Friday, April 29, 2011
Plaid Cymru in irony fail
According to the BBC Plaid Cymru leader Ieuan Wyn Jones stood up in Caernarfon yesterday and attacked "Labour's failing education policies". He said young people were in danger of falling further behind. Well yes, Deputy First Minister with collective responsibility for those very same policies, don't you think that this is your failure too?
On Dragon's Eye last night, Plaid's Cymru's Deputy Leader argued that because they had allegedly put the case for change within the government apparatus the nationalists were insulated from blame for the way that young people have been let down by this One Wales Government.
Well, it does not work like that. When you are in government you take responsibility for all the good and bad decisions and their consequences. If Plaid Cymru felt so strongly then why did they not walk away? Were the ministerial limousines too comfortable?
Both Plaid Cymru and Labour are playing a game of government without consequences and they are devaluing politics in the process. It is even getting to the point where each is disowning the records of their own ministers.
They are able to do this because the Welsh media is so weak both in the uniformity of its coverage and in the resources it is able to bring to bear on this election. They are also benefiting from a general lack of public interest and/or understanding of how the Welsh Government works and what it is responsible for.
The exception to all of this is the excellent coverage from the BBC and in particular the savaging of Carwyn Jones by Oliver Hides on Radio Wales yesterday, and the excellent series of leader's' interviews on Dragon's Eye with Felicity Evans. If only more floating voters watched/listened to them.
Above all Plaid and Labour are able to get away with this because they are trying to turn this election into a referendum on another Government and in doing so they are undermining the principle of electoral accountability within Wales and the legitimacy of the Welsh Assembly itself.
On Dragon's Eye last night, Plaid's Cymru's Deputy Leader argued that because they had allegedly put the case for change within the government apparatus the nationalists were insulated from blame for the way that young people have been let down by this One Wales Government.
Well, it does not work like that. When you are in government you take responsibility for all the good and bad decisions and their consequences. If Plaid Cymru felt so strongly then why did they not walk away? Were the ministerial limousines too comfortable?
Both Plaid Cymru and Labour are playing a game of government without consequences and they are devaluing politics in the process. It is even getting to the point where each is disowning the records of their own ministers.
They are able to do this because the Welsh media is so weak both in the uniformity of its coverage and in the resources it is able to bring to bear on this election. They are also benefiting from a general lack of public interest and/or understanding of how the Welsh Government works and what it is responsible for.
The exception to all of this is the excellent coverage from the BBC and in particular the savaging of Carwyn Jones by Oliver Hides on Radio Wales yesterday, and the excellent series of leader's' interviews on Dragon's Eye with Felicity Evans. If only more floating voters watched/listened to them.
Above all Plaid and Labour are able to get away with this because they are trying to turn this election into a referendum on another Government and in doing so they are undermining the principle of electoral accountability within Wales and the legitimacy of the Welsh Assembly itself.
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"If Plaid Cymru felt so strongly then why did they not walk away? Were the ministerial limousines too comfortable?"
Really Peter, from the Lib Dems? I think the irony is on you there.
Really Peter, from the Lib Dems? I think the irony is on you there.
# posted by 
: 9:40 AM
: 9:40 AM
Never mind Peter, you might be in Government in a few weeks time and then you can show us all how its done just like Clegg is doing in London!
No, because not only is the Liberal Democrats involvement in the UK Coalition based on policy, but we are delivering on many of our manifesto pledges and we are not going to disavow our record.
And yes, Plaid Gwersyllt that is the general idea.
And yes, Plaid Gwersyllt that is the general idea.
What's interesting is the way the Welsh Lib Dems in various hustings try to distance themselves from the ConDem government - despite being a part of it (by nature of being a federal party). We don't agree with police commissioners, we don't agree with raising tuition fees... now that's what I call hypocrisy.
No, that is called devolution. It means that we can do things differently in Wales on devolved matters or, in the case of the Police we can seek devolved powers so as to do things differently.
Some of us watched "Pawb a'i Farn" S4CTV last night (Thursday28th) - it's a Welsh version of "Question Time". None of the panel were very good, however, the Labour man Alun got the Plaid Cymru trendy young lady in a fix. She said that Plaid Cymru was 100% Anti Nuclear Energy as a Party Policy. The Labour guy kept pressing her about the Plaid leader's support for a Nuclear Power Station in his consitituency and kept asking her if she opposed nuclear power generation in Anglesey. After being asked five times she finally said she opposed it. Some hypocrisy there. Anyway none of the Panel were up to much. The best question from the floor came from Lib Dem's Sylvia Lewis querying the great discrepancy of spending betwween England and Wales on school pupils. It seems that English school children get over £600 per year more spent on each pupil than Welsh pupils get. Let's hope the electorate consider how Labour and their Plaid cronies have diddled our children for a generation now!
# posted by : 4:07 PM
: 4:07 PM
Well done Lib Dems for highlighting the great discrepancy in Education funding between English schools and Welsh schools that disadvantages all Welsh children. This is down to LABOUR who ran the Governments at Westminster and Cardiff for so many years in recent history and latterly in Cardiff with Plaid Cymru's help in keeping Welsh children deprived.
# posted by : 10:50 PM
: 10:50 PM
Unfortunately lower spending on services is inevitable with devolvement, the cash to pay for WAG is creamed off from the total available and report after report highlights lower standards of service. So you get what you asked for in Wales. Time to a return to a Government only for our whole country. Do you remember ? It's called the United Kingdom !
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