Here is a great comment from a Guardian piece about whether losing Scottish MPs would condemn rUK to a permanent Tory majority: Here are some FACTS. Sorry about the injecting facts into this whole debate, but sometimes needs must. Please, please bear with me, as this is important. The 67 years since the end of World War 2 have seen 18 General Elections to the Westminster Parliament, with the following outcomes (sources below): 1945 Labour govt (Attlee) ———————————— Labour majority: 146 Labour majority without any Scottish MPs in Parliament: 143 NO CHANGE WITHOUT SCOTTISH MPS 1950 Labour govt (Attlee) ———————————— Labour majority: 5 Without Scottish MPs: 2 NO CHANGE 1951 Conservative govt (Churchill/Eden) ——————————————————– Conservative majority: 17 Without Scottish MPs: 16 NO CHANGE 1955 Conservative govt (Eden/Macmillan) ——————————————————– Conservative majority: 60 Without Scottish MPs: 61 NO CHANGE 1959 Conservative govt (Macmillan/Douglas-Home) ———————————————————————— Conservative majority: 100 Without Scottish MPs: 109 NO CHANGE 1964 Labour govt (Wilson) ———————————— Labour majority: 4 Without Scottish MPs: -11 CHANGE: LABOUR MAJORITY TO CONSERVATIVE MAJORITY OF 1 (Con 280, Lab 274, Lib 5) 1966 Labour govt (Wilson) ———————————— Labour majority: 98 Without Scottish MPs: 77 NO CHANGE 1970 Conservative govt (Heath) ——————————————– Conservative majority: 30 Without Scottish MPs: 55 NO CHANGE 1974 Minority Labour govt (Wilson) ———————————————— Labour majority: -33 Without Scottish MPs: -42 POSSIBLE CHANGE – LABOUR MINORITY TO CONSERVATIVE MINORITY (Without Scots: Con 276, Lab 261, Lib 11, Others 16) 1974b Labour govt (Wilson/Callaghan) —————————————————– Labour majority: 3 Without Scottish MPs: -8 CHANGE: LABOUR MAJORITY TO LABOUR MINORITY (Lab 278 Con 261 Lib 10 others 15) 1979 Conservative govt (Thatcher) ———————————————— Conservative majority: 43 Without Scottish MPs: 70 NO CHANGE 1983 Conservative govt (Thatcher) ———————————————— Conservative majority: 144 Without Scottish MPs: 174 NO CHANGE 1987 Conservative govt (Thatcher/Major) —————————————————— Conservative majority: 102 Without Scottish MPs: 154 NO CHANGE 1992 Conservative govt (Major) ——————————————— Conservative majority: 21 Without Scottish MPs: 71 NO CHANGE 1997 Labour govt (Blair) ———————————– Labour majority: 179 Without Scottish MPs: 139 NO CHANGE 2001 Labour govt (Blair) ———————————– Labour majority: 167 Without Scottish MPs: 129 NO CHANGE 2005 Labour govt (Blair/Brown) ——————————————– Labour majority: 66 Without Scottish MPs: 43 NO CHANGE 2010 Coalition govt (Cameron) —————————————— Conservative majority: -38 Without Scottish MPs: 19 CHANGE: CON-LIB COALITION TO CONSERVATIVE MAJORITY Therefore: - On ONE occasion (1964) Scottish MPs have turned what would have been a Conservative government into a Labour one. The Tory majority without Scottish votes would have been just one MP (280 vs 279), and as such useless in practice. The Labour government, with an almost equally feeble majority of 4, lasted just 18 months and a Tory one would probably have collapsed even faster. - On ONE occasion (the second of the two 1974 elections) Scottish MPs gave Labour a wafer-thin majority (319 vs 316) they wouldn’t have had from the rest of the UK alone, although they’d still have been the largest party and able to command a majority in a pact with the Liberals, as they eventually did in reality. - On ONE occasion (2010) the presence of Scottish MPs has deprived the Conservatives of an outright majority, although the Conservatives ended up in control of the government anyway in coalition with the Lib Dems when Labour refused to co-operate with other parties in a “rainbow alliance”. And so (still listening??): for 65 of the last 67 years, Scottish MPs as an entity have had no practical influence over the composition of the UK government. From a high of 72 MPs in 1983, Scotland’s representation will by 2015 have decreased to 52, substantially reducing any future possibility of affecting a change. The simple reality of the matter, established indisputably and unambiguously by these stats, is that England and the rest of the UK are and always have been perfectly capable of electing a Labour government if they want one, whatever Scotland does. The truth is that Labour doesn’t need Scottish MPs, and an independent Scotland would NOT give the Tories a permanent majority in the remnant UK. So Michael and your daft sub-editors: shut up.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Sep 2014 17:41:49 +0000
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