Changing of the guard?

Not content with stretching his goodbye by six months, it seems that the ground is being prepared for Rhodri Morgan to stay on even longer and fulfill his wish to be First Minister to greet the Ryder Cup when it comes to Wales next summer.

Leaders do hate to leave.

The Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly is similarly digging his heals in. Nick Bourne’s critics in his own group are numerous, but there is no consensus on an alternative candidate.

Soundings have been underway for some time. Darren Millar, Andrew RT Davies and Jonathan Morgan have all been canvassed as alternatives, but the rules for bringing about a leadership challenge are unclear. And more importantly no single candidate has enough support to launch a credible bid.

So it seems the favoured tactic is to destabilise Nick Bourne.

In an extraordinary speech last week Jonathan Morgan accused his one-time ally of losing “the moral, ethical and political capacity to show leadership”.

The convention of coded attacks seems to have been suspended by the restless AM for Cardiff North. His sweeping denouncement was aimed at “Politicians who have claimed inappropriately or illegitimately, whether it be phantom mortgages, iPods, plasma televisions, trouser-presses or duck islands for their ponds”.

In the current environment it would be hard for anyone to disagree. Except perhaps his own leader and his old friend the Parliamentary candidate for the Vale of Glamorgan. As John Dixon points out attacking a third of the group you hope to lead may not be the cleverest politics.

But it is a bold move. I argued at the time of his departure from the Opposition frontbench that having opted against going to Westminster it was unlikely that he would content himself for long with Chairing the Audit Committee. And so it has proved.

However, it does beg the question that if the leadership of his own party is so fundamentally weakened, what’s he going to do about it?

Well, he going to give another speech that much we do know. Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre is hosting a lecture from him on June 15th modestly titled "Welsh Conservatism and how the 2015 Assembly election was won."

It’ll be an interesting speech. But talk is cheap. His peroration last week was: “We must seize the initiative”.

Lets see if he does.

Wales - A tolerant nation?

Although only 1 in ten of the population agrees that 'to be truly Welsh you have to be White', a quarter of them strongly agrees and a further 29.5% tends to agree. The welcome in the hillsides is clearly not extended to all.

From the Welsh Assembly Government's Living in Wales Survey

Not so grim north of Ponty

The lack of posts over the past week or so has been because I am finishing a piece of work on the Heads of the Valleys. Instead of banging on about how awful everything is, this report looks at some of the good things (yes, there are quite a few). Doing this raises all sorts of questions about how the regeneration of the area is being addressed.

One thing that has surprised me is how uneasy some people have been at the prospect of looking at the good things. Perhaps some of them feared this would be the shortest report in history. Certainly some seemed to think that any whiff that its not so grim up north of Ponty would jeopardise efforts to regenerate the area.

The opposite is in fact the case. The findings show that, surprise surprise, people do leave valleys schools with good A levels and go to university, and yes, there are some thriving businesses up here, and some good restaurants and decent pubs too etc. So if there good things, it means that the less good things can change. Perhaps that is what the sceptics are afraid of.

Mr Speaker?

To jab or not to jab

Yet another nasty disease is in the news today, this time not a new one in the form of swine flu but that old scourge of measles. It seems that there are 127 cases this year, in large part because the take up of vaccination against the disease is so low. The next Bevan Foundation 'Last Tuesday' debate is on this very subject, on 30th June 2009, in Ty Hywel, Cardiff Bay with the Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Mike Ponton (NHS Confederation) and Dr John Watkins (Cardiff University). Free but contact us to reserve a place.

Low Carbon High Hopes

Doing some work on the transition to a low carbon economy. The question is not so much 'when' - because the change is inevitable - but 'who' and 'how'. It is pretty clear from previous rounds of economic change that, unplanned, the effect on individuals and on communities can be devastating. But it need not be like this. By thinking about who will be affected by the changes, and helping to mitigate the worst effects, it ought to be possible to have a prosperous low carbon future. However, few if any of the various strategies for Wales or the UK feature jobs and employees, skills, compensation or other elements of the language of job change. Changing to a low carbon economy is not simply an environmental challenge - it is a social and economic one as well.

Recession hits charities

The recession has finally hit the Welsh voluntary sector, with Morgan Parry, well known Director of WWF Cymru, taking redundancy following a downturn in income to the charity.  An article coming out in our magazine, Review, suggests that many charities have been hard hit just at a time when demand for their services is rising.  I suppose someone had to be first to go but it is a shame indeed to see Morgan depart.  I hesitate to wonder who will be next.

The Game

The expenses revelations over the last week have been grim. Even old Westminster operators have winced at the claims for maintaining moats and helipads.

But the spirit of the practice is no surprise.

It has long been an open secret to those with a working knowledge of Parliament that the system of allowances was regarded as a top-up of their salary by MPs. It's another wheeze.

Just as MPs hide free foreign trips (if they are on official business they don't have to be declared), so a free London flat to sell-on at profit when you stand down is just another perk of the job.

In lieu of a 'proper' salary most MPs feel entitled to make claims up to the limit of their allowances, regardless of how much they actually spend.

Gerald Kaufman, for example, is reported to have made regular claims for “odd jobs” which he submitted without receipts at a rate of £245 every month — £5 below the then limit for unreceipted expenses. When these were challenged by officials he replied: “Why are you querying these expenses?”, and threatened to make official complaints against them.

After all, who would find out?

Journalists would be unlikely to probe. It simply would not be cricket. As a Lobby Corespondent myself for three years I was complicit. I knew about some of the wheezes but wouldn't have dreamed of offering it as a story to my newsdesk - it would have broken the code, and more importantly, it would have resulted in me being frozen out from polite political society (and sources of intelligence). Of course I didn't know the details of the excesses, but I didn't ask either. Where would I start?

"It's systemic", the veteran Lobby Correspondent Mike White blogged this week, "and those of us who routinely explain or defend the political class – including me – are damaged by it, too. Rightly so".

The Telegraph's chequebook journalism has been lauded. But the revelations surely serve as testimony of the failure of journalism not it's high point. The credit belongs to Freedom of Information campaigner Heather Brooke, who has hitherto been regarded by many in the world of political journalism as naive and unhelpful for seeking disclosure of expenses.

There's no shortage of people saying sorry, but most are simply sorry the details have been published. They still don't get it.

Another Lobby Correspondent, the BBC's Nick Robinson, reports that some Tory MPs regard the forced repayments by the shadow cabinet of claims for furniture and gardening as "the price of David Cameron's press release". Simply the cost of getting the Leader of the Opposition on the right side of the story.

The saga goes to the heart of our system of politics and journalism. The unwritten rules which govern them have been exposed. That's what has been so traumatic for inhabitants of the Westminster village this week - the dark nooks of the Palace have had light shone into them. The game is up.

Put up the dole

The idea that higher unemployment benefit puts people off working has very little evidence at the best of times and none during a recession, according to a report published by Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Instead, low levels of Job Seeker's Allowance (£64.30 a week for over 25s) consign people to deep poverty and deter other family members from working.  If the rate went up by 50% JSA would cost between £3 and £4 billion, mere peanuts compared with the amount poured into banks. Article coming out in the next issue of our magazine - full report here.  

115,000 votes up for grabs

With all the huge uncertainty surrounding the European elections, you might think that politicians would be keen to get every vote they can. Not so keen, it seems, that they are willing to produce election material for blind or partially sighted people. With 115,000 people in Wales with sight loss that's a lot of potential voters not getting information. Add to that the problems visually impaired people face in the polling booth, and a significant group of people are being disenfranchised.

(Having seen the stuff coming through my letter box, you might argue they are being spared a lot of tedium but that is not the point.)

Valleys tourism boost

Today's Western Mail highlights that 22 million pounds is to be spent on the south Wales valleys. This - particularly the investment in cycling and walking - is good news and confirms the inadequacy of the original 15 million a year allocated to the Heads of the Valleys Programme.

The quality of the valleys' environment is one of the highlights identified in the work we are doing on the Heads of the Valleys, with better air quality, water quality, footpaths and biodiversity than many other urban areas. However, it doesn't sit comfortably with image of the valleys that pervades the media and most of Cardiff's population. Labelling somewhere else as being poor, disadvantaged and shoddy means that you don't have to take a critical look at your own patch. The problems are 20 miles up the road, and not right on the doorstep.

Valuable though this investment is, it must only be the start. The next step must be investment in education, so people have the skills and qualifications they need to take advantage of the opportunities opened up.

Prepare for cuts

At a seminar today one speaker began to try to get a grip on the magnitude of forthcoming public spending cuts - at least 10 per cent was his take, worse than anything seen in the Thatcher era.  I clearly remember these days in local government, with NO capital to spend, and they were not good.

In the past, cuts were made in two ways - they were either across the board i.e. every service took the same percentage reduction, on the grounds that services would be maintained by 'efficiency' savings, or they fell on services where cuts generated the least protest - libraries, sexual health services etc.  This time round, it is time for a different approach.  If there are to be cuts, they should be in those areas of activity that either a. have little impact or b. are not an investment for the future. So, for example, spending on education that results in skills and qualifications should be untouched - or even increased. Spending on leisure services - often first to be chopped - should be maintained where facilities are well used and people's well being improves.  But there should be big question marks over activities of little proven benefit - North - South Wales Air Service? some adult education provision? treatments that offer very marginal health gains, etc. 

To know what to chop and what to save you need proper independent evaluation - which is precisely what most publicly funded activities don't have.  

Signs of the Times no. 1 - swine flu

1. The anti-bacterial hand gel had completely sold out at WH Smiths at Cardiff Central Station

2. WH Smiths sells anti-bacterial hand gel

3. My children's class rooms suddenly have tissues and the toilets have hand soap 

4. My children suddenly wash their hands voluntarily

5. I saw someone in the street wearing a face mask

6. The swine flu leaflets are eerily reminiscent of 'Protect and Survive' leaflets

7. There is a British Sign Language sign for swine flu (make circular motion around nose with a clenched fist then make gesture of fingers up nose)

Estates are 'social concentration camps'

According to Sunday's Independent, a report to be published by the Fabian Society tomorrow (Friday) will claim that Britain's housing estates are 'social concentration camps', because people on such estates are more likely to be unemployed and die younger than their privately housed counterparts.  No doubt when the report is out it will provoke more headlines like the Independent's, blaming council housing for tenants' problems.

'Social segregation' in housing is increasing i.e. the better off more and more live in different areas to poorer people. But the Independent ignores the fact that segregation takes two - not only poor people ending up in social housing but, more importantly, better off people choosing to live as far as possible away from poorer people, using their money to buy nice houses in nice neighbourhoods.  Poor people don't have that choice, and live where they can get a home - in what is left of Wales's social housing stock, which is invariably on grotty damp peripheral estates that no-one wanted to buy.  

The root cause of the problems on social housing estates is not social housing (though it is far from perfect), but poverty and lack of opportunity.  If people on these estates had the same qualifications, incomes, health and opportunities as the people on a Barratt or Wimpey estate, the problems would all but vanish.  But then talking about poverty and inequality is much harder than blaming bricks and mortar.  

Devolution’s dirty little secret

Happy 10th anniversary to the National Assembly. To mark this occasion the man who lead the non-Party 'Yes for Wales' campaign, Prof Kevin Morgan, has written a sober piece to remind us that the promises made have not been delivered.

"We had over-inflated ambitions in 1999 about the ability of government to improve economic performance" he laments.

It is worth reading the entire piece, but here is a damming reminder of the state we are in:

The Welsh Valleys remain stubbornly at the bottom end of all statistics. Of the top 10 Parliamentary constituencies with the highest incapacity benefit claimants in the UK, the Valleys contain five – Merthyr, Rhondda, Cynon Valley, Blaenau Gwent, and Aberavon. For Wales as a whole there is a steady stream of negative statistics:

Only the West Midlands has had slower growth since 1999;

Lowest private sector R&D spend in the UK;

lowest full-time weekly wages in the UK;

bottom of UK rankings for tests for 15-year-olds;

we spend 8% per child less than England in schools;

we have a spending gap of £55m with England in higher education;

fewer graduates remain in Wales for employment than other UK nations.


And now make a wish...