A Guide to the Barnett Formula

I’ve been running with the hoodies of blog steerage (as a Scottish journalist once coined) for a few years now and the same arguments keep coming up time and again.

So, I’ve decided to create a ‘cut out and keep’ guide to the Barnett Formula. I’ll do the same for an English Parliament, but first...

1. Does Scotland actually receive more money than Wales and every English region, without having to pay a penny extra in taxes?

Yes, here are the facts.

2. Isn't it based upon need and if Scotland have greater need, shouldn't they have a greater share?

It's not based upon need and Scotland don't need it.
As Alistair Darling pointed out, Scotland has the highest income per head in the UK, outside London and the South East. So why does the third richest "region", out of twelve, get the second highest handout? More importantly, why don't English MPs challenge Brown when he lies to Parliament that Barnett is based on need?

3 Someone once told me that London gets more than Scotland, is this true?

It is possible to show London gets more if you include “invisible” expenditure. How ANY taxpayers’ money should ever be allowed to become invisible in the first place is a separate question, but a (not exhaustive) list of invisible spending can include such items as civil servants' wages, army, navy and air force top brass, the Queen’s frocks, Gorbal Mick’s expenses, MPs second homes, plasma teles and the deputy Prime Minister’s dinner bills. None of this goes to people in the form of services (as in Scotland). It just means more well paid people, higher house prices, more Michelin starred restaurants and a lower standard of living for ordinary people. A double whammy as someone once said.

4. Would it make any difference if such largess was reigned in?

David Cameron said “I always say to English audiences …do not believe that there's some pot of gold here…Get it in perspective."

OK Dave (may I call you Dave?), let’s do that. In the ten years following devolution, Scotland received almost £60bn more than England

That’s a lot of money when spread between 5m people, but in England (ten times Scotland’s size) it is enough to pay for the entire schools and universities budget. This also translates into better pay for nurses, teachers, smaller class sizes, life saving cancer drugs (not available in England), free tertiary education, sight saving drugs etc etc.

5. Does oil have anything to do with it?

No, if Scotland is part of the UK it is UK oil and its benefits should be distributed on the basis of need. This may be a good argument for independence (see below) but not for special (ie unfair) treatment.

6. Does England subsidise Scotland, or is it the other way around?

Tony Blair puts England’s contribution at £10bn and the Scotsman Newspaper recently put it at £20bn. The McCrone report stated 30 years ago that Scotland’s surplus would be “embarrassing” if they were an independent nation. The truth is, no one knows because successive Government departments have obfuscated the facts. Maybe Scotland subsidises the rest, maybe England, maybe not…who cares?

The point is WE ALL PAY EXACTLY THE SAME TAXES, BUT SOME BRITONS GET A LOT MORE BANGS FOR THEIR BUCKS (See 3 above) and this is THE problem with Barnett.

7. Should Scotland be “fiscally independent”?

No, this phrase suggests a special treatment within the Union (see 3 above) they should either be “in” or be “out”… makes yer choice!

8. Should Scotland be independent?

I’d vote for it, but that’s my opinion. Your opinion should be based on more factors than money though.

9. Is the Union dead?

I can’t see England putting up with this situation for much longer, can you?

Who's kidding who?

Last Saturday's episode of Dr Who, broadcast on BBC1, had a scene which portrayed the English as racists by using the phrase "England for the English" in the context of someone being sent to a labour camp.

Dr Who is made by BBC Wales and they have been consistent in their use of “Britain” and “British”, until now. Rather than use the better known and older phrase "Britain for the British", they changed it somewhat. Why? And how did this come about?

I imagine a room somewhere in BBC Wales, two writers are working their way through their creative block...

...how about "British Jobs for British People"?

... No, that wouldn't work, the author is Scottish

...OK, how about "Britain for the British"? It was the title of a book written in 1902 by a socialist and was adopted as a theme by the then fledgling Labour Party. It was also a popular theme for the National Front in the 1970s and is commonly used by the BNP today.

...No, that wouldn't work either, because it includes Scots and Welsh. We've got to think of a way to slag off the English whilst leaving the Welsh and the Scots squeaky clean.

...I know, I know! How about we change the word "Britain" to "England" and then change "British" to "English"? So, "Britain for the British" becomes "England for the English"!

... Brilliant! That way we can liable the English and leave a subliminal message in the minds of the viewer

... Yes, but will it work? Surely people will realise that English national sentiment has only arisen since devolution and if anything they're the most tolerant nation in these islands.

... God no, they'll realise nothing! The tellie is often the only source of information for these plebs and we ARE THE TELLIE!

... are you sure they'll forget so easily?

... they're like bloody goldfish! Most are so dumb they won't remember the phrase "Britain for the British" was ever used by the time the programme has finished.

... Got it! So, if we say it often enough and no one complains, it'll become received knowledge and everyone will only associate such a negative phrase with England and English!

... EXACTLY!

... Well now we've put that one to bed, let's go and thump an English horse!

"...we need to make a transition to democracy as soon as possible"

How long will the international community sit on its hands whilst this man refuses to legitimise his Government with a fair election? This bigot refuses to accept the democratic will of the people he governs! He thumbs his nose at every principle and moral obligation, whilst desperately clinging to power. A power he knows would be taken from him, if he ever dared hold an election.

Democratic plebiscites are swept aside, if they don’t go his way. If he thinks he'll lose an election, he simply refuses to hold it!

Some of his citizens are actually dying because he has agitated tribal differences and openly diverts money from the majority of people in order to give his own people preferential treatment. The principle of "One Man, One Vote" has been swept aside so that his tribe can wield a disproportionate amount of power.

Every democratic indicator shows the majority are thirsty for the same democratic and fiscal privileges as "his people" but he stubbornly refuses to acknowledge their calls.

Bare-faced lies are his only justification for such measures and the opposition are too timid to challenge him. There are some brave dissenting voices, even amongst his own ranks, but such dissent is ruthlessly suppressed by an individual ominously referred to as "the Chief Whip”.

The title of this post quotes Brown addressing the summit launching the 43-nation Union for the Mediterranean, in Paris. He was referring to Zimbabwe when he said "We should not lessen the pressure on this regime,I believe we need to make a transition to democracy as soon as possible."

Well Mr Brown, at least Robert Mugabe (pictured) has led his party to democratic victory at least once! You can’t even claim this moral authority, never mind justify the continuance of Barnett and the lack of an English Parliament!

Letter in the Sunday Times

England's Health Apartheid was summarised in the Sunday Times with this cartoon by Heath.It shows a scot in the "top tier" looking healthy giving a thumbs up sign, whilst in the "bottom tier" is a sick looking patient in the "UK" bed. OK it didn't say "England" but it is a start.

There is also an article reporting "MPs tell Brown to purge his Scots" opposite another "NHS scandal: dying cancer victim was forced to pay". I don't mind how many Scots there are in the UK Government, they should be selected on merit. What I do object to is Scots Ministers/Prime Ministers failing to address the democratic and funding deficit in order to feather the nests of their kith and kin in the North.

Devolution is not a matter of life or death. Oh wait, IT IS!

My blogs are often light hearted, but here is a story that demonstrates the extent of this Government’s discrimination against England and how a lack of an English Parliament really can be a "life or death" matter.

Englishman Jack Hose has paid National Insurance (at the same rate as those in Scotland) for fifty years. He now has cancer and was sent home by the Royal Bournemouth Hospital "to die”. He then discovered a cocktail of drugs (including Cetuximab) that has managed to stabilise his condition.

Guess what? The drug Cetuximab is not available on “the NHS” according to the Sunday Times. Guess what else? It is freely available to the likes of Brown, in Scotland… well thank God for that!!

The odious slimeball that is the ENGLISH Health Secretary, Alan Johnson, had the breathtaking, blood pressure soaring, homicidal inducing gaul to say this victim shouldn’t be allowed to PAY FOR IT HIMSELF because it would create a “two tier NHS”.

WELL Mr. GOVERNMENT “WE ARE LISTENING” MINISTER …A TWO TIER SYSTEM WOULD BE AN IMPROVEMENT ON THE FOUR TIER ONE YOU’VE CREATED! By the way, guess which nation has the bottom tier (in terms of spending?) ...of course, England!

Please write to Johnson and the Times. For some reason I’ve never been able to leave comments on the Times pages (anyone know why?), but please leave your comments there.

"Now I don't think you wanted to do that, did you?”

It is possible to bury bad news on a day full of bad news. This is a day full of bad news for Gordon Brown (right), so I would like to record this little nugget that may have passed him, and most of us, by.

Firstly, a little background on the workings of our illustrious leader…

Gordon Brown is not a Unionist. Gordon Brown is a Scottish partisan who has recently embraced the union in order to prevent (divert) the majority of Britons from threatening the privileged status that he himself has organised for his fellow countrymen. Brown has ensured, and continues to ensure, that Scotland’s interests are “paramount” in all his “actions and deeds” as he solemnly swore he would do, when he signed the Scottish Claim of Right in 1988.

The Plan
Brown was a major architect of the devolution settlement. It was designed to promote and protect two things dear to his heart, 1 Scotland and 2 the Labour Party. His design was to put Scotland beyond the reach of the Tories and take the wind out of the nationalists’ sails, thus making Scotland forever Labour. Hurrah!

This is why power was devolved to the Celtic (Labour) nations when national division made little sense. However, the national settlement could not be extended to England (no English Parliament for you laddie) so he planned to carve out other Labour strongholds on a regional level who could also be given assemblies too. These Assemblies would have less power than the Scottish Parliament thereby neutering England AND the Tories by putting vast areas of the UK beyond their reach. The man’s a genius!!

The Result
What a politician! What a Machiavellian giant who would forever be remembered across the centuries as the man who saved the Tories in Scotland! (Huh? surely saved Scotland FROM the Tories??). No! Read that again... Gordon Brown is the man who saved the Tories in Scotland!

It's true! According to Angus McLeod of the Times, the Tories were a spent force in Scotland by the 1990s, but “…the Scottish Tories have been left thanking God for devolution ever since. That, and probably that alone, has saved them from complete decline in Scotland.”

Don’t you just love it when a plan comes together? As Oscar Wilde once said, (referring to the death of Little Nell in Dickens’ Old Curiosity Shop) “you would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh”.

If this is your epitaph Gordon, I recommend you take another look at the Crewe and Nantwich bi-election results, just to cheer yourself up a bit.

Brown Knows!

Sometimes, campaigning for a cause that lacks the backing of any major political party or national newspaper, feels like flicking grains of rice at a bulldozer that’s about to squash us into oblivion.

But other-times, you get a chink of light that shows it actually does some good. A sign that all our letters, blogging, lobbying and arguing in cyber space actually does get through to those in power. One such time was yesterday when Gordon Brown said “There is also an English lobby for a separate English parliament.”

He used it in the context that giving England what he has granted his fellow countrymen would somehow be damaging to the Union. (This is the Union that he himself has destabilised more than any other person in history and the same Union that an English Parliament would actually serve to save.) Anyway, as Jack Straw should have said (according to Secret Person) “I am wholly in favour of an English parliament. If you stay on the current route, there would be little advantage seen by those in England for maintaining the Union, because the argument would be, what exactly is in it for us?”

Well said secret person, but let’s just bask for a moment in the knowledge that we’ve managed to pierce Brown’s ivory tower… "An English lobby for a separate English Parliament!"

Does he mean us? I think he does, you know? He knows! Brown knows!