Referendum Now?

Rumours abound that the All Wales Convention will soon report and suggest that the time is ripe for a referendum on part 4 of the Government of Wales Act 2006. None too soon in my view. This will enable the National Assembly to pass Acts, rather than rely on Westminster to approve powers to pass Measures in bites of subject areas. The process of transferring powers, The Legislative Competence Order system seems to not be functioning properly. In particular the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs seems to have taken on its self the role of second chamber to the National Assembly, and instead of deciding the constitutionality of a request for powers and the reasonableness of such a request it now seems to want to know in detail what possible Measures could flow from such a grant. In short it wants to control any future legislation. In the guise of “review” it seeks to restrict and control the National Assembly and the Welsh government. Alun Michael is a past master of micromanagement and excels in this role on the select committee, his grudge against the National Assembly for voting him out of office is clear for all to see, and carries over in his input into the deliberations of the Select Committee. As chief apologist for the current system he presents a reasonable sounding case for this level of enhanced “scrutiny”. In reality it impedes good governance and frustrates the ability of Welsh governments to control their own legislative program.

The LCO process is a mess, it must be intolerable for the Welsh Government to have its legislative program controlled by another legislature, especially as the time table is entirely in the hands of Westminster. How can they plan? How can they draw up policy that requires legislation when they have to go cap in hand to get specific legislative power for specific purpose? One could almost conclude that the current settlement is a conspiracy designed to ensure that the referendum passes with the full support of all Assembly members.

To the various posters on political blogs who disbelieve the pollsters, well some scepticism is sensible, but all the polls seem to point the same way, and unless everyone is manipulating the process this is highly unlikely. You can see from the BBC English language Welsh politics blogs that some of the posters there believe in a grand conspiracy encompassing much of Welsh civic society (all the voluntary organisations, trades unions, community groups etc) or at least all those parts of it receiving Assembly funding, the Welsh Political Parties (at least all the parties represented in the National Assembly) and all the Welsh print and broadcast media, to force further devolution on an overwhelmingly anti devolution Welsh Public. The scale of this can be seen in attacks on the Welsh Government for looking into the possibility of setting up a Stock Exchange in Cardiff or a Welsh Honours system – they see this as proof positive that the Welsh government is secretly plotting to make Wales independent. Nonsense of course. In living memory Cardiff and Swansea had stock exchanges, as did about 16 other towns in the UK. Indeed Birmingham has recently set up a virtual one... As for the honours system, well this is something most communities and private companies have.... Perhaps British Gas or Butetown are planning independence as well?

The current settlement fails basis test of reasonableness, its not reasonable that one government has to rely on the goodwill of another for its legislative abilities or the timetable for the implementation of its legislative program. The lace doily of legislative powers granted to the National Assembly impedes joined up government. Fragments of power are transferred over policy areas, requiring the Welsh Government and backbenchers to go back to the Parliament at Westminster every time they want to create a new Welsh Measure that falls outside the narrow confines of what is already devolved. A referendum is the only way forward, it does not give the National Assembly the powers it needs, only independence will do that, it doesn't even grant the Assembly the powers of the Scottish Parliament or give it any tax raising powers, however it would be a vast improvement over the current situation.

£42 Million Question

Well it was inevitable, the announcement that the Welsh Assembly Government planned to spend £42 million doing up the civil service HQ in Cathays Park drew the expected storm of protest. Spending money on the government is never popular, so no surprise that this produced some headlines. The usual suspects trotted out their line that there were better causes, that this money should be spent on schools and hospitals and that the National Assembly, the Welsh Assembly Government and the civil service in Wales should be abolished. Now while I agree schools and hospitals should have money spent on them this doesn't detract from money being spent, when needed, on the actual infrastructure of government.

So what is this money for? The headlines don't tell us much, and the newspaper reports don't give much detail either. We are left with the impression of civil servants working in luxurious conditions while the rest of us face the cold winds of the credit crunch. All the focus has been on the building in Cathays Park, comprising the old Welsh Office Building, a grade 2 listed 1930s Portland stone building and the modern (ish) 1980s extention, which houses the bulk of the Welsh Civil Service. This at the time was the largest office building built in the UK. It houses thousands of workers.

So time for a few facts.

1. The money is to be spent over six years, that is £42 million is not to be spent in one year.
2. A total of 19 buildings in and around Cardiff will be refurbished, this is the sum for all those buildings not just one.
3. The work is necessary (so we are told) to bring the buildings up to a modern standard for health and safety.
4. The work includes upgrading the buildings to make them more energy efficient.
5. When completed the building will cost £5 million a year less to run, for the most part due to greater energy efficiency.


So it looks less like an exercise in featherbedding and more like an investment. An investment that will pay for its self in under 9 years and then give savings to the Welsh Government of £5 million a year. In times when we are all being told we must move to reducing our carbon footprint and government must save money doesn't this now start to look like, to coin a phrase, prudent expenditure?

This of course raises some questions. Such as why the media decided to give the spin on it that they did? Another knocking story, politicians eager to jump onto a bandwagon without finding out the facts is not exactly novel, but the unnamed Plaid politicians should know better.

Of course a similar crash program of refurbishment should be happening with our schools and hospitals, it would do much to invigorate our economy and keep those the building trade etc employed. Unfortunately the sums of money aren't available to do this, as the National Assembly for Wales and the Welsh Assembly Government have no borrowing powers. At a time when the UK government are spending billions on propping up the banks this sort of stimulus package is exactly what we need here. A general upgrading of all public buildings to conform to the latest health and safety requirement and to ensure maximum energy efficiency would save us hundreds of millions a year in running costs, if the savings for the 19 buildings are replicated throughout Wales. And as a bonus this would go someway to cutting our carbon footprint. Perhaps this is what, in part, Ieuan Wyn Jones was suggesting when he produced a paper calling for a £3 billion investment.

What Now?

Plaid's decision to enter government with Labour was a move based on principle. It was to ensure that Wales had stable government and to ensure that Wales got the best deal with the strongest National Assembly that could be obtained. The Rainbow Coalition was rejected because the Lib Dems had shown themselves to be unreliable and there were doubts that the referendum could have been won without the active support of the Labour Party. Plaid rejected the extra power that the party could have had by holding the First Minister's position in favour of what was best for Wales. That was a courageous decision and one that has to be applauded.

They took the second fiddle position to Labour based on Labour's promise to advance the cause of devolution and to give a period of settled government. It looks as if Labour is reneging on that commitment. As ever Labour is putting party above country, despite what ever Alun Michael says this is a power grab by Westminster, a desire to control and dictate to the Government of Wales what it may or may not do in future - this is outwith their powers and in this case Mike German is quite correct.

This LCO sets a precedent. The National Assembly will be confined to passing anodyne legislation that no one objects to and/or policies pre approved by the majority of the Welsh Affairs Select Committee. This is not devolution its remote control.

The time in now for those elements in Labour who support devolution - real devolution that is - to stand up and be counted.

Plaid has some hard thinking to do, they need reassurances that the deal is still on and working. Having the First Minister unilaterally backing down does not bode well.

The government is not yet broken, but there is work to do to convince that the project is still worthwhile.

Devolution Settlement Starts To Fail?

Well according to The Dragon's Eye the Wales Office thinks that the Housing Legislative Competence Order is "fatally flawed" - which is the first the Welsh Government has heard of this.
Essentially the dispute is over the thickness of the salami slice of legislative authority that Welsh Labour MPs are willing to concede to the National Assembly. At stake is the scope of the National Assembly to legislate over the “right to buy” for council tenants. The Welsh Government would like the power to suspend, or even abolish the right to buy council houses by tenants in those councils where there is a serious shortage of social housing. MPs believe that the LCO should be restricted to the immediate intent of the Welsh government, which is selective suspension of the “right to buy” and that additional power should not be extended without a further request for power to themselves via a new LCO.

At the heart of this is whether the Assembly can be given the power to legislate without having to go cap in hand to the Welsh Affairs Select Committee of the House of Commons each time. It would appear that the Select Committee want each LCO to be so narrow that they can only be used to pass one Welsh Measure pre approved by them, effectively giving them the power to veto Welsh laws and control the policies of the Welsh Assembly Government. This is not how the system was supposed to operate. The settlement built into the Government of Wales Act was to enable the Assembly to draw down legislative power field by field within subject areas. It was supposedly permissive. MPs were to agree the principle that the Assembly could legislate in that area and any proposed Assembly Measure was to be illustrative, they were not intended to look into future possible legislative measures.

Behind this is a power struggle, between the pro and anti devolution wings of the Labour Party. For the anti-devolutionists a nice side effect of this is to put a strain on the Labour/Plaid coalition. If, as now appears, the Secretary of State for Wales is siding with the Welsh Affairs Committee then the power struggle has intensified. It is up to the Labour ministers in the Welsh Assembly Government to now make a stand, support publicly the proposed LCO, argue for it and against this assumed authority of the Welsh Affairs Select Committee to dictate policy. If they don't Plaid will begin to wonder what is the value of being in a coalition with a party that is not prepared to support its own policies and which defers to Westminster.

If Welsh Labour can't deliver on this LCO then what hope is there of them fulfilling their promise on a referendum to transfer full legislative power?

The power to only pass those laws and make policy that agrees with Westminster is no power at all. Which is where a large chunk of the Labour party would like it to be. If they can detach Plaid from the coalition then Christmas will have come early for them.

A year and more on...

Has the sky fallen in? Has Wales lurched into some Mordor morass of doom? I suspect not... yet to have heard some people the idea of a Plaid/Labour coalition was totally unconscionable, the two parties having so little in common that the coalition would fall apart in weeks. Its here a little over a year later, and apart from the loss of one minister going strong. What of the One Wales Agreement? Slow steady implementation by all accounts. Plaid ministers, though untried seem to have performed well, remarkably few public disagreements within the Assembly.

Contrast this with the noises off. Clearly the group most dissatisfied with the current Assembly Government are the Labour MPs from Wales. It looks like they have not come to terms with either the consequences of Devolution MKII or the new coalition. Witness the petulant outburst from my MP, Alun Michael – in response to the quite measured (given the circumstance) comments of the Presiding Officer, he lays into the Assembly for overwhelming the Welsh Affairs Committee with requests to give the Assembly legislative power in a number of narrow areas. Well given that this was the situation created by his party in rejecting the main recommendations of the Richard Commission, I am tempted to say if you can't cope this is your fault.

Peter Black sums it up rather neatly. I can't help but wonder if Alun Michael hasn't some unresolved issues with his rejection as First Secretary of the Assembly. He constantly steps into the limelight to take pot shots at the Assembly – its Presiding Officer - and the Welsh Government in general. Sour grapes me thinks....
The main obstacle that I can see to the Coalition working, as far as I can see, is the limited vision of Welsh Labour, who seem more keen on keeping the power in Westminster than letting the Welsh Government flourish.

Well we will see how things go. Expect matters to get more frayed when the general election come upon us...