Many observers of British society and much of public opinion would deny that regionalism is an issue in the United Kingdom in the 1990s. Such a standpoint reflects a lack of regional consciousness in much of southern Britain and a lack of knowledge of, or even sympathy with, other parts of the British state. Electors often need to be reminded that the UK is comprised of four nations, England, Scotland, Wales and part of Ireland, as well as the Channel Isles and the Isle of Man; or that indigenous languages other than English are spoken in Britain &endash; particularly Welsh (spoken by around 500,000) and Scots Gaelic (spoken by about 80,000). For the purpose of this chapter, the nationalist demands of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will be considered alongside the less obvious regional demands of England itself, even though the arguments for separate recognition of different national identities and demands is of a much larger scale and ideological order than those advanced for regionalism all round. In any case, development within the British constitutional system of stronger political institutions for the different nations of Britain is increasingly seen as contingent upon the acceptance of a set of regional institutions for England. Despite a public rhetoric which denies and denigrates regionalism (at the level of national government and the tabloid press), there are several indications that the regional issue will not disappear and that it is having to be addressed, albeit piecemeal, by central government. As the crisis of legitimacy facing Britain's political institutions and élites deepens, it is likely that the regional issue broadly defined will once more occupy the centre of the political agenda as it did for a time in the 1970s. What was not resolved then may yet have to be resolved in the late 1990s.
The origins of the UK's reluctant entanglement with regionalism are various. These range from the nationalist claims of Scotland and Wales which have had to be accommodated by the British political system since the 1880s; the political settlement of the Irish question in 1921 which led to the creation of a largely self-governing province of Northern Ireland; and the practical administrative and occasionally decentralist demands of the English government and political class. The regional dimension in British politics has ebbed and flowed, but it has never died away completely. The spread of political allegiances in the last quarter of the twentieth century suggests that it is likely to be a continuing flashpoint in the British political system, even if occurring episodically.
One of the spin-offs of the paralysis of the United Kingdom regime caused by the campaign for Irish home rule in the nineteenth century was the seriousness with which claims for Scottish and Welsh home rule were taken. The Liberal platform of the late 1890s contained promises of 'home rule all round', a package of devolution measures affecting the whole of the British Isles, even if a precise role for the English regions was not defined. Progress on the Irish question was frustrated by the House of Lords and by the outbreak of the First World War. By 1918 it was clear that a clean break would have to be made between Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, an out-turn which choked off the broader British debate on devolution. The nationalist cause in Scotland and in Wales became channelled into political parties dedicated to self-government formed in the 1920s and 1930s. A petition (the Scottish Covenant) demanding a Scottish parliament was signed by two million people in the late 1940s and a similar but much less widely supported petition to parliament was organised in Wales between 1950 and 1955 (see Hanham, 1969 and Butt Philip, 1975). No one at this stage was marching for the cause of English regionalism, nor have they done so since.
The current cycle of devolutionist pressures in the United Kingdom can be traced back to the mid-1960s when a combination of regional economic decline, disillusion with the Labour party and anxiety (in Wales) about cultural change fed a strong political revival of Scottish and Welsh nationalism. The House of Commons was forced to spend much of its time between 1974 and 1979 on devolution legislation which however came to nought as a result of two referenda held in Scotland and Wales in March 1979. Matters in the province of Northern Ireland were also on the move, but in an unrelated way. The inability of the Protestant dominated Unionist Government in the province to deal adequately with the substance of grievances from the minority Catholic population caused the Conservative Government at Westminster under Edward Heath to abolish the provincial government at Stormont in 1972 in favour of direct rule from London. Over twenty years later this remains the position, despite many abortive attempts to re-establish an elected Northern Irish Government based on power-sharing or with entrenched minority rights.
The agitation for greater recognition of Scottish and Welsh devolution has had other political consequences, such as the transfer of new powers and resources to the Scottish Office and the newly-established Welsh Office (1964), the passage of the Welsh Language Act (1967) giving equal validity to Welsh in public administration in Wales, the mobilisation of MPs more frequently into regional groupings to lobby their own party leaderships, and the setting up of a Royal Commission on the Constitution under Lord Kilbrandon, which reported in 1973. Regional policy also attracted greater attention in the 1960s and 1970s before being cut back by Conservative administrations after May 1979. Local government and administration has been a continuing object of attention by successive Tory prime ministers. The formation of the Greater London Council and the six metropolitan county councils in England in 1963 was followed by a wholesale reform of local government in England, Scotland and Wales in 1973&endash;74, abolition of the GLC and the metropolitan counties in the mid-1980s, progressive privatisation of service provision previously undertaken by local councils, and further reviews of local government structure in 1992&endash;94 in order to establish unitary local authorities as widely as possible. Such turmoil is symptomatic of an early phase of institutional reforming zeal, reflecting confidence in the ability of structural changes to improve quality of service, which gave way in the 1980s to a zeal to cut down bureaucracy and to contain burgeoning local government spending. Regional strategic needs and the desirability of creating or building upon existing regional identities have been very low on central government's list of political priorities. Yet the regional dimension has been hard to extinguish, even in England, and shows signs of revival as the millennium approaches, despite the increased centralisation of power in Whitehall and Westminster and the impact of improved physical and media communications upon the attitudes, place of residence and lifestyle of the citizens of Britain.
In 1951 the Conservative and Labour parties captured between themselves almost 97 per cent of the total votes cast at the October general election that year. By February 1974 a quarter of the votes cast at the UK general election were cast for parties other than the two largest parties, most of them committed to some form of regional devolution or even more radical reorganisation of the British state. That position has remained broadly unchanged at all subsequent general elections. The vagaries of the British electoral system have meant that these votes have often not been able to be reflected in the distribution of seats in the House of Commons. Yet between 1974 and 1979 the votes of Liberal, Nationalist and Ulster MPs played critical roles in ensuring the survival of Labour Governments in two successive parliaments, and there have been signs since the general election of 1992 that the 'minority parties' are once again becoming critical determinants in the passage through the Commons of significant parts of the Conservative government's programme. With such influence comes the power to re-set the political agenda to include issues related to devolution and regional policy (see Rose, 1982 and Bogdanor, 1979).
The long drawn out attempt to establish assemblies in Scotland and Wales in the 1970s dominated the legislative timetable of the House of Commons and proved extremely divisive for Labour, whose northern English MPs were extremely suspicious of the advantages that would accrue to Scotland and Wales once devolution was in place. The proposals for a scheme of legislative devolution for Scotland and administrative devolution for Wales were eventually submitted to national referendums in each country. The Welsh scheme was roundly rejected by voters by a margin of almost four to one, while the Scottish scheme was approved by a small majority but failed to attract the support of forty per cent of the electorate as required by the Westminster parliament. The whole exercise proved extremely debilitating for the political class as a whole, for no tangible result other than the ultimate demise of the Callaghan government. Yet the arguments had revealed some serious difficulties in trying to set up a scheme of devolution which omitted any consideration of the English dimension. Scottish and Welsh MPs at Westminster would have been able to vote on issues only of concern to England, because devolved assemblies in Scotland and Wales would be responsible exclusively for several policy fields. Northern and south western MPs were alarmed at the autonomy offered to Scotland and Wales but denied to their re gions. The Welsh electorate proved very suspicious of anything seen as a sop to Welsh nationalism, and would have been much reassured if the devolution scheme had been part of a package in which the English regions were included.
The incoming Thatcher administration in 1979 was not only ideologically opposed to devolution but had compelling practical reasons for abandoning the whole project. The price of so doing was a progressive alienation of Scottish public opinion during the 1980s. Labour meanwhile was left to sort out its internal differences. No mention of a Welsh assembly, let alone a scheme of regional government for England, was made in its 1983 election manifesto, but by 1987 pledges of action on both had returned. The experience of the 1970s persuaded the Liberals that a federal solution was the only way to avoid the many anomalies that would be introduced by a scheme of piecemeal devolution. Unfortunately, some of their allies in the newly formed SDP, such as Dr David Owen, were contemptuous of federalism &endash; at British or European levels &endash; and the Alliance leadership had to be content to reaffirm the primacy of establishing Scottish and Welsh parliaments as part of a phased introduction of an overall devolutionist structure.
The threat of rising Scottish and Welsh nationalism appeared to have been contained by the Conservatives for much of the 1980s, with SNP representation at Westminster reduced from a high point of 11 MPs in 1974&endash;79 to 3 MPs at the 1987 general election. Scotland continued to be the most promising lever on the British constitution upon which the hopes of all those who argued for home rule, regional devolution and a wider agenda of constitutional reform rested. In the UK as a whole, the cross-party Charter 88 movement was set up in 1988 to argue for a whole set of inter-locking constitutional reforms, including greater regional autonomy, and attracted 40,000 subscribers and some centre-left quality newspaper support. In Scotland itself a broad-based coalition of forces, including the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties, the Church of Scotland and business leaders established a Scottish Convention which met to work out an agreed scheme for a new Scottish parliament. Despite the weakness of the Conservatives north of the border (with 9 MPs at Westminster out of 72), the government of John Major, who succeeded Mrs Thatcher as Prime Minister in November 1990, was able successfully to tar all the non-Conservative supporters with an anti-unionist brush at the April 1992 general election. Against all expectations the Conservative vote increased slightly to twenty-six per cent of those voting in Scotland; 10 Tory MPs were returned to Westminster and the status quo was defended and maintained. Further progress on devolution in Great Britain appears to rest upon the Conservatives losing their majority in the House of Commons, and this essentially will require a change of heart in England.
Regional policy, defined as the attempt by governments to influence by policy measures the course of economic development in the regions, has a pedigree in the United Kingdom that goes back sixty years. In Britain the principal objective of regional policy has been to maintain or to create employment, whereas in other EC states other objectives have formed part of regional policy, such as land-use and infrastructure planning. Macro-economic policy considerations arising from the danger of overheating the most successful regional economies causing cost-push inflation across the whole national economy have also justified government attempts to rebalance economic growth patterns as between regions all over Western Europe.
The first attempts at UK regional policy were made in the Special Areas Acts of 1934 to 1937 in response to the collapse of employment in the slump years in regions such as South Wales, parts of Durham, Tyneside, West Cumberland and Scotland. This piecemeal approach was developed into a more generalised regional policy following an influential wartime review, the Barlow report. A more or less integrated regional, industrial and employment policy was maintained from the 1940s until the end of the 1970s and the arrival of Mrs Thatcher as Prime Minister (see Smith, 1989).
The methods adopted by central government policy-makers have been used continuously but are often varied in terms of policy mix. The most favoured method has been the provision of capital grants to industry, in the private sector as well as in the public sector, linked to regional development and the creation of jobs. This approach has run into several difficulties. It has usually been addressed to manufacturing industry, when the main sources of job creation were in the service sector. It is increasingly constrained by EC rules (see below), and its efficacy has been strongly challenged by neo-liberal economists. However a major study for the Department of Trade and Industry in 1986 found that much of UK regional policy had been successful in creating nearly 600,000 long term jobs (Moores, Rhodes and Tyler, 1986).
Another instrument that has been used to boost regional development and employment has been the provision of large public funds for public infrastructure in the regions &endash; for motorways and roads, rail electrification, telecommunications, power generation and water supply developments, new towns and, to some extent, new universities. Central government departments have been dispersed in whole or in part to regional locations away from London: the Crown Agents were sent to East Kilbride (near Glasgow), the main social security activity (now the Benefits Agency) went to Newcastle, the Department of Health to Leeds, and the Manpower Services Commission (now part of the Employment and Training Agency) to Sheffield. Economic development institutions have been set up such as the English Estates corporation (now privatised) which built and managed industrial estates, new town and later urban development corporations, regional development agencies in Scot land, Wales and Northern Ireland, and the short-lived National Enterprise Board (1974&endash;1979) (see Butt Philip, 1978). Government grants to subsidise current employment costs in regional undertakings played a major part (notably the Regional Employment Premium and the Temporary Employment Subsidy schemes) in the policy of the 1970s, and these do continue in the 1990s in the public transport field with annual subsidies to the regional operational costs of British Rail and Caledonian MacBrayne's ferry services to the Scottish islands.
The ideological thrust of Mrs Thatcher's governments in the 1980s was clearly in conflict with such interven tionist subsidies. Market forces could have been allowed free rein and regional dispersal of firms and employ ment achieved in the long term as companies moved away from high cost, scarce labour regions to lower cost, rich in labour regions. There were bound to be short term costs in terms of socio-political damage, leapfrogging wage and housing price spirals, and inadequate infrastructures in the expanding areas. Fortunately the theory was never fully tested as the rigidities in the labour and housing markets soon became clear; the famous 'get on your bike' advice given to the unemployed by one senior Tory Government minister, Norman Tebbit, fell foul of the realities of the absence of affordable and available housing in those areas where employment opportunities were greatest. The Thatcher governments therefore never completely abandoned regional policy. They proved fearful of applying their economic philosophy fully in this area, and they were trapped by continuing EC funds for regional development being tied to co-finance by UK central or local government. After major reviews of regional policy in 1983 and 1988, the 'social' justification for regional policy was accepted, but the budget for regional grants continued to be cut in real terms, and the areas eligible to receive such grants greatly reduced in size. Assisted area status was still much sought after in the 1990s, as the key to unlock funds from Brussels, if nothing else, and by 1993 the UK government was adding areas like Portsmouth, Thanet and the East End of London to its list having previously removed areas such as mid-Wales, North Devon and North East Scotland (see Tighe, 1993 and Wintour, 1993).
Conservative Governments may have downgraded regional policy as such since 1979 but they have accepted the case for limited public sector intervention in special areas, where possible linked with private sector finance. This has led to the formation of new designations such as tax-relieved 'enterprise zones', and new appointed bodies directly funded by central government, such as the London Docklands Development Corporation and a host of urban development corporations, operating for example in Bristol, the Black Country and Merseyside inner city areas have had to compete for central government funds in the thirty 'City Challenge' schemes. In 1993 some unification of these separate urban initiatives was announced in the form of new 'City Pride' teams linking local businessmen with civil servants to oversee urban policy implementation (Willman and Burt, 1993). This represents another sign that regional policy is being overtaken by urban policy, and specifically inner city concerns. The bare economic indicators, especially the figures on regional unemployment rates (see Table 1), help to explain why this is so. In parallel with the onset of the 1989&endash;93 recession there has been clear evidence of convergence in the economic circumstances of the various UK regions, although a similar trend predates this. In the twenty-two years since 1971 all regions have seen a rise in unemployment, but whereas the most affected region (Northern Ireland) saw its unemployment rate double from 7 to 14 per cent, the least affected region (the South East) saw its unemployment rate rise almost fivefold from 2 to 10 per cent. The regional differential has thus narrowed over two decades, and this is also true for the movement of regional GDP, although the greatest change has occurred as a result of the most recent recession, whose long term impact cannot yet be assessed.
To an important extent, the condition of regional economic policy remains stronger in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, where specific initiatives have been made and separate political institutions exist to support and to implement them. One reading of the economic convergence noted above is that the separate regional policies of those named areas have indeed proved their worth. In 1966 as a result of regional economic and political pressure a new Highlands and Islands Development Board was set up to stimulate employment and economic development. This was followed in 1975 by the new Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland Development Agencies. They offered an integrated, interventionist, hands-on approach to the resolution of long standing regional economic difficulties and appear to have had much success. (The situation in Northern Ireland has proved more difficult than in Scotland and Wales, possibly as a result of the continuing communal conflict there, although the Local Economic Development Unit (LEDU) which assists small firms in Northern Ireland has been very successful). Early Conservative attempts to abolish them in 1979&endash;80 foundered on intense local opposition, including from their own supporters. In the 1990s, the Scottish agencies have been broken up into smaller area-based units and they have been given employment training as well as economic development roles. They may however have lost much of their value as developers and implementers of regional industrial strate gies, just because of their smaller scale and local focus.
Undoubtedly a major element in the success of these development agencies has been their close sponsorship and relations with the so-called 'regional' departments of central government &endash; the Scottish Office, the Welsh Office and the Northern Ireland Office, the latter set up shortly after direct rule was re-imposed in 1972. This administrative arrangement has transferred most of the domestic responsibilities of central government in these named areas to the relevant 'regional' department (e.g. agriculture, health, transport, education, environment and employment). The 'regional' departments have enjoyed considerable autonomy, as well as the responsibil ity for distributing their sizeable block grants for public expenditure which Whitehall has handed down. This has enabled significant differences in the evolution of education policy or the levels of the local 'poll' tax to be funded and sustained. In addition, the much smaller political élites present in these 'regional' capitals have been able to work across departmental boundaries at all levels with considerable ease, away from the gaze of West minster, shielded from much public accountability, and motivated to work for the common good of their sub-national territory.
This configuration of administrative devolution and regional development agencies working successfully in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland has naturally attracted the envious eyes of some English regions. In the 1970s, some of the bigger, quasi-regional authorities set up their own regional enterprise boards with funds from their own employees pension funds, county council grants and some private finance. The West Midlands and Greater London Enterprise Boards even managed to survive &endash; but in much truncated form &endash; the demise of their founding local authorities. Lancashire Enterprises Limited had acquired a national reputation for innovative and enlightened investment and help for local firms. But the aversion to regional approaches in England has been mirrored at this level too with individual local authorities each embarking on their own local economic initiatives, with rare examples of co-operation (such as between Devon and Cornwall, or Yorkshire and Humberside) serving as exceptions that prove the general rule. Some English county councils have argued that they are sufficiently large to count as regions in their own right: Essex (population 1.25 million) is one such council to have pursued this line, even to the point of twinning with the French region of Picardy and setting up a joint representative office in Brussels. At least eight British regions, counties or districts have separate representatives in Brussels, alongside Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (see Audit Commission, 1991).
By the end of 1993, two further developments in the organisation of local administration point in contrary directions as regards the future of the regional dimension. On the one hand local government reform is proceeding apace with the Local Government Commission under Sir John Banham being directed to establish unitary local authorities in England, leading to the demise of most county councils. In Scotland the proposed reform of local government announced by Ian Laing, the Secretary of State for Scotland, in the summer of 1993 would abolish all regional councils. The Banham Commission, in sounding out public opinion, is not even asking respondents if they have any sense of regional identity, unlike the Kilbrandon and Redcliffe-Maud commissions of the 1970s (Royal Commission on Local Government in England, 1969 and Royal Commission on the Con stitution, 1973). Yet in an attempt by central government to streamline the organisation of central government departments at regional level, Whitehall has proposed to establish new regional directors at a senior level to co-ordinate the work in the standard regions of several government departments (regional economic development, environment, employment and training, industry and transport) and to offer a 'one-stop' shop to firms and local authorities (see White, 1993a and Willman and Burt, 1993). This may indeed be a classic example of top-down regionalism, of devolution rather than decentralisation, but it is almost as if the very fragmentation of local government at base level is driving the Conservative Government inexorably towards the recognition of the region for strategic planning and development purposes, in defiance of its own rhetoric. This may however be at the expense of elected and directly accountable local government (see Capon, 1993).
Regional policy has become a major concern of the European Community since the late 1960s when EC leaders from the original six member states realised that a strong Community regional policy was an essential accompaniment to the project for economic and monetary union. This interest in regional policy, which was of most concern to Italy, was then exploited strongly in the enlargement negotiations of 1970&endash;71 when the United Kingdom and Ireland, as applicants to join the EC, sought and obtained compensation for their peripheral position relative to the main Community markets. Britain was also keen to establish a budget line, in the form of the new European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), from which it could draw large amounts (initially 28 per cent of the entire Fund) in order to balance some of its potentially large 'net contribution' to the overall EC budget. By the mid 1980s the ERDF had expanded considerably on the back of further additions to the membership of the Community and was increasingly being organised in combination with the European Social Fund (ESF) and the guidance section of the fund financing the whole of the common agriculture policy. The three funds, the so-called structural funds, will account for around one third of EC budgetary spending by the year 2,000, compared with less than ten per cent of spending in 1980.
A more long-standing constraint on the development of national regional policies has been the Community's control over state aids, using Articles 92 to 94 of the EEC Treaty. The logic of EC competition policy demands that national governments should not be permitted to distort competition and subsidise 'lame duck' enterprises which are otherwise uncompetitive and not viable. The European Commission (DGIV) in Brussels must there fore authorise any regional development scheme, using state subsidies, in any member state &endash; also any subsidy to a particular sector of industry or to a particular firm. The Commission has tried to make a judgement on the 'objective need' of particular regions using its own consistently comparable data of regional deprivation and divergence, and establishing a sliding scale of permitted levels of subsidy (in terms of percentage of the whole capital cost of a project) applicable to each region of the Community. While the controls on state aids from Brussels were honoured as much in the breach as in the observance in the 1970s, the drive to complete the single European market begun in 1985 has encouraged successive competition commissioners to apply the rules very comprehensively and to require much more information about, and control over, regional and sub-regional incentive schemes to encourage existing and newly-formed businesses to grow. Although the Commission is permitted to allow subsidies where conditions justify them, this detailed control has nevertheless begun to bite, and contributes significantly to the way UK government departments, local authorities and enterprise agencies can structure their economic incentive packages for regions and areas in difficulty.
In the United Kingdom the process of European integration has thus heightened the role of the Community in the management of regional development at the level of Whitehall, and below. Securing eligibility for receipt of structural funds from Brussels, and then competing for those funds once eligibility is established, has proved to be a major strategic consideration for regions as varied in their needs as the West Midlands, Strathclyde and Devon and Cornwall. As state aids have become more heavily controlled, and fewer job creating investment opportunities presented themselves, so the bulk of EC funding has been more and more devoted to the co-finance of infrastructure projects. Major Whitehall constraints on local authority capital spending have made it increasingly difficult for EC-funded regional schemes to be launched, and there are long-standing disputes between Brussels, Whitehall and local agencies over the extent to which central government pockets money received from the Community rather than passing it down the line: this is the issue of 'additionality', over which the Commission and other member states have made periodic threats to withhold funds from Britain.
These sums received from the structural funds are not inconsiderable &endash; around £900 million per annum, in the late 1980s, nearer £700 million each year in the 1990s. They have acquired extra significance for the regions as UK government spending on regional development grants was cut back sharply in the 1980s. The result has been that regional spending priorities have been increasingly dominated by EC, not UK, eligibility criteria and policy objectives, with the Department of Trade and Industry, the lead department in Whitehall, content to travel along the path toward greater Europeanisation of regional policy (Department of Trade and Industry, 1988). Local and regional authorities' bids for assisted area status, a sine qua non for receiving ERDF support, have increasingly had to be made to Brussels as well as to London. Whereas in the mid-1980s only Northern Ireland was deemed by the EC to be worthy of top priority funding from the structural funds, with mid-Wales and Devon and Cornwall obtaining some rural development help, by 1993 Merseyside and the Highlands and Islands were added to the list of 'objective one' regions, and towns in south east England, such as Portsmouth and Margate, were bidding to be included.
EC funding for poorer regions, concentrating mainly upon capital projects for infrastructure and industrial development and vocational training schemes, demands much new activity for UK central and local government, especially as England was stripped of almost all regional administration by the Thatcher administration. Regional development plans have had to be submitted to Brussels on the basis of which Community Support Frameworks, directing EC aid, have been negotiated. Funding from Brussels for integrated operations covering areas in and around Belfast, Birmingham and Glasgow has been conditional upon a regional team of administrators and local representatives being formed to implement and monitor the approved major funding programmes. Regional GDP statistics have, very controversially, had to be prepared in addition to regional unemployment statistics, so that Brussels can take a pan-European view of Britain's regional needs. In the absence of any defined regions in England (other than the over-large eight 'standard' regions), county councils have had to bid for regional status in the eyes of Brussels, or make alliances with their neighbours to do so. Local authorities have had to become increasingly wise to the policies and politics of the European Community, in order to benefit from the myriad programmes, with subsidies attached, emanating from Brussels and in order to comply with and implement, as agents of central government, the letter and the spirit of the Single European Market. They have been instrumental in alerting the Commission to the specific problems of regions facing industrial shutdowns in coal, shipbuilding, steel, defence and other sectors, prompting in turn EC-led targetted conversion programmes like RECHAR, RENAVAL, RESIDER and KONVER respectively. The Commission has seemed to many in local and regional government, for a long time, to be more sympathetic and more in tune with regional needs than Whitehall.
It is not just that the whole administrative structure of England is unsuited to the structure for developing and administering EC structural fund programmes (the position in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland being wholly different) which the Community has laid down for all member states. England lacks a regional tier of administration, and the small regional outposts of central government departments have not been in the habit of co-operating one with another. The Wilsonian structure of regional economic planning boards and councils from the 1960s was finally dismantled in the early 1980s. Strategic urban planning authorities, such as the Greater London Council and the metropolitan county councils were all broken up in the mid-1980s and not replaced. This left no apparatus in England with which to handle the ever-growing need of Brussels for regional interlocutors and regional economic analysis, as was pointed out by a House of Lords Select Committee in 1984 (House of Lords Select Committee on the European Communities, 1983&endash;84 and 1987&endash;88). By the autumn of 1993, the UK government was forced publicly to announce a reversal of policy and a strengthening of the regional offices of central government departments such as the environment and employment ministries (see White, 1993b). The purpose of these reforms being ostensibly to exercise greater control over the urban development corporations and to enable civil servants to respond better to European initiatives.
Another event in 1993 tellingly illustrated how the process of centralisation of power in the British state is colliding with the development of the European Community. The Maastricht Treaty on European Union provides for the creation of an EC-wide Committee of the Regions to advise the EC institutions on regional needs and issues. The UK government did not oppose the creation of this new quango, having other more important fish to fry in the treaty negotiations, but it proved surprisingly resistant to demands from the House of Commons that all twenty-four UK representatives should be drawn from elected local government councillors. It appears that the Conservative Government would have liked to put British ministers with regional portfolios on their Committee, but MPs &endash; perhaps fighting other battles &endash; decided to insist on a councillors only clause, and the government was defeated.
Although British society is relatively homogeneous in relation to other European states there are still many factors in its composition which make for diversity, much of which is manifested in differences in the geographical distribution of characteristics, lifestyles and traditions. These differences form much of the basis of regional sentiment and identity in the United Kingdom, as well as the fact of geography itself.
The British population itself has diverse origins. While very few can identify their Norman ancestry, let alone their origins as incoming Jutes and Angles from continental Europe, there is still a keen sense of the different ethnic identities in the Celts in Ireland, the Picts and Scots in Scotland, the Norse people in Orkney and Shet land, and the mixed Celtic-Briton population of Wales. More recent migrations of Irish, Afro-Caribbean and people from the Indian sub-continent have not taken on a regional form but particular urban concentrations. This means that some ethnic differences in Britain have a regional cultural resonance while others do not. This is seen in terms of differences of first language, for example, where the large Urdu, Hindi and Gujurati speaking populations are spread across several urban centres in England, while the smaller population of Welsh speakers (circa 500,000) is concentrated in Wales, with especially high concentrations in the north and west of the country. Minority languages specific to the British Isles also occur in Ireland and northern Scotland, being Gaelic in kind. Dialects and the incidence of particular idioms and word forms also have a strong regional distribution throughout Britain as elsewhere.
Popular culture is also subject to regional variations, despite the pervasive influence of nationally organised mass media. Television has important regional opt-outs (especially for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) as regards the BBC, and independent television, apart from its national news service, is completely regional in its organisation. The daily press is even more biased towards London production and orientation, but does have a hard time in selling papers in Scotland and Northern Ireland, where indigenous dailies such as The Scotsman or Belfast Newsletter or regional variations of the national dailies are more favoured. A long campaign led to the creation of a separate largely Welsh medium television channel in 1980 subsidised by the whole independent television network. The arts in general have developed an increasing regional profile, with national orchestras, theatre and dance companies making regular touring appearances in regional centres, and the regional centres themselves developing a substantial artistic life. Part of the Tate Gallery's collection in London has been moved to a new permanent site in Liverpool, while Glasgow has made great strides to develop a cultural profile that rivals that of Edinburgh. Leeds now hosts an internationally recognised piano festival and Birmingham has a symphony orchestra of international standard. Market researchers have found important differences of taste occurring between regions whether it be fashion or food and drink. The Welsh have a penchant for tinned salmon and the Geordies for brown ale, it seems. In sport, the more thriving activities often have regional organisations to implement national rules, as a practical response to supervising events and behaviour of athletes rather than a real expression of regional identity (the Welsh Rugby Football Union excepted!). Some sports do have a particular regional presence, rugby league in northern England, hurling in Ireland, and Highland games in northern Scotland. The voluntary sector also spawns regional organisations as a necessary interface between national and local activities, the more extensive its area of work and activities become. A few trade unions are region-specific such as the Educational Institute of Scotland and the Farmers Union of Wales, while in Ireland trade unions often ignore the border for organisational purposes.
In the world of education there are pronounced differences between Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and the rest of Britain. Thus the break between Scottish secondary and higher education occurs one year earlier than in England and Wales, and a different examination system and degree course structure results. In Northern Ireland almost all schools are still divided on communal lines, while in Wales, the Welsh language has a special place in the national curriculum and numerous Welsh medium primary and secondary schools and pre-school groups have been set up since the 1950s. The University of Wales has a special federal structure, but this appears to be breaking down (rather as is that of the University of London).
Variations in religious affiliations and observance are also to be found in the regions within the indigenous Christian tradition. Thus church-going in Northern Ireland is a majority pursuit, compared to one in seven of the UK population as a whole. Important Catholic concentrations occur in the West of Scotland, Merseyside and other areas of high Irish immigration since the 1840s. Non-conformist Protestants are strongly concentrated in the South West and North of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland a more advanced form of Protestantism prevails, and the Church of Scotland has more than once provided the focus for national campaigns on behalf of the whole nation. The Anglican tradition provides the established state church only in England.
Regional religious differences form part of the reason for regional political variations in voter allegiance. Catholics provide disproportionate support for Labour in central Scotland, and the non-conformist past accounts for a large part of the survival of the Liberal tradition in the west of England. In recent years general elections have demonstrated more pronounced variations by region in the swings of voter support for political parties. The 1987 election saw an ever sharper loss of support for the Conservatives the greater the distance from London, but a favourable swing to the government in the South-East of England (see Butler and Kavanagh, 1988, p. 284). In 1992 the reverse occurred, with the largest swings against the government occurring in the South-East and the South-West (see Butler and Kavanagh, 1992, pp. 324&endash;332). The political battle is somewhat different in both Wales and Scotland where nationalist parties make the party contest a four-way split. In Northern Ireland, none of the British political parties is a significant player in the politics of the province, and the seventeen MPs attending Westminster are drawn from four distinct Northern Irish parties. Political differences of this kind have led the UK parliament to continue to legislate separately for Scotland, with its own Romano-Dutch legal system. Northern Ireland, and occasionally Wales too, also benefits from separate legislation and different standards, where moral and social issues are at stake.
The distribution of public expenditure is also skewed in favour of the more peripheral regions of the UK. In part this reflects the great role the public sector has played in the economic life of such regions (although this is fast diminishing), and in part it reflects different degrees of economic activity among regional populations. The tax take is much greater in southern England where incomes and employment rates are higher. By the same token cuts in welfare payments affect disproportionately those living in areas furthest from London (see Hencke, 1993). The imposition of value added tax on fuel consumption from 1994 will, for reasons to do with the colder climate, bear hardest on those living in the north of Britain. The new uniform business rate introduced in 1990 was intended in part to tax businesses in southern England more heavily than those in the north.
As noted earlier, patterns of employment are regionally distinct, and this affects not only the balance between the private and the public sector, but also the growth and popularity of self-employment. Between 1979 and 1987, for example, self-employment in Great Britain grew by some 52 per cent, but the regional growth varied from Wales (+19%) and Scotland (+21%) to South West England's (+90%) (Department of Employment, 1988). In some respects the regional organisation of major public sector employers such as British Coal and British Steel has atrophied as the industries themselves have declined. The regional organisation of the gas supply industry was abolished in the early 1980s, and is being much reduced in significance at British Rail. Regional organisation has however been institutionalised upon the privatisation of the electricity and water supply industries. Regional health authorities overseeing health care provision will survive only until 1996, but some regionalisation of police functions has occurred and more is being canvassed (The Guardian, 22 October 1993 and The Independent, 22 October 1993). A major problem with such regional institutions is that the territorial divisions within which they operate almost never coincide across different functions. Where regional provision of public services, of public infrastructure and some strategic planning is called for the ensuing ar rangements have been invariably ad hoc in nature (e.g. road building) or nothing has been attempted (e.g. waste disposal strategy).
Economic differences between the UK regions have also led to striking divergences in the behaviour of the housing market between the regions in the 1980s and 1990s, the boom of the former especially in the south and east being followed by a major bust. Because home ownership using mortgage finance affects half the population, major differences in purchasing power have emerged between the regions as regards non-housing related expenditure. This in turn has altered the severity and impact of the recession across the regions of the United Kingdom and has contributed to the apparent convergence of regional economic indicators noted above.
The portrait of the UK regions thus depicted is confusing, as regional variations in social, economic, political and cultural life are revealed to have many different, almost kaleidoscopic, configurations. Yet the particular distinctiveness of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland emerge clearly and this has been recognised in the arrangement of public administration, and to a lesser extent the law, of these countries. The position in England is less clear-cut, for while regional differences do exist they are by no means so sharply drawn compared with the rest of the United Kingdom, nor do their contours very often overlap. There is no regional administration or government or public life to give shape or form to such regional differences as do exist, or to build up a regional constituency of shared interests. Indeed in many parts of middle and southern England no clear regional identity exists among the population at large. Where some regionalisation of government was beginning to emerge, and an identification with it by public opinion, the institutions were destroyed in 1986, in the case of Greater London much against the views of the electorate. A contributory factor, in addition, has been the much stronger local identities, typically to be found in counties such as Somerset, Cornwall or Durham, which reflect administrative (and socio-cultural) divisions which go back one thousand years. The French départements (two hundred years old) and the German Länder (less than fifty years old) cannot compete. Changes in communications are making for a reconfiguration of identities and interests. Nationally dominated television, radio and newspapers have spread national perspectives and values to the whole population of Britain, and have contributed to the further marginalisation of regionally based ethnic cultures, provoking a spirited political response. One of the most dramatic of such responses was the hunger strike started by Mr Gwynfor Evans, former Plaid Cymru leader and MP, in 1980 to persuade the new Conservative government to honour its election commitment to establish a separate Welsh fourth television channel. The government succumbed to pressure on this issue.
The shrinking of the separation of the periphery from the core of the UK and its capital as a result of high-speed rail and air travel, and the development of an extensive motorway network, has opened up many previously remote parts of Britain to outside influences and has made the notion of regional government and regional identification more feasible. The great paradox is that just as these possibilities are being opened up, the official position of the UK government could scarcely be more hostile. Indeed one construction to be put upon the administrative and structural reorganisation of government and the public sector pursued since 1979 is that the Conservatives have consciously sought to undermine all large centres of power located away from Westminster with a view to reinforcing the power of central government. A parallel rhetoric can be deployed to claim that the break-up of big local authorities and the waves of privatisation will deliver more local control to consumers, customers and communities. But their margin of control has been reduced by Whitehall strings attached, and by reductions of real capital and real current spending limits. In relative terms central government has won back power from the regions and has ensured that no regional institutions in England with any political weight have survived to challenge Whitehall's priorities. The final irony appears to be that in response to a mixture of excessive fragmentation of local government and EC pressures central government is itself having to re-invent the regional tier of administration, albeit completely under Whitehall control.
Regionalism was always likely to have difficulty winning political acceptance in the United Kingdom. It appeals to planners and to the politically marginalised, especially those on Britain's periphery, but the idea of regionalism does not sit well within the political culture of the twentieth century British state. Since the Norman conquest in the late eleventh century the ideology of firm central government control over the regions as an essential condition for the survival of the state and the exercise of British power elsewhere in the world has been dominant. All opposition to those in charge of the united British State has been neutralised, whether external or internal in origin, often by use of 'divide and rule' tactics. The unionist ideology, buttressed by pragmatic arguments, has been supported by appeals to resist incursions on British sovereignty by Brussels and by outbreaks of jingoism and reinforcement of national pride occasioned by victory in world wars and the 'successful' Falklands war. The national tabloid press, which is very extensively read, has been a willing accomplice in reinforcing such attitudes.
There is an implicit assumption too that a weakening of the bonds that tie the components of the British state together will work to the advantage of Britain's more powerful competitors, undermining British effectiveness on the world stage. According to this argument, a strong Britain is better equipped to resist any Franco-German conspiracy in Brussels or the escapades of any United States administration. Britain, despite its much reduced economic and political weight, must still have its own independent nuclear defence capability, larger than average standing armed forces, and its own seat on the United Nations Security Council. Applying this perspective, there is no real recognition that other large states have sought to and succeeded in drawing strength from the institutionalisation of their own internal regional diversity and needs.
Unionist ideology has combined happily with a mistrust of local government leadership and its integrity. Although all too many Westminster politicians have 'fallen short' in their personal lives or embarked upon foolish policy nostrums (the 'poll tax' fiasco of 1988&endash;91 being a fine example), it is the vicissitudes of certain local councils (especially in Labour parts of London) and of fallen heroes such as Newcastle's T. Dan Smith that are best remembered. The British political élite (like the Irish political class) does not trust local government and local politicians, an attitude which conveniently feeds the trend towards even greater centralisation of power in London. Regional government and elected regional assemblies are depicted as introducing extra and unnecessary layers of bureaucracy. Arguments for greater accountability over the exercise of executive discretion are brushed aside. There is almost a pervasive attitude of fatalism about the efficacy of any reform of UK political institutions, not so surprising in view of the widely-perceived 'failures' of all health service and local government reforms since the 1960s.
Ideology and scepticism about the politics of regionalism have also found support from strong localist sentiment especially in parts of England, which is focussed on the traditional counties, with their long history and tradition. The county councils are expected to be the casualty of the new round of government reform in progress, in which case the way would be much clearer for establishing a regional tier of government at a later date.
Another unspoken factor at work is the fear felt by the Westminster-based political class concerning the creation of rival power bases and potential competitors in the political process. This was most graphically illustrated by the refusal of the Houses of Parliament to give any privileged access to its premises to the 81 elected members of the European Parliament for the first 11 years of their existence. The MEPs were seen as poaching on the constituency work of MPs and were, it seems, not to be encouraged or assisted in their work. Westminster has much the same self-interested approach to the possibility of delegating its work to and offering an alternative significant political career structure through new regional political institutions.
Although this analysis is not encouraging about regionalism in the United Kingdom, it has set out to show that regional issues are likely to return to the top of the political agenda especially if there is a change of government at Westminster. There are significant pressures within the political system in the United Kingdom which will force Parliament to take another hard look at the devolution options, and it is likely that any scheme adopted will have to have an English dimension to it in order to gain full political consent and legitimacy. Those who support the strengthening of political regionalism in Britain can continue to use the EC dimension as a lever on national government to persuade it to take account of regional policy needs and to put in place some appropriate regional administrative structures. But a more dramatic strategy, one much more difficult to achieve, would be for political parties in the United Kingdom to use the electoral system for Westminster elections to force the issue by uniting behind one 'regionalist' candidate in each constituency. The effect could be as dramatic as the sweeping from power of the Canadian Government in October 1993, when the governing party was left with a mere two seats in the legislature, but party competition and advantage is likely to get in the way of such a project, and the priority that would have to be given to demanding a new constitution and settlement in the UK is not yet sufficiently accepted. Failing this, those who would like to see a stronger regional tier of government will have to do more to win the argument among the general public by facing down the complaint that regionalism will lead to more bureaucracy and by restating the arguments for greater democratic control and accountability over existing government activities. There also needs to be a conscious attempt, especially on the part of those in local government, to build up regional institutions so as to encourage greater regional identification in England and to demonstrate the relevance and need for a regional dimension. Two obvious areas where more could be usefully done are in strategic planning at regional level, and economic development with the formation of more regional development agencies by local authorities. One example of regional cooperation on strategic planning questions is to be found in the SERPLAN organisation, a forum in which the planning officers of London boroughs and South-East English county councils develop policy and through which they lobby Whitehall. Since only one county council in England is exclusively controlled by the Conservatives there are important opportunities for the opposition parties to pursue a regional agenda through local government. There is little evidence that this is their intention, a measure perhaps of the more short-term focus of the political parties and of the low intensity of feeling in England on the regional dimension to politics.
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Table 1: Regional unemployment rates 1971-1993 (%) |
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South East |
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South West |
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East Anglia |
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East Midlands |
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West Midlands |
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Yorkshire and Humberside |
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North West |
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North |
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Wales |
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Scotland |
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Northern Ireland |
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All of UK |
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1. September only
Source: Department of Employment