Saturday 10 October 2009

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.

Saturday 7 March 2009

£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.