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    October 26

    Grimsby Telegraph

    10:00 - 25 October 2007

    English hospitals are shedding services while Wales can offer cheap prescriptions and Scotland free care for the elderly because of the out-dated Barnett formula.

    This formula, created at the end of the 1970s, awards a greater proportion of public funds per head of population to Scotland and Wales than to England.Eighty per cent of the UK's wealth comes from England, allowing the devolved bodies now set up in those countries to provide generous benefits to their populations.

    The Barnett formula has allowed the Scottish Parliament to introduce free long-term care for the elderly and abolish university top-up and tuition fees.

    The Welsh Assembly froze prescription charges two years ago and has done away with them to those under 25. It also intends to scrap all prescription charges as soon as possible.

    The Barnett formula was intended to be short-term only, but 20 or so years later, it's still going.

    Its creator, Joel Barnett, has called for it to be replaced, but the main political parties, worried about handing a coup to Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties, lack the political will to reform it.

    There is now a party that has the people of England's best interests at heart.

    The English Democratic Party is a growing force in the world of politics and if you do not receive a leaflet through your door soon, then please look it up on the web. It is also looking for volunteers to help with fundraising and spreading the word.

    Until we, in England, get either a political party capable of shaking the complacency of the main parties, or an English parliament, answerable to the English electorate, to call for a fairer allocation of funding, we will be expected to just sit by and do nothing.

    Kevin Hunter, Old Mill Court, Grimsby.

     

    Reader comments

     

    It is heartening to hear that Kevin Hunter and people like him are waking up to the fact that England is now the only country in Europe that does not have a dedicated Parliament/Assembly. The "Scottish" government in Westminster have all signed the "Scottish Claim of Right" in which they vow to put the interests of Scotland paramount in their political dealings. Devolution has changed, forever, the relationship between the four countries that make up the United Kingdom. Scotland, having been given a taste of independence wants even more and will sue for complete independence in the near future, why New Labour could not see this coming is beyond me. The Welsh Assembly is about to be given more autonomy over Welsh affairs and they are not far behind Scotland in their wish for complete independence. In today's news, Northern Irish MPs have been invited to attend the Dail, the "Parliament" in Southern Ireland, it does not take a degree in rocket science to see where this might lead. England is to be split into 9 European "regions" thereby losing all sense of identity and culture, the age-old Counties and Shires will disappear to be replaced by "Regional Assemblies", "Unitary Authorities" and "Local Area Authorities". It's not too late - Vote English Democrats" whenever you can.
    Patrick Harris, English Democrat., Portsmouth, England

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