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David Cameron and the National Assembly for Wales

“I believe there is only one way out of this national crisis we face. We need a massive, sweeping, radical redistribution of power. From the state to citizens; from the government to parliament; from Whitehall to communities; from Brussels to Britain; from judges to the people; from bureaucracy to democracy. Through decentralisation, transparency and accountability, we must take power away from the political elite and hand it to the man and woman in the street.”

I have just read the groundbreaking speech by David Cameron today in which he defines the "Post-Bureaucratic Age" of smaller and more accountable government and sets the real agenda for change within the UK.

It certainly captures the mood of the moment across the country and sets out a clear and defining contrast with the Labour Party and its supporters.

For Wales, there are a number of mixed messages. For example, despite the promise of greater devolution from the UK central government, there is no indication that this will be through the existing bodies alone. Indeed, there are a number of statements that will send shivers through the corridors of power in Cardiff Bay.

"Could we let individuals, neighbourhoods and communities take control? How far can we push power down?"

i.e. if local government is going to get more powers, will this mean more devolution downwards to councils from bodies such as the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Welsh Assembly and the Scottish Parliament? Rather than increased powers from the UK Government to devolved bodies, will we also see further decentralisation from the devolved bodies to local authorities?

"So at the election we will include proposals in our manifesto to ask the Boundary Commission to reduce the House of Commons, initially by ten per cent.And while they're at it, to get rid of the unfair distortions in the system today, so that every constituency is the same size in each of the nations of the UK".

If the number of MPs is to be reduced by a minimum of 10 per cent (and possibly more in Wales where the constituencies are far smaller than for the rest of the UK), will this mean that a greater number of AMs will be chosen through PR from regional lists in 2015, possibly changing the power structure of Welsh politics forever.

Alternatively, will it mean a potential reduction in the overall number of Assembly Members (and similarly across other devolved bodies?)

Certainly, this is a historic speech that could set the constitutional agenda for the next parliament and beyond.

As always, the devil will be in the policy detail but the question remains as to where Wales fits into all this and how this radical agenda for change will be applied here ?

Comments

Daran said…
The two central questions you pose are the ones which leapt out at me too.

If decentralisation is the aim, I can only conclude the absence of the word devolution to be deliberate. This does not provide clarity to the Conservative position.

With regard to cutting the number of MPs, this is something I am broadly in support of, including equalising numbers of electors between constituencies in all the nations of the UK. But I also accept that the argument put forward to defend bigger Welsh numbers on the basis of better/stronger representation is also a powerful one. Personally I also favour increasing the number of AMs.

But without an explicit connection between the two (and I accept Cameron is unlikely to give that) then we could end up in a situation where he gets damned for certain suggestions without any of the appeasing noises you suggest he makes.
Bored of Amlwch said…
Wonder if he asked Mr Bourne what he thought.
What about the House of Lords what did he say about them.
Its flim flam all of it, from him and Johnson,just trying to plaster over cracks
Anonymous said…
“We need a radical shift of power …. redistribute power back, from Brussels to Westminster, from Whitehall to town halls, from the state to the citizens. …. disperse power among communities, through localism and through referendums”.

Seems Cameron like plagiarising too eh?

http://www.order-order.com/2009/05/cameron-my-government-will-be-open-online-all-the-time/

There is nothing revolutionary about this speech, it offers no actual firm commitments, is hypocritical and essentially tell those Tory voters in my area to bog off by killing dead electoral reform.
Bob said…
"There is nothing revolutionary about this speech, it offers no actual firm commitments, is hypocritical and essentially tell those Tory voters in my area to bog off by killing dead electoral reform".

Which area is that then, Merthyr?

Idiot
Anonymous said…
Dylan this a fascinating post but it raises a number of questions. I am by no means a conservative but readily accept that Cameron is running rings around the confused and contradictory statements of labour cabinet ministers. Yet let me delve into more detail. You pose the question of devolution below the Assembly to local government or even to neighbourhood management, concepts which I have great sympathy with. It is after all the principle of subsidiarity which sadly the growing centralism of the devolved system and Cardiff centric politics of Wales seems to frown upon. I say this particularly from the standpoint of someone like myself who lives in Flintshire.

Yet last week the Welsh Tories were proposing the creation of so called "free schools" which will come under the direct control of the Welsh Government and be directly funded by central government in Wales. Let's forget for now all the previous national education funding disasters synonymous with ELWA and ask the question how does this policy sit with Cameron’s and your blogs championing and new found enthusiasm for local government?

It would require that education authorities are broken up and those schools are run from Cardiff. Simon Jenkins has rightly argued that "Autonomy under the state is always a contradiction in terms". Yet that is the basis of your new schools policy.

You will reply that this is parent power and choice but haven’t we been here before? Tony Blair's guru Lord Adonis (so brilliantly parodied in “The thick of it") copied New Labours education reforms almost verbatim from the Baker 1988 act and the Patten 1993 version. They too were motivated by antagonism towards local government. They too tried to induce parents to remove their schools from council to central government control and were even given a 15% budgetary bribe to do so. In Wales just 2% of schools opted to become "grant-maintained", almost all small ones threatened with closure.

My point is simple and has been detailed more eloquently on Peter Blacks blog. In short how can you claim to be championing local government when at the same time the Welsh conservatives are talking about rolling back local democratic accountability and centralising, a case of old habits die hard perhaps?.

I would hope that you see this is a logical question and not political point scoring since one of the positive things that might emerge from the current Westminster debacle is new and open environment which will allow for greater consensual thinking across parties and the recognition of good ideas no matter what the source. Again well done on a great post.
Dewi Harries said…
Don't get your point about AMs Dylan - They would just have different constituency sizes foe Westminster and Cardiff - as in Scotland.
Jeff Jones said…
Cameron at the moment is obviously making a better fist of the fallout from the expenses scandal than any other national politician. Opening up a debate on constitutional reform is an interesting new line of attack but as the Mail and Sun editorials this morning show it will not divert voters attention from the real issue of the moment which is how to deal with the MPs who have clearly abused the existing expenses system. The fact that 81% of Tories want Kirkbride to go shows that immediate action is still required. The issue with the Cameron speech as you quite rightly point out is in the detail. Too much of it still seems linked to political advantage such as the rejection of PR. Even if you don't agree with STV then it is clear that AV which still manintains the consttiuency link has merits. The idea of devolving power away from Parliament also has merits. But it has to be linked to a new financial system both for the devolved administrations and local government. You really can't argue for more powers for the Assembly without also looking at devolving some form of tax raising powers. In the 18th centuries Americans talked of 'No taxation without representation'. I would argue that in the 21st century we should be talking about 'No representation without taxation'. We also need to decide what local government should be responsible for and how it will raise the money to finance those responsibilities. As for structure, directly elected Mayors scrutinised by councillors elected by PR should do the trick. Will it all happen? Only if those responsible for making legislation at both Westminster and the Assembly adopt a more mature political attitude and realise as Congressmen and Senators do in the States that powerful local representatives are not a threat to your political status. It also might require a written constitution but that's another matter.
Daran – I also find the absence of the word devolution strangely at odds with the general message of decentralisation being put forward by DC. There seems to be a feeling that central office either doesn’t get devolution or is just ignoring it. As I have said before, it is here to stay and the Conservative Party should be fully embracing it like any other form of government in which it wishes to actively participate. Certainly, given the economic mess that we find ourselves in, our policies could and should have a resonance with the electorate, especially as Rhodri and Ieuan seem to have pinned their entire hopes for the Welsh economy on the one trick pony that is ProAct. At the same time, I can see that he was directing this speech towards those directly concerned with what is going on at Westminster and a more general approach to political governance across the UK. However, I agree that we will need clarification soon on this matter re: the Assembly and I was personally disappointed with what I have seen of the Roberts review. Perhaps we can have a second bite at the cherry, so to speak, within this new political reality!

Mr Amlwch – As I said, this is about the constitution of Westminster and the broader UK picture. I don’t know about Nick’s views – you will have to ask him – but I would certainly prefer a House of Lords where the majority of members are directly elected, although I would reserve a number of places for those crossbenchers that bring both a detailed expertise and a broad experience of other areas to the process. As for papering over the cracks, I think you have failed to realise that the political classes have been rocked to the core over the expenses exposure and are quickly putting forward alternative scenarios that could and should make our politicians more accountable.

Anon 5:33 – I don’t get your arguments here (and neither does Bob obviously). How on earth is the speech hypocritical? Cameron has been talking about small government with increased social responsibility since he was elected as leader of the party. Finally, one would hope that he will get this message across and, thanks to the retirement of the grandees across the party for abusing the system, may end up with the backbench support to make it happen. Indeed, he may have a stronger mandate for change within the party after the next election than Margaret Thatcher had in 1979 when she had to bring the old guard into her cabinet as a result of trying to balance the different wings of the party.
Anon 12:26 - It is a logical question and thanks for commenting. My take on the creation of these ‘free schools’ is that control would effectively be devolved further from local authorities down to the local communities who would be running these, so further devolution as such. They would merely be funded from the Assembly, not managed centrally. Regarding your point about “antagonism towards local government”, it would seem that the as the Conservatives now run a number of councils in Wales, that is no longer the case.

Dewi - I don’t think we can assume that, in terms of devolution, “For Wales, see Scotland” holds true. There is no reason why we should follow the Scottish model at all in terms of different boundaries and there may be pressure, certainly given the make-up of the Assembly, for greater PR. You can imagine 30 new Welsh Parliamentary first past the post seats and therefore 30 Assembly seats. We could then have 30 PR seats (6 for each region). Perhaps you could model such an outcome! Alternatively, there could be an argument for having two AMs for each new constituency in Wales (shame they didn’t have it in 2007!!!). Whilst I would welcome more AMs, I don’t think there is any appetite whatsoever for increasing the number of politicians in this country.

Jeff – You are right about the expenses – I personally believe there should be a clearout of all those MPs who have been seen to abuse the system. Party loyalty works both ways and in continuing to cling on as they are doing, MPs such as Kirkbride are damaging the party for their own self-interest.

As for PR, I believe the Labour Party would have had far more legitimacy if they had introduced this when they had a large majority in the first term and not now when they are facing electoral wipeout at the next election. Such desperation to cling onto power through any means, just won’t wash with the public any more.

I agree we need a thorough review of the state of this nation. This cannot be done on the hoof, especially as the next 12 months will be focused on soundbite politics. I therefore believe David Cameron needs to promise a royal commission to examine how he would put into place a complete reform of the governing of this country and this would report to Parliament within one year. Certainly, the general policy thrust is in place as shown in the speech but there needs to be a broader consensual (even cross party) approach to how this will be worked out. We are literally talking about a radical revolution in the way that this country will be governed for possibly the next 100 years.
Dewi Harries said…
"Perhaps you could model such an outcome!"

...Task for tonight.....
Dewi Harries said…
There you go Dylan

Result Predicted
PC 15 15
C 12 15
Lab 26 23
L Dem 6 8
Ind 1
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dewi - can you check again - the new number of seats add up to 62!!!
Dewi Harries said…
PC -15
Con - 15
Lab = 22
Lib Dem = 8

It's that blasted independent (really messes up modelling...) Mind you it was only 61 before not 62....

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