Is this new government anti-Wales?
Bubble — By Alun Davies AM on June 20, 2010 7:00 am
A view from within the Assembly on the way Wales is not being properly viewed (Photo courtesy of Steve Jones)
PETER BLACK has had very little sleep in the last week. He probably regrets his decision to describe Nick Clegg’s attitude towards Wales as a “blind spot” almost as much as David Melding probably now regrets telling BBC Scotland last month that the appointment of a Secretary of State from an English constituency is “unacceptable… an error… and shocking”.
It was, of course, a great disappointment to all of us on the government benches that neither chose to repeat these colourful views during the debate on the Queen’s Speech on Wednesday. But despite this, Peter and David’s vividly-expressed observations are telling since they reveal and illuminate some of the worries, tensions and fears that lie below the surface of the Welsh coalition parties about the fundamental attitudes and beliefs driving the decisions and priorities of the new government.
I accept that it is the duty of opposition to oppose and I may be expected to make the worst-possible case for this government, its policies and motives. I did not, however, expect to have such help from the government’s own side.
For many of us, the early decisions of this ConDem government exhibit and reveal a thinking where Wales is not an integral and valued part of the Kingdom but a distant and faraway place of which this government cares little. And this begs a more fundamental question – is this a government that has simply misplaced Wales or is it a government that is actively anti-Wales?
While the chattering classes tell us not to be beastly to the Member for Chesham and Amersham, there is a real danger that some quite profound decisions will escape scrutiny in this rush to be friends with the new regime. These are not Labour policies or Labour priorities. Rather they represent a consensus across the Welsh political spectrum and this has been disregarded by the new government.
In barely a month we have seen decisions on funding, the referendum, media and fiscal policy where important Welsh interests have been a poor second to the ideological imperatives of the right wing. And despite the best efforts of the cappuccino-drinkers of the commentariat to persuade us to overlook such things it is already clear that Wales is the invisible nation in Clegg and Cameron’s Britain.
But we should have seen this coming. Wales was entirely absent from the initial coalition agreement. This was a devastating illustration of the sheer lack of influence of both Welsh parties on their UK leaderships. We were told that the detailed coalition agreement would be different. It wasn’t.
On funding issues we have seen a Scotland Bill included in the Queen’s Speech – but for Wales a curious and peculiar decision to put Holtham and fair funding on the back burner and linked to a successful referendum. So the UK Government appears to be bribing the Welsh people to vote yes in a referendum where most members of that government would prefer a no vote. In the meantime, Scotland gets a new financial settlement and Wales gets a £300m shortfall. Year on year.
And whilst we are discussing the referendum (Governor Gillan refers to it as the “Welsh” referendum in order to confirm her outsider status) why is it that it will take this new government 10 months to prepare for such a vote? In 1997 it took weeks – elected in May and a vote in September. We can conclude that it is not a priority – and further – that Wales does have a sufficiently strong voice or influence to make it a priority.
When the UK Culture Minister, Jeremy Hunt, took his decision to scrap the independently-funded news pilots he compared national news in Wales with local city news in England. He demonstrates a lack of knowledge and a lack of care that is quite breathtaking. Again we would have expected a voice to nudge him or a wider political perspective to remind him of vital Welsh interests. There was none.
But perhaps most seriously for the present are the decisions being taken over public spending. The discussion and debate over deficit reduction is for another day, although the UK government’s justification for its vicious cuts programme is becoming more threadbare and less convincing every day with the publication of every new piece of economic data. What is critical is that it is now apparent that there is no recognition at all of the circumstances facing Wales or of the measures already taken by the Welsh government.
Last week Jane Hutt met the (new) Chief Secretary and explained the measures that the government had taken over years to reduce bureaucracy and to streamline government. She demonstrated that Wales had led the way in innovation and efficiency but her arguments over Welsh financial pressures fell on deaf – and disinterested – ears.
Finally there is the question of the Secretary of State herself. Cheryl Gillian makes much of her birth in Llandaff, but in reality she has spent more time in Cheltenham Ladies College than she has spent in Wales. And she hasn’t looked back. She is one of the weakest ministers in the government and has been sidelined to just a single Cabinet sub-committee. Again the comparison with Scotland invites the conclusion that Cameron would simply not have treated that country in the same way.
In isolation, these decisions are simply poor decisions and demonstrate poor judgement. But taken together these blunders may amount to a pattern of behaviour that merits a scrutiny and description of a government that has in a very short time gone beyond simply an accidental loss of an understanding or sensitivity for Wales.
It may be possible to detect something more; a pattern may be emerging whereby Welsh needs and interests are simply not taken seriously by this new government. At best this represents a careless disregard for the best interests of this country. I suspect that it may be worse than that.
The evidence is becoming compelling that unless there are significant changes in policy and personnel then this government will profoundly damage Wales and the core interests of people living in this country. We may be facing the most anti-Wales Government since Thatcher.
And that goes far beyond the concerns of everyday politics and the duty of an opposition to oppose. Peter and David have warned us.
Tags: Alun Davies, Cheryl Gillan, Conservatives, IFNC, Liberal Democrats, public spending
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35 Comments
I don’t regret my blogpost at all but then your interpretation is not a fair or accurate representation of what I wrote.
As usual Alun you are making it up as you go along. This is especially so with regards to the IFNC, which Labour could have contractually committed to before the General Election and thus forced onto the new government and also to Barnett reform, which Liam Byrne rejected as late as February 2010 (http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2010/02/03/no-plans-to-reform-barnett-formula-91466-25748858/) saying:
“Wales is well funded. Identifiable public spending per head in Wales is 14% above England and in the 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review, the Welsh Assembly Government received an annual average real terms increase of 2.4% compared to the UK average of 2.1%… The Government has no plans to change the Barnett formula.”
The fact is that Labour had no intention of reforming the way Wales is funded whereas this new government has included in its programme a Treasury-led review (as Calman was) that looks beyond funding at fiscal responsibility as well. That is a significant step forward.
It seems to me that the people losing sleep are Labour who are still struggling to come to terms with being rejected by the government and who are responding, as you are, by lashing out indiscriminately at mythical Aunt Sallys.
For those of you who like a good old-fashioned dust up, full of pointed barbs whittled down to 140 characters, please let me recommend Twitter on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons, when you’ll see the two gentlemen above disagreeing in a spirited way over the issues of the day, taking their arguments in the Siambr online. It sometimes becomes a three-way ding-dong with another AM. If only I could remember her name…
Voters would have more respect for Labour politicians if instead of writing pseudo nationalist nonsense they instead presented a logical rebuttal of the Coalition’s economic policies and offered an alternative. They could start by carefully reading Will Hutton’s article in the Observer and any recent writings from Paul Krugman and David Blanchflower. They could also start to flesh out the recent statement by David Miliband that the budget deficit should be reduced not by a 4 to 1 split in favour of public sector cuts but by a 2 to 1 split.
The town crier stunt was childish and pathetic and whoever thought that up should be given his or her P45 by the Party, Criticising Cheryl Gillan for being an MP in England is also not going to get the Party anywhere. If you use that argument then no Labour MP can ever again be a minister in a UK department such as education. Most people are also not that interested when the referendum will be held. Many will in fact see it as a complete waste of millions of pounds of taxpayers money as services are being hammered and a diversion from the real issues facing ordinary people at this time.
Opposition after 13 years in government isn’t easy. Some of us who have been in the Labour Party since the 1960s remember the aftermath of both 1970 and 1979. Ordinary people in the UK need Labour to return to government as quickly as possible and the Liberal Democrats to return to their senses. This is a time for serious opposition not heckling someone because they happen to make a statement which you might disagree with . An attitude which sadly seems more suited to Student Union politics will not convince the millions who deserted Labour on May 6th to return to the Party I’m afraid.
Reluctantly, I have to agree with Jeff’s analysis here. It’s troubling how easily the Welsh Labour Party seems to be slipping into a critique of the government that essentially depicts Wales as some distant imperial possession with a completely unique set of needs. For good or ill, the coalition is making decisions that are aimed at and affect people in Wales every single day. The fact that it doesn’t explicitly say the word “Wales” when announcing those decisions does not mean it is not governing in the interest of Wales, at it sees it.
The challenge for Labour is surely to demonstrate that the policies being enacted are bad for businesses and families in Wales and that there is a plausible alternative, rather than playing the periphery card and expecting this will somehow rally support. It won’t, and if it does it’s very short-sighted.
Playing the (wo)man) not the ball.
How many teams are going to get far in the World Cup with that approach?
Alun is honest enough to admit his role, and having an attack dog is always an important component of any opposition, although it is certainly not my place to comment upon and make recommendations about internal Labour party politics.
I think a debate over the reasons for why there is already considerable unease over the new Welsh Secretary is a non-starter. Much of this is dismissed as evidence of the mythical Welsh collective thin skin, but it is nothing of the sort. People expect our Secretary of State to be right across her brief, and she has already engineered too many ignorant pratfalls to allay fears. At the end of the day, if you don’t like Governor Gillan (sorry, couldn’t resist), because she comes from England or because she has a worrying lack of knowledge about her portfolio (and I’m not necessarily saying this is the case, but it seems so so far), the consequences are shared – what is she going to do for Wales?
I understand Adam’s use of “imperial possession”. He has argued to me and elsewhere that for Whitehall, Wales is a numbers game. However, we have little proof that the culture among civil servants in London that have to address Welsh matters is changed since devolution. In fact, there is plenty of evidence that it hasn’t. In fact, I could quote you an example of a UK Government agency based in Wales who has a shocking lack of awareness of the Assembly and its functions. Anecdotal, yes, but still completely unacceptable.
And Wales does have its own set of unique needs. Some of this is because economy is inextricably linked to culture. And before anyone starts, I don’t mean the language. It has to do with traditions of sons following fathers into the mines, workshops or into the classrooms, a greater emphasis on agriculture and tourism (despite their relatively modest contribution to the Welsh GDP), an absence of an indigenous financial class, and so on. It also extends to what we haven’t got, and Alun makes the point well on the IFNCs.
This must be something that the new Government takes account of. It’s in the ConDems’ own interests, too. If England and Scotland emerge from recession and Wales doesn’t, through bad decision making in Westminster, then the country will become a millstone around the neck of a UK recovery.
Where I personally disagree with Alun is the emphasis on the funding shortfall. We’re not going to get it. We weren’t going to get it under the last government and we won’t get it now, because it just isn’t there. I personally would far rather see a switch in priorities to economic development, building a strong, independent Welsh economy that can benefit from trade with the rest of the UK while standing apart from it, and as immune as it can be to recession when the next financial crisis inevitably strikes. Prosperity is the Welsh electorate’s first priority.
Dunc
Full response later, but for now:
Of course Wales has characteristics that set it apart from the UK average in all sort of indices. But all the things you cite – and more – exist in the one of more regions of England, and in the other devolved nations. These should be addressed by government. Of course they should. The issue I wanted to highlight is whether by failing to single Wales out as some sort of special place in all policy pronouncements (and name her in some sort of tick-box exercise) the UK government is ignoring Wales or being anti-Wales. I say that on that basis, the case ain’t proven. More widely, we just need to stop look for slights where they probably don’t exist.
And I’m not sure I ever said “numbers game”.
The immediate riposte to the question posed must be “no more than the last Labour government and probably less so, on the evidence to date” .
However, Alun Davies has returned full circle to the problem that Labour created. Having started two different devolution journeys in Wales and Scotland with no defined destinations, he should not be surprised at continuing unrest and differences of opinion inside those devolved countries. It would be interesting to know what destination he has in sight for Wales: full independence inside Europe, an independent country within a federal UK ) similar to the states of the USA) or no tax-raising powers but law making powers – please come clean Mr Davies.
However, if he unwilling or unable to answer that question, perhaps he should (theoretically) sit in David Cameron’s chair and try to give answers to the problems facing the UK today: a static economy with an unsustainable budget deficit and a growing public debt.
Wales accounted for 5% of the people who actually voted in GB last month. So should Wales get 5% of this government’s attention or can Mr Davies plead a special case for Wales?
Cuts have to be made across the UK if the books are to be balanced. However, it is disappointing to hear the usual reaction from LAs, Unions and politicians that they will have to cut services – never is mention made of keeping services but cutting bureacrats. During the last 13 years Labour recruited into the public sector over 800,000 managers, enablers, checkers etc that are now surplus to requirements. Unfortunately most do not have the skill sets that would make them easily transferable to the private sector.
I fully support Duncan’s final point, “Prosperity is the Welsh electorate’s first priority.” But does WAG have the capability or capacity to effect this requirement? It would appear not at present, as there seems to be more priority on such items as language and Welsh culture (and mocking new Secretaries of State for Wales) rather than a unified effort to get people back to work from both the unemployment and incapacity registers whilst immigrants are very willling to fill the jobs that the locals appear reluctant to take.
Westminster can help on such matters as corporation tax, the benefits gap and NI, but economic development is a devolved matter. Wales needs to trade with not just the UK but the rest of the world. A Welsh company that I am mentoring has in the last two years developed trading partners in Texas, Abu Dhabi, Mumbai and Kula Lumpur. The business is out there but it will not just come to you. Wales needs more people in WAG and IBW who have done it before and can lead the way.
So Alun Davies, please expound your plans for reviving the Welsh economy and bringing the hope of prosperity back to the Welsh people and especially those who have given up. To give you a clue, it has to start at the foundations of education in Wales.
Apologies Ad, first of all for putting words in your mouth. What I was trying to explain you had said to me (God, I hope it was you – you know what alcohol’s done to my faculties) is to look at it from the point of view of civil servants, who do play a numbers game. I guess they have to – or had to. My argument is that a more individual needs-based approach to support might benefit all of the UK by playing to regional strengths.
Sure, the examples I mentioned could be found in the North East, Clydeside or Greater London, but they can be stitched together in a way that makes areas demographically and economically unique – as we know, because they’re usually regarded in such a way.
I see your point about what construes anti-Welsh. But – and I’m pretty sure you would agree here – what is important is outcomes. We expect the Welsh Secretary to deliver the policy climate in which we can prosper. Gillan has to take a Welsh perspective when all the things Financier mentions above are considered on a UK basis, to see if they will benefit Wales. If not, then she should say so. Otherwise, she will have failed her brief. Well, I’m sure she can argue that she has fulfilled her brief, but people in Wales may not see it that way.
What I’m saying is that instead of inspecting her Welsh credentials, we should be scrutinising her decision making. If it falls short, we are entitled to say so. We’re stuck with this Government for at least four years. Instead of picking needless fights, we should be kicking it in the behind to ensure we get the best for Wales. And for me that starts with the economy.
I have just got up and its 100+ outside so please excuse my apparent irascibility. But what utter rubbish is this? Are you so desperate to get elected next year that you will will demonize this present administration (as much as I disagree with its policies especially “Free Schools”).
Its all rather infantile. I don’t hear that concentration camps are being erected or that the Assembly is going to be scrapped.
I do remember that the previous Labour government has played games with Wales making a hash of implementing the Richard report and shortchanging the nation as regards our grant.
Oy veh!
Jeff! Its nice to see mature people like your self still in Labour!
I agree with Duncan’s point this government could also be anti Norhumbrian and anti Mercian to borrow some an antecedents from the early middle ages! Unfortunately my excuse is not alcohol its the interminably hot weather and my head for the alcohol!.
Like Adam, I “reluctantly … have to agree with Jeff’s analysis”. And Jeff is right to argue that “Ordinary people in the UK need Labour to return to government as quickly as possible and the Liberal Democrats to return to their senses. This is a time for serious opposition not heckling someone because they happen to make a statement which you might disagree with”. (Not entirely convinced that the FibDems could return to their senses if they tried, but that’s another argument.)
It won’t be surprising that, as a civil service trade union rep, I take issue with Financier, who trots out the tired old anti-public sector prejudice when s/he claims “never is mention made of keeping services but cutting burea[u]crats. During the last 13 years Labour recruited into the public sector over 800,000 managers, enablers, checkers etc that are now surplus to requirements. Unfortunately most do not have the skill sets that would make them easily transferable to the private sector.”
Could Financier explain how services can be delivered without public sector workers? Could Financier define what the term “bureaucrats” means to them? – or is it just a catch-all term for “the mythical millions of public sector workers we can easily do without”? Can Financier likewise define the terms “enablers” and “checkers” (I’ve never encountered an enabler or a checker in my entire public sector career)? Can Financier specify exactly what public sector roles are now “surplus to requirements”, and why? Can Financier share with us what “most” public sector workers’ skill sets are, and why they’re unsuitable for the private sector?
Just as Alun’s original post seemed unfortunately to be … less than rigorous, so Financier’s scapegoating of the public sector is lazy and unhelpful.
Just now the new Government seems to be mostly anti-Sheffield – looks to me as if the pain is going to be spread out whether we like it or not.
Why are Scotland getting attention? I wonder if the thinking is that at least there is some kind of Tory mandate in Wales after the election, whereas in Scotland, well nothing. It seems quite credible that the Tories should try to make some further inroads in a part of the UK that has rejected them, for the sake of a Union which they evidently believe in – so no surprise that our referendum gets delayed. Working together as opposed to pulling apart – how Celtic is that?
This is the same Alun Davies that is rapidly earning the nickname Vuvuzela amongst his Assembly colleagues?
Poor old Financier always gets both barrels when he attacks the public sector, especially the Civil Service! For me, however, it’s personal. My sister has worked in companies house for over 20 years, hard worker is she. Has a new baby and house, is she surplus to requirement? Is that the sort of person F has in mind? If so I hope I can count on Gez on saving her job? However reading F comment he seems to have one particular group in mind? However, 800,000 is a lot of people to put on the dole (since they have no usable skills).
Also I would knock the public sector. In the US it was the stimulus package that is creating jobs all over the country saving the country from the mess created by the bankers playing casino games with pensions and then bailout by public money. Why should ordinary people lose their jobs because of the sins of the few?
Unemployment is not good for the economy. Did the UK stimulus help create new jobs? Only sound investment in the economy and the creation of new businesses will reduce the debt. Unfortunately the debt will not be reduced by cuts alone.
He is right there has to be a change in our way of thinking. Education is needed for that. Closing schools sacking teachers ending with large classes will not help Wales.
Alun Davies and co must have a plan. Whining and crying wont help.
I don’t know where Alun Davies on the question of devolution? Does he favor a full law-making Aassembly, just like my local council, the Dodge City Commission? Or something more substantial like the State of Kansas, or just the present arrangement? Wales’s former “Viceroy” HE Peter Hain dilly-dallied not only that issue but many of the LCOs. What does Alun want, and what will he do?
Mike,
I have every sympathy with the plight of your sister at Companies House,(and she does not fall into the group I classify as bureaucrats) but she is one of the many victims of technology change, in the same way that makers of CDs have lost business to downloading from the internet, or as years ago PCs removed the need for typing pools.
At one time Companies House was a paper led organisation – you had to apply for many paper forms. Then these became available on-line to print off. Now most returns and accounts are made on-line and the off-line option is being removed. Thus there is less paper to move and post to open – whether on-line will mean more or less fraud remains to be seen.
Mike said “If so I hope I can count on Gez on saving her job?” I worked at Companies House for 13 years, Mike, and I know that people there work very hard for relatively little reward. It’s a quaint notion that I alone might save Mike’s sister’s job. That’s a matter for collective solidarity, as I’m sure he knows.
Refreshingly, Financier is quite right to note that Companies House has changed from a paper-based operation to online registration. But that’s not what might lose Mike’s sister her job. Eleven per cent arbitrarily-imposed cuts across the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills; together with tomorrow’s Budget cuts, and later Comprehensive Spending Review cuts – those are what might do for many public sector jobs.
I don’t think fraud is the only issue to consider when moving to paper-less processes. There is a possibility of social exclusion (probably not too relevant here), but there is an emerging body of evidence in other areas of governmental responsibility that demonstrates that the push towards automation is creating new inefficiencies, as the machines are being put before service delivery.
Look at the unholy mess created by the Student Loans Company last year. What a total fiasco. And now we have had a task and finish group in Wales that has recommended the same route. At the least the Education Minister has adopted a wait-and-see approach. Presumably, he wants to see what happens this summer with the million of additional pounds that have been sunk into this disaster.
As for the Budget, a lot of it is speculation. We only have a little over 24 hours to go. I will be us using Will Hutton’s piece, among others, to measure against tomorrow’s announcement:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/20/budget-cuts-george-osborne
Financier, you say
“I fully support Duncan’s final point, “Prosperity is the Welsh electorate’s first priority.” But does WAG have the capability or capacity to effect this requirement? It would appear not at present, as there seems to be more priority on such items as language and Welsh culture (and mocking new Secretaries of State for Wales) rather than a unified effort to get people back to work from both the unemployment and incapacity registers whilst immigrants are very willling to fill the jobs that the locals appear reluctant to take.”
Your dig at WAG on language and culture is not justified on any rational basis; a very small % of money goes on these areas and it’s hardly a priority for many (Labour) AMs or Ministers. Au contraire – getting people back into work is arguably the key priority and has been for over a decade. What you are right to be questioning is the unified effort bit and the effectiveness of lots of different fiefdoms in WAG and DWP and local govnt all doing their own bits with little mutual learning of what actually works. This ineffectiveness is going to become even less justifiable with money getting increasingly tight and WAG and DWP need to ensure that what they do is complementary to the extent that bodies with different political outlooks can do.
Prof Morgan’s article on the excess costs of bureaucracy in Wales is worth a read.
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business-in-wales/business-news/2010/04/28/brian-morgan-is-it-not-time-we-changed-the-way-we-do-things-in-wales-91466-26330145/
“Some of us who have been in the Labour Party since the 1960s remember the aftermath of both 1970 and 1979. Ordinary people in the UK need Labour to return to government as quickly as possible and the Liberal Democrats to return to their senses.” says Jeff Jones.
As someone belonging to a roughly similar generation I cannot resist pointing out that the Labour Party Jeff Jones joined in the 1960s and New Labour are totally different parties. To suggest that “ordinary people” will benefit from the return to government of the party that helped bring about the financial crisis by fawning over bankers and hedge fund managers distorts recent political and economic history.
New Labour made the mistake of becoming besotted with people it had never understood and, inevitably, it all ended in tears. Now we’re all crying. That is, us ‘ordinary people’, who have the sense to know who to blame for the mess we’re in.
P.S. As for Alun Davies writing “pseudo nationalist nonsense”, I say better that than the ‘socialism’ preached by such men of principle, defenders of “ordinary people”, as the Lords Tonypandy, Kinnock, Touhig and countless others who couldn’t wait to fill their boots and don the ermine. You want pseuds, poseurs, windbags – then look to the anti-Welsh element of the Labour and Unionist Party in Wales.
Financier, Brian Morgan’s article on the Welsh public sector is worth a read indeed. One small but very costly point; the 43% of additional NHS spending going on salaries was largely decided in England as part of NHS England & Wales salary rises regardless of the lower cost of living here
Well said, Royston Jones. You could add Lady Kinnock, the Member for Africa to your list.
Nice to see the Nats out in force again attacking their favourite bete noires. Poor old George Thomas still getting hammered after all these years. Although it is interesting that no one ever attacks the Bollinger Bolshevik Nye Bevan. I suppose that he has now become an honorary Welshman. Ironic given that if he was alive today he probably would have utter contempt for everything that Welsh Nationalism stood for.
This hatred of individual members of the Labour Party really is a broken record which adds nothing to political debate. It’s just as stupid as Labour supporters arguing that all Nationalists are Fascist sympathisers because of Saunders Lewis and Ambrose Bebb’s flirtation with the ideas of Action Francaise. Although whoever wrote the sentence that Wales was a ‘unique country’ with ‘remarkable leaders’ must have been influenced by Bebb who once argued that ‘Wales needed a Mussolini’.
“if he was alive today he probably would have utter contempt for everything that Welsh Nationalism stood for.”
I wouldn’t have thought he approved of it during his lifetime but he might have appreciated the Welsh Assembly policy on free prescriptions.
I don’t think you have to be a ‘nat’ to find George Thomas’s toe-curling sycophancy repulsive, or to disapprove of Glenys Kinnock’s priorities.
I think we’ve argued this one out, gents. It’s all getting a little too ad hominem for my liking. Let’s get back to the topic in hand, please.
Poor old George Thomas. One thing you could say about old George that he was not invisible either in Cardiff West or Ely.
I am sure that Nye Bevan have been found amongst those who opposed devolution, I don’t think he even supported a Welsh secretary of state.
Saunders Lewis hated Bolshevism more than he admired fascism, being a Catholic in the mold of G K Chesterton, who abhorred fascism.
Is this new government anti-Wales?
It’s as pro-Wales as the last one.
“Ironic given that if he was alive today he probably would have utter contempt for everything that Welsh Nationalism stood for.”
Seeing as Bevan’s NHS only exists in the publicly funded format because of devolution, I think not. His contempt would firstly be directed at Blairism and the Private Finance Initiative that it spawned. A programme completely rejected in Bevan’s health service in Wales.
Debating what dead people might or might not have thought about things today is rather fruitless. Bevan would not have been at home in today’s Labour Party. Then again, he often wasn’t at home in the Labour Party of his day. And, although he clearly had a deeply patriotic streak in him, he would have had nothing but scorn for the intellectual arguments advanced by nationalism.
Luke’s argument that the only real NHS exists in Wales is, of course, rather daft. In his own day, Bevan has strong objections to the use of private finance in the NHS. It was still the NHS, just as it is in England.
“Debating what dead people might or might not have thought about things today is rather fruitless. Bevan would not have been at home in today’s Labour Party. Then again, he often ………………”
How does that contribute to anyones’s five a day!
In answer to the original point of this debate before you all resorted to petty sniping:
“Is this new government anti-Wales?”
I don’t think this is particularly true, I suspect the answer is worse; the truth is they don’t particularly care either way,they are indifferent to Wales. Its just not on their radar. And until the Assembly Members start growing some balls and stop squabbling like children about who is or isn’t a nat or anything else and start doing what you are paid to do, which is to represent and give true vision to the citizens of Wales, then the situation won’t change.