IPPR survey: "The English Question- The View from Westminster"

The Institute for Public Policy Research is a "leftish-progressive" UK think-tank with strong ties to the Labour Party. Over the Christmas holidays, they produced a report detailing MPs’ attitudes to how the various devolution "settlements" have affected England; do MPs believe England is losing out as a result of these changes as many people have claimed?

Something like 1 in 6 MPs took part in the survey with a pretty representative mix of parties, so the results may well prove to be very relevant during the period of the next parliament:

40% of MPs agreed that England had lost out because of devolution to the other nations of the United Kingdom, compared to 38% who disagreed. 50% of those who
agreed with this view were Conservative MPs and 28% were Labour MPs

Not much of a difference there, the more important contrast being obviously between the views of the Conservatives and Labour. Curiously enough, the IPPR has not broken down the MPs sampled into regions and countries but I think it’s a fairly safe bet that the vast majority of Conservative MPs asked will be representing English constituencies with Labour being spread out more widely between the three parts of the UK which return their MPs. That could be one reason for Labour MPs' reluctance to admit that England has lost out; another could be as the party which created the assymetrical devolved shambles, they are reluctant to own up to theor own responsibility for the present state of affairs.

The proposition that ‘England should be governed as it is now’ elicited a
strikingly small amount of support from the current cohort of MPs (10%).
Slightly more MPs (11%) support the very radical idea of an English
Parliament than indicate support for the status quo.

Now that is interesting- leading you to think that there is going to be movement in England's (and hence the UK's) constitutional status one way or another during the term of the next parliament; movement perhaps, but the IPPR have pushed the concrete question much more into the long-term:

MPs were also asked to consider the likelihood of each of these proposals being implemented within the next twenty years:

• A parliament for England: only 4% of respondents saw this as likely to come
about.
• English Votes for English Laws: 44% of MPs (among whom 52% are Conservative and 20% Labour) believe that this will be implemented.
• Devolved regional government in England: despite the fact that most MPs favoured this option, only 21% of MPs actually think that it will be implemented. The overwhelming majority (67%) are Labour MPs.
• More powers for local government in England: 43% of MPs believe that there will be reform in this area. Among this group 59% are Labour and only 22% Conservative.

As the report says, "MPs’ expectations in terms of reforms to the governance of England are conditioned by the policy position advocated by their own party" but despite that caveat, Unionists outside England continuing to believe that the present status quo should/will remain are employing dangerous head in the sand tactics.

Finally...

MPs were asked whether they thought that the different levels of funding received by the nations of the United Kingdom was fair. A clear majority of MPs (62%) said that the current distribution of funding was unfair. Among those who thought it was unfair 74% were Conservatives and 50% were Labour MPs. Only 29% of MPs felt the distribution of funding was fair, of these just 6% were conservatives.

Again, the breakdown between the parties is the key here and that 62% overall figure is only going to increase post this year's election. Barnett's days, if we hadn't already guessed it by now, are numbered.

Update

Rather embarrassingly, not "finally" actually!

I've got carried away above and omitted the main reason why I wanted to post about this survey in the first place...

Less than 22% of MPs believe that Scotland will separate from the rest of the United Kingdom within the next 50 years.