PROFESSOR DYLAN JONES-EVANS

Over on Ordovicius , Sanddef dismisses the proposition by the Western Mail's David Williamson that the Conservatives will make any serious gains at the next election in Wales. However, on Vaughan Roderick's website , Karl the Bookie calls fourteen seats for the Conservatives: Labour 15 ( Aberavon , Swansea West, Alun and Deeside , Caerphilly, Cynon Valley, Neath, Cardiff South and Penarth , Cardiff West, Delyn , Islwyn , Merthyr and Rhumney , Ogmore , Pontypridd , Rhondda , Torfaen ) Conservatives: 14 ( Aberconwy , Vale of Glamorgan , Brecon and Radnorshire , Carmarthen West and South Pembroke, Cardiff North , Newport West, Vale of Clwyd , Clwyd South, Clwyd West, Gower , Monmouthshire , Bridgend , Preseli Pembrokeshire , Wrexham ) Plaid Cymru : 5 ( Arfon , Carmarthen East and Dinefwr , Dwyfor Meirionnydd , Llanelli , Anglesey ) Lib- Dems : 5 (Swansea West, Ceredigion , Cardiff Central, Montgomeryshire , Newport East). Both are brave men to call the results for a gen

Last week, it was revealed that senior civil servants within the Welsh Assembly had received bonuses of more than £686,000 last year which equates to a rise of more than 154 per cent during the last five years. More tellingly, twenty eight lucky individuals actually earn more than £100,000 per annum, which is higher than any other Minister except for Rhodri Morgan himself. This follows revelations of exceptional pay increases and high salaries for other senior public sector staff such as chief executives of local authorities, vice chancellors of universities and the heads of Wales' remaining quangos. Incredibly, these Assembly bonuses come at a time when education is in a mess, the health service is going through yet another reorganisation and the state of the economy is declining. When the buck is suppose to stop with those at the top, it would seem that they are getting paid for reaching ‘targets’ they themselves have set for performance but which the general public would have di

Next week, the search for this year’s fastest growing Welsh companies comes to an end. Applications for the 2008 Wales Fast Growth 50 (FG50) project have to be submitted by July 31st 2008 to be eligible for this year’s supplement, to be published by the Western Mail in October. All the fifty firms selected will also be shortlisted for the Wales Fast Growth 50 awards, which will be celebrated at a gala dinner at the Holland House Hotel, to be hosted by Declan Curry of BBC Breakfast News fame. Not many people are aware that, this year, the FG50 actually celebrates a decade of identifying the entrepreneurial firms of the future. The origins of the project started after I had arrived at the University of Glamorgan in 1996 to establish the Welsh Enterprise Institute. After a couple of years of creating the right infrastructure to take the Institute forward, I felt the time was right for a publication to celebrate the best of Welsh entrepreneurs. That may seem strange to people today but a d

A report released today by Oxford Economics shows that the wider South East (Greater London, the South East and the Eastern Region) made a positive net contribution, of £37.7 billion to the UK public finances in 2006-07. For Wales it shows that whilst the Government spends £28.4 billion, tax revenues of only £19.3 billion were raised in 2006-07 - a net drain of minus £9.1 billion. Of course, these are the headline figures and I am waiting for a full copy of the report before examining this in further detail but it does show that fiscal autonomy for Wales may not be feasible unless real structural changes are made in the UK economy, and certainly not in the foreseeable future.

During a period of acute problems for the business sector across North Wales, it is time for the Assembly to look again at the business rates system it currently operates. As this column has pointed out over the last few months, the relief that is provided for small businesses in Wales is worse than either Scotland or England, despite the earlier promises made by one half of the Labour-Plaid Government to reduce the burden on the wealth creators in our local communities. In many rural areas, businesses have seen their rates increase by an average of £800 since April 2007. This, of course, comes directly out of the pocket of many owner-managers who essentially pay themselves whatever is left over after expenditure on the business every month. Therefore, ironically, even though the Assembly Government does not have direct tax-raising powers, by ignoring calls for a fairer business rate system in Wales it has actually added to the personal tax burden of thousands of entrepreneurs across t

I am sure you are all as confused as I am over the current state of the UK economy. On the one hand, we have David Blanchflower of the MPC stating that we are in recession already and need to cut interest rates now, and various commentators stating that we are about to crash . House prices continue to fall and manufacturing output is down . On the other hand, the price of oil is finally coming down and this is being reflected in the forecourt prices and banks are cutting their mortgage rates . Retail sales are improving and the IMF has lifted its growth forecast for the UK economy. To be honest with you, I doubt if any economist out there knows what on earth will happen over the next six months. Certainly, if oil continues to drop (and that will depend on the speculators) we could have a very shallow recession. On the other hand, if consumer and business confidence fails to recover, then we could be in for a very depressed two years of slow if not negative growth within the UK ec

Most of my writing has, quite naturally for an entrepreneurship academic, focused on highlighting some of the major issues facing the small firm sector in Wales. More importantly, it has examined how specific policies can be developed to help small businesses, which would be expected given that small firms make up the vast majority of businesses within the region and that there are countless opportunities to provide advice and funding to support the sector. This is not to say that large firms - those employing more than 250 people - cannot make as important a contribution to the development of the small firm sector as the public sector, especially through relationships which provide direct support for smaller companies. In Wales, the latest statistics from the Small Business Service indicate that there are only 180 businesses employing more than 250 employees. Whilst Wales has the lowest number of large firms of any other UK region apart from Northern Ireland, their relative importance

Alwyn ap Huw raises the issue of Dolgarrog Aluminium in his latest blog entry . Of course, I have written on this issue numerous times since last September. However, Alwyn asks about the decontamination of the site which, after all, has been a heavy industrial plant for over 100 years. I have it on very good authority that when the original management buy-out went ahead in 2002, the only way that funding at the time could proceed if the WDA undertook to take full responsibility for any liability arising from the subsequent clean-up of the site. Of course, the question that arises is, when the WDA was shut down, whether this responsibility for the land clean-up, as would be expected, was automatically passed onto the Assembly Government. If that was the case, there arises the question of whether (a) Assembly officials knew about this issue in October of last year when the company went into administration and (b) whether they informed the Minister of the full facts at the time so that he

I have been tagged by Ms Wagstaff to consider what has been the biggest waste of public money. If I keep this to the field of economic development in Wales, we could be here all day. However, to be really naughty over this one, you could argue that the £200k or so that WAG spent on having a full-time North Wales Director and Director of Enterprise since 2006 was a monumental waste of money as she has now been replaced by another senior colleague doing this part-time on top of another major job (Director of IBW). The spin over the new part-time position is that 'it gives North Wales a direct voice in Cardiff" although the real reason is that that the economic development division simply do not have the money for a replacement appointment having overspent by millions on transport (BBC, there's a story for you if you bothered to do any research!) Worryingly, this arrangement seems to be working out extremely well than the previous arrangement, which may show that we have too

It would seem that the Welsh blogosphere is slowly being eroded with the disappearance of Chickenfoot , Southpaw Grammar and Normal Mouth in the space of a few weeks. I can understand the time it takes to put blogs together. With a new job that will take up an enormous amount of my time, I had seriously thought about letting this blog fade away gracefully into the ether. Perhaps I am fortunate in that I have two weekly columns, one in the Daily Post on Mondays and the other in the Western Mail on Saturdays, which I write in my spare time and which form the basis for this particular blog. Nevertheless, with events changing daily, you do have to keep up with what's going on elsewhere in the blogosphere , which does take a lot of your spare time. As a result, my posts are usually written early in the morning or late at night, like a number of other bloggers . Anyway, I have a 450 page Ph .D dissertation to read before acting as external examiner at University College Dublin later thi

According to the Press Association: "More than 500 jobs are being axed at digger giant JCB as the firm announced steps to cut costs after a "rapid decline" in business. The Staffordshire-based firm said the positions were expected to go across its manufacturing workforce. All of JCB's UK factories will be affected by the job losses, hitting staff at eight factories in Staffordshire, two in Wrexham and one in Derbyshire. The 500 manufacturing job cuts account for 8% of JCB's UK total employee base, but it added that a number of office-based staff positions are also facing the axe. It said details of the further redundancies were still being hammered out. JCB revealed that orders had plummeted, leaving its forecast production schedule for the rest of the year down by 20%. The privately-owned firm warned last month that sales growth was under pressure as the credit crunch slowed construction demand this year." I just hope that Welsh Assembly officials are alrea

Hat-tip to Sanddef regarding the Welsh Devolution Monitoring Report. The section on the economy makes, to put it delicately, interesting reading. "The implications of the Government of Wales Act on subject-specific business in the Assembly are becoming clear. There were only two opportunities to question the Minister of Economy and Transport over the whole session, and although the Higher Education inquiry evidence sessions of the Enterprise and Learning Committee took up most of the time available, progress is slow and other key areas of debate (especially with regard to school education) have been neglected as a result. Some further progress in constructive dialogue between parties has occurred, probably as a result of the changed alliances in defending and opposing coalition politics in the Assembly. While these are welcome, resources and opportunities to improve the relative economic position of Wales have not been sufficient, and an assessment of the quality of both policymak

The Western Mail runs the story today that Wales is being robbed of £2 billion pounds per annum because of the inadequacies of the Barnett formula. According to Lord Barnett himself, " This week’s IPPR report compared spending levels against GVA (Gross Value Added) per head, a standard measure of prosperity. On the basis of the calculations, London and Scotland receive more than they would get under a needs-based formula, while Wales gets 14% too little – around £2 billion". At long last, someone realises that we are getting shortchanged and I hope that Welsh politicians of all parties at the Assembly and Westminster will put this issue as their main priority. However, can someone please tell the Assembly Government to stop being in denial about GVA as we will get nowhere unless they start facing the rela economic situation in Wales. For the last few years, they have been rubbishing the fact that, according to GVA per head, we are the poorest region in the UK. In stead of acc

The latest multiple deprivation index for Wales has just been published. The twenty most deprived communities are as follows: 1. Rhyl West 2 (Denbighshire) 2. Butetown (Cardiff) 3. Queensway (Wrexham) 4. Rhyl West 1 (Denbighshire) 5. Rhyl South West (Denbighshire) 6. Townhill (Swansea) 7. Penydarren (Merthyr Tydfil) 8. Twyn Carno (Caerphilly) 9. St. James 3 (Caerphilly) 10. Penrhiwceiber (Rhondda Cynon Taf) 11. Castle 2 (Swansea) 12. Pen-y-waun (Rhondda Cynon Taf) 13. Caerau (Bridgend) 14. Penderry (Swansea) 15. Tredegar Central and West (Blaenau Gwent) 16. Tylorstown (Rhondda Cynon Taf) 17. Gurnos (Merthyr Tydfil ) 18. Cyfarthfa (Merthyr Tydfil) 19. Castle 1 (Swansea) 20. Townhill (Swansea) On the day that there are 'celebrations' over the One Wales Coalition and after nine years of devolved responsibility for social and economic development, we still have deep pockets of deprivation concentrate

It seems that it is finally here. According to a survey from the British Chamber of Commerce, the UK is facing a serious risk of recession within months. The focus of the Assembly's Economic Development Department must change immediately. In economic terms, Wales is on a war footing and for the first time, we have some autonomy over how we react to this recession thanks to devolution. This is no longer about managing its usual economic priorities but about ensuring that the Welsh economy comes out of this situation better than other parts of the UK over the next couple of years. It is about survival, not growth; it is about consolidation, not expansion, and critically, it is about retaining highly skilled jobs rather than attracting new ones. The warnings are clear. Let us hope that our politicians have the courage to act accordingly.

Last week, it was announced that the key stage three results in Wales have fallen further behind England than ever before. Statistics published last week by the Assembly Government showed that the difference was most significant in maths, for which results in Wales were nine points lower than in England. The gap has widened since records began in 2000, when there was a two per cent difference in maths. The gap in GCSE results are also widening, with six per cent more pupils in English schools obtaining five A*-C grades. If this isn't ringing any alarm bells, then it should be. The future of any nation lies in the education of its young people and if they are failing, then as sure as night follows day, so will the Welsh economy.

During the last few weeks, I have been working alongside Dr Piers Thompson of the University of Glamorgan to examine the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) and utilise the fantastic dataset we have to examine the specific phenomenon of those who start up more than one business, commonly known as habitual entrepreneurs. As many are aware, there has been an enormous growth in policies which have focused on the increasing the level of entrepreneurial activity across the world. Interestingly, the vast majority of resources are aimed at creating a greater understanding of entrepreneurship and providing a greater proportion of the population with the skills required to undertake such activities. In Wales, as in many other countries, this has manifested itself through the massive growth in enterprise education activities, particularly within universities, although the jury is still out whether initiatives such as the Enterprise College have had any real effect on entrepreneurial activity.

In April 2008, I compiled a list of the job losses in Wales since May 2007 . Today, we saw 157 job losses announced at AB Electronics in Cardiff. Since the last tally in April, the following job losses have been announced April Corus , Llanelli , 300 jobs Fenmarc , Wrexham , 190 jobs Kimball, Bridgend , 160 jobs May Western Corrugated, Cwmbran , 60 jobs Georgia Pacific, Bridgend , 46 jobs Flexsys , Wrexham , 163 jobs Nemo Personal Finance, 70 jobs JCB , Wrexham , 56 jobs David Mclean , 30 jobs June Kingspan , Blaenau Gwent , 59 jobs Paramount Foods, Deeside , 150 jobs Ventura , Cardiff, 600 jobs July Zurich, Cardiff, 70 jobs AB Electronics, 157 jobs That equates to over 1700 jobs in just over three months. This, of course, only covers major announcements and does not include any redundancies in construction and retail which have also been going on during the same period. I believe the reality of the current position of the Welsh economy has yet to hit home. Yes, new jobs are being su

As some of you may have noticed, I have started my new job at the University of Wales this week as Director of Research and Innovation. More details are contained within an article by Martin Shipton in the Western Mail today but after nearly twenty years in academia, this is probably the most exciting role that I have ever undertaken. Given the massive interest it is already generating amongst industrialists in particular, the Global Academy is the perfect opportunity to put Welsh business on the world map.

Excellent article by Professor Tony Chapman , Vice Chancellor of UWIC , in the House magazine. His argument, reflected by all the universities in Wales I am sure, is that the government can’t keep asking Welsh universities to do more with less. Simply put, the deficit in public funding of universities in Wales, compared to England, amounts to £70m a year the size of the gap has grown to such an extent that it now represents 20 per cent of the total higher education budget in Wales, and equates to a shortfall of £1,000 in funding per student the gap between Wales and Scotland is even greater: £150m per annum , or £2,000 less per student. To close the gap, which is critical for ensuring Wales becomes a more prosperous nation, Tony suggests the following options: Making a persuasive case for universities getting a larger slice of the Assembly Government’s overall budget, especially as for every £1 invested by the Assembly Government, the economy receives an output of £5.30. Maintaining th

Everyone welcomes last week’s decision by the American company McKesson to create over three hundred new jobs in Bangor. The company, which provides an integrated human resources and payroll system for the NHS, is a testament to the way that the private sector can provide efficient services within the public sector. The sad irony, though, is that whilst this business was rightly supported by grant aid from the Assembly Government, the same Labour-Plaid coalition has itself ruled out any involvement by the private sector in the NHS in Wales. Such an ideological approach to the delivery of public services could, over the long term, have a serious effect on ability to provide efficient services not only within our health service but across a range of other areas. Certainly, there is growing evidence that the private sector can make a real contribution to ensuring that the Welsh budget goes a little bit further. According to the CBI and other business representative groups, there is enormo