Lords (or has that been stacked)?

I'd agree that the smaller parties won't vote against their own electoral interests. However, it might be in the SNP's electoral interests to support the boundary changes. Look at the last boundary changes and you see that with a reduction of 13 seats, the SNP actually held all their mainland constituencies in 2005, and added the Western Isles. It was Labour that lost the bulk of the seats.

Looking at the proposed constituencies as they stand, I'd reckon that Angus East & Kincardine, Angus West & Perthshire East, Banff & Buchan, Moray & Nairn and Perth & Kinross-shire, along with Na h-Eileanan an Iar should all be pretty comfortable for the SNP. So 6 seats again but a higher proportion of the seats in Scotland than at any time since the 1970s. Plus if the decline of the Lib Dems is as severe as it looks from the 2011 and 2012 elections, then there are possible pick ups in the Highlands and Aberdeenshire without requiring too much of an increase in the SNP vote.

[Deleted]

I just can't see the SNP voting with the Tories on something that makes a Tory majority more likely unless they've been offered something very very good as a result...

If anything, I'd expect the SNP to abstain on the grounds that the changes should be irrelevant as far as Scotland is concerned and because it doesn't really affect their seats anyway.

[piperdave]

I don't think it likely either but just thought I'd point out these changes are favourable to the Nats,