Anti-Welsh Liebourites such as Piggy Andrews and others have recently been jumping on the bandwagon to gainsay the troubled economies of small independent nations in a pathetic attempt to cover up the devastating problems of a genuinely failing state: the good old UK.

Their argument runs something like this: These troubled times prove that Wales is far better off under the protective wings of Westminster rather than going it alone as an independent nation. Just look at small independent nations like Iceland and Ireland – they’re going bust. Isn’t it just great, especially when just a year ago these uppity little countries had GDPs which put that of the UK to shame? Well now they’re on the road to ruin, while we, under Gordon Brown’s world-saving helmsmanship are deadheading towards an early recovery. The green shoots just lurking there under the surface ready to spring to life.

Piffle and balderdash.

As Lieghton and his chums well know, Brown and Liebour’s mismanagement of the current economic crisis has saddled every man, women and child in Britain with a debt in excess of £35,000. The UK’s manufacturing base has been shot to bits; public spending (Liebour’s euphemism for electoral bribery) has reached unprecedented levels, and the whole flimsy structure is about to split apart against a backdrop of mounting public anger, a police force running out of control, and dangerous, unpopular and prohibitively costly overseas adventures to which the UK’s poorly equipped armed forces have been committed.

No wonder the Scots are asking themselves whether they want to be part of this basket case arrangement. So should we. Urgently.

Despite the grim reality of the situation charismatic Rhondda AM and “Minister for Regeneration” (!) Piggy Andrews seems happy to continue bamboozling his long-suffering constituents with a mishmash of downright twaddle and hogwash in his local organ. This is what he wrote in last week’s offering:

“They (Plaid Cymru) want to cut Wales off from the rest of Britain.

They threaten jobs coming to Wales.

Over recent years they have said that Wales should be an independent country, like Iceland.

Well, we know what has happened to Iceland in the current global economic crisis.

It is bankrupt.

An independent Wales would be bankrupt very quickly, cut off from UK and international investment.”

If, like me, you can’t honestly believe that Piggy is completely devoid of intelligent thought, then he’s got to be spouting this stuff for nefarious reasons.

The whole idea of independence is to give Wales the prosperity and economic security it lacks as part of the United Kingdom, because union with England (and the boom-and-bust policies of successive Liebour and Tory governments) has turned Wales into one of the poorest parts of the EU. The whole idea of independence is to attract inward investment into Wales, because it can’t get it under the present arrangement. The whole idea of independence is to ensure job creation in Wales and to prevent the current drain of talent as young people are forced out of the country to find work. The whole idea of independence is to put Wales at the heart of Europe with a direct voice at Europe’s decision-making top table rather than seeing it represented by dodgy second-hand car salesmen from Essex. What on earth would be the point of championing it if it wasn’t?

It’s precisely because those who get the point realise that small independent nations like Iceland and Ireland have the ability to control their own affairs – for good or ill. Iceland may be bankrupt, but this is NOT because it is independent, but because it had bad leadership and bad fiscal management in a global financial crisis.

Britain is bankrupt for the same reason.

Ireland, on the other hand – another example Liebourites use to warn of the ‘dangers’ of independence – is regularly disparaged in the British press with gleeful headlines such as “Roar goes out of Celtic Tiger” and “Celtic Crown loses Gleam” with accompanying pictures of half-drowned cats, drink-sodden leprechauns and the like, is, actually proof that small nations have a better chance than large ones. Well, better, certainly, than the poor old UK.

In an article (‘Celtic Tiger sharpens its claws for recovery’) in last week’s Financial Times, BP chairman and former EU commissioner Peter Sutherland describes Ireland’s problems as being ‘acute rather than chronic’. The article is worth quoting at length because it clearly shows the unfathomable chasm between the incisive analysis of a brilliant international economist on the one hand, and the bizarre ramblings of a puffed-up buffoon from the backbenches of Wales’s toothless Assembly on the other.

“The reasons for the deficit are well known,” writes Sutherland, “Ireland’s growth and tax revenues, from about 2003, became overly dependent on housing. So, when the property bubble burst, the economy slowed sharply and tax revenues plummeted. The problems of the Irish banks are related to this issue too (their exposure to US mortgage-backed securities and other non-domestic toxic assets is minimal).

While the housing slowdown and the associated budget deficit has created a major challenge, to focus exclusively on housing-related problems provides a distorted picture of the under lying health of the Irish economy. The economy has been a phenomenon since the late 1980s. From a relatively poor country on Europe’s periphery, Ireland has risen to become one of the richest economies in the world in 20 years. Even after an anticipated 8 per cent fall this year, its GDP per capita, in terms of purchasing power, will remain significantly higher than that of the UK or Germany. And, while unemployment has risen, there are still 80 per cent more jobs in Ireland today than 15 years ago. Much of its infrastructure has been transformed during this period.

Since 2007, Ireland’s current account position has been rising and, at the current trajectory, it should return to surplus by the year end. To the extent that Irish public sector borrowing has been rising, this is being more than offset by a rise in private sector saving.

The cause of these favourable statistics is export-led growth, led by inward investment in industries such as information technology, pharmaceuticals and private sector services. The fact that Ireland’s economic success has been driven by exports in these areas has resulted in a far stronger basic Irish economy than the one that existed in the 1980s. Because of the nature of these exports the drop in exports anticipated for this year, as a result of recession, is estimated to be only 5.9 per cent. The corresponding Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development figure for Germany is 16.5 per cent, France 11.4 per cent and Great Britain 9.8 per cent. Some others are considerably worse, such as Japan, forecast at 26.4 per cent.

Another issue on which there has been much comment is the alleged disadvantage to Ireland of being in the eurozone. In reality, Ireland may have been saved by its membership from the possibility of a run on its currency – however unwarranted such a run would have been. The UK, meanwhile, has seen its currency fall by 30 per cent against the euro and this is likely to bring short-run benefits. This option is not, of course, available to Ireland; flexibility has had to come instead from an adjustment in real wages. But – and this is the most important positive for Ireland’s long-term prospects – there is clear evidence that it is dealing with the competitiveness issue in a sustainable manner and one I believe to be unprecedented in the OECD area.

The latest data suggest there has already been an 8 per cent drop in private sector wages and salaries and, via the “pension levy”, there has also been in effect a 7-8 per cent fall in public sector pay. It is hard to imagine wages in other economies displaying such flexibility. If these figures are maintained or even supplemented, the Irish economy should emerge from the recession in a highly competitive position. Meanwhile, the minister of finance has given an undertaking to maintain Ireland’s low corporation tax rate of 12.5 per cent.

It has to be recognised that Ireland has a very open economy.

Ireland’s problems are acute in nature rather than chronic. Once Ireland overcomes this short-term panic – and I believe that last week’s budget, whatever its alleged deficiencies, was a vital step in this process – the basic strengths of the Irish economy remain formidable. If the Irish people continue to react constructively to the harsh measures necessary, Ireland will be in a very strong position to benefit from the eventual global recovery and its healthy demographic profile will greatly help in this.”

Piggy and his cronies need to wise up. Yes, we all know that the recession is global; but it will be small nations like Ireland who will see the first green shoots of recovery rather than Britain’s benighted wasteland.

by Cuneglas