BACK TO BUSINESS (OR NOT?)
The National Assembly for Wales had its first meeting of the third term today with a short but important session when we re-elected our Presiding Officer, Dafydd Elis-Thomas, and installed Rosemary Butler as our Deputy Presiding Officer.
Dafydd has given great service as Presiding Officer over the past two Assembly sessions, and his experience will be invaluable in this third term. Also his humour will defuse difficult situations when they arise.
Rosemary is popular across the Assembly and she has the commitment, drive and sense of fairness to be a very effective Deputy Presiding Officer, and there was clear consensus that she will be excellent in the post.
The Welsh Conservative Group met officially for the first meeting of the third session and William Graham was returned as Chairman of the Group. It certainly seems strange without Lisa, Glyn and Laura at our meeting, and we will clearly miss their experience and their input, but it was good to see the range of new members there already becoming accustomed to the Assembly, and clearly we will hit the ground running when business really does start here.
Negotiations are going on at the moment, not to do with government I have to say, but to do with rooms here on the third floor. Clearly it is important that Party Groups are grouped together but with personnel changes here over two Assemblies there are sometimes difficulties in ensuring this and William is now spending a lot of time negotiating on offices and moves to try to bring some coherence to this. I wish him good luck!
