Welsh Political News

I recently signed an on-line Downing Street petition:

"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Proclaim St David's Day as a national holiday in Wales."

And this was Tony's response.

"The Government receives a variety of suggestions for new or different Bank Holidays and celebrations. Whilst the Government is pleased that so many people are interested, as you can imagine it is not possible to please everyone as to who or what should be celebrated. Unlike Northern Ireland, where St Patrick's Day is a bank holiday, bank and public holidays in Great Britain do not, by tradition commemorate particular individuals, events, or institutions, other than those associated with Christmas and Easter. Moreover, many individuals and communities in Wales already celebrate St David's Day in a way they consider more suitable. The present pattern of bank holidays in the United Kingdom is well established and accepted, and the Government has no current plans to change the arrangements."

The call for a public holiday is backed by Plaid,the other Assembly opposition parties, Welsh civil society, and 87% of the Welsh public – the case is only opposed by New Labour and the CBI. Wales currently languishes at second from bottom in the European bank holiday league with just eight a year - half the number enjoyed in Italy. St. Patrick's Day is seen as an economic opportunity in Ireland.

Many of us will celebrate St. David's day.  But its hard to see how these minimal celebrations will be considered "more suitable" than everyone having the day off.  Tony says "its not possible to please everyone" in Wales.  What he won't do, is displease the CBI.

I had a lot of time for Rod Morgan, as Chair of the Youth Justice Board. His recent resignation was disappointing news.

Rumours that Louise Casey, Blair's ASBO Tsar is the Downing Street favourite for the job will anger and worry youth and youth justice workers.

The Social Justice Minister has reservations. This widespread concern is well justified. She addressed the Youth Justice Board's Annual conference late last year and succeeded in insulting an entire profession.

Rod Morgan has written to her telling her that her behaviour was 'not befitting a senior civil servant'.

The increasing rightward shift of Westminster's Criminal Justice policies will result in more criminals in the long term. The number of young people criminalised has increased by 26% in three years, while crime rates are falling. New Labour has created over 3,000 new offences since 1997. The number of young people in prison has doubled in a decade. The prisons are full.

This 'lock 'em up' mentality is not only unsustainable; it is also creating unsafe communities in the long term. Rehabilitation is secondary to punishment, despite the fact that prison acts like a crime factory, with people much more likely to reoffend after release from prison.

The Home Office is currently under review, so it's a good time for a Welsh Youth Justice Board. We can get those John Redwood arguments out again. If England wants Louise Casey and her tabloid-courting agenda, they can have her. In Wales, we don't want to do things Blair's way. And we shouldn't have to.

Rhodri Morgan has today launched an attack on David Chameleon.

He says "The Tories have their own image problem in Wales. They can win a majority in England. They have in the past occasionally won a majority in Scotland. But they have never had a majority in Wales in any general election since the secret ballot was introduced in the 1860s."

He's right. Wales still suffers from the damaging policies of a party it never, ever elected. Isn't that a good argument for independence, Rhodri?

Here is a link to a website which reports on what is being said each day by Tony Blair through his spokesman at the morning press conference. On 3rd May last year it was a litany of pathetic whining to try and justify the failure to deport dangerous Somali criminals back to their country.

Specifically the spokesman said it was to dangerous to fly planes into the country. Personally I would have thought it would be incredibly easy to deport people to Somalia. You simply fly them to Kenya and drive them North to the border then wave them across. Better still pay a Somali driver to pick them up on the border and take them to the nearest town. Easy.

Basically I would have readily accepted the excuse about not flying people into Somalia in planes and looked for alternatives.

How naïve of me, because when they needed to the Government had no problem flying a plane straight into Somalia at very short notice. Unfortunately they weren’t deporting rapists muggers or other violent criminals (human rights etc etc) Instead at a reported cost of £50,000 the plane was sent to rescue a number of young “Britons” who had voluntarily gone into this benighted country and were apparently fighting with terrorists linked to Al Qaeda.

Safely back in Blighty they were released after a bit of perfunctory questioning. They are now able to organise their next sojourn to a Jihadi frontline safe in the knowledge that our government will willingly go to great expense to charter a jet to fly then home at the drop of a hat if they get into any difficulties. Doubtless they will also be entitled to generous backdated benefits claims for the time spent away.

Ah well at least we have now established that the Foreign Office can fly planes into Somalia. No doubt we will now see some of its citizens who have come here and broken our laws being deported back there.

Or am I just being naïve again…..

Myself and my family have always been loyal Conservative supporters. Even though we came from one of the largest Labour strongholds in Wales (between Monmouthshire and Torfaen), we always believed that what the Conservatives stood for would be what was best for the country. However, regardless of this...i have completely changed my mind.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that I'm converting to the left wing of Labour or the Liberal Democrats......i am merely tired of being treated like a piece of dirt on the bottom of the Conservative shoe, even though i have showed my loyalty for over 5 years.
Even when i held authority in Monmouthshire within the Conservative youth group, i noticed that hardly anyone (MP's or Assembly Members) were interested in what the youth groups had to say. Despite i was offered so many promises of Parliament visits, work experiences and political placements, none of them ever materialised. Annesley Abercorn (CF chairman candidate) being one of them, who offered me an opportunity to come down to parliament in the summer 0f 2005 for work experience, and conveniently forgot about it once the CF election was over (not a bad idea of getting my vote i must say).
Even within my own blog, where freedom of expression should entitle me to say what i feel is happening to our country and the Conservatives themselves, Mark Clarke (current Chairman of Conservative Future) tried to have my site deleted, simply because the material on it was "too controversial". May i just say here that i love the way Iain Dale has recently criticised the Labour party for limiting the expressions of Labour bloggers, yet he has the very same thing occurring within his own party. Sorry Mark......i will say what i think, and the fact is Cameron doesn't know which political platform to stand on right now. Yet another method of gathering the votes it seems.

So what have i finally decided. Well.....after too many false promises....too many fake offers, and too many attempts to control my own political opinions, i have decided to become independent. Labour and the Liberal Democrats will never see a cross by their name on my voting slip, and the likelihood is...neither will the Conservatives.
Personally, i hope this post causes a lot of headaches for some people within the Conservatives......perhaps only then will they learn to start listening to what really matters amongst their voters, stop making false promises to get votes, and actually accept criticism and controversy as an opportunity to improve, not to disregard.