Monday, December 03, 2007
Looking for cash
The first ever Finance Committee report on a Welsh Government draft budget has been published and it makes for interesting reading. In my view it underlines the case for such a committee to have been incorporated into the Assembly when it was first set up in 1999.
The Western Mail tells us that the Committee expresses serious concerns that modest rises in spending over the next three years will leave the NHS struggling with the rising cost of drugs, and local councils having to make cutbacks – or push council tax up even further – in order to make ends meet:
A section of the report reads, “The Finance Committee has grave concerns that the current local government settlement is inadequate to safeguard core services and asks the Minister to review the total funding.”
It also suggests there is a “lack of clarity” over the Assembly Government’s reserves and questions whether the Treasury, which ultimately holds the purse strings, has been fair in the way it allocates funds to Cardiff Bay.
Although the Barnett formula gets a hammering there is enough detail in this report to raise some fundamental questions about the Government's priorities and to cause the Finance Minister to re-think how he has allocated funds. It is worth pointing out that there is a One Wales Government majority on the Committee but that all parties have subscribed to the report's conclusions.
We shall now see how the Minister responds to these criticisms when the draft budget is debated on 11th December.
Update: Alun Ffred Jones has just been on Radio Wales to rubbish the report, which he described as being put together in haste. He effectively questioned whether the report has all-party support. He also said it was nonsense to cost each of the One Wales' commitments within the budget. Alun Ffred is a member of the Finance Committee but was unable to attend the meeting that compiled the report due to other engagements.
It was inevitable that this report would be put together in a hurry. The timetable set by the Welsh government was very tight. It is not very reasonable therefore for members of the Administration to use that lack of time to try to undermine effective scrutiny.
It is also the case that the meeting which put together the report contained representatives of all parties. There were three Labour AMs present and Plaid Cymru AM, Mohammed Ashgar was there for the final part of the meeting, during which time the report was given the go-ahead.
In the circumstances I do not see how Plaid Cymru can wash their hands of the report's conclusions and nor should they. Effective scrutiny requires government backbenchers to put partisan considerations to one side so as to question the actions of the executive. That is a lesson that some Plaid Cymru members need to learn.
The Western Mail tells us that the Committee expresses serious concerns that modest rises in spending over the next three years will leave the NHS struggling with the rising cost of drugs, and local councils having to make cutbacks – or push council tax up even further – in order to make ends meet:
A section of the report reads, “The Finance Committee has grave concerns that the current local government settlement is inadequate to safeguard core services and asks the Minister to review the total funding.”
It also suggests there is a “lack of clarity” over the Assembly Government’s reserves and questions whether the Treasury, which ultimately holds the purse strings, has been fair in the way it allocates funds to Cardiff Bay.
Although the Barnett formula gets a hammering there is enough detail in this report to raise some fundamental questions about the Government's priorities and to cause the Finance Minister to re-think how he has allocated funds. It is worth pointing out that there is a One Wales Government majority on the Committee but that all parties have subscribed to the report's conclusions.
We shall now see how the Minister responds to these criticisms when the draft budget is debated on 11th December.
Update: Alun Ffred Jones has just been on Radio Wales to rubbish the report, which he described as being put together in haste. He effectively questioned whether the report has all-party support. He also said it was nonsense to cost each of the One Wales' commitments within the budget. Alun Ffred is a member of the Finance Committee but was unable to attend the meeting that compiled the report due to other engagements.
It was inevitable that this report would be put together in a hurry. The timetable set by the Welsh government was very tight. It is not very reasonable therefore for members of the Administration to use that lack of time to try to undermine effective scrutiny.
It is also the case that the meeting which put together the report contained representatives of all parties. There were three Labour AMs present and Plaid Cymru AM, Mohammed Ashgar was there for the final part of the meeting, during which time the report was given the go-ahead.
In the circumstances I do not see how Plaid Cymru can wash their hands of the report's conclusions and nor should they. Effective scrutiny requires government backbenchers to put partisan considerations to one side so as to question the actions of the executive. That is a lesson that some Plaid Cymru members need to learn.
Comments:
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Plaid had better get used to the flak that is going to come its way because of the budget settlement. They fell apart in RCT once they had to take decisions and were criticised for those decisions.Only last week we had Elfyn Llwyd asking Gwynedd CC to think agian about its school closure programme. A programme which has been supported by Dafydd Iwan and Lord Elis Thomas.What is fascinating is to see Plaid AMs such as Dai Lloyd defend the budget when Labour Ams have been very quiet. Plaid's problem is that unlike their SNP colleagues they can't blame it all on the UK government. Next year we could have the chaos of schools making teachers redundant whilst hiring school nurses who are not required. Dai Lloyd'd defence of this measure as part of the attack on obesity was laughable. He should talk to school teachers who are old enough to remember school nurses. The only thing they often achieved was to provide aspirin for those who wished to avoid lessons and to provide lessons in how to join the incapacity band wagon when you decided that work wasn't for you..
# posted by 
: 10:10 AM
: 10:10 AM
How about AMs actually getting off their backsides complaining and actually working together to turn the Welsh economy around? A Welsh tiger economy based on sound common sense economic strategies - in place of the miss-mash ones provided by the befuddled and incompetent "do-gooders” currently in-situ at the Welsh Assembly.
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