The Condition of England under the Coalition

Abstract

This chapter explores the profound impact the Coalition’s policies have had upon the condition of England, arguably far greater than in the other constituent nations and territories of the United Kingdom because of the absence in England of devolved, directly elected institutions, which elsewhere have acted as veto points on Westminster and Whitehall, and led to a different political settlement for schools, hospitals, housing, universities and social care from that experienced in England. The chapter also highlights how the Coalition’s Programme for Government was quintessentially a programme for England, because of the consequences of the devolution implemented by the Blair and Brown governments. Many of the key elements of the Coalition’s programme, such as David Cameron’s vision of the ‘Big Society’ and the top-down reform of the National Health Service (NHS), have applied to England alone, even though they have been framed within a political narrative of British rather than English modernisation. In this important regard, Coalition ministers have continued the long-standing British tradition of conflating the identity, interests and institutions of England with those of the centralised British state.