to think that this will bring about England as a separate country after this?

[chomalungma]

Is Boris Johnson the Prime Minister of the UK in name only? He seems to have forgotten about the rest of the UK in his speech as it was mainly about what people can and can't do in England.

Are there police on the border crossings in Wales and Scotland?

This crisis must be playing into the hands of people who would like to see the other countries in the UK as sovereign states recognised by the UN (as Richard Osmond would say)

Personally speaking, I think it would be good to have England as its own country. And good for the other countries as well. We could of course co-operate economically, have freedom of movement and free trade etc.

Well we offered Scotland independence and they turned it down

Who's we?

Another shining example of the arrogance that exists. Anyone with half a brain can see things have changed massively since 2014. And yet still the same old tired stuff gets trotted out to about it "being once in a generation", which incidentally was a remark by Alec Salmond, it was never officially SNP policy. Funny enough democracy means things can change.

I hope so op. Fed up with wales and Scotland having their own parliaments and not the English. As soon as one got their own parliament they should have also made the rest of the countries independent.

Kazzyhoward I was mainly thinking that it was the south east that I'd like to escape from too tbh.

I think the Covid situation has just reinforced the division that Brexit had already started - for Scotland and NI anyway.

Look forward to hearing about you campaigning for an English Parliament then Rhubarb

Don't deride the other nations for something that YOU don't have - get out and make it happen. Just like the other countries had to do

A lot of people on MN confuse the terms 'English' and 'British' quite freely and regularly. Prince William is often referred to as 'the future KIng of England' so I imagine lots of people are confused.

I was fasinated by the Tory MP the BBC had on before BJ made his speech. I am paraphrasing now, but basically the conversation went

MP: "The UK will be moving forward together"
interviewer "But the other regions have said they won't be changing what they are doing"
MP: "Well, we want all 4 parts of the UK to move forward together."

It was very much "We want to change, and we want everyone else to change too. The fact they don't want to do as we tell them doesn't stop our plan being for the whole UK."

Well we offered Scotland independence and they turned it down

😂😂😂

What's the little England massive?

You have your answer.

Interested how Wales and Scotland would fund themselves?

I know I post this everytime this sort of thread crops up but.....

Scotland has;

32% of the UK's land area.
90% of the UK's fresh water.
96% of the UK's oil reserve.
63% of the UK's natural gas reserve.
82% of the UK's exploitable coal reserve.
92% of the UK's hydro power.
60% of the UK's timber production.
44% of the UK's Forests.
60% of the UK's fishing grounds (which are around 4 times more productive than neighbouring grounds).
32% of the UK's agricultural land
25% of EUROPE'S offshore energy potential.

And only 8.2% of the UK's population. I think we'll managed to fund ourselves just fine.

@Buccanarab Yes absolutely right. I love when people bother to research properly before bashing Scotland. Scotland will be just fine. I say this as someone who was born and raised in London. My family from my mother's side is Scottish though and I love to visit scotland. There are a lot of beautiful places to see

@Buccanarab fair enough, in that case we should go for it. I do think there are unique needs etc in each place that would be better served probably by complete control by each. As long as we have a proportionate amount of the UK wide spending spread back between us all ie shipbuilding then happy days.

I don't think its question of whether Scotland will 'manage' or not. It has enough resources and products to export etc.

If Scotland wants independence, go for it. I'm fed up of the half way house which is semi devolution resulting in two parliaments with all the extra bureaucracy that hasn't translated into better outcomes for actual citizens. Same for Wales and NI. And England left with no own parliament of its own.

Fed up of seeing Scottish MPs waste questioning time of the PM on independence rather than critical issues for Scotland and the wider country. We will never move on to sorting actual issues whilst political parties are fixated on their end goal. It clouds all other topics.

We'd be best to shake up the whole governance of the UK.

UK parliament supreme for certain matters like defence but doesn't need 650 MPs nor to meet so often. Which will save a tonne of money by not duplicating parliaments on the same matters.

Full devolution to the four nations, MPs meet in local parliaments instead. In fact, they can just hold them virtually. Taxation powers, transport, all council services, education, health. Regional areas set tax and keep the proceeds. Scrap councils as all their services should come under control of the regional parliaments which also saves money.

Some part of the country will more expensive to live in than others from a tax perspective. We can then judge which areas offer good value for money and move accordingly to what suits our own politics.

Initiatives like baby boxes for every household will have to collect the revenue from their nation to fund it. Gives voters much more say on whether that is acceptable or not. Allows Scotland to become the high tax, high spend state, and other nations to decide whether more diversity co-coordinators and cycle pathway improvements officers and other layers of non jobs and bureaucracy are really needed. Or whether we can have a smaller state and more money in our own back pocket to spend. Oh and we should have much more power to kick out useless MPs, ones that change parties with out going back to voters for re election and those that break the law.

If England wants it's own parliament then vote for it like Scotland did.

Full devolution to the four nations, MPs meet in local parliaments instead. In fact, they can just hold them virtually. Taxation powers, transport, all council services, education, health. Regional areas set tax and keep the proceeds. Scrap councils as all their services should come under control of the regional parliaments which also saves money.

Which is exactly what should have happened. Unfortunately, the incompetent baffoon John Prescott was put in charge of English devolution and he came up with a ridiculously stupid, expensive and pointless plan for regional assemblies which were outright rejected as the general public could see they were ANOTHER tier of expensive bureacracy that achieved nothing. If the English had been offered the same kind of devolution as Scotland, it would have gone ahead.

Like I said upthread I look forward to hearing posters that are bemoaning the lack of English Parliament to start campaigning for one.

Another case of those who see someone with something that they want, and rather than work to get similar for themselves, they scream "it's not fair" and try to take it away from the person who had it in the first place.

England already IS a separate country though. It had borders and a name.

England already IS a separate country though. It had borders and a name.

There's a difference between Geographical and Political. It's exactly why there was all that confusion about us "leaving Europe" which is physically impossible, as opposed to leaving the EU which is a political body, so possible.

The UK is a political body, not a geographical one. Geographically, we're part of the British Isles, along with Isle of Man which isn't part of the UK as it's politically independent of the UK!

I was facetious!

Unfortunately, the incompetent baffoon John Prescott was put in charge of English devolution

Interesting to know. The same person behind the demolition of perfect good houses to replace them with new builds and line the pockets of developers rather than just renovate the houses....

His taste for money wasting and bureaucracy really has left an awful legacy in this country.

moneyweek.com/3526/how-john-prescott-wasted-22bn

The English people on this thread need to get over themselves thinking that England has all of the money and no one in the other nations works and England pays all of the other countries and they couldn’t survive without it. Unlike England we have many natural resources in our countries, which you steal. I’d like to see England survive without US. England has such an inflated sense of ego, the time of the British empire are over and England is a small, arrogant little nation filled with some of the most obese people in the world who are less educated than others in Europe, vastly not speaking another language and a great many of whom are living in poverty because the government doesn’t care about them. It relies heavily on foreign exports since it doesn’t have very many natural resources, most of which are from the EU (so it totally makes sense to leave right.) Also I thought that the UK is a union, if it is it shouldn’t be said that England ‘gave permission’ for the other countries to hold a referendum, you’re not a parent. This is why the UK will never ever be a union, because there is not equal power between the nations. It’s what England says it gets, and the level of idiocy in the English population means that that usually drags the other nations into their shit too.

what England says it gets, and the level of idiocy in the English population means that that usually drags the other nations into their shit too

Sounds about right........

(Bet you're glad you got all that off your chest though)

Well we offered Scotland independence and they turned it down

WTF?

Bountiful England? I think you'll find 'Scottish Independence' isn't something offered by England

He is very poor at communicating, even when delivering a prerecorded speech.

His message was as clear as MUD.

I couldn't stop laughing at that. We offered you independence 😂😂😂 Aye OK pal so you did. England is not superior.
You have a point @Curiositykilledthecat113 England should get independence see how far they get without the rest of us.