CAMBRIA POLITICO

Will Ieuan end up as Bourne’s deputy ?

Jul 172009

ONE OF the main weaknesses of Ieuan Wyn Jones has been correctly lighted on by politicians at the Assembly.

The Deputy First Minister is a sometimes shy man who would much rather deal with issues quietly in a smoke-filled room (except there aren’t any, as smoking inside has been banned) than out in the boxing ring, giving his opponent a slugging, writes Clive Betts from the National Assembly press gallery.

With the final briefing before summer recess, a number of politicians closed in on him. You can try to dismiss this as politicking.

But it is happening so frequently that his weakness has plainly been exposed. Although he is seen as a competent minister (by most, that is), he is also recognised as a person who is worth attacking – because he won’t hit back strongly and convincingly enough.

The first to pile in was Tory leader Nick Bourne. Then followed Kirsty Williams, of the Lib Dems. Yet again.

Mr Bourne decided to have a go over the road-construction programme (just before its publication).

Mr Bourne is not the first person to be intrigued with the change in roads priorities from the heavily-used east-west links to those between north and south, very few of which reach a dual-carriageway need.

We all know why that is happening. Minister Ieuan Wyn Jones is a Nationalist. And he doesn’t answer to a constituency which is based either in the southern industrial or northern commuter (to England) belts.

Several journalists tried hard during the briefing to get Mr Bourne to allege Plaid Cymru subterfuge, a preference for party ideology over economic need, etc. We tried in vain; better luck next time perhaps.

Mr Bourne pointed to the greater importance of east-west for both business and tourism; he refused to accept the argument apparently expressed by former Tory Minister of State Wyn Roberts, that north-south should be pursued during periods of economic difficulty because they cost far less, and that east-west should be deferred until lots of cash is available.

One of the problems for Mr Jones is that he is seen as trying to avoid discussing the issue openly.

Perhaps I don’t blame him for trying to avoid Mr Bourne’s east-west pal Huw Lewis (Labour, Merthyr) and others in the Labour group. To them, it is their centralised British ideology which decides their preference for anything which runs west-east (ie towards England and London).

The issue raised by none other than the finance committee is the refusal of Mr Jones to release the wording of a ministerial advisory group dealing with transport. At one time, the committee threatened legal action (an unheard of action in Assembly terms).

Within an hour of the briefing, the Tories in the plenary had tried to force the document into the open – without much success, either. But it looks very bad for Mr Jones’s belief in openness. Or for giving the opposition a biff on the nose.

Then there’s Mr Bourne’s complaint about Mr Jones sending a deputy minister (John Griffiths, Newport East) to reply to a committee report on education and learning.

On that issue, Mr Jones may have taken the right option. But the continual drip, drip, drip of allegations that he will do anything go avoid facing his challengers, does him no good.

Mr Bourne similarly accused Mr Jones of sitting on issues which came across his desk, delaying replies so long that their pertinence had passed. Just like inaugural First Secretary Alun Michael, who was rumoured to count paper clips, so long did it take for decisions to emerge.

Indeed, both are very similarly characters. Both believe deeply in public service; both are entirely honourable. But Alun never made it to the Cabinet (instead he was handed the issue of fox-hunting to sort out).

Ieuan made it to the Cabinet. But only because Dafydd Wigley fell temporarily ill.

Some people fear that the current Plaid tactic of slogging away in government to gain experience will backfire at the next election. The party will have gained lots of experience.

But they will have gained little CREDIT for what has been achieved by the coalition government because of Ieuan’s softly, softly, catchee monkey tactics.

Plaid could end up by default as the third party in the Assembly. Which could leave us with Ieuan as deputy to Bourne as first minister. Oh dear me…

Kirsty claws into Ieuan

Welsh LibDem, Welsh Politics 1 Response »

Jun 212009

QUITE A little battle is opening up between new Lib Dem leader Kirsty Williams and certain parts of the Assembly Government, writes Clive Betts from the National Assembly press gallery.

The Lib Dems released a press statement at their weekly press briefing on the number of laptops and other electronic equipment which the Assembly government and its officials have lost or had stolen.

The worst department, apparently, is economy and transport, headed by deputy First Minister Ieuan Wyn Jones.

Ms Williams went close to blaming Mr Jones himself for the 13 laptops and two Blackberries (a superior form of mobile phone) which have vanished. Was this because of the sort of leadership his department was providing ?

One almost expected Ms Williams to say that, clearly, nationalist leadership could not be trusted; perhaps they were secretly exporting them to independent Dublin.

Ms Williams certainly used one very good point … in that it is proving extremely difficult to obtain information about missing property from the government. Or of most other sorts of information. The open government we were promised from our National Assembly is certainly far from what we are in fact being provided at the moment – except perhaps in openness to theft and loss.

But beyond that openness problem – which deserves greater dissection, at a later date - lies a personality clash which seems to be developing. The previous week, Ms Williams had claimed Mr Jones’s economic department had been making a bad job of dealing with one of her constituent’s business problems during the present economic downturn.

This had led to Mr Jones leaping to his feet during an Assembly session, waving a sheet of papers at the Lib Dem leader, and alleging that all the information she had claimed was not available was in fact easily to hand, if only she had asked him.

Yet, a week later, Ms Williams demanded to know why she had still not had sight of the information that Mr Jones waved around. Her constituent made the same complaint. He still had not received the information that Mr Jones said was available to him.

A strange issue.

It almost seems to link with the complaint made by an Assembly committee that Mr Jones was refusing to supply them with information on transport priorities which they thought they had a right to. Some (Labour) members of the committee even threatened to take Mr Jones to court.

The Cardiff Assembly was supposed to be an excellent example of openness of information. Or, it was when Ron Davies, Caerffili AM, father of devolution, and former Welsh Secretary, still roamed the corridors.

It’s been a sadder and weaker institution since he left.

Plaid hopelessly overtaken by the Scots

Plaid Cymru, Welsh Politics 3 Responses »

Jun 152009

No wonder Plaid didn’t try to present last week’s cabinet briefing to the press in Cardiff, writes Clive Betts from the National Assembly press gallery.

It’s not so much that Labour had to explain away a disaster, Plaid were faced with the same job. And if you’re in the middle of the shit, Rhodri Morgan is far more capable of explaining he is in fact surrounded with the milk of human kindness than Ieuan Wyn Jones could ever attempt.

Mind you, Wigley would have had a good try of proving that dirty brown is really white …

We haven’t yet had a line on who will give the Cabinet press briefing tomorrow. Who they decide to chose will rest an awful lot on what news release the government plans to make in the next few days. And they don’t tell you that sort of thing beforehand.

Mind you, Plaid did a good job of trying to hide the electoral disaster they had just suffered. Must be something to do with having a former BBC Wales journalist as special adviser to IWJ.

Thus, we had a story about welcoming back Jill Evans to continue her work as an MEP – without saying anything about what had happened to Eurig Wyn, member until 2004 (he disappeared when the number of Welsh seats fell by one).

Plaid, in fact, had a pretty decent story to tell from Europe. Their vote had gone up, particularly in their target areas.

But brazen talk beforehand of a second seat – in the same way as the Tories had spoken of gaining a seat – had been totally falsified.

Ieuan hadn’t wanted to turn up to face the press and explain the gaping difference with Scotland.

Yet again, Wales had been proved to be an offshoot of England where some people speak a non-Germanic language. I suppose the most obvious difference politically was in UKIP’s ability to win a seat.

Previously, I and some others had scorned them as being too-English. In Scotland, that taunt is still flung. But, up there, their candidates got their balls frozen; their vote fell; and Strasbourg seats were restricted to members of the main parties.

But it isn’t the fate of UKIP which tells you the temper of the frozen north (in winter, that is). It was the way in which the SNP unequivocally gained the peoples’ vote; nationally, they gained 29% to Labour’s 21, with other parties lagging.

More crucially, the SNP came first in every council area bar four (out of 32) – the party even won Edinburgh, although not Glasgow.

In stark contrast, Plaid was fourth third in Wales with 19%. The big parties were only a point or so ahead. But clearly the Welsh Nationalists have a long way to go to win the support of the people of Wales.

Just look at the Westminster constituencies where Plaid did well. There were only seven in which Plaid came first – Carmarthen East and Dinefwr, Llanelli, Ceredigion, Conwy, Caernarfon, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy, and Anglesey.

All are seats which Plaid already hold at one level or other. There’s then the list of where the party came second (which might mean a long way behind the leader). If Plaid had come first in some of these, we could start dreaming of an independent Wales.

But, really, this is a list of the second-hopers – Blaenau Gwent, Ogmore, Caerffili, Islwyn, Clwyd West, Merthyr, Aberavon, Neath, Carmarthen West, Preseli, Rhondda, Cynon, Pontypridd, and Swansea East.

If you’re a politician who happens to dream a lot at night, Plaid Cymru is a party you would be happy with.

All I can say is that, when Scotland wins its freedom, the Welsh will be the first to scream that they are being diddled by the English. But the truth is that Wales usually lags behind the Scottish leaders. And that has been proved once again.

Lib Dems claim Labour says Ieuan isn’t up to it …

Welsh Politics No Responses »

May 192009

I’M SURE Cambria - and its political editor – will get the blame for this report.

But all I’m doing in penning this attack on Ieuan Wyn Jones, Plaid group leader and deputy first minister, is repeating the words from the Liberal Democrat briefing this morning.

Kirsty Williams, the Lib Dem group leader, asked whether Mr Jones was capable of continuing to hold his alternative job as minister for the economy.

The reason she gave was not political. It was because she said he could not manage his workload.

She took her evidence from a freedom of information answer – the percentage of his letters which he answered within the official target of 17 working days. His figure was only 72 pc, compared with figures of over 90 per cent for other ministers with relatively-allied responsibilities.

Ms Williams, AM for Brecon and Radnor, said, “The head of the department that is responsible for the well-being of our economy doesn’t seem to be responding to the economic downturn in Wales.

“If Welsh businesses treated their customers this poorly, they wouldn’t last long. The First Minster’s mantra of agile government for fragile times should be more like agile government in fragile times.”

Ms Williams then goes on to claim that “some Labour AMs even question whether he is capable of holding both economy and transport portfolios while being Deputy First Minister”.

It isn’t, of course, Mr Jones who pens the actual answers to the public; he merely signs on a dotted line put before him by his civil servants. But it is he who agrees the line to be taken. Ms Williams wonders whether he is taking far too long in deciding what the lines should be.

Shades, indeed, of Alun Michael when he was First Secretary in the months after the Assembly first opened 10 years ago. The jokes that went around then about Mr Michael taking care to pile neatly the paper-clips undoubtably played some small role in his early departure and replacement by Rhodri Morgan.

Getting ready for an election to replace Ieuan as Plaid’s leader

Plaid Cymru, Welsh Politics 10 Responses »

Apr 292009

Ieuan Wyn Jones seemed surprised – but far from dumbfounded – when approached by Cambria with news that some people are after his job.

The individual, of course, is Adam Price, the Carmarthen East and Dinefwr MP. To bid for the leadership of the Plaid group in the Assembly, he would of course have to become an AM.

Informed that the current incumbent for that seat – the former rev-min Rhodri Glyn Thomas – had dryly responded that he had yet to be approached with the suggestion that an early retirement might be in order – and the underlying feeling is that his reaction to any such suggestion would be along the lines of, “Piss off” – Mr Jones gave the sensible reply, “That is all totally hypothetical.”

And yet why should one of the most senior figures in Plaid have commented to Cambria that it was exceedingly interesting the amount of public speaking that Mr Price is currently managing in Wales.

“He is speaking so often that he is even managing to contradict himself,” I was told.

What was interesting was that Mr Jones seemed totally unaware of what was going on. As there have been stories around for some years doubting his continued hold on the group leadership, one would have expected to have found antennae specifically tuned in that direction.

Of course, the truth is probably that the party sometimes seems so unsure of itself that rumours of this sort are totally censored by party officials, even when speaking to the party’s own leaders.

If Ieuan is eventually to get the chop, you can be sure of one thing. The execution will be defered until after the election. It’s only juvenile right-wingers among the Tories who can risk jeopardising election support with a contest before the polls.

Labour plans to replace Rhodri Morgan in advance of the poll – giving the new incumbent ample time to settle in before the 2011 election. Mr Morgan himself is going to extreme lengths to dampen advance speculation about his own party’s contest. Asked about the poll at the first cabinet briefing of the new term, Mr Morgan refused point blank to add anything to what he had said earlier.

And to minimise the resulting story, he refused to remind journalists of what he had said earlier. Of course, one reason he refused to give a reminder might be just in case his new reminder might turn out to be slightly different from what he had said earlier !

Air Ieuan – an electoral embarrassment?

Plaid Cymru, Transport, Welsh Politics 5 Responses »

Apr 072009

When I was working for the London technical press, one weekly journal got quite excited about the launch of the daily air service between Cardiff and the North.

The magazine, aimed at local authority professionals, were extremely surprised about the development.

You can be sure, that wasn’t because they thought it such a grand idea. More likely it was because their readers – in one of the technical services – were quite amazed that such money was being spent in the light of the existence of roads and railways.

My stories for the magazine predated the coalition government’s decision to spend quite substantially on up grading the rail link, and its decision to prioritise the north-south highway.

Some might say here lies a nationalistic-style prioritisation which runs counter to the needs of Wales … apart from politicians wanting to reach Cardiff.

Let us remember how important Cardiff is in transport terms. The international baccaleuriate organisation is pulling out, apart from some specialist functions, because the city it too difficult to get to from the rest of the world. Which is another way of saying that almost the only places you can get to from the city’s airport are Spanish holiday resorts.

Although there are big adverts in Cardiff central station from Lufthansa … you’ve got to go to Bristol to find them.

That northern air link is threatening to turn out bad for Plaid. The Penarth Times carries on attack from an intelligent left-wing Labour supporter on the coalition, which focuses on Plaid, and refers to the “heavily subsidised Ieuan Air Link”. Even Plaid people have been known to refer to “Air Ieuan”.

The party replies that it was the previous Labour government which set up the daily flight to Holyhead, not far from the party leader’s home in Llangefni.

They then add that important users of the flight are civil servants who are running Wales. After all, it takes around five hours to reach Holyhead by road from Cardiff, and four hours to Llandudno.

So how much does Ieuan himself use the flight? One way each week he goes by plane (to Cardiff), while the other is by train.

What about Labour AMs? Unfortunately, that party doesn’t possess any Assembly seats in the north-west. The electors don’t seem to vote for them …

In other words, this flight could turn into an electoral embarrassment.

A case of newspaper inequality at expense of the Tories

Welsh Politics 6 Responses »

Jan 132009

Nick Bourne and the Welsh Tories seem to be storming to political advances within the next year after the collapse of the Western Mail concatenation of attacks on the propriety of the expenses he has received for being an AM and living in a flat in Cardiff during Assembly weeks.

We can expect an annual sluice of such journalistic stories each time the details of expenses paid – which almost descend to the issue numbers on receipts – are released. Normally, the not-so-hidden agenda among the public is – don’t give taxpayers’ money to politicians.

The agenda with the Western Mail, however, seems rather to serve the interests of the anti-Assembly far-right in Welsh politics.

The Mail was founded to serve the Tory Party; it then killed off the opposition which stemmed from the majority party of Wales (the Liberal-supporting South Wales Daily News); after which success it ridiculously claimed that a “paper created to serve a party now serves a nation” (Nye Bevan didn’t think so; he accordingly burned it above Ebbw Vale); and the resultant current effective monopoly (how often is the Daily Post referred to in Cardiff Bay ?) continues far too often to curry its own favourites, usually right wing Tories.

Can Cardiff’s Valleys put a spark into Ieuan ?

Transport 8 Responses »

Dec 212008

The Assembly – and in particular Ieuan Wyn Jones, transport minister and deputy to Rhodri Morgan – will soon be presented with an opportunity to make a mark which will last a half-century or more.

Alternatively, the institution, its ministers and its civil servants could bust their chances through short-sightedness, inability to plan, and failure to innovate.

The gossip has been heard around Cardiff Bay for about a month. But this week an apparently well-founded press leak has gone far to turn this gossip into fact.

The railway line between Swansea and Paddington is to be electrified. Current plans are to make an announcement early in the new year, with the intention of starting work in 2012.

According to the magazine Today’s Railways UK, the work would be done in five years – or even in three.

Now, this will of course be a London scheme, bringing nearer to completion long-term talk of electrifying all the main lines from the English capital.

Which only goes to emphasise the London-centredness from which the rest of Britain suffers.

But once the electric wires reach Cardiff, the situation changes dramatically for Wales. For some years, work was under way under the old South Glamorgan County Council to electrify the suburban railway system around Cardiff.

After the county was converted into two unitary authorities, it seems the professional engineering working on the project was quietly disbanded – at least partly because of the disruption which accompanies any such major organisational changes.

The idea at the time was linked to talk of running trams to Cardiff Bay. To this day, the precise routes which these tramlines would follow are carefully safeguarded by planners.

But a decade or more later, the transport situation in the South has changed somewhat. At that time, one of the reason for trams was to get rid of the ugly Bute Street railway embankment.

Now, traffic is growing so much on the Valleys railways that all the talk is of expansion. Platforms are being expanded to take six-car trains; the line to Ebbw Vale has reopened; the next plan surely will be the reopening of the Beddau link at Llantrisant.

Cardiff now is rapidly developing a metro system the equal of the best in the British Isles and the equal of those on the Continent.

A metro system is typified by frequent services (preferably every 15 minutes); stations which are close together; good links to bus services (OK, that’s still to happen in a worthwhile way).

Indeed, trains on a metro take the place of buses on our jam-packed roads.

In Rhondda, almost every village has its station (which means, collecting all the fares is a tough job for the guard !). On the Coryton branch, some stations are within walking distance of each other.

All right, the Ebbw Vale line is a failure from the point of view – a number of the stations closed by Dr Beeching have inexcusably failed to reopen.

All that is obviously wrong with the Valleys system is the trains. Most of the coaches have only two axles; the last time two-axle coaches were common on the valleys, it was the 19th century, and the coaches were swiftly relegated to use on colliers’ work trains.

New trains are needed in the Valleys.

Now, it so happens that one of the main reasons for the Paddington electrification is that the high-speed trains (HSTs) have to be replaced.

The question must then be raised as to whether we get heavy-weight electric trains, as used around London, or whether we adopt systems pioneered some years ago in Germany allowing the new trains to double up as trams and enter town centres (as well as Cardiff Bay…).

This will be a big project. It will mean an enormous amount of work be all levels in the Assembly. Fortunately, the minister is a friend of the railways…

And if we are thinking in coalition terms, this would be a true coalition project. For the person who first spoke of a Cardiff metro was Sue Essex, the Cardiff North Labour AM, and subsequent transport minister.

Older Entries Newer Entries

Will Ieuan end up as Bourne’s deputy ?

Kirsty claws into Ieuan

Plaid hopelessly overtaken by the Scots

Lib Dems claim Labour says Ieuan isn’t up to it …

Getting ready for an election to replace Ieuan as Plaid’s leader

Air Ieuan – an electoral embarrassment?

A case of newspaper inequality at expense of the Tories

Can Cardiff’s Valleys put a spark into Ieuan ?

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