IWJ hasn't changed Ynys Môn for the better - can he really change Wales for the better?

In a remarkable snub to their leader, Ieuan Wyn Jones, delegates at the Plaid Cymru conference yesterday voted decisively against subsidies for the North-South air link between Anglesey and Cardiff (a.k.a. IeuanAir). Now I'm not a particular supporter of subsidies myself, but surely its extraordinary that IWJ is unable to even get his own party to support one of his flagship policies?

Or is it..? The truth is that this is yet another policy issue where Ieuan Wyn Jones has been unable to lead his party to the direct detriment of the constituency he represents:

• Despite Ieuan Wyn Jones apparently being in favour of nuclear power (in Anglesey anyway), Plaid Cymru is steadfastly against any nuclear installations in Wales.
• Despite RAF Valley being one of the last remaining large employers on Anglesey, Ieuan Wyn Jones declined to slap down or even respond to Plaid MP Elfyn Llwyd's calls to ban the RAF from conducting low-flying training in Snowdonia -- the very raison d'etre of RAF Valley.

Has there ever been such a weak party leader?

Furthermore, in his speech to conference yesterday, Ieuan Wyn Jones made the following bold claims:

"Managing Wales may be what other parties are about, but for Plaid putting up with things as they are, just doesn't feel right ... I didn't come into politics to manage Wales. I came into politics because I wanted to change Wales, and change Wales for the better"

Its just as well he doesn't want to "manage" Wales because, as we have just seen, he can't even effectively manage his own party.

Secondly, with regards to Ieuan's claim to want "to change Wales, and change Wales for the better", I invite all readers to examine his record here on Anglesey - a constituency he has represented as either MP or AM for the past 25 years:

• Anglesey is the poorest sub-region in the United Kingdom with the lowest Gross Value Added (GVA) per head in the United Kingdom. At £10,998 per head, Anglesey’s GVA is just 55.1 per cent of the UK’s average. When you are officially the poorest place in the UK things by definition can't have been any worse - or at least have not improved under 25 years of IWJ.
• Anglesey is poorer than some of the poorest parts of rural Poland according to the 2009 OECD Factbook.
• Data for full-time employees show that average earnings in Anglesey were approx. £396 per week in 2007, compared with £415 per week in Wales and £456 per week in the UK. It should be noted that gross average earnings on the Island were distorted by wages paid to employees at Wylfa and Anglesey Aluminium, which are substantially higher than other wages in the area.
• However we don't have to worry about Anglesey Aluminium distorting average earnings on the Island anymore because it was forced to close in 2009 wiping out at least 450 direct jobs and an estimated further 240 jobs through indirect and induced effects.
• In addition Anglesey has also lost Octel in Amlwch, Eaton Electric in Holyhead (240 jobs), Peboc in Llangefni (100 jobs), Menai Electrical in Gaerwen (50 jobs), Readileads (35 jobs) and Vion/Welsh Country Foods has restructured in Llangefni and Gaerwen (191 jobs). These are on top of the countless other jobs lost at small businesses throughout the Island which aren’t reported in the local press. 
• In fact, according to research by the University of Wales, since 2001 there has been a decrease of 2,100 jobs in private sector employment on Anglesey and the proportion of those employed in the private sector has decreased from 74 per cent to 67 per cent.
• Anglesey is currently suffering from an employment ‘triple whammy’, with the lowest level of employment coupled with the highest rates of job-seekers claimants and economic inactivity in North Wales.
• Remarkably farming in North Wales has fared even worse than business. During the period 1997 to 2007, the economic contribution of agriculture to the North Wales and Anglesey economy fell by a staggering 67 per cent compared to an overall UK decline of just 7 per cent.
• On top of all this, Anglesey County Council is poorly managed, riven with infighting, and planning on raising Council Tax by 15% over three years.

Now you may say that it is unfair to blame IWJ for all of this - and you'd be right. As Anglesey residents, the best we can say for him is that he has made exactly zero difference whatsoever to the constituency he has represented for the past quarter of a century. "Putting up with things as they are" is actually exactly what he has done here on Ynys Môn -- hardly a record to inspire confidence in his ability to transform Wales for the better.

Quotes of the Day ("who the puck"-edition)

Ieuan Wyn Jones said during his speech to the Plaid Cymru party conference today:

"Managing Wales may be what other parties are about, but for Plaid putting up with things as they are, just doesn't feel right ... I didn't come into politics to manage Wales. I came into politics because I wanted to change Wales, and change Wales for the better"

'Puck', a regular commenter on this blog, responds:

"It would good to see this in action nearer to home, unless of course Mr Jones's intent is make the rest of Wales more like Ynys Mon."

Ouch! 

Albert Owen distorts reality over Anglesey Aluminium closure again

Yesterday it was announced that Anglesey Aluminium will officially commence decommissioning the holyhead plant meaning that aluminium smelting will never again return to Anglesey. In response to this bad news, Albert Owen MP has popped up to once again to apportion blame for the plant's closure on anyone other than his own Labour government. Previously Albert has blamed "Conservative hypocrisy" for its closure, this time he lays the blame squarely on Anglesey Aluminium itself, saying "If the company was serious about continuing to smelter it would have taken up the generous government offer in 2009 to help bridge the gap over a difficult economic period".

Just as Albert never tires in peddling these blame-avoiding half truths, the Druid never tires in setting the record straight here. 

The UK's declining energy capacity
compared to rising peak demand levels
(Source: The Economist)

Anglesey Aluminium was forced to close because it used to consume daily 12% of Wales' total electricity and therefore depended on a cut-price electricity deal with the nearby Wylfa nuclear power station. Now, It was clear for years that the Wylfa reactor - which has been producing electricity since 1971 - would need to be decommissioned around this time, and when that happened the economic viability of Anglesey Aluminium would be severely compromised unless a new reactor was already in place at Wylfa. Unfortunately, as we all know, the previous Labour government's obsession with 'renewable energy' and expanding the proliferation of windmills across the country led it to take its eye of the ball of preserving our essential power supplies. The fact is that most nuclear plants (including the current Wylfa reactor) and half of UK's coal plants are due to close over the coming decade and the Labour government had no concrete plan on how to replace them. The Department of Energy and Climate Change itself estimated last year that, of a total of around 75GW in generating capacity, 20GW will disappear by 2015. And as the current peak demand is around 65GW and growing, that means that the UK could be facing energy blackouts by as soon as 2015.

Anyway, as the current Wylfa reactor inevitably neared the end of its working life, it was acquired by the Government's Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) to be decommissioned. Now essentially government owned, the NDA's lawyers had to inform Anglesey Aluminium that Wylfa would no longer be able to supply it with the cut-price electricity on which it depended as that would constitute 'state aid' under EU law. Indeed, this was made clear by the NDA in January 2009 when its spokesman said this:

"There’s been no breakdown in the relationship between ourselves and Anglesey Aluminium but we have explained to them the situation. We cannot extend the current contract with them due to new European legislation on providing subsidies to private companies.”

Furthermore, Anglesey Aluminium was anyway sensing difficulties ahead due to the then Labour government's pledge to reduce UK carbon emissions by a staggering 80% by 2050 (incidentally this pledge was made by Ed Milliband - the very man Albert Owen is now backing to become Labour leader). To meet these goals, the EU has introduced a carbon trading scheme - an administrative approach to control pollution (in the shape of 'carbon') by providing economic benefits to companies for achieving reductions in the emissions of carbon. During a debate about the closure of Anglesey Aluminium in the Houses of Parliament, Robert Goodwill MP, the then shadow transport secretary, had this to say about the EU scheme:

"is not the fundamental problem the operation of the European Union emissions trading system, which is making it increasingly difficult for primary metallurgical industries to operate in the EU? It would be all well and good if it resulted in the reduction of global CO2, but it merely results in carbon leakage to other economies such as China and India, which are not constrained in the same way."

Exactly right, and precisely what happened in the case of Anglesey Aluminium - many of whose managers were headhunted to work at Dubai's new state-of-the-art aluminium smelter, operating safely outside the EU's emissions trading system. The simple fact is that charging for carbon adds yet another layer of anti-competitiveness for already struggling heavy industries operating within the UK or Europe.

Due to this 'double whammy' affecting its future viability, is it any surprise that Anglesey Aluminium -without a secure supply of cheap energy - decided to turn down a pre-election bribe of £48m from a panicking Labour government eagerly trying to paper over the cracks of its incompetence and lack of foresight in the field of Energy Policy? 

Bonus Extra: If you need any more persuasion then please read this blogpost where I explain how both the Corus Steelworks in Teeside and Anglesey Aluminium died of the same causes.

North Wales Police Authority: do you want our views or not??

This weeks Holyhead and Anglesey Mail includes a half page appeal by the North Wales Police Authority for residents to take part in a survey to record their views on the Coalition Government's plans introduce directly elected Police and Crime Commissioners. One rather gets the impression from reading the article that the majority of the members of the Authority - in the manner of turkeys being asked to vote on Christmas - are against the proposal. Anyway, with the consultation period on the proposed legislative changes ending on September 20th, Douglas Wynne, the Vice Chair of the Authority makes the following appeal:

"Time is short and it is important that the people of North Wales have an opportunity to voice their opinion because it is our job to represent their views. It's vital that they feed into this consultation process so that we can find out whether they think the proposed changes are a good idea or not."

Sensing Wynne's urgency, the Druid last night followed the link given in the H&A Mail and clicked through to take the survey ... only to be greeted by this:

Personally the Druid is entirely in favour of elected Police and Crime Commissioners and would welcome the opportunity to register my view - but I see little point in members of the Police Authority wringing their hands in public, calling for everyone to take part in a survey, and then immediately closing down said survey.

Overrated: New Welsh Business Rates relief scheme still less generous than in England and Scotland

Yesterday the Welsh Assembly Government let it be known that from 1 October 2010 until 30 September 2011, it would temporarily increase relief for Business Rates in Wales. According to the press release:

"Most business premises with a rateable value up to £6,000 will not pay any business rates and most of those with a rateable value between £6,001 and £12,000 will receive rate relief that will be reduced on a tapered basis. This means that business premises with a rateable value of £8,000 will get around 66% rate relief; whilst those with a rateable value of £10,000 will get around 33% relief."

Of course for small businesses in Wales this is very welcome news indeed - however in order to fully assess its value we need to understand how the previous relief scheme stacked up against other regions in the UK (as due to the devolved structure of the UK, England, Scotland and Wales all now have different Business Rates relief schemes).

All businesses make a contribution to local government services through what is known as 'Non Domestic Rates' (a.k.a. 'Business Rates') based on a valuation of their property by the Valuation Office Agency (VOA). The rates payable are calculated by multiplying the valuation of the property by a 'multiplier' determined each year by either the Welsh Assembly Government in Wales, the Communities and Local Government Department in England, and the Scottish Executive in Scotland. Accordingly, if a property used by a business in Wales has a rateable value of £20,000 for example, its business rates bill would be calculated by multiplying £20,000 by the Wales multiplier (40.9 pence in the pounds for 2010/11) giving the business a bill of £8,180 for 2010. However, in order to help small businesses in particular, each of the regions operate a relief scheme whereby eligible businesses are given discounts on their bill according to the rateable value of their property. Below is a summary and comparison I have made of the various business rates relief schemes as currently operated in England, Scotland and Wales:

Click to enlarge

As you can see, the business rates relief scheme in Wales has been far less generous towards smaller businesses than comparable schemes in England and, particularly, Scotland where since April this year all businesses with a rateable value of less than £10,000 have been lifted out of paying completely. To illustrate how much more comparable Welsh businesses have to pay than their English or Scottish counterparts, I have calculated the business rates payable for businesses in each of the three regions at five different bands:

As you can see, businesses in Wales with a rateable value of around £10,000 or less pay considerably more than comparable businesses in England, whilst the same businesses in Scotland pay nothing!

However, as I noted at the beginning of this post, the Welsh Assembly Government has now introduced an increased relief scheme for Wales which will lift all businesses with a rateable value less than £6,000 out of paying business rates at all - great, right? Well, up to a point, yes - but the fact is that the WAG scheme is identical in all particulars to the one announced (pdf) in England in July this year. And because WAG  has anyway set a slightly higher multiplier for Welsh businesses (40.9p compared to 40.7p in England and Scotland), Welsh businesses still have to pay more than their English and Scottish counterparts - as the following calculations based on the temporary relief scheme show:

Its worth noting that businesses in Scotland continue to pay less even when compared to the new temporary schemes introduced in England and Wales!

So, in conclusion, it would be curmudgeonly of me not to welcome the new levels of business relief in Wales - they are sorely needed. However it is essential that we recognise that small businesses in Wales are still at a competitive disadvantage compared to small businesses anywhere else in the UK. 

Small businesses are the backbone of the Welsh economy - they employ more people and contribute to their localities by complementing and supporting other local businesses. With an overlarge Public Sector in Wales it is essential that we do everything we can to grow our homegrown small businesses - however, as the above comparisons show, in the one area where the Welsh Assembly Government has complete freedom to create a competitive advantage for our small businesses, it has comprehensively failed. And our AM, Ieuan Wyn Jones, as Minister for Economy and Transport, has to take a large part of the responsibility for that.

++ Cllr Phil Fowlie steps down ++ (Updated Again)

Apparently Phil Fowlie, the councillor for Rhosneigr, has just announced he is stepping down.

Fowlie was Leader of Anglesey County Council from May 2008 until April 2009. His decision to step down as Leader came just 20 days after former Managing Director Derrick Jones had his contract terminated following deteriorating relations between Jones and the ruling Original Independents.

It was under Fowlie's watch that the Wales Audit Office first reported on the "erosion of trust" between senior officers and senior councillors, prompting a two week inspection by the Wales Auditor General. This all led directly to the Welsh Assembly appointing the Recovery Board and David Bowles as Interim MD.

UPDATE: By popular demand, below is the letter Phil Fowlie sent to Alan Morris at the Welsh Audit Office whilst he was Leader of the Council in December 2008. In it he made serious claims against various senior officers, including:

• Officers wanted some, if not all the Executive to fail
• Officers dragged their heels over implementing the island’s school re-organisation programme
• Officers failed to offer “any assistance” to the executive on governing Anglesey council
• Officers failed to attempt to resolve a “serious issue with sickness” with council staff
• The corporate management team displayed a lack of “honesty” and “integrity”, in the manner in which they handled the “Graigwen” issue.

This letter and the Audit Offices own findings led to the Welsh Audit Office's 'Annual Letter' on IoACC in January 2009 detailing an "erosion of trust" between executive members and corporate officers.

Fowlie was later caught out when he claimed that the same Alan Morris at the Welsh Audit Office had advised Executive Members not to attend a meeting with the Corporate Management Team arranged by the  Council's Audit Committee in February 2009. Morris sent an email clarifying that he had offered no such advice. I understand that Ombudsman complaint against Fowlie concerns this and other matters. 

Anyway, the thoughts of the Druid are with Phil Fowlie and his family at this difficult time. Phil is widely known as an all round nice guy and deserves our sympathy and best wishes for a speedy recovery.

Fowlie Letter Welsh Audit Office 18.12.2008

UPDATE 2: Glyn Pritchard-Jones has some more documents of interest from this period up on his site here and here.

Serious questions for Anglesey County Council management

Back in April, IoACC Interim MD David Bowles sent a letter to all councillors in which he completely denied that the Council had in anyway acted incorrectly with regards to a Housing Renovation Grant and Town Improvement Grant obtained by Gwynfor Pierce of Holyhead. In fact Bowles went so far as to call the allegations "smears". Many long-term readers of this blog will be aware of the case in question as Gwynfor Pierce is a regular commenter on this site.

Anyway, together with other Anglesey residents who have had similar experiences, Gwynfor has continued to press his case and, thanks to the intervention of Mark Isherwood AM, he was recently able to arrange a meeting between himself, Mark Isherwood, Cllr Peter Rogers, and PricewaterhouseCoopers – who are IoACC's auditors. In a letter sent today to David Bowles and copied to all councillors, Gwynfor explains the outcome of this meeting:

Dear Mr Bowles,                   

RE; Meeting with PWC / 88 Market Street, Holyhead

I am informing you that my accountant, two other couples, Cllr Peter Rogers, Mark Isherwood Shadow Minister for Justice and myself attended a meeting with three people from PWC [Pricewaterhouse Coopers - District Auditors] in Holyhead three weeks ago.

I worked through my extensive paperwork and I presented to PWC, -  altered and false invoices, the e.mail to the builders secretary asking for an excuse to silence my accountant, the partly hidden Internal Memorandums, the false financial summaries and numerous other documents. The auditors were shocked. Cllr Rogers was similarly shocked as were the other couples. Mark Isherwood had of course seen these before – which was why he arranged the meeting.

I certainly got the impression that PWC were referring matters to the police and were taking the matters I raised very seriously as it all points to collusion/conspiracy to commit fraud by some involved and a failed attempt to cover it up.

I am not surprised that IOACC officers are denying that they have done anything wrong and are seeking to avoid responsibility, their letters contain financial inaccuracies, contradictions, reports based on inaccurate information and suggest that invoices have been altered or even falsified..

It is clear from your letter to all Councillors in April, that you believe the allegations to be “smears” and “if there were concerns they were not within the Council” You confirmed to all Councillors that “no evidence had been found to substantiate the allegations” and that you were “unaware that Cllr Durkin has any evidence to substantiate such serious allegations” which you described as “heinous” 

I can confirm to you that the evidence that I presented to PWC with Cllr Rogers, Mark Isherwood and the two couples present, was the same evidence that I presented to yourself, Cllr McGregor and Cllr Durkin prior to your letter to all Councillors.

You claimed that “the investigations in respect of this case have raised questions with regard to the applicant” because “some terms of the grant have not been complied with” 

Point 2.8 in the latest of three reports published by your Internal Audit Services highlights the terms to which you refer claiming the Council may have been misled. 

Two Internal Memorandums from the Corporate Director of Housing to the Corporate Director of Finance that were discovered in November 2009 under FOI,  which were forwarded to yourself and Cll McGregor, show that that either the officers concerned were aware that the terms were not being complied with, or aware the terms were being complied with misleading the applicant. They show an applicants contribution of £NIL and that your Internal Auditors failed to report their significance..

The Internal Memorandums were previously furnished to the applicant in February and September 2008 but both had been photo copied with another document over the top, covering the £NIL and its corresponding wording. I find it disturbing that officers of the Council did this and that other senior officers, aware of these memorandums, are quite willing to allow the applicant to be blamed of misleading the Council into paying two grant payments of which he had no knowledge had been made, direct to the builder.

Yours sincerely

John G Pierce

Now I personally cannot say definitively whether the allegations regarding this grant are true or not – however, considering the reaction of both PWC and Cllr Peter Rogers, it appears that David Bowles' April letter to all councillors may have been a little too hasty. 

Gwynfor, and the other residents who have suffered from similar experiences, deserve to have their allegations investigated soberly and at arms length from the council itself. It is now incumbent on all councillors to ensure that we get to the bottom of this affair. Furthermore, in addition to the intervention by PricewaterhouseCoopers, I understand that at least one media organisation with a reach far beyond this humble blog has also today been in touch with Gwynfor regarding this matter, meaning that shortly it may well become impossible for IoACC to continue to sweep it under the carpet.


Comments Moderation: as always comments which name names and make allegations will be deleted.