The title of this post is a quote from an article written for Cambria Politico by Adam Price just after he relinquished his role as an MP.

There is a lot of speculation going on at the moment about the leadership of Plaid Cymru by Ieuan Wyn Jones. Will he go or won’t he? Is he to blame or not for the dire performance of Plaid in this election? Would changing the leader improve things? Probably not. There are more fundamental things wrong with Plaid that need to be addressed first. Price would undoubtedly make a good leader of Plaid but the difficulties of bringing him back into the fold given the state of the Party now, the entrenched hierarchy and the temptations available to him in the USA (or in business) seem insurmountable. As a canny politician, Mr.Price is not the man to commit political suicide even if it would be … for Wales.

As I see it, one of the most important of the problems facing Plaid is that Plaid is not perceived as the Party of Welsh Business. After all it is people’s jobs and the economy that are uppermost in most minds and although Plaid addressed this in part in their manifesto by no means was it top of the agenda lying buried beneath other things that only a minority of people give a flying toss about. One of the reasons for this is that most Plaid politicians appear to come from a public sector or vocational background and appear to have little or no conception of what goes on in business or what needs to be done to make an economy tick. This applies to Labour as well (more so) and Plaid and Labour must bear joint responsibility for the poor economic performance of Wales over the past electoral term. Since IWJ had the economic portfolio in the last WAG then this, in itself, is probably reason for him to take another role within Plaid. He was clearly hamstrung by Labour and ‘consensus’ politics in this role and it maybe needed someone more aggressive or manipulative.

Clinton’s ‘it’s the economy stupid’ mantra has been paid lip service to but otherwise ignored or not understood by the policy makers. The other Master Strategist that Plaid have not learned from is Lyndon Baines Johnson. It’s not necessarily about personal charisma or Media manipulation (there is no real Media in Wales) it’s about the ‘levers of power’ – where they are and how to pull them. IWJ had a major lever of power in his hands (the economic portfolio) and for whatever reason did not use this effectively on his own and Plaid’s behalf to stay or grow in power. LBJ would undoubtedly have used this to great advantage. Political power comes from the distribution of  patronage and again Plaid failed to grasp the simple concept that the handing out of jobs, funds and favours is the most effective surest way of building a power base. At its crudest level there was and never has been enough money in Plaid. LBJ was a genius at fund raising. In other words, Plaid leadership has shown almost complete lack of  understanding of how politics really works. It has committed the cardinal sin of naiveté.

There is no point in hoping for Adam Price to be Plaid’s Kennedy or even Salmond because this type of politician can only come to the fore in a Party that has thoroughly understood the politics of power, money and patronage. Plaid needs an interim leader that has the naked lust for power and behind the scenes influence that LBJ had in the Democratic Party in the 50s. Now that scant attention will be paid to Plaid for the next 4 years this is a good opportunity for such an individual to emerge within Plaid. However, no such individual will flourish or perform unless there is something in it for them such as … money. Sources of (real) money come from business so until Plaid faces up to the necessity to make itself attractive to business by espousing relevant economic policies and down playing its Left of Labour positioning then it is doomed to fragment and fade from relevance.

Politicians in Plaid seem to think that politics in a Democracy is all about representing the views of the people and implementing their wishes through manifesto policies. Errrm… No. Politics is not about that. Voter wishes and opinions fluctuate wildly depending on economic circumstances, performance of the National rugby team, or mood. So trying to second guess or represent this cannot be done. To put it crudely, success and leadership comes from imposing a personal ambition and vision on the electorate by persuasion, emotional and monetary blackmail and demagoguery. Voters will follow if they are led; consulting them on the direction is pointless and politicians should be skilled enough not to force them down paths or into pens they don’t want to go or to identify policy areas that ‘spook’ them. Focus groups are fine for identifying these spooky or politically boggy areas. There has been too much concentration on manifestos and policy statements but who ever reads this apart from political opponents, anoraks and the Media. The ordinary voter gets his or her voting intention from their families, peers and friends at work, conversations in the pub and their economic circumstance, not from politicians who they never see or political programmes on the telly that aren’t watched.

The current phrase/excuse going around at the moment is that politicians have been ‘hard working’ on our behalf (and are exhausted)!?! The current lot don’t know the meaning of hard work. Anyone who has ever studied the history of politics will know how very much harder older generations of politicians worked to get people’s votes. A current complaint is that nobody has ever seen or met any of the candidates in person – with such a small country as Wales there is absolutely no excuse for candidates not to have met every single person in the constituency no matter up which dirt track or mean street, pressed their flesh looked them in the eye  and asked for their vote – if LBJ did it in Texas it can and must be done here. This is what will differentiate Plaid from the others. This is what will work.

Another ‘elephant in the room’ is that the issues of Language and Nationalism are hopelessly entwined to the detriment of intelligent debate on both, to the complete confusion of the electorate, and a happy exploitative hunting ground for political opponents. Nationalism in Scotland has been successfully promoted by the SNP and if Plaid are to pursue Independence and a Nationalist agenda (which they should) they must somehow separate it from the Language. You can be proud of (nationalistic about) your country even if you cannot converse in the language of Heaven. Unless this dichotomy can be avoided the Valleys and English speaking urban areas will always go back to Labour (as they have done in droves this time around). This is a mould that must be broken.

In an earlier post I wrote that I thought that Wales had a good set of politicians on the whole. I think I shall revise that to say that the political class we have in Plaid are well meaning and mostly good people but they are hopeless ‘politicians’. Maybe that is not a bad thing and maybe it is the ‘Welsh Way’ – but as far as getting things done in a dangerous world and difficult competitive economy it is surely not enough nor does it advance the Cause of Wales as a Nation.