Nick Clegg has lost the West Lothian Question

Having kicked the West Lothian Question into the long grass, Nick Clegg has only gone and lost the bloody thing. Fortunately the Labour Party's Alan Whitehead (yes, you read correctly, he's a Labour MP) was on hand to remind the Deputy Prime Minister that he had promised to set up a commission.

To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what progress he has made on establishing a commission to consider the West Lothian Question.

And the response from Conservative Mark Harper (Parliamentary underling to Nick Clegg, Political and Constitutional Reform) was:

I will be giving consideration to the requirements over the coming weeks and aim to announce our plans for the commission by autumn 2010.

In other words they've done absolutely bugger all because they're all too busy slashing the budgets on English departments. Isn't it strange to have a Labour MP raising the West Lothian Question? If my memory serves me correctly only three Labour MPs ever mentioned it during Labour's thirteen years in power (Frank Field, Andrew Macinlay and Derek Wyatt).

And since the coalition government took power Labour's Lord Stoddart and Lord Grocott have each asked two Parliamentary questions on the WLQ, both enquiring as to the predicted cost of such a commission and its likely composition. Perhaps some Scottish Labour sphincters are a twitching at the prospect of English Votes on English Laws, or perhaps Labour sense that this is an issue with which to divide Conservative from Lib Dem.