Anglesey's "Schofield-gate": raised in First Minister's Questions

The Ombudsman's decision to drop a controversial case against Cllr Elwyn Schofield, made by the Welsh Government's appointed troubleshooter to Anglesey Council, David Bowles, was raised today in Cardiff by Mark Isherwood AM during First Minister's Questions:

Question By Mark Isherwood AM :

"How do you respond to the Public Service Ombudsman for Wales decision at the end of last week to drop a case against Anglesey Councillor, Elwyn Schofield on grounds that the evidence was contradictory and largely uncorroborated. A case brought by the Welsh Government appointed former Interim Managing Director, who also produced a Terms of Engagement obliging council group leaders to sign which forced them to 'Publicly and Robustly' condemn this Councillor and other named Councillors, which led to, ultimately, the appointment of the Commissioners, the postponement of the local elections and the drastic boundary Changes."

Answer from Carwyn Jones, First Minister:

"Well [splutter, splutter]. I don't wish to comment on something that's been done by the Ombudsman or finding made by the Ombudsman, that's a matter for the Local Authority."

(Watch it for yourself here from about 20 minutes in).

Carwyn Jones sidesteps the question as he wasn't being asked to comment on the Ombudsman's decision, but on the judgement of the then most well paid civil servant in Wales, David Bowles, who had been sent in by the Welsh Government to solve Anglesey County Councils problems but ended up making them far, far worse. 

The issue was raised for a second time later on during Business Questions when Janet-Finch Saunders AM called on Carl Sargeant, the Welsh Minister for Local Government, to make a statement on the matter.

Had what happened on Ynys Môn under the direction of a Welsh Government Viceroy happened in any South Wales council it would have been a major scandal. Because it happened in Anglesey it has been largely ignored. That might be about to change.

Watch this space.

Carwyn Jones fails to practise what he preaches

I will be taking a closer look at how yesterday's Comprehensive Spending Review affects Ynys Môn later on, but I just wanted to make a quick post about First Minister Carwyn Jones' response to it, and in particular this remark:

"[The cuts] will undoubtedly hit Wales harder than other parts of the UK because we are already underfunded, as recently demonstrated by the Holtham Commission."

It certainly true that Gerry Holtham found that the Barnett Formula underfunds Wales to the tune of £300m per year in terms of need compared to an equivalent region in England. Lets put that into perspective though: the Assembly's budget for 2010/11 is £15.12bn -- this means that the £300m of underfunding is the equivalent of 1.9% of that budget. Don't misunderstand me: we definitely want that £300m, and indeed deserve it, but to claim that we in Wales are especially suffering because of this underfunding is an exaggeration -- especially as it is increasingly simply being used by Welsh Labour politicians as a crutch with which to beat the coalition government whilst claiming victimhood. If Mr Jones and his colleagues are so concerned about this underfunding, why didn't Labour use its recent 13 years in power in Westminster, plus a further 11 years in the Welsh Assembly, to rectify it? 

Secondly, it could be argued that to plead underfunding whilst at the same time paying for free prescriptions, free swimming, and free breakfasts for all primary school children sends out something of a mixed message to HM Treasury.

Finally, as it happens WAG has a kind of internal 'Barnett Formula' all of its own for allocating local government grants to Welsh councils -- however this is also based not on need but on on the size of the populations in each council area. As a consequence of this two of the poorest counties in the UK, Anglesey and Conwy, received the lowest settlement rise of just 1 percent from the Welsh Assembly Government this year, compared to, for example, a 2.9 percent rise for the far more prosperous Cardiff City. In actual fact Ynys Môn would have received even less than 1 percent if they had not been able to negotiate a special 'floor'. If the Welsh Assembly believes that Wales should be funded according to need rather than population, then perhaps it would be better if it practises what it preaches? 

Carwyn Jones and Alex Salmond choose the easy path

The first ministers of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have issued a joint statement attacking the UK government's spending plans. The following is the important part of their joint declaration:

"The proposals to cut public spending to such an extent run the risk of stalling any recovery.

Private sector demand remains fragile and access to finance continues to be constrained.

The current plans for fiscal consolidation could therefore have a significant and lasting negative impact on the economy, including people's jobs, which would undermine the very efforts to address the UK's fiscal position.

We believe that promoting economic growth is the best way to restore the health of our public finances and this must be our overriding priority."

Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister, has been spearheading today's announcement and has taken every opportunity to lampoon the coalition's spending plans on TV and radio news programmes. I would remind him of two things:

• Firstly, according to the Holtham Report, whereas Wales is underfunded by the Treasury to the tune of £300m a year compared to an equivalent English Region, Scotland by the same calculations is currently overfunded by a whopping £4.2bn per year. This means that as we move into the belt tightening phase, Scotland starts from a better supported position than any other region in the UK.
• Secondly, if Alex Salmond thinks that the coalition's programme to reduce spending is too severe he has recourse to a very simple means of offsetting the effects of those the cuts in Scotland: he can use the tax-varying powers granted to the Scottish Parliament to increase income tax in Scotland by up to 3p in the pound in order to fund a reduced pace of cuts. Unfortunately Mr Salmond doesn't have the balls to unilaterally adjust income tax in Scotland as he knows the Scottish electorate wouldn't tolerate it -- therefore he's content to demand that the elected Westminster government (which is already overfunding Scotland by £4.2bn) should abandon their much telegraphed plans and instead raise taxes throughout the UK so as to protect the Scottish public services which Mr Salmond himself is too politically cowardly to take action to protect.

Of course unlike Scotland, the Welsh Assembly has no such tax varying powers and therefore Welsh first minster, Carwyn Jones, is able to make the same argument as Mr Salmond safe in the knowledge that he is not in anyway accountable to the people of Wales for the amount of tax they pay. However he is responsible for how efficiently that public money is spent -- and if WAG was a paragon of efficiency and cost-effectiveness I would have great sympathy with Carwyn's position. However we know that public money in Wales has not been well spent and the recent problems highlighted by the leaked McKinsey report into the running of the Welsh NHS are a case in point, as was the decision to maintain for ten years the £50K+ salaries of hundreds of NHS executives who were found to be surplus to requirements following the last Welsh NHS reorganisation. Therefore, although I fully support any calls for the Barnett Formula to be amended as per the Holtham recommendations, I would argue that the first task of the Welsh Assembly Government is to prove that it can manage public money more efficiently before taking the easy option of simply blaming the coalition government's spending plans.

On a related note, I have argued previously (here and here) that the Welsh Assembly should have tax varying powers in order to, amongst other reasons, make our Welsh politicians more accountable to the Welsh electorate. However as per the example set by the Scotland Parliament, which has had such tax varying powers since it was formed but has chosen never to utilise them, I suspect that a Labour/Plaid Cymru-controlled WAG also would probably just take the politically cowardly route of not using them either. The fact is if you continue to do the same old things, you will continue to get the same old results -- its time for some new and radical thinking in Wales if we are to radically improve our economic situation.

Revealed: Albert Owen's "Pledge Card" to Anglesey voters

The Daily Post is reporting that Ynys Môn MP, Albert Owen, was joined by Welsh Assembly Government Leader, Carwyn Jones AM, yesterday in Menai Bridge to launch Labour's general election "pledge card" to Anglesey voters.

Two things confuse me about this story:

• As far as I'm aware the General Election hasn't even been called yet
• How did Carwyn Jones get up to North Wales now that the North-South Airlink is no longer flying? Very curious...

Anyway, see that pledge card Albert is waving around in his hand? Well, the Druid pulled a few strings and managed to obtain the very one that Albert is brandishing in this photo. And, just for you, Dear Reader, here it is:

   

UPDATE: Oscar is making some very interesting claims about Albert Owen's travel between Anglesey and Westminster here.

   

The BBC 'devolution' poll - what makes North Wales different?

  
The BBC has carried out a poll to gauge the level of support in Wales for the Welsh Assembly. The headline results, with only 13% of respondents wanting the Welsh Assembly abolished, show how much Welsh public opinion has swung behind the concept of some kind of devolved government in Wales over the past 30 years:

click to enlarge

As the Druid is a 'Gog Blog' it is always interesting with all-Wales polls to see how the opinions of North Wales residents differ from those of Wales as a whole.

North Wales: pro-Assembly, anti-Westminster

North Wales residents are much more pro-Assembly and anti-Westminster than any other part of Wales: only 17% of North Wales respondents thought Westminster should have the most influence over Wales - much less than the 25% of West & Mid Wales respondents or 27% of SE Wales respondents. Similarly 69% of North Wales respondents thought that the Welsh Assembly should have the most influence over Wales - more than the 63% of West & Mid Wales respondents and just 57% of SE Wales respondents. Furthermore, just 6% of North Wales respondents agreed with the statement "Wales should remain in the UK and the Assembly should be abolished", compared with 12% and 16% of West & Mid Wales and SE Wales respondents. This is actually quite surprising as it has commonly been thought that there is a resentment in North Wales against the Assembly being located in a 'distant' South Wales - this is obviously no longer the case with the most unequivocal support for the Assembly actually coming from North Wales.

North Wales: comparatively anti-Labour, pro-Conservative except in reference to the economy

In response to the question "Putting aside your own party preference, which of the four main party leaders in Wales do you think has the qualities to be the best First Minister for Wales?", only 28% of North Wales respondents named Labour's Carwyn Jones compared to 43% of West & Mid Wales respondents and 40% of SE Wales respondents. Surprisingly the support for Plaid Cymru's Ieuan Wyn Jones at around 16% was virtually the same in North and South Wales, whereas the Conservatives' Nick Bourne was named by 15% of North Wales respondents compared with just 9% and 7% of West & Mid Wales and SE Wales respondents.

In terms of the economy, however, North Wales respondents showed the same levels of support for Gordon Brown and Carwyn Jones (47%) as the rest of Wales. Strangely, however, despite their greater willingness to support Nick Bourne as First Minister, less North Wales residents thought David Cameron & Nick Bourne where stronger on the economy (21%) compared to West & Mid Wales (26%) and SE Wales (23%). Clearly David Cameron's personal standing is not as much of an asset in North Wales as elsewhere.

You can download the poll data yourself here (pdf).