None of us who remember the terrible time local government endured in the 1980s as budgets were sliced and powers reduced can be unhappy to see greater powers given to local government now. In the 1980s Margaret Thatcher’s government looked across the Thames at the unemployment figures draped over the side of the Greater London Council building, and to her it might as well have been the flag of a foreign power raised over her homeland (reminding her after the Falklands episode that there were ‘enemies within’). Away went the GLC and the metropolitan county councils. In practice it was a time of massive centralisation.

The Lib Dems are right to be concerned about where county councils fit into the picture now with the rise of ‘metro mayors’ and whether there’s too much of an urban takeover, but the move towards more control at local level is a welcome one in principle. However, devolution isn’t just about giving power away. It’s also about sharing power.

I’m not sure that Andy Burnham really understands this, despite his recent meeting with the leaders of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and it is with the ‘nations’ outside England that the danger lies. If you think that all you’ve got to do is give powers away (‘Can we control policing in Wales?’ ‘Yes, maybe we can agree to that’) then you will find that eventually whoever receives additional powers will want more until eventually it seems logical to ask for complete control. I’m not saying that this would be a danger in the case of the English regions. Giving Kim McGuiness a budget over transport policies in the North-East is not likely to lead to a demand for an independent Northumbria. But in the case of those parts of the UK where there are already strong forces calling for full independence, it is arguable that those who say ‘giving some powers away is bound to be a foot in the door leading to demands for more and eventually everything’ have a point.

It is for this reason that devolution must have an element of sharing power as well as giving it away. James Dennison’s recent exploration of governing structures in the UK in Lib Dem Voice talks of a change to the second chamber. He suggests ‘around 300 voting members of the Lords elected by first past the post in territorial constituencies, giving the second chamber a deliberately different mandate rooted in place.’ This would be an excellent development giving the House of Lords a distinctive role in bringing together representatives of the regions and nations. It’s maybe a little like the German ‘Bundesrat’ but it doesn’t have to be the same. James also talks about appointed experts adding to the numbers in the second chamber.

The important thing is that the nations and regions making up the UK not only have an increase in the power to manage their own affairs, but they have a say in how the UK as a whole is run. That is where a revised second chamber can play a key part. The recent approach has been a little too passive-aggressive, promising the regions and nations they’ll have plenty to decide for themselves if they’ll just go away and leave central government alone. There’s a suspicion that the King of the North remains too England-centred in his outlook, despite learning a few Scottish placenames in order to stress the importance of local government across the border. After all, as anyone with an atlas can see from a British perspective, he’s barely King of the Midlands.

There will be questions about how much power a reformed House of Lords should have and whether it should even be able to veto decisions of the Commons. But I believe that to keep the UK united, all parts of that nation-state need to grow used to joint decision-making. That’s what’s been missing so far.

For instance, if it came to an issue of whether to leave the European Union, this should be decided by every part of the United Kingdom, or at least by a qualified majority. If three parts opposed it, for instance Scotland, Northern Ireland and London, then that would be enough to ensure it couldn’t happen. The regions and nations making up the UK would then feel they really did have the power to influence national decisions rather than simply being sent away to do their own thing. Just imagine what it might feel like to be Scottish and told that: ‘You can manage the railways and your education curriculum. Oh, by the way, we’ve decided to leave the European Union.’ It would obviously be very difficult, if not impossible, to maintain a United Kingdom on that basis. Oh, wait a minute….

* Mark Corner is a UK national, who teaches economic history and philosophy at the University of Leuven, is married to a Czech EU official and lives in Brussels. He has just published A Tale of Two Unions suggesting that Brexit may damage the British Union unless the UK becomes more positive about the way the European Union is structured.