let’s see the evidence!
It is clear Peter Hain is rattled about the forthcoming Assembly elections – with some justification! I don’t find going round talking to people that there is a great wave of sympathy for the Labour Party in Wales. They feel let down by Tony Blair and they feel let down by Rhodri Morgan in Cardiff Bay.
However, the sort of wild hyperbole and over the top nonsense that the Secretary of State is dishing out is not worthy of him or his office. His tactics seem to be to try to frighten people into voting Labour by suggesting erroneously that we believe in massive budget cuts for Wales. Clearly we do not. The Barnett block is determined by what happens at Westminster not what happens in the Assembly elections. He is also suggesting that somehow the opposition parties are playing politics with the draft budget in the Assembly. This is nonsense too. The Labour Party is in a minority here and had promised to engage in discussions about the budget. This hasn’t happened. We have put forward a series of totally reasonable amendments which have been passed by the Assembly requesting more money for example, for the ambulance service, for schools and for public transport.
The administration here has indicated that they will negotiate on these matters with the opposition parties. That, at least, is responsible government.
Then, in a very provocative move, the Secretary of State indicates that he may block requests for legislation for any non-Labour administration in Cardiff Bay. This is clearly fettering his discretion in advance of any requests and is grossly irresponsible and could provoke a constitutional crisis. Perhaps he will have got John Prescott’s job by then so the problem may not arise!
Additionally, the Secretary of State mounted another of his partisan and spiteful attacks on regional members in Cardiff Bay. He never made such attacks when he was promoting Alun Michael’s fight to win a regional seat in Wales. He is clearly totally out of touch with what is happening in Wales, for example if he believes that regional members do not hold advice surgeries. They do, and I think he will find, if he actually studies the evidence, that uniformly they are hard working throughout their regions.
I have yet to receive a shred of evidence from him, although I have requested it, indicating dissatisfaction with regional members or any evidence that they are not doing the job as effectively as they might. Come on Peter, let’s see the evidence!
