PROFESSOR DYLAN JONES-EVANS

Given the speech by the Welsh Education Minister earlier this week, it may be worth examining the latest league tables from the Times Good University Guide . The Times Good University Guide is the most authoritative and widely respected guide to universities in the UK and is an essential and comprehensive tool for students and parents at home and abroad. It ranks 113 UK universities according to eight criteria, including student satisfaction, research quality and degree results. So what are the results for Wales? Cardiff 34 (-8) Aberystwyth 40 (+6) Swansea 49 (+1) Bangor 54 (+1) UWIC 67 (+9) Lampeter 85 (-6) Glyndŵr 93 (+4) Glamorgan 94 (0) UWCN, Newport 96 (+11) As the ranking above, Cardiff remains the best university in Wales, although it continues to lose ground on its rivals within the elite Russell Group, dropping a further eight places to 34th. It is followed by Aberystwyth, whose ranking has increased to 40th. Bangor and Swansea have moved up one place. The major winners in th...

As expected, the new Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government has made an immediate impact, with twenty two new bills introduced during the Queen’s speech. I have already discussed the potential impact of one of most significant bills, namely the promise to raise income tax allowances so that “low and middle income employees’ will pay less than they do now. The long-term goal, over the course of this Parliament, is to take the first £10,000 of all individuals’ income out of tax. What about the others? As a result of devolution, some of the bills apply only to England. For example, the Academies Bill will only allow English schools to apply to become academies and gain independence from Whitehall control, whilst the Health Bill will only give increased power and responsibility to doctors and nurses in England. However, there are also those bills that will apply across the whole of the UK and it is worth considering which of these will have an effect on the wellbeing of Wales a...

A hat tip, of sorts, to Vaughan Roderick. Late last year, Vaughan made a Freedom of Information ( FOI ) request to the Welsh Assembly Government to determine the criteria for Strategic Investment Capital Fund ( SCIF ) projects and whether approved projects met the criteria (or not). As part of the FOI request, a list was provided of the 31 projects that had received £467.3 million of capital funding from the Government during the period 2008-2011. Looking at the first tranche of projects, it would seem that some still have considerable spending allocated for 2010-2011. Indeed, what is noteworthy is that two of the projects will not, because of various circumstances, be drawing down any funding for this year. According to press reports, the All Wales Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Programme and the South East Wales Shared Services Centre – HR, Payroll & Training will not be needing this capital expenditure in 2010-2011. For example, the cost of swine flu in Wales was estimated by ...

No, I didn't write Leighton Andrews' speech last night but if I had, it wouldn't have been too different to that delivered at Cardiff University. Politically, Leighton and I have major differences on a range of issues but on this one, we agree completely. As someone who has fought against the system throughout his career to try and do something innovative and enterprising within the university sector in Wales, I have nothing but admiration for a man who can make the statement that "those running Wales’ universities are an out of touch elite whose poor leadership is hampering attempts to improve the country’s prosperity". The touchpaper has been lit. One can only hope, if the Minister, as the Mexicans would say, the cojones to drive through reforms that finally see the development of a Welsh university sector that puts Wales, and the Welsh economy, first.

Another day and another confused utterance from the former Secretary of State for Wales which, as usual, is reported unchallenged by the Welsh media. This time, Peter Hain attacked a plan that “could” see the number of Welsh constituencies reduced from 40 to 28. He said: “Reducing the number of Welsh constituencies will greatly reduce Wales’ voice in Westminster. The ConDem government is not only trying to gerrymander votes in Parliament with a new 55% bar in no confidence votes, but also trying to gerrymander constituency boundaries in their favour. “Their plans will mean already large Mid Wales constituencies of Ceredigion, Dwyfor Meirionnydd, Brecon and Radnorshire and Montgomeryshire will become even bigger, making it hard for voters to hold their MPs accountable, and for MPs to get around their constituencies. “There will be a damaging knock-on to the Assembly by reducing constituency Assembly members who are linked to numbers of MPs in the same constituencies and reducing the si...

The key taxation policy in the Queen’s speech is a promise for a ''significant increase'' in personal allowances for income tax in next month's Budget, with a long-term goal of taking the first £10,000 of an individual’s income out of tax. What effect would this have in Wales? To find out, we would have to rely on the latest “Survey of Personal Incomes, HM Revenue and Customs”, which estimates the distribution of personal incomes across the regions of the UK. This suggests that Wales will benefit the most of the four nations from this policy i.e. an additional 16.5 per cent of those working in Wales would no longer be paying tax on their incomes as compared to 15.9 per cent for Northern Ireland, and 15.2 per cent for Scotland and England. This would mean that a quarter of a million additional people in Wales would no longer be liable for tax on their incomes. Only two English regions would get a greater benefit than Wales from the implementation of this policy, nam...

One of the real political gaffes so far this year was when Peter Hain compared Wales' economy to that of Rwanda , stating that Wales was a wealthy country in comparison to the African nation, one of the poorest countries on the continent. As he said back in February, "Do you not agree, that compared with Rwanda and most countries in the rest of the world - most countries in the rest of the world is the point I was making if you'd not chosen to take that quote out of context - that Wales is indeed still a wealthy country?" That is why I read a recent article from Harvard Business Review with a slightly ironic smile on my face. Written by Daniel Isenberg, a Professor at Babson College in Massachusetts (the leading entrepreneurship college in the World), it makes an interesting observation about how the Rwandan economy has developed rapidly in recent times: “In the latest Ease of Doing Business ranking from the World Bank , one country made a spectacular leap—from 143rd ...

After being given the frontpage by the Western Mail today to warn of ‘savage cuts’ to frontline services, it would seem that Peter Hain was wrong yet again. According to the Treasury , the Welsh Assembly Government will have to find £162.5 million of savings during the next financial year. This amounts to 2.6 per cent of the £6.2 billion expenditure reduction across all UK Government departments and is considerably below the £220-£300 million of cuts suggested by both Labour and Plaid in the aftermath of the general election. No-one is ever happy at reductions in spending but as was pointed out over the weekend, this is solely a result of the last Labour Government running up an ‘official’ debt of nearly £900 billion pounds. Certainly, these savings can be made without affecting frontline services in health and education. For example, the total savings necessary are equivalent to a 12 per cent saving in the administration column of WAG’s education budget, as pointed out last wee...

With the new UK Coalition government setting out its manifesto for the next five years, many political commentators seem to have conveniently forgotten the financial mess left by Labour after thirteen years in power. According to official statistics , the UK’s total public sector net debt climbed in April to a new high of £893 billion, or 62.1 per cent of GDP, from £755 billion in April last year. In other words, the money borrowed by the UK government in the last twelve months alone went up by SIX times the annual budget of the Welsh Assembly Government. This current official national debt is equivalent to £13,000 for every man woman and child in the country. However, others have argued that the ‘official’ national debt is not the real situation and hides other major problems, including public pension liabilities (£1200 billion), PFI borrowing (£130 billion) and Network Rail (£22 billion). This could mean that the real public debt could be as much as £1.8 trillion – over £25,000 f...

According to the Welsh Assembly Government, “ Proact provides training for employees who are on short time working, and helps companies retain skilled staff who may otherwise be made redundant. It is only available to businesses which have introduced short time working and face the threat of redundancies”. If “threat of redundancy” is the key measure for triggering ProAct support, then surely the majority of companies would have been required, by law, to notify the Redundancy Payments Service of a proposal to dismiss 20 or more employees as redundant at one establishment within a period of 90 days or less. The important term here is that the term "proposing to dismiss" does not mean that an employer has to have formulated definite plans for redundancies. Even where an employer is considering two options (which would be the case when considering Pro-Act), and only one of which involves redundancies, then the obligation to consult still applies. Consultation commences once th...

Following Monday's entry on how better procurement could help cut the deficit, I have just picked up on another report in the Guardian which also suggests a similar approach. The article "Food can help cut the fiscal deficit" suggests that sustainably increasing food production in the UK makes both financial and environmental sense and that the case for better procurement in the health sector can be equally applied to the schools budget. As the authors note, "In opposition, the Tories created an ambitious public sector procurement working party, chaired by Zac Goldsmith, now MP for Richmond Park. This had David Cameron's blessing. Public procurement, worth £2.2bn a year, can lead the way in linking better health standards for schools with UK production. The nutrient standards which began in 2008 for primary and 2009 in secondary and special schools need further nurturing. A number of blocks to raising UK food production loom. First is the skills shortage. Try ...

Has Leighton Andrews inadvertedly made the job of cutting the Welsh Assembly’s budget easier over the next couple of years? His review of education spending within Wales , published yesterday, found that almost a third of expenditure in the sector was spent on administration. Clearly, the aim of the review was to put the case for moving funding away from administration and towards frontline services. Mr Andrews himself says that : "The review is not about cuts in funding, but freeing up resources by changing the balance in funding between front line and support services." Yet, by suggesting that cuts in administration can be made without directly affecting the current frontline provision in Wales, some would argue that he has helped to make the case that there are efficiency savings that can be made by reducing administration and bureaucracy. Hardly the type of proposed cuts which, according to Betsan Powys, had "absolutely terrified" some Labour members in the Cham...

I received a text late last night telling me to get onto YouTube to hear Alicia Keys' new version of of her latest hit song, entitled "Empire State of North Wales". I think we gogs have finally got our own 'anthem'. p.s. The Druid has had a similar epiphany on hearing it , except my hiraeth did actually bring a tear to my eye and I can't wait to go back later this month.

One of the policies that was suggested by the Conservative Party during the election campaign was an “ Honest Food Campaign ” which, amongst other things, would ensure that local councils and NHS organisations would have to publish details of the food they buy so that people can see if meals served in schools and hospitals are locally sourced. As regular readers of this blog will know, this is something I have been banging on about for years and I am glad that we finally have a government that is going to do more about getting the public sector to purchase food locally. Of course, I fully expect that there will be those who will suggest that purchasing from local firms will be more expensive and may lead to problems with sourcing, although evidence from one NHS Trust in England suggests that hundreds of millions of pounds could actually be saved as a result of a more locally-based buying strategy. Last week, it emerged that by cooking hospital food using fresh local ingredients rather ...

There seems to be a lot of soul searching by supporters of the “Party of Wales” at the moment, with some trying to spin the fact that the party made "significant gains" across Wales. However, the reality is somewhat different to the political spin and it is worth examining what actually happened to Plaid Cymru when the country voted last week. On May 6th, Plaid won three seats with only Arfon increasing its percentage share of the vote. In Dwyfor Meirionydd, Elfyn Llwyd’s share of the vote went down by 6.4 per cent whilst Jonathan Edwards polled 10.2 per cent less than Adam Price in 2005. However, it is outside of their three seats that they had the biggest disappointments of the night, failing in its key target seats of Ceredigion and Ynys Mon, and coming fourth in Aberconwy. To be fair, Llanelli, with a fairer wind, could have been won on the night, but that was an outside shot given that resources had been poured into the other three target seats. More embarrassingly for a...

In the week that we had only the second change of government in three decades, the economic challenge facing the new Conservative-Liberal Democrat administration was made stark when unemployment data showed that the number out of work in the UK had risen by 53,000 to 2.51 million, a level last seen in 1994. In Wales, we now have 133,000 people who are officially unemployed, an increase of 57,000 since 2008. So what is to be done to turn around this recession? Not surprisingly, reducing the budget deficit is to be given priority, there seems to be very little detail in the agreement between the two parties on what the Government will do to promote growth within the economy, although there was plenty of potential policies on entrepreneurship, financing of businesses, innovation and the development of the green economy in both parties’ manifestos. This may suggest that there is scope for further policy development, especially when many are asking what can be done to support job creation i...

David Cameron made good his promise to visit Scotland within a week of becoming Prime Minister today and seems to have forged a good relationship with Alex Salmond. According to Sky News , “Cameron, clearly, came here on a charm offensive. Salmond welcomed his pledge to appear before the Scottish Parliament once a year, answering questions from MSPs, and for ministers from Edinburgh to be quizzed by MPs at Westminster" So, whilst David Cameron is welcome in Scotland, the same cannot be true of Wales. Back in 2009, it was reported that, for Lord Dafydd Elis Thomas , “The prospect of a UK Prime Minister fielding questions in the Senedd’s debating chamber alarms him…not only does he believe it would result in constitutional confusion, he fears it would encourage the type of party political fire-fights for which Westminster is famed". Such a critique is not limited to Plaid Cymru's senior politicians. On Wednesday, in an article in the Western Mail, First Minister Carwyn Jone...

Given the expected hysterical outbursts from the usual quarters regarding Cheryl Gillan's appointment as Secretary of State for Wales, I was going to post a robust piece to burst some of the hypocritical bubbles that have emerged from those who should know better. However, it would seem that one of the Dewis from the excellent Politics Cymru website has done the job for me and I hope he doesn't mind that I post his comment here. "The appointment of an MP from an English constituency as Welsh Secretary does indeed lack the “sensitivity” Peter Hain refers to. But is there actually any more to it than that? In practice, does the fact Cheryl Gillan got the job over her 8 Welsh Tory colleagues or 3 Welsh Lib Dem colleagues make any difference? Firstly, if one wanted to start an argument about Ms Gillan’s Welsh credentials they might start by pointing out that the fact she was born in Cardiff, has Welsh ancestry and has (apparently) sung the national anthem on the radio puts her...

Some of the policies of the new Conservative-Liberal coalition government have been broadly outlined in the press today. Whilst waiting for further details, a number of these could have a significant impact on Wales THE ECONOMY Substantial rise in income tax thresholds for lowest paid from April 2011 – as Wales has a higher proportion of lower paid workers than any other region of the UK, this will have a major effect on take-home pay with hopefully knock on effect for the economy. Departmental spending review this autumn – will the Welsh budget be ‘protected’ from any reductions in expenditure? EDUCATION Investment to reduce class sizes for children from poorer backgrounds – whilst this will be an Assembly decision on implementation, there will be pressure on the Labour-Plaid coalition to use the additional funding passed down for this purpose New independent schools in state sector - "free schools" - to be set up – unlikely that the Labour-Plaid coalition will follow th...

So there we have it. David Cameron is Prime Minister after several days of detailed negotiations between the two major parties that actually gained votes during the general election last Thursday. Any other outcome, despite the political punditry, would have been a travesty of the overall result, regardless of the fact that not one party gained an overall majority. I wouldn't say that some of my best friends are Liberal Democrats but a number of their policies on low taxation and civil liberties would be on my list of urgent matters for this country to deal with immediately if we are to mend a broken economy and a broken society. Could this new government end up being the most radical and progressive of recent years? I suppose it depends what you define as progressive but David Cameron's political instincts are ones that could, and should, make a real and positive difference to this country's future. It certainly will be more progressive than the last Labour government. Whi...

Last week, I was honoured to be able to host the Young Enterprise North Wales finals at Venue Cymru in Llandudno. Young Enterprise is a national programme within schools that aims to inspire young people through enterprise, with students setting up and running their own real company for a year. The winners of the North Wales competition go on to represent the region in the Welsh finals in Cardiff later this year. It was a marvellous experience to meet such a group of energised and enterprising young people who had developed new business ideas and, more importantly, had created a profitable business in the space of less than a year. Of course, many will say that entrepreneurship is something that you are born with and that it cannot be taught to anyone, but enterprise education is more than about just starting a business. Done properly, enterprise education can provide young people with new career choices and helps to change their mindset towards staring and even working within small bu...

Having read the Sunday papers today, the most insightful article amongst a melee of speculation and commentary is by Professor Vernon Bogdanor in the Sunday Telegraph. Arguing that the voters have elected an "unviable parliament", he suggests that there are difficulties in getting the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats to form a viable coalition. As a result, David Cameron may well have to settle for a minority government where he would find difficulty in securing overall support for some of his measures, most notably expenditure cuts to bring down the deficit. In Professor Bogdanor's view, there are only two ways of escaping from this situation. "The first would be if the Liberal Democrats accepted Gordon Brown's offer of an immediate referendum on the electoral system. That would be supported by the nationalist parties and might enable Mr Brown to secure a vote of confidence in a Queen's Speech...yet even with PR on the table, Mr Clegg might well be un...

Given that Labour's main economic argument during the election campaign was that we couldn't put the economy at risk by taking £6 billion out of the economy during the current year. it would seem that the European Union have just done a deal to do that for us without our permission two days after the national vote. Even though the UK is not part of the eurozone, it would seem that deal is being agreed which will see all members of the European Union, not just those who have the euro as their currency, having to contribute to the loan package of £100 billion to be given to Greece. According to reports, euro-zone leaders are attempting to get round objections from countries such as the UK by invoking Article 122 of the Lisbon Treaty, intended to enable a collective response to natural disasters. This is a decision that does not need unanimous agreement amongst the 27 members. The loan to Greece would be £95 billion and it is estimated that the UK's exposure to liabilities cre...

Having stayed up to support Cardiff North Conservatives until around 5am this morning, I have just managed to get a few hours sleep before checking what has been happening elsewhere across the country. For those of you who have not been involved in an election count before, there is little opportunity to find out what is going on elsewhere as you are spending your time assessing what is going on as the tellers count the votes. So here are a few reflections on last night. I am immensely proud of what my wife, Angela, and her team achieved in Cardiff West. From a standing start sixteen months ago with a local party organisation that did not exist in any meaningful way, a young and dynamic group of people was put together that has achieved a swing of over five per cent in one of Labour’s safest metropolitan seats. Indeed, if Plaid Cymru had maintained their electoral share from 2005 instead of dropping over 5.5 per cent of their vote, then it would have been a far closer result. The Card...

The YouGov poll for ITV Wales yesterday has topline figures of LABOUR 35% CONSERVATIVES 27% LIBDEM 23% PLAID CYMRU 10% In 2005, the vote share was as follows; LABOUR 43% CONSERVATIVES 21% LIBDEM 18% PLAID CYMRU 13% This works out as a swing of around 6-7% from Labour to the Conservatives in Wales, larger than what is currently being recorded in most UK polls. If repeated at the general election on Thursday, then the Conservatives would gain four seats (Cardiff North, Vale of Glamorgan, Aberconwy and Carmarthen West & South Pembrokeshire) and Plaid Cymru would gain two (Ynys Mon and (nominally) Arfon). There is also a swing towards the Lib Dems, probably securing their current seats in Wales. Plaid Cymru will naturally be disappointed that their share of the vote looks set to drop at this election. However, that assumes a uniform national swing and given that Labour's votes are largely concentrated in a number of seats across the South Wales Valleys, will that be the case? For e...

A new poll released today in the Western Mail suggests that the decline in Labour’s fortunes is less than what is being recorded across the UK. “According to the paper, the poll of 1,000 voters in Wales, conducted by Cardiff-based Research and Marketing Plus, showed Labour on 37.5%, Conservatives on 23.5%, Liberal Democrats on 21.0% and Plaid Cymru on 10.8%. ….but the party appears to have made up ground since April 19, when a YouGov poll for ITV Wales – in the aftermath of the widely hailed performance in the first TV leaders’ debate of Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg (pictured below with Gordon Brown) – put Labour’s support on 33%, just four points ahead of the Lib Dems at 29%, with the Conservatives on 23% and Plaid on 9%.” On the surface, this seems like good news for the Labour Party but there is a simple issue in that it would seem that the organisation carrying out is not a member of the British Polling Council (BPC). Therefore, anyone in the polling business, or who follows political...