Cameron promises 'fairer' powers split for UK

David Cameron used his speech at his party's conference to underline his promise to deliver more power to the Scottish Parliament, but failed to spell out what that could mean for Wales.

He told the conference that he had 'one more task' for the former Welsh Secretary William Hague, who's standing down as an MP at next year's UK Election. That task, he said, involves 'bringing fairness to the constitution.'

Many politics-watchers in Wales will find that passage of the speech odd, implying that the answer to 'unfairness' in the constitution for Wales is to ensure that only English MPs can vote on English-only laws. That strikes me as more of a vow to England than a vow to Wales and Northern Ireland.

[When I interviewed the Prime Minister on Monday](http://Cameron promises )he acknowledged that delivering that would be complicated, given that so many laws affecting England are actually England-and-Wales laws.

Also in that interview he said he was 'happy to look' at the possibility of devolving further powers to Wales such as broadcasting and policing although he singled out policing as one area he finds difficult to see being devolved.

But as far as the Prime Minister is concerned, those are subjects for further discussion and the main focus for Wales is to transfer some control over income tax to a future Welsh Government. The Welsh Secretary has already announced that a more flexible version of that would be on offer but only after a referendum.

In private senior Conservative MPs are conceding that there may well be considerable further devolution to Wales as the UK parties work out how to fulfill their promise to the Scottish people. Government sources suggest that ultimately what's likely to be on offer is a more equal sharing-out of power with Wales and Northern Ireland given the same or similar responsibilities to Scotland.

That scenario will encounter its own controversies and is linked to this complicated commitment to English votes for English laws. Perhaps that's why the Prime Minister didn't go into more detail in his conference speech.