I'm curious! What do people expect to find in the minutes?

I'm more curious about what they're hiding.

This would be the meeting when Tony Blair allegedley claimed that the Welsh were b@stards!!!

Yes, and the one about which Donald Dewar boasted "We have been trying to do in several weeks what took several years in the 1970s"

And about which the Times wrote:

There is no need to have an inflated sense of respect for the current devolution settlement. It was not handed down in tablets of stone, but was the result of protracted horse-trading between Dewar and sceptical Westminster cabinet ministers who were reluctant to surrender power and influence. Devolution as it stands contains a number of inconsistencies and ragged edges.

It is useful to understand how this happened. The crucial negotiations took place in a cabinet sub-committee called DSWR (it stood for “devolution to Scotland, Wales and the English regions”) in the first months of the 1997 Labour administration. It was chaired by Derry Irvine, the lord chancellor, who was widely seen as reflecting Tony Blair’s deep reservations about the devolution project. Over 11 weeks DSWR considered 39 policy papers on Scottish devolution, with Dewar having to battle the whole way.

In a recent book of biographical essays about Dewar, Lord Irvine himself gives a taste of what went on. “DSWR was determined that the Scots could not proceed as if their lucky number had come up and what they wanted they could demand,” he writes. “For Donald, DSWR was onerous in the extreme. There was constant sniping — entirely legitimate — from those whose enthusiasm for the Scottish project was somewhat behind Donald’s.”

Some battles were won in the teeth of bitter opposition from English ministers, elections to Holyrood by proportional representation, for example. Some were conceded — eventually, Dewar did not insist on abortion law being devolved. Other battles were simply lost — while all matters of criminal justice were devolved, the law on drugs was reserved to Westminster.

Some of the battles may require to be fought again.

Well, they are being fought again.

Interesting. I thought the battle over PR had been decided before the 1997 election. So some wanted to go back to the trenches for a bit more hand-to-hand stuff? Ah well, nothing changes.

And we in England were already disbanded into "regions" - no need for a national English referendum, of course!

I’ve been dipping into Anthony Seldon’s Blair Unbound. According to Seldon, Blair had no interest in constitutional matters and most of the Cabinet thought elected English regional assemblies were ‘stupid’ and nothing more than Prescott’s toy. Jack Straw is usually credited with filleting the proposal on English regional assemblies so maybe there are some ‘interesting’ comments on that aspect of devolution which Straw would prefer to remain undisclosed.

Reading the Scottish and Welsh press it would appear that Donald Dewar won several key battles against 'English MPs' - the number of Scottish MPs and proportional representation were two things Dewar had to fight for. Last week Jack Straw declared he had always favoured AV+.

The Westerm Mail quotes Alan Trench:

Constitution expert Alan Trench of University College London said he was not surprised by the decision, saying ministers tended to view Cabinet minutes as the "holiest of holies".

He added: "It's clear from the research I've done that there were some serious disagreements about various aspects of devolution at that time.

"The Secretaries of State for Wales and for Scotland were seeking to get all they possibly could, and were facing a number of rearguard actions from the likes of Straw and Prescott."

• Did anyone argue that the devolution settlement was unfair on England; or was an English backlash predicted?
• Was the regionalisation of England opposed at all, and was it advanced as a method of mitigating English grievances?
• Did anyone argue for English Votes on English Laws and did anyone argue that the number of Scottish MPs ought to be reduced?
• Did anyone, in particular Donald Dewar, support powers for Scotland that are now the subject of wrangles over the Calman Commission recommendations?
• Did anyone advance the cause of legislative powers for Wales?
• Was the Barnett Formula or alternative funding mechanisms discussed?
• Was Jack Straw's favoured voting system for Scotland at odds with what he now proposes for Westminster elections; and on what grounds were different systems put forward (in the case of Scotland to make it difficult for any one party - ie the SNP - to win an overall majority)?
• What were the objections to maximising devolved powers?

There are so much potential for embarrassment.

Did he really call us b@stards? What a funny thing he is and to think I voted for him in 1997. Oh well, so some Scot things we Welsh are b@stards, like we care, well, I know I don't, LOL!