Of the elite, by the elite, for the elite
The Chartists fought to make our politicians accountable. True Wales argues that real devolution needs to strive for their aim
SOME 170 years ago, the Chartists marched on Newport to win the vote for the working people of Britain. Most of their demands now form the bedrock of representative democracy as we know it. The one outstanding demand for annual Parliaments is considered impractical and costly, but its underlying purpose – to put accountability at the heart of our politics – remains as pressing a priority now as then.
The current debate about the powers for the National Assembly has nothing to do with pushing power down to the people, and everything to do with concentrating more power into the hands of a political elite in Cardiff Bay. Devolution began life as, and has remained, a project of this Welsh political establishment. Secured on the consent of just barely 25% of the electorate, it has become clear to many that it has not lived up to expectations. The response has been cries for more powers, leading to yet more centralisation – and greater costs. In 1997, Government ministers claimed that the Assembly would cost £10-15 million to run. In fact, each year, Assembly administration alone costs approximately £365 million. If the establishment has its way, even more of Welsh taxpayers’ money will be spent on further powers for an institution which ought to be focusing fully on schools, hospitals and securing prosperity for the people of Wales.
The elite refuse to disclose the destination of this journey. Yes campaigners argue that the National Assembly should have the same powers as the Scottish Parliament but vociferously deny that this is a step towards separation. Yet, in Scotland, the governing Scottish Nationalist Party is set to run a referendum on independence next year. If, as is often repeated, devolution is a process and not an event, the people of Wales are entitled to be told what is at the end of that process. The nationalists, governing within the coalition in Cardiff Bay, have made no secret of their aim of separation from the UK within 20 years, which would leave the people of Wales, on current figures, £9.1 billion per year worse off.
Many of those campaigning for a Yes vote deny that taxpayers will have to fund the additional 20 AMs recommended by Lord Richard (the last grandee drafted in to the tell the establishment what it wanted to hear). Yet these are the same people who actively campaigned for the Richard report to be implemented in full. Some argue that this change would not require extra money and that it could be paid for by cutting our representation at Westminster. This last option takes us back to the slippery slope and would leave the people of Wales without that hard-won voice in Parliament and with considerably less influence in the UK, as well as on the European and world stage.
The All Wales Convention was remitted to establish the “choice” as being between more powers now or more powers later. Nothing better exposes just how little politicians wish to open up any sort of meaningful public debate on this issue. Now we can expect this clique, having received the advice it told its convention to deliver, to attempt to set the referendum question without meaningful consultation with anyone who opposes a Yes vote. That is not acceptable.
The principle of devolution is a good one. The trouble is that we have been given nothing like the real devolution that politicians espoused when seeking election as well-paid Assembly Members. Devolution was meant to bring power closer to the people. Instead, it has delivered us a mini-Westminster, whose members are scarcely less distant to ordinary people, and whose accountability is so opaque that you cannot even find out how often your local AM attends debates. The fact that none of the main political parties in Wales are prepared to voice any opposition to this constitutional change, even though a considerable proportion of the population is against it, shows how disconnected Assembly politicians are from the people of Wales.
The real devolution challenge is not the constant search for more powers. It is to place power into the hands of the people. That means root-and-branch reform of the entire British political system. In Parliament, there is a huge amount of work to be done to restore credibility, much less to improve accountability. In Cardiff Bay, the further centralisation of power will only make people feel more disconnected. Turnout will continue to bump along the bottom, the Assembly will continue to fail to deliver and then the inevitable will happen: the demand will go out for yet more power. Instead of diverting more time, energy and money into their quest for further powers for themselves, why are our politicians not looking at real reform that will bring real people into their little bubble? Why are they not looking to cut their recess time, so that they can spend more time scrutinising the executive? Why are we not looking to sweep away restrictions to freedom of information so that the public can scrutinise for themselves?
Instead of a referendum on moving from Part 3 to Part 4 of the Government of Wales Act 2006, we should be establishing voters’ juries and regular, documented town hall meetings. We should be setting up a proper petition system, where AMs are required to debate and take seriously well-supported petitions. We need to reform the Assembly’s electoral system, so that all members are equally accountable. Instead of spending time debating whether LCOs or primary powers are more convenient for the politicians, the debate should be about reforming the closed system of local government and introducing elected mayors. With so much reform needed at central, devolved and local government, why is it that the only meaningful discussion is about just how much power 60 people in one corner of Cardiff Bay should have?
The proposal in front of us is the establishment’s solution. Devolving power more directly to the people of Wales is the true Welsh solution.
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It is very interesting that the de facto talking head for the True Wales organisation talks about gauging public opinion and not seeking out answers that suit what the elite are asking for.
On your website, you have continued to wax lyrical about the ‘surveys’ you are carrying out, then without qualification highlighting them as ‘Brecon wants abolishment’ or words to that effect.
Can you please, in the spirit of truth and democracy, make clear the sample size, the independence of those collecting information, the questions as they were asked, and how it was independently checked for accuracy? I only ask because you have dismissed the convention as a stitch up, a colleague of yours Len Price said the 3000 people the AWC spoke to was ‘pitiful’. I would hazard a guess that none of your ‘surveys’ have had a sample size of 3000?
Secondly – Rachel Banner…”is a longstanding member of the Labour Party.”
The rant about some nationalist hijack is woeful, but I question whether you have the ability to look around you when you attend local CLP meetings. The One Wales Government is led by….LABOUR, the First Minister of Wales is LABOUR, the LABOUR PARTY voted in One Wales easily – are the 70% of labour members who voted for One Wales all raving nationalists? Will you please confirm to us all that you will campaign openly and against your party’s policy?
Your point about citizen juries etc is a good one, but why this could not work side by side with further devolution is neither explained or faced up to. Nor is the point that you oppose the ‘centralising’ of power in Cardiff Bay, but happy for it to continue in Westminster.
That Rachael Banner claims devolution is only about giving power to the political elite in Cardiff and well paid Assembly Members, whilst she campaigns for the power to remain with the political elite in a different country and the even better paid and expenses compromised MPs shows her clear lack of understanding. Misrepresentation is clearly the way untrue Wales aim to fight their dirty campaign.
If Rachel Banner really wants to start a rational debate about expansion of Assembly powers, it would be useful if she didn’t start with such a disgraceful distortion of facts that she wouldn’t dare use in her profession as a teacher.
Yes, the Assembly does cost £365m to run but most of that is the civil service costs, and there was already a substantial civil service in place before devolution udner the Welsh Office. The real test of the financial cost is the increase in real terms of the administration of government in Wales since 1999. There certainly has been a substantial increase, the civil service is much bigger, it does many more things, but to portray us as having gone from paying nothing before devolution to paying £365m instead of a promised £10-15m is a distortion of facts Tim Williams would have been proud of. Would True Wales like no Assembly, no Welsh Office and direct rule from London? That’s the implication of this line of argument.
I also fail to see how AMs are inaccessible? Frankly, it’s difficult to think of a more accessible group of politicians. They’re certainly far easier to contact than my local councillors……
How can you have a rational debate with these people when they preface their remarks with untruths and unproven assumptions? It is very difficult to even engage with them in a mature way.
The tragedy is that this piece ignores that there are very real ways that the Assembly has in fact brought power much closer to local people, off the top of my head-
* Assembly Committees touring Wales, putting different towns on the map and localising devolution.
* The work of the petitions Committee, so far thousands of ordinary people have engaged with the Assembly through signing petitions that have then been discussed in Committee.
I suspect the author wouldn’t want to acknowledge any examples of this because she has already pre-determined her position.
It’s not a pleasant job, but it’s best to unpick True Wales’ distortions and untruths in a systematic way.
1. Centralization
RB claims that the Assembly is about concentrating power and centralization. Matters now devolved to the Assembly used to be handled by Westminster and Whitehall, but now they are dealt with by a body that deals with only a twentieth of the UK population, which means that decision making is much closer to the people than was the case before.
2. Clear to many that it has not lived up to expectations
The usual misleading rhetoric. Perhaps many people are disappointed with the Assembly, but many, many more believe that the Assembly should have most influence over Wales. By a margin of 3 to 1 people in Wales believe the Assembly should have more influence than Westminster, and by a margin of 4 to 1 we believe that the Assembly should have more influence than Local Authorities. So it’s quite clear what most people think the appropriate level of devolution should be.
Source
If you’re disappointed with either the decisions or performance of the current government the bottom line, in any democracy, is to vote for a different party at the next election.
3. Cost of Assembly
The cost of the running the Assembly came in right in budget. It was £13,847k in 1999. Since then it has gone up modestly, and for 2006-07 was £20,773k. True Wales are simply adding in the costs of items which in the past would have been accounted to UK Government departments.
Source
4. The “end” of the devolution journey
Devolution will stop at the point where the majority of people in Wales don’t want to take it any further. It’s interesting to note that the devolution of policing to NI is often referred to as “the last piece of the devolution jigsaw”. It’s also worth noting that the UK Government considers its own proposals for further devolution in Scotland as something that will strengthen Scotland’s place in the Union.
5. £9.1bn
That is one figure from one group, Oxford Economics, which simply fails to account for some taxes either paid in Wales or paid on profits made in Wales, but accounted as having been paid outside Wales. We will get a much more accurate picture when the Holtham Commission produces its second report.
6. Considerably less influence
There is no possible justification for Wales to have more than its fair share of MPs relative to the remainder of the UK. Scotland, which was similarly over-represented, had its number of MPs cut to the normal UK levels after getting a Parliament with primary lawmaking powers. And so should Wales. AMs cost the taxpayer much less than MPs.
The irony is that the Tories are pledged to even up the sizes of constituencies anyway, irrespective of whether Wales has an Assembly with primary lawmaking powers.
7. The AWC
So RB wants us to believe that “the All Wales Convention was remitted to establish the ‘choice’ as being between more powers now or more powers later”? I’m not quite sure she understands such over-complicated phraseology. The choice was set out in the GoWA 2006 … an Act of the UK Government in Westminster. If anyone is unhappy with these two options, they should blame Labour MPs in general and Peter Hain in particular.
As for the wording of the question, why doesn’t True Wales come up with a proposal that sets out the two options available, rather than complain that they don’t like the options?
—-
From then onwards, RB goes into a world of speculation. She makes out that she wants to improve the entire British political system. That’s fine. If she believes in it, let’s see some firm proposals. But I suspect that she doesn’t really have any. She’s only interested in nothing more being devolved to Wales.
It’s rather like telling people waiting on the platform for a train not to catch this one because—if only you’ll wait in the rain a little bit longer—the next train will have crystal chandeliers, leather armchairs, a personalized surround sound enertainment system and complimentary champagne … and, of course, it will have bells on it!
I’d suggest that most of us just want to get on the first train that will get us to where all the polls show we now want to be, namely one step further on from where we are now. Simple, practical politics for where we are now will always be more important than speculating about some sort of totally different form of politics.
P.S. When I started writing this, there were no comments. I can see that I have duplicated what some others have said, so my apologies for that.
Rachel,
I believe in free speech, and I fully respect your position on devolution in Wales. However, can you open your mind up a tiny bit? Can’t you at least concede that some people, the ‘elite’ as you call them, want a Welsh Parliament because its what they believe in? You may not agree with their point of view, but you should respect it, in the same way I respect your view, though its not my personal opinion.
Its rather lazy and naive to assume that everyone in favour of a ‘yes’ vote is simply after more political power.
Secured on the consent of just barely 25% of the electorate. an undisputed statement. This of course is democracy by sleight of hand, it can never be democratic where a minority of a few thousand are able to march a group of people towards a destination just over the horizon, a long march some might say.
The elite refuse to disclose the destination of this journey. This is the long march that so many of the Welsh Assembly politicians have stepped into, the very same people who might decry Plaid Cymru philosophy have become beguiled by political possibilities. How does a Conservative voter support a constituency Labour party candidate in the belief such a vote is a vote might deny the Independence movement, this is such a difficult choice when the Welsh Assembly Government has little opposition that might question the activities of those in government.
The principle of devolution is a good one. It is a modern Conservative premise that good government can be challenged directly by the electorate, devolution in this respect would seem to be next step in the search for localism, democracy by the people for the people is a political aim not achievable with politics that does not include dissent as part of construction, at the Assembly there is little evidence of politicians putting aims above an agenda that is parochial at best.
I commend Rachel Banner to any readers as a chartist champion of Welsh democracy, devolving power more directly to the people of Wales would be a Welsh solution in the tradition of direct action.
Is there an answer to the issues of democracy in Wales, it might rest with a referendum test, it is necessary to coerce moderate political parties to engage with the public, for the politicians to embrace truth as a virtue, and for politics to recognise that people are more important than agenda. Join the search for democracy at No 10 petitions!
A question for Rachel Banner, how do you protect democracy against extreme politics?
I’ll vote for more powers for Wales and I won’t make a single penny from it. Nor do I want to. I just want Wales to have some self-respect.
I wish the Assembly would have more powers then we’d have more council houses and less holiday homes. That would be good where I live. Westminster hasn’t addressed this problem. The Assembly, or Plaid’s Jocelyn Davies has. Doesn’t sound very elitist to me.
Rachel Banner has made the error of confusing the National Assembly for Wales(the legislative arm of government) with the Welsh Assembly Government (the executive branch)
In her article she says that in 1997 Government Ministers Estimated the running costs of the National Assembly for Wales as between £15-20m.
She then goes onto mistakenly claim that: “In fact, each year, Assembly administration alone costs approximately £365 million.”
The National Assembly’s budget for 2009/10 is in fact £49.710m and the previous year it was £46.181m.
She is of course referring to the running cost contained within the Welsh Government’s budget.
Moreover, it has to be pointed out that the £15-20m estimate is made at 1997-98 prices.
Between April 1997 and Oct 2009, in terms of inflation, the CPI(Consumer Price Index) has gone up by 25 per cent, the RPI(Retail Price Index) by 28 per cent and average public sector pay has risen by 49 per cent.
The legislative competence of the Assembly has increased over time and responsibilities of the Assembly have increased over this period. That means more staff have been employed and running costs have increased.
There are further questions of comparability between the estimated Assembly costs from 1997-98 and those in the latest Welsh Government budget for 2010-11. These are due to the fact that as a single body some of the back office functions would have been shared.
Admin’s note: We’ve removed a needlessly personal remark from the end of Ci Du’s comment, and I’m not especially delighted by the tone in some of the contributions to this thread. Let’s debate and disagree frankly, but without impugning the motives of others, or implying that they are thick. As well as being a cheap shot, it’s also very boring and almost certainly wrong.
Play the ball, not the (wo)man, please.
CiDu …..
In Wales there is a need for approximately 7000 new homes, our construction industry in Wales is operating at approximately 70% of new build capacity, the Welsh Assembly has, in the GOWA 2006, schedule 7 subject 11 Housing and housing finance, all the powers it needs to satisfy demand.
So it is not self-respect that is lacking, possibly those in control of this devolved area are more concerned with a political agenda than actually building homes. This could have been a flagship area of devolved government that would demonstrate a caring and effective government that worked across political boundaries, who would oppose good solutions to housing needs.
According to the True Wales website, True Wales is determined:
to lobby both the Welsh Assembly and United Kingdom governments to hold a referendum, duly supervised by the Electoral Commission, regardless of the findings and recommendations of the All-Wales Convention.
Rachel’s article seem to suggest that a referendum shouldn’t be held. Perhaps she could clarify that point?
When I hear talk of localism by those who reject more powers for the National Assembly is it real power to both local councils and the people (local referendums that are not just the consultative type). Or is it just rhetoric? Giving local authorities the power and money to build new schools to replace of the museum edifices dating from the Victorian era. build new hospitals and repair roads. to rebuild our crumbling infrastructures.
I am not convinced I remember that it was the Thatcher government that castrated local government and centralized power, so I am rather skeptical of Conservative claims to support it. As for elites I rather deal with a elite in Cardiff Bay than Whitehall. At least I can afford the bus fare to get there, and its a local call.
“Secured on the consent of just barely 25% of the electorate”
Anti-devolutionists should try and develop a more sophisticated argument. What you have to realise is that even less voted ‘no’. It would have hardly reflected the will of the people of Wales if we would have remained solely goverened by Westminster.
This argument also assumes that the 49% who stayed at home on the day of the referendum are all anti-deveolution.
Michael, the powers to build new schools has been devolved, if you have a particular issue, lobby the Assembly, the only exception in GOWA 2006 are the Research Councils, why would we duplicate those particular institutions, it wouldn’t make economic sense.
An elite, by definition, whether at Cardiff Bay or Whitehall, are probably in need of supervision by the electorate, remember Rome of Caesar. I would prefer a meritocracy where people were placed first.
The “big lie” technique is to keep on repeating an untruth, even AFTER it has been shown to be a lie. This is evident in the comment by John Tyler (aka Stonemason) at 3:56.
Schedule 7 of the GoWA 2006 sets out the areas in which the Assembly will be able to legislate AFTER a Yes vote in a referendum. At present the Assembly is NOT able to pass ANY legislation on housing, because there are no Matters inserted into Field 11 of Schedule 5.
For a fuller explaination, please read this.
Yes, John, the powers are devolved, but the financial resources are not. It’s a vicious circle. The Assembly is not able to raise taxes and the block grant is totally inadequate.
As for Caesar, he had the support of the people to create his dicatorship whilst the Patricians in the senate fought him to safeguard the rights of the Republic.
Why, midway through this Assembly government, have so few houses been built to satisfy the needs of people requiring social housing?
It is clear to the majority of people, that it was more important for the present coalition Assembly government to prevent existing social housing tenants from purchasing their homes under UK legislation, the right to buy, rather than pursue an effective housing strategy. Today over 6000 families are still waiting for homes, not a turf lifted to pour foundations, not a brownfield site being decontaminated ready for development, today this government so intent on acquiring out of kilter legislation has failed the people of Wales.
What mattered to the homeless was not the matter that said “No”, but the matter that could have said “Welcome”.
I wonder if the Assembly government would have failed Wales, if it had not compromised its heritage by agreeing to the “One Wales” agreement.
Mike ….. with Barnett funding Wales to the tune of £8,139 per person might it be a question of priorities.
As for Caesar [according to Plutarch], after his assassination, and unfortunately for Rome, there followed a series of civil wars against what were perceived as political aristocrats by the Roman middle and lower classes.
To the National Assembly for Wales
Thank you for your post and for your e-mail.
Since both the projected estimate of costs made by Ministers in 1997 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/politics97/devolution/wales/news/0818.shtml)
and, indeed, our figure of £365 million refer to the period before the legal and constitutional separation of the legislative and executive functions following the 2006 Government of Wales Act, we did not feel it appropriate to distinguish between the National Assembly for Wales and the Welsh Assembly Government.
Our main purpose in citing this figure, of course, is to point out that estimates presented to the Welsh public in 1997 were vastly different from what we now currently spend on the Assembly. In the BBC article alluded to above, Ron Davies pledged that cutting the number of quangos in Wales would more than pay for the cost of running a Welsh Assembly.
We accept, of course, that there would have been costs at the Welsh Office. The figures to which we refer, however, are set out below and, as I am sure you appreciate, we in True Wales are not, in any case, advocating a return to the pre-devolution settlement. We do, however, believe that the people of Wales are entitled to be given a realistic estimate of exactly how much this latest proposed constitutional change would cost.
As you point out, the legislative competence of the Assembly has increased over time, and extra responsibilities have resulted in the need for more staff and higher running costs; this reinforces our argument that primary law-making powers will increase costs even further.
A breakdown of Assembly staff and administration costs for the year 2006-7 (FOI Disclosure log) which total £364,937,000, is outlined below:
2006-2007 (Indicative) All figures £’000
Assembly Member Costs
Members Pay Costs 4.354
Members Expenses & Support Staff 6,602
Assembly Accommodation & ICT 9,366
Election & Other Expenses 2,267
Hire of Vehicles & Equipment 164
Non Cash Items 951
Total Assembly Member Costs 23,704
Administration Costs
Officials Pay Costs 224,085
Special Advisers 332
Accommodation 13.766
Central Administration 26.118
Accommodation Leases 7.516
Hire of Vehicles & Equipment 921
Travel, Subsistence & Hospitality 1 1,523
T & Telecommunications 31,801
Other 11.302
Non Cash Items 13.869
Total Administration Costs 341,233
Total Assembly Members & Administration 364,937
I do not, therefore, see the need to make any corrections in my article. If you require further clarification, please do not hesitate to let me know.
Assembly Cost:
In 1997, 2 days before the referendum, I phoned Ron Davies’s office and asked how he had came up with a total cost of £17M for running he election and the first year of the Assembly, that included the rental of City Hall. I had put together a figure based on various amounts made available to the public. This came to a minimum of £21M to a maximum of £25m.I was told that the Secretary of State wouldn’t have published a figure of £17 if he hadn’t good reason to do so. I didn’t believe him and subsequently I discovered I had good reason not too. Six years later Ron Davies publically admitted that the figure of £17 had been chosen because it was felt that the public wouldn’t accept a figure of £20 and would vote against devolution. He admitted, therefore, that he duped the electorate and the ‘yes’ result was based on a deception. We have good reason not to believe politicans.
The public wouldn’t have voted for the Assembly if they had known that the cost of the building would total £67M. It is no use trying to justify the amount by how little we spent in comparison to Scotland. It is however, a warning that following the Scottish devolution example, as many want, is both the low and high road to excessive and unaffordable spending.
If we had a re-run of the 1997 referendum and people were told that the cost would be neither £17, nor £21-25M but a staggering £365 – as recorded in the FOI Disclosure log- would the people of Wales voted for devolution? As Brucie says, “I think not.”
To be frank with you, we could all have a good weekend in Vegas blowing the lot – and it would be better value.
The claim that moving from Part 3 to Part 4 is fiscally neutral…savings on bureaucrats not spending time on LCO’s would offset the cost of lawyers working on writing new legislation, has a familiar ring. “Ron Davies pledged that cutting the number of quangos in Wales would more than pay for the cost of running a Welsh Assembly.” MAMA MIA! – How could he have had the effrontery to have said such a thing? So if we extend £17 to £365 and £1.8M to £39, we will probably be near the true cost of moving to Part 4.
Hmmm. Seems to be quite busy here. If any one is interested our take on True Wales is here-
http://cambriapolitico.com/2009/02/untrue-untrue-untrue-thats-all-we-get-from-true-wales/
It appears that Rachel Banners contribution this morning is designed to confuse the issue rather than to clarify it.
To be clear, the allegation she has made is:
“In 1997, Government ministers claimed that the Assembly would cost £10-15 million to run. In fact, each year, Assembly administration alone costs approximately £365 million.”
and
“Our main purpose in citing this figure, of course, is to point out that estimates presented to the Welsh public in 1997 were vastly different from what we now currently spend on the Assembly.”
The information she has presented in this morning’s comment is taken from the link I gave in my comment yesterday. It did not require a FOI request to get it, there figures (in fact more detailed figures) were already publicly available.
Her allegation is that something which was projected (in 1997) to cost between £10-15 now costs approximately £365. This is a deliberate distortion of the figures. What was projected to cost £10-15 in fact cost £13.8m in 1999-2000 and cost £23.7m in 2006-07. It is the seventh cost in her list, i.e. “Total Assembly Member Costs … £23,704k” We can compare the figures for each year on the first sheet of the spreadsheet I linked to.
True Wales would do well to remember the Golden Delicious Rule:
Always compare apples with apples.
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The second allegation in RB’s comment this morning is that:
“primary law-making powers will increase [Assembly] costs even further”
This is something that was examined in some detail by the AWC, and forms part of their report, which we can all read for ourselves. Yes, there will be additional costs involved so far as the Assembly is concerned. But there will be correspondingly reduced costs to UK government departments in Whitehall and Westminster.
However the big saving will come from having a clearly defined list of what the Assembly is and is not able to legislate on (Schedule 7). At present we have a situation in which both MPs and AMs (and of course the staff responsible to them) spend many months, if not years, of duplicated time and effort (and therefore taxpayers’ money) arguing with each other over the same thing. This wasteful process will thankfully come to an end after we vote Yes in the referendum.
The essence of good democracy is that the people must know which set of politicians is responsible for what … so that they can be held accountable for how well they do the things for which they alone are responsible, without being able to point a finger of blame elsewhere.
I’m a little bit confused by the figures that Rachel Banner quotes here.
Am I correct that £341,233 is for the Welsh civil service, rather than the Assembly per se. If so, do you have figures as to how much more that is because of the separation of the Welsh CS from a general British CS?
Actually, having seen the breakdown of costs, I am more open to the idea of an extra 20 Assembly members – an increase of one third in the Assembly members’ bill would only be £8 million. OK, that money could be spent on other things, but if it improves the administration, I would expect more than £8 million of benefits to come from it.
By the way, I’m keen on the argument about true devolution towards the people – this is something that I would like to see more of from the Assembly, though I’m not sure how much power they have to change the responsibilities of local government, for instance. But the whole “Elite in Cardiff Bay” argument leaves me cold, I’m afraid. Having dealt with AMs and ministers in the course of both work and local activism, I find them approachable and sympathetic.
I guess its fashionable to question the integrity of politicians, but it seems a sad way to run a referendum campaign. I’d rather hear facts from both sides about where this specific referendum will take us, rather than “Road to independence” / “Gravy train” / “Proud to be Welsh” etc arguments.
In his acclaimed book ‘When Was Wales’, the late historian Gwyn Alf Williams writes that one of the aims of the 1839 attack on Newport by the Chartists of Gwent was to establish an independent ‘Silurian Republic’ (Chapter 9 ‘The Frontier Years’).
Therefore it is quite ironic that those self-same Chartists now being claimed by the anti-devolutionists of ‘True Wales’ were actually people who wanted to see the end of the unionist British state, and were prepared to lay down their lives to do so.
The tone of some of the contributors here is pretty nasty. I can tell that they’re all Plaid Cymru activists and from someone who’s pretty neutral as far as politics is concerned I would like to offer a word of advice…… trust me you do not come across well when all you do is stifle debate by offering nothing but personal attacks on Rachel Banner.
Has Rachel Banner any proof for her recent assertion that there is a fifth column of separatists in the ranks of Welsh Labour?
The moderators of this site would not tolerate or allow personal attacks. Adam did a pretty good job on this thread of ensuring that that didn’t happen. So it isn’t welcome that Henry has revived this thread after two months of dormancy and has tried to conflate criticisms of True Wales with personal attacks, which they are not.
This kind of crassness undermines the job the moderators are doing and makes it harder to criticise the piece without being seen as ‘being personal’. Perhaps that was Henry’s intention all along.
Luke
I let the comment through as it did not make a personal attack itself, nor appeared to be blatantly partisan. I did have cause in the thread to warn against the tone of some contributions in respect of the article’s author. But you are right that no personal attacks were published.