Quote: “The ILEA was not directly part of the government of Greater London, it was a quango (but still part of the GLC, like London Transport) that ran education within Inner London (in other words the former LCC area), this was due to the fact the LCC was responsible for education, yet its successor the GLC had that power removed, so I would not count no 3, so there have been 3 versions of Greater London Government which are:”
Nothing quango-astic about ILEA, it was like a county council education committee in the first version of Greater London, a directly elected education committee in the second version, and non-existant in the third and fourth.
Quote: “From 1 to 2: Because the GLA was a Labour-run pain to the backside for Maggie and the Tory run Westminster, so to get rid of their biggest enemy they abolished it, in other words nothing more than cynical political strategy”
Only in the five years of Livingstone. For much of its time the Greater London Council was Conservative controlled, with a majority of 82-18 over Labour in one election. Why do you think the Conservatives created it? Its creation was, originally, a classic exercise in party political gerrymandering (hence the crazy illogical zig-zag boundary!).
Quote: “The problem with Greater London is not because it a bad idea, but with the fact it does not cover the entire urban area, metropolitan area and commuter bet and the fact it has nowhere near the amount of powers and autonomy it needs…”
While I agree on you on the fact there have been too many (and not really needed changes), Greater London was a relativity good idea (how could the LCC run London, when they did not run areas like East Ham, Enfield, Croydon, Southall, Ilford, Dagenham and Wembley, which have been part of the London urban area since the 1930s at least), trouble is that it has been done badly, the GLC did not have enough powers, then it was abolished for no good reason, then it was brought back as the GLA, but with even less powers and after all this time still not covering all of the London Urban Area, Metropolitan Area and Commuter Belt”
That’s WHY it’s a bad idea: too small to be regional, to large to be provincial (county level). For conurbation government that works reasonably well, they should have gone down the Paris/Ile de France route, i.e the Thames Valley, from Oxfordshire to the coast, and including the "London" airports.
Quote: “When I meant London Borough’s where “focused on doing things they are best done at a regional level” I meant functions and services that are normally done by county councils (which I want transferred to the GLA)
In other worlds the boroughs of London should be like the boroughs in New York, they should only be co-ordinating the operation (not running itself, which will be done by the GLA) of services that are normally done at district country level and advice the GLA in running of services and doing the full range of district and county level functions/powers”
Functions that are “normally done by county councils” should obviously be done by county councils, which is why “Greater London” is a bad idea (it superceded the county councils).
As for New York, the “boroughs” there do nothing, they are constituencies for the election of an official (the borough president) who sits on the NY city council with the other councillors.
Quote: “The GLA should also receive the full range of devolved powers (and maybe more) as Scotland**, not only that but it should also receive its own flag and coat of arms (which would the ones of the City of London) and annex the rest of the London Urban Area, Metropolitan Area and Commuter Belt, lastly the City of London should be abolished and replaced by a London Borough (with its city status moving to the GLA)”
Be your age! If a Livingstone controlled Greater London Council was able to challenge the government of the day, there is not a cat’s chance in hell of today's version being given the kind of more powers that you advocate!
Quote: “After all that, the “County of Greater London” should be renamed the “State of London” (and have the city status off the City of London)*, formally separate from England and become the “5th” home nations of the United Kingdom, in other words, London becomes a city-state while staying part of the UK”
Why?
BTW, Greater London is not a county and can't be a "state" (there are no states in the UK).
Quote: “*As part of this the “Greater London Authority” should renamed the “Government of London” and the position of “Lord Mayor of London” should be absorbed into the position of “Mayor of London”
Why not “first minister” or “president”?
Quote: “No they did not have a vote on independence, they had a election and all that really happened was that CIU (Which is a relativity moderate Catalan nationalist party which was before the recent election the ruling party in Catalonia), which decided to adopt a platform for independence (previously they demanded more autonomy) and despite this ended up losing their majority (but still the biggest party) and the real gainers where left wing nationalist parties (Spain-wide left and right wing parties did the more or less the name as last time)
The main reasons are all economic, Spain as you know is suffering a rather bad economic crisis and that included Catalonia, this also meant that national (and regional debts) have risen quite a lot, to fix this both national and regional governments have made austerity measures which are very unpopular and have not really fix the problems of debts, this has meant Catalonia has vast debts it really needs to pay off, so that is why they have demanded a bailout, of course with the debts of Spanish Banks, its cannot really do this
So that is why there have been calls for independence (they already have significant autonomy from Madrid), so that they can use the money used to fund central government towards the paying of their debts (and thus less austerity), also they cannot hold a “referendum” on independence without Madrid’s approval and they have refused to allow one, so whatever vote there is would make little difference for the time being”
More nonsense! Catalonia did indeed vote for pro-independence parties, whist asking Madrid for a bail out. The Spanish experience shows us exactly why we should not have gone down the route of regional government/devolution. Too late now, that particular genie won’t go back in the bottle.
Quote: “Yes England CURRENTLY contains London + South East and Cornwall, however…
Cornwall is rather different to the rest of England; it has its own language, culture and even its own flag (which is flown all over the country), they are only part of England in name only and there are not too many “locals” who can say they are proud of being “English”
But that’s a separate argument completely than when it comes to London + SE…
The question is not “are Londoners proud to English/British?” they are without a doubt, the problem is that there is a growing gap between London, its metropolitan area and commuter belt and the rest of the UK (not just the rest of England), this is reflected economically, employment, tax revenue, investment, socially and even in our own aviation sector
Overall the difference is vast, such much so that a resident of Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds or Newcastle have more in common with the a resident of Cardiff, Swansea, Edinburgh, Glasgow or Aberdeen than a resident London, Brighton, Oxford and Chelmsford
How is this going to work when it comes to an English Parliament?
Would you want an English Parliament that was bias in favour of 40% of its population (London, its metropolitan area and commuter belt) over the other 60% of its population (rest of England)?
Prefer decentralisation to devolution but it's too late!
Only an English parliament or no devolution answers the West Lothian question.
Quote: "Remember the British Parliament is already bias in favour of 1/3 of its population (London, its metropolitan area and commuter belt) over the other 2/3 of its population (rest of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), this is one of the reasons (the others include nationalism and economic)
So I am suggesting devolution (separately) to both London (its urban area, metropolitan area and commuter belt) and the rest of England, for the sake of keeping the union together (unless the 5 home nations agree to end it), because there is resentment from all side of the UK about the current setup
Lastly does it matter (as a Londoner) if it’s an “English” or “London” running things where you live?
As for Boris, surely you don’t know that he is better at hosting HIGNFY, than being mayor, he has spent millions on new “Borismaster” buses, he has made sure London got a raw deal in terms of sponsoring the bike scheme and the cable car (not such a good idea); he has scraped the South London Tram and abandoned AND revived the Dagenham Dock DLR project, he got too close to Murdoch and he is popular because he a good personality, not because he has good polices (even from a right-wing perspective), may I go on…”
Forget it, it’s obviously never going to happen: as mentioned before, an English Parliament (even without Cornwall!) would be big enough to challenge the Westminster Parliament, so it will never be allowed.
Quote: “may I go on…”
No, please don’t!