UK 'facing constitutional crisis over devolution'

Tony Blair will be warned today that Britain is facing a "constitutional crisis" because he has not matched devolution in Scotland and Wales by devolving power to English regions.

The Fabian Society, an influential Labour think-tank, will warn that under a future government, Scottish Labour MPs could out-vote Tory-dominated English representatives on policies that would affect only England. The society will urge Mr Blair to set up a constitutional commission to answer the so-called "English question". The Fabians will say in a report: "Once a government at Westminster is dependent on Scottish votes to secure English measures, such matters will cease to be merely anomalies and will become the stuff of constitutional crisis."

The report will increase the pressure on Mr Blair to spell out his plans for the English regions in Labour's manifesto for the next general election. The Prime Minister is cooling on the idea of regional assemblies, but his deputy, John Prescott, is keen to see them set up.

The commission proposed by the Fabians would aim to forge a consensus on a new constitutional blueprint based on "radical decentralisation" of government in England. The society offers three alternatives: elected regional assemblies; greater powers for local councils; and the creation of "city regions" led by elected mayors.

Tony Wright, Labour chairman of the Commons Select Committee on Public Administration and co-author of the report, said: "From now on devolution ... starts being an argument about England: the English question is now on the table and will not go away."

Michael Jacobs, the Fabian Society's general secretary, said: "Democratic decentralisation in some form is imperative. When Rover collapsed, who was there to speak, and act, for the West Midlands? Who speaks for Merseyside or the North-east or Cornwall?"

Mr Blair is already under pressure on the issue after William Hague's plan to restrict the votes of English MPs at Westminster to matters affecting England. At present, Scottish MPs cannot vote on matters that are the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament but can vote on the same issues when they affect England.