TRG and the State of the Union

To mark the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, last night we held a debate on the state of the union, today. Our four speakers were each asked to put forward one idea for reforming the current arrangements and they were well placed to make suggestions. David Mundell MP spoke for Scotland, Nick Bourne AM for Wales, Dominic Grieve MP for England and Sir Malcolm Rifkind gave his unique perspective as a former Scottish Secretary now representing the very-English Kensington and Chelsea.

The audience vote at the end was perhaps not a surprise. They chose to adopt a policy of English votes for English laws through a grand comittee, sitting at Westminster and made up of English MPs.

And it was a good audience, numbering over 110 and they provided some great questions, too.

What was a surprise was the level of press interest. There were two film crews, a dozen print journalists that wanted to talk to members of the panel and Newsnight’s Michael Crick. Sadly, I did not managed to catch any news last night so I have no idea if anything was carried. If anyone saw us mentioned, please let me know and post a comment!

The event did at least make the footnotes on the BBC website with comments from Sir Malcolm and the Western Mail for Nick Bourne.