Simon Jenkins’ article (The United Kingdom is broken. It’s time for a new British federation, 5 July) could not be more relevant at this low point in UK governance. Only three of the UK’s four “nations” have devolved assemblies, and currently only two of these have a functioning administration.
His view that “a bespoke autonomy for each nation in a new British federation” is now critical would also, I think, be shared by members of the House of Lords select committee on the constitution. In 2014, it recommended that the UK government and political parties “devise and articulate a coherent vision for the shape and structure of the United Kingdom, without which there cannot be constitutional stability”. Paragraph 350 of its January 2022 report, however, would seem to dispel any idea that the government is even remotely interested in this matter: “Witnesses agreed that the lack of vision was undermining efforts to promote the union’s benefits.”
Possibilities for reform abound – a second chamber representing the constituent nations of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland? The House of Commons elected (as in Germany) by a two-list system of first-past-the-post/proportional representation? A new relationship of the monarchy to the state, perhaps more similar to that of Denmark or Sweden?
The most important aspect of all of this constitutional soul searching is whether it is possible any more to have a good-humoured national debate about repairing the fabric of a very disunited UK.
Paul Tattam
Chinley, Derbyshire
• Simon Jenkins highlights one of the union’s main weaknesses, namely that only one in five of English voters care whether Scotland goes independent. I am a Scot who lives in England and identifies as “British”, and it is unfortunately true that many English-born people I know will spontaneously identify as “English”, and some will struggle to see the difference. It can’t help the mindset of union-minded or dithering Scots to know that many English people know little about Scotland and appear not to care about the union.
Perhaps it’s time to point out to the English that Scotland and the Scots are in fact deeply ingrained in their own national identity. Without Scotland there’s no Team GB, and there’s no union jack without the Scottish blue. And Britannia would no longer rule the waves, even in nostalgic song.
Iain Forbes
London
• The ambitions of the Scots, Northern Irish and Welsh would surely be better met by a Celtic federation than a British one. A Scottish, Irish and Welsh alliance could be a stepping stone to a new constitutional settlement for those parts of the UK where the political and cultural ethos is closer to Europe than England. And the Northern Irish will maintain their links with the part of Britain to which they have always been closest.
John Skrine
Corsham, Wiltshire
• Simon Jenkins states that Blair’s devolution initiatives “sparked a sudden outbreak of regional identity politics”. However, it could be argued that these initiatives were the culmination of a long, if uneven, process of increased nationalist sentiment. The byelection victories of Gwynfor Evans for Plaid Cymru in 1966 and of Winnie Ewing and Margo McDonald for the SNP in 1967 and 1973 respectively, arguably mark the advent of discontent with the unionism of the Conservative and Labour parties.
Michael Cunningham
Wolverhampton
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