Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Promises, promises!
It has to be said that one of the vagaries of devolution is that those parties who have never had to think through their policies on a Welsh level before have had to grapple with the myriad of powers and competencies available to the Assembly, whilst at the same time thinking up issues on which they can differentiate themselves and which the Assembly can actually make a difference. As a result manifestos have either been very vague, unachievable or, as with the Welsh Liberal Democrats and Wales Labour last time, wrongly costed.
Inevitably, this has led to newspapers like the Western Mail (and journalists with 'a certain agenda' as the First Minister described that paper's Chief Reporter in the chamber today) spending the next four years, aided and abetted by the Freedom of Information Act, unpicking every promise word by word as part of a legitimate scrutiny process.
The latest episode in this saga is 'free personal care for the disabled part 10'. In today's paper, Martin Shipton reveals that this now abandoned pledge could not have been imposed on the councils who would have had to implement it. He goes on to report that a Cabinet briefing paper dated August 2004 stated that "the Assembly has no statutory mechanism that can be used as a vehicle for implementation.
In other words, councils could not be compelled to participate. For that reason, said the paper, the Assembly Government would have to come up with enough money "to secure local authorities' voluntary agreement to operate the scheme."
The same briefing paper went on to suggest getting the co-operation of councils might be more difficult without meeting the full cost of the scheme "given the changed political landscape within local government since recent local government elections".
To be fair I do not think any Council of any complexion would have voluntarily co-operated with this policy without having the full cost of implementation provided up-front, and that is Rhodri Morgan's problem. He talks elsewhere in the paper about the Assembly Government using 'sticks and carrots' to persuade councils to put its policies into action and is happy to blame local government when things go wrong, but these are his commitments, not theirs. If he is really serious about keeping his promises then he would ensure that councils have the resources they need to do the job they are being asked to do.
This is no better illustrated than over the commitment to spend £560m over four years on doing up school buildings. Only about half of this money is actually earmarked for this purpose when it is given to local Councils, they are expected to find the rest themselves out of their normal capital allocation. As a result the amount spent on the ground is significantly less than that the Government say they have given. They are trying to deliver the programme on the cheap instead of providing all of the extra money they promised as additional and new cash.
The lesson for 2007 is stark. We all need to cost our manifesto properly and thoroughly research whether our promises can actually be delivered. If we do not then we will have contributed further to the disillusionment with politics and politicians.
Inevitably, this has led to newspapers like the Western Mail (and journalists with 'a certain agenda' as the First Minister described that paper's Chief Reporter in the chamber today) spending the next four years, aided and abetted by the Freedom of Information Act, unpicking every promise word by word as part of a legitimate scrutiny process.
The latest episode in this saga is 'free personal care for the disabled part 10'. In today's paper, Martin Shipton reveals that this now abandoned pledge could not have been imposed on the councils who would have had to implement it. He goes on to report that a Cabinet briefing paper dated August 2004 stated that "the Assembly has no statutory mechanism that can be used as a vehicle for implementation.
In other words, councils could not be compelled to participate. For that reason, said the paper, the Assembly Government would have to come up with enough money "to secure local authorities' voluntary agreement to operate the scheme."
The same briefing paper went on to suggest getting the co-operation of councils might be more difficult without meeting the full cost of the scheme "given the changed political landscape within local government since recent local government elections".
To be fair I do not think any Council of any complexion would have voluntarily co-operated with this policy without having the full cost of implementation provided up-front, and that is Rhodri Morgan's problem. He talks elsewhere in the paper about the Assembly Government using 'sticks and carrots' to persuade councils to put its policies into action and is happy to blame local government when things go wrong, but these are his commitments, not theirs. If he is really serious about keeping his promises then he would ensure that councils have the resources they need to do the job they are being asked to do.
This is no better illustrated than over the commitment to spend £560m over four years on doing up school buildings. Only about half of this money is actually earmarked for this purpose when it is given to local Councils, they are expected to find the rest themselves out of their normal capital allocation. As a result the amount spent on the ground is significantly less than that the Government say they have given. They are trying to deliver the programme on the cheap instead of providing all of the extra money they promised as additional and new cash.
The lesson for 2007 is stark. We all need to cost our manifesto properly and thoroughly research whether our promises can actually be delivered. If we do not then we will have contributed further to the disillusionment with politics and politicians.
