The Assembly Government spends billions of pounds on those things, the vast majority of its budget. I think regardless of which party we support, alot of “time, effort and money” goes into those things. It is deliberately obstructionist to suggest otherwise.

The ‘financially neutral’ phrase is qualified in the report. However, I am puzzled by your insinuation that a step towards autonomy in the EU could possibly be taken without recourse to a further referendum in Wales.

3.2.9 This evidence suggests that while costs are an important dimension, in particular for the public’s perceptions, the likely impact on the National Assembly for Wales of a move to Part 4 would be, broadly speaking, financially neutral in terms of current budget allocations. In Whitehall, there should be a small, but unquantifiable, release of capacity if consideration of LCOs were no longer needed.

3.2.10 Should the National Assembly for Wales move to Part 4, the saving for the Welsh Assembly Government of £1.98 million from not having to go through the processes of acquiring powers through LCOs and Framework Powers in UK Bills would likely be reallocated to the formulation of policy and drafting of Assembly Bills.

A representative of Plaid on the Radio Wales show said that he was not concerned with the use of the powers under part 4 but that they are in place as a precursor to the next step, defined by Adam Price as independence within twenty years. Any change in the constitution should be examined in the light of how the change can be used. Tomorrow’s Wales want to use the powers in Part 4 to change the Government of Wales 2006 Act (GWA) to redefine the powers of the Assembly beyond the referendum issues of granting Part 4. These changes will provide the basis of the next and final step of implementing autonomy within the EU a.k.a. independence. Granting Part 4 isn’t the only method of providing effective government.

Hywel Francis MP evidenced in the Welsh Affairs Select Committee’s submission to the All Wales Convention (AWC), ‘the LCO process is complex because law-making is complex and any system which ‘changes the rules according to which people are governed’ can only ‘be simplified to a certain extent without risking the essential checks and balances’ which ‘ensure fairness and equal treatment under the law.’” Peter Hain is also of the opinion that the current system is working as intended. The set-up at Cardiff Bay is such that even if Part 4 was granted, the powers couldn’t be used instantly. It is probably the case that there will be no real difference in the obtaining and using the powers contained in the GWA by either Part 3 or Part 4. The Assembly have obtained twelve LCO to date and used four. Obtaining them has proven to be easier than implementing them and nothing will change under Part 4.

Sir Emyr Jones Parry pointed out that there will be a greater cost under Part 4 than Part 3 because of ther need of additional lawyers. There lawyers are not yet in place, nor can they be until Part 4 is granted. The time to achieve all of this under Part 4 means that ‘full powers’ will be far off and probably not in place until the beginning of the next but one Assembly in six years time, In this six years any necessary powers will have been transferred under Part 3. From a practical point of view there is ‘much ado about nothing – MUCH”. The only reason why people want Part 4, is not based on need but political ambition…autonomy within the EU.

It is for this reason that True Wales continues to draw attention to the pointlessness of an expensive referendum on Part 3 or Part 4. The issue is not about practical government which can and is being delivered under Part 3 but the intention of using Part 4 to revise the GWA to position the Assembly to step to autonomy. True Wales main concern is better government from the Assembly, which needs to address issue raised by Kirsty Williams who says “There are many problems in Wales that need addressing; the struggling economy, poor health service and an education system facing big cuts.” Time, money and effort would all be better spent on addressing these problems rather than diverting them to a referendum about the esoteric issues of Part 3 or Part 4.

I do agree with Adam that for those of us who are both Labour and broadly pro-Britain this is the wrong place to try and draw a line in the sand.

The concern about the separatist ratchet – i.e. that it only turns in a single direction – maybe true or not but, like it or not, the fact is that since 1997 we have moved down this path and the debate needs to be framed in the context of visions and values, not the pros and cons of the LCO framework. Fundamentally the issue is about where, short of independence the devolution process should settle. Although devolution will remain dynamic, a clearer delineation of what powers lie where is no disaster.

Full disclosure; I’m a mongrel. My mother was born in Inverness, my father in Cork. I entered the world in Northwick Park General Hospital, Wembley. Since the age of five (aside from time at university) I lived in Wales (first Swansea, then Cardiff). Following unpleasantness a couple of years ago I now work and live in London. I own a house in central Cardiff, which I’m considering selling. I only consider myself as having a Welsh identity on the 7/8 days a year when Wales are playing major international rugby or football matches. More important identities to me would include: Arsenal fan; Swansea City fan; enthusiastic(ish) cyclist; trade union member; humanist; chess player. If pressed I would tend to say that I am a citizen of the first world who happens to hold a British passport.

Thing is that there are at least as many mongrels like me in Wales as there are pure Celts such as Simon Dyda or AluninDyfed who measure people primarily on a scale dictated by their Welshness or Britishness. Our interest in constitutional debate is fleeting and based around perceptions of material advantage. By definition those of us who don’t care much about welshness come late to the debate. I am more concerned for example with who will run Britain in 12 months time than who will run Wales in 24 – not least because the former is more important than the later in the sense that whether it has primary powers or not the Assembly budget will reflect the decisions made in Westminster.

The slippery slope concern of unionists needs to be recognised not in an unthinking ‘thus far and no further’ reaction, but by putting forward a positive vision that can be contrasted with the fantasies peddled by Dyda, Dyfed etc. We should argue for tax raising powers and the abandonment of Barnett. The idea that independence means something for nothing will only be challenged by making our new Welsh political masters and mistresses fiscally accountable. We also need a UK wide consensus on the impact of devolution on our constitution. Debate has been focused on Scotland and even today copying the Scots seems to be the main plank of the separatist’s transitional programme. It’s about time that the non separatist majority in Wales wakes up and starts to challenge the separatist premise that everything the UK did was always evil.

This is worth a post all on its own, but I feel Adam makes a serious error in his analysis of national identity by failing to pay sufficient attention to the second world war and the accession to the EEC in 1973. These rather than local issues are the two events that have had the most profound effects on how national identity is perceived and serve in large part to explain the generational differences that come out in quantitative opinion research.

Agree with much that you have to say. Adam Price’s mock-invitation to David Melding was revealing, in that it demonstrated how nationalism has conflated its own ideology with that of devolution (Jon Osmond was also guilty of this recently when he lumped support for independence with support for a Parliament together and stated that this group collectively favoured further devolution). As you rightly say, Melding’s analysis was that of a unionist, but anything other than a die-in-the ditch, have-what-we-hold approach to the constitution is now seen by Plaid as part of its project. It is an extraordinary surrender on the part of those who advanced, and who still believe in devolution.

With that in mind, I suspect you are also right about unionism’s complicity in the toxification of its own brand.

Best

Best
Daran