According to the BBC, the survey found that:

31% of people thought the Welsh assembly had a negative impact on how Britain was governed, compared to 11% in 2007.
Those who thought devolution to Wales had made no difference fell to 24% from a high of 66% in 2003.
About a quarter (26%) thought Wales got more than its fair share of UK public spending, with slightly more (28%) saying it got “pretty much” its fair share.
Only 7% thought England got its fair share, while 40% thought it got less than it deserved.

Furthermore, the BBC states that ‘a proposal to adjust procedures at Westminster so that only English MPs vote on matters affecting England was supported by 79% of people.‘

I have to say that this is indeed something that I support. It cannot be right that while AMs, MSPs and MLAs are the only people who decide on certain issues in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively, England’s lack of devolution means that MPs from all across the land have the right to vote on issues which are exclusively English.

Speaking with BBC Radio Wales, Eddie Bone, the Chair of the Campaign for an English Parliament said that ‘the English no longer trust the UK government to highlight English concerns and that it’s too focused on Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland.‘ He continued to say that ‘it shows that the people of England have finally woken up to the fact, really, that their tax money is subsidising the rest of the United Kingdom.‘

Now this is not a view that I recognise. Frankly, the UK government is anything but focused on Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. In recent years, it would be fair to argue that it has quite nearly neglected those countries. The UK government may claim that its actions are in the interest of the UK as a whole, it [the government] can at times be extremely narrow-minded in the way it acts, often ignoring Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as well as undermining the democratically-elected leaders of those countries. Furthermore, to argue that English tax money is subsiding the rest of the United Kingdom is a dud argument. Why does he think that Wales’ 4 largest political parties are in agreement on the need to reform the Barnett formula? It’s because we don’t get our fair share.

UPDATE: In his first press conference of 2012, the First Minister demonstrates a counter-argument to Mr Bone’s. Watch from around 2:30 in the video, below.

If the four (yes, four) nations of the UK aren’t to have fiscal responsibility each for themselves, then I’m in favour of taxes being pooled and redistributed to each nation individually, according to need and deservedness, in order for them to spend on the issues which affect them individually, with the rest of the money being spent on issues which remain under British jurisdiction.

So yes, I do support English devolution, and sorting out The England Question, or the West Lothian Question, but Mr Bone does nothing to help his cause – and that is a cause that I cannot support.

For Wales, CRhJ.

For Wales,

Blwyddyn newydd dda wrth y ddau ohonom. Daethed 2012 ichi dunelli o hapusrwydd, llwyddiant, iechyd a llewyrch.

Dros Gymru,

CRhJ & JAH

I’ve recently started working for Cardiff University as an ‘Insider.’ What that means is that I’m opening up my real-life Facebook page to the public, and specifically to 2012 undergraduate applicants.

(c) Cardiff University

Why? To give them a glimpse of what it’s really like to be a Cardiff University student and answering any of their questions (especially the trickier and more studenty ones that they wouldn’t ask an admissions tutor).

This is part of the University’s wider marketing strategy, which also includes a new scheme, launching today, called Thrive.

Thrive, or Ffynnu in Welsh, will give 2012 undergraduate applicants to Cardiff University the chance to progress through a series of online clues, which will eventually lead to one of them (if they get all the clues), winning free tuition for life at Cardiff University. Literally.

The scheme’s website reads:

What would free tuition for life mean to you? Perhaps a PhD in your 30s? An MBA in your 40s? Or how about a Spanish course in your 70s? Maybe the question to ask is: how would you use unlimited free tuition from one of the UK’s top universities to make the world a better place?

Imagine that. Even if you get to the life final (the end stage of the competition – a live final event in Cardiff) but don’t actually win, you’ve already bagged yourself a scholarship towards your time as a Cardiff University student.

(c) Cardiff University

If you’re applying to Cardiff University this year, you can’t afford to miss this opportunity. This ground-breaking competition is open to all applicants for full-time undergraduate study from the UK & EU applying to Cardiff for 2012 entry. To continue through to the final stages you will have to have received, and accepted on a firm basis, an offer for undergraduate study at Cardiff University.

Clues to where you can find the first challenge will appear here from mid December. To register your interest, ready to receive the first clue, go to our registration page. Even if you’re not applying for 2012 entry, you can pre-sign up for 2013 here.

This is an opportunity not to be missed!

By the way, please do feel free to use Facebook’s subscribe function, if you want to get a glimpse of what it’s like to be a real Cardiff University student. Here’s the page where you can subscribe to my colleagues and I and see what it’s like for all of us – all studying different subjects, from different schools, from different places all across the UK, and at different stages of our academic careers – on the Thrive website.

Dros Gymru, CRhJ.

Yr Aelod Cynulliad Plaid Cymru drs Ddwyrain Caerfyrddin a Dinefwr, Rhodri Glyn Thomas AC, yn siarad mewn rili pensiynau yng Nghaerfyrddin bore ‘ma. Trueni mawr na chafodd Bethan Jenkins AC wneud yr un peth yn Abertawe, ond o leiaf wnaeth pobl Caerfyrddin glywed ein neges, hyd yn oed os na chafodd pobl Abertawe.

Plaid Cymru’s Assembly Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr, Rhodri Glyn Thomas AM, speaking at a pensions rally in Carmarthen this morning. Glad to see that he was able to speak there even though Bethan Jenkins AM wasn’t permitted to speak at the rally in Swansea. At least the people of Carmarthen got to hear our message even if the people of Swansea didn’t.

As you are aware, Alex Salmond’s government in Edinburgh plans on holding a referendum in or around 2015, offering the people of Scotland a question about their country’s constitutional future. The people of Scotland will be asked whether they wish to secede from the United Kingdom, remain with the current settlement or switch to what is increasingly known as ‘DevoMax.’

In light of this, you will know that the time is right for Wales to begin questioning what implications the Scottish referendum will have on it. Whether Scotland votes ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ or indeed anything in between, there is no doubt in my mind that this is the beginning of a new chapter for the politics of these islands.

As much as your coalition government wishes to campaign against a ‘yes’ vote in Scotland’s referendum, a ‘yes’ result in that referendum is a very real possibility. It is the same people who say that a ‘yes’ result is not possible who also said that the people of Scotland would never delivery a majority SNP government – in a system specifically designed not to deliver majority governments.

The Silk Commission must now investigate the power of giving Wales a level of fiscal autonomy, and it must also look at the possibility of widening the scope of the Welsh devolution settlement. In respect of that, your government must now commit to making time within the rest of your term of office to introducing and delivering a Wales Bill, should the Silk Commission recommend that fiscal and other powers be transferred from Whitehall to Cardiff Bay. Without that commitment from your government, the work and eventual findings of the Silk Commission will be both pointless and worthless. They will have been a waste of time and a waste of taxpayers’ money.

Regardless of my personal position regarding devolution and independence, it is still important that these questions be discussed now. The debate is on-going in Scotland and whatever the result of its referendum later this decade, if Wales were not to discuss and debate its implications on it now, and if your government were not to commit to cooperating with the Silk Commission, Wales will be left floundering in 2015 and thereafter. We will be a Nation questioning our position within whatever is left of the United Kingdom, or questioning our role in the United Kingdom if it remains ‘united’ in its current form. This is something that our people can ill afford.

It is not enough for your government to use campaigning against a Scottish ‘yes’ vote as an excuse for not discussing these issues in Wales now. As with any referendum, the result is not known to anyone – not to you nor I nor First Minister Salmond. Should your government decide that now is not the time to discuss these issues in a Welsh context, it would, in my eyes, be guilty of serious malpractice, a neglect of one these islands’ most beautiful – and indeed most ancient – Nations, and indeed incredible irresponsibility.

It is for that reason that I press on you as Secretary of State for Wales to enter into direct negotiations with the Prime Minister and with the First Ministers of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland now, regarding the future constitutional settlement of the Nations which make up these islands. With or without a Scottish ‘yes’ vote, no one can deny that the constitutional make-up of the United Kingdom is at a turning point.

The role of your government is not to bury its head in the sand, but to face up to the matter at hand, and to discuss these issues responsibly, treating all as equals. You must not and may not be so reckless and cavalier as to assume that the status quo will remain. I assure you Secretary, that if you do that, you will create a far wider divide between the Nations of these Islands than already exists, and your government will be responsible for leaving Wales, Scotland, England and Northern Ireland as four Nations questioning who they are and what their role is, lost.

I received a response from the Wales Office yesterday, and here’s what they had to say:

The [Silk] Commission will carry out its task in two parts. First it will look at the financial accountability of the National Assembly and the Welsh Government, reviewing the case for the devolution of fiscal powers and recommending a package of powers that would improve their financial accountability to the people of Wales and which is consistent with the United Kingdom’s wider fiscal objectives. It will aim to report part 1 in the autumn of next year.

Yes, I know that. Thanks. Now get on with answering my letter. The Wales Office goes on:

Once the Government has considered the Silk Commission’s recommendations on financial accountability, the Commission will turn its attention to the second Part of its remit, looking at the powers of the Assembly and recommending modifications to the present constitutional arrangements that would enable the Welsh devolution settlement to work more effectively. It will report on Part II during 2013.

In relation to both parts, the Silk Commission must make recommendations which are likely to have a wide degree of support.

Our friends at the Wales Office aren’t doing too well, are they? I’ve written them a letter about the Silk Commission and the first half page of their response is a description of the Silk Commission. Okay, I’ll persevere. They go on:

This Government is committed to a strong, united Kingdom, and the Secretary of State for Wales has made it clear that any changes arising from the Silk Commission, either fiscal or constitutional, must be beneficial to both Wales and the United Kingdom as a whole.

Okay, so you’re still not answering my points. I’m starting to lose patience.

It would not be right to prejudge the conclusions that the Silk Commission may come to. The Government will carefully consider the package the review recommends and take a decision in light of the evidence.

Discussions between the UK Government and the Welsh Government on all aspects of the Holtham Commission’s reports are continuing in parallel to the Silk Commission. However, the Government has made clear that fundamental reform of the system of devolution funding – governed by the Barnett formula – must await the stabilisation of public finances.

Turning to your other comments, the Scottish Government has said that it will seek to hold a referendum on Scottish independence in the second half of the Parliamentary term. The UK Government believes that the Scottish Government must answer the substantive questions about what they mean by independence. These questions will doubtless be subject to public and political debate. Any referendum needs to present the people in Scotland with a clear and decisive choice about whether they wish to remain part of the UK.

The Prime Minister has said that the UK Government will make the optimistic case for the UK by highlighting the areas where Scotland benefits from being part of the United Kingdom, and the UK benefits from Scotland being part of it. There are economic benefits, international influence, shared values and better prospects for achieving more together in the future and the Government will work hard to maintain that position.

Why do I even bother?

For Wales,

CRhJ

We think that that’s fair enough, and is probably the right decision. What we believe is that that shows the characteristics of a leader who would be able to take stock of what sort of a party is before her and what her members want from the party (and crucially, which direction they want to see the party taking) – we think that that’s better conveyed through the Welsh phrase ‘pwyso a mesur.’ The purpose of Plaid Cymru’s root-and-branch review, as far as we can see, is indeed that – to take stock of what’s happened and why, where we are now, and which direction we take hereon in.

In some ways, we feel that the party’s a little tired. Four years in Government, a grueling Yes for Wales campaign of which Plaid Cymru was an instrumental part, and an election in which we lost some amazing Assembly Members and in which some fantastic candidates missed out on gaining seats. There’s no wonder we’re tired.

We believe that Leanne has the potential to move Plaid Cymru into this new and exciting phase in its existence. We share her views on many important issues of the day and feel that she is radical enough, yet charismatic enough, to appeal to Plaid Cymru’s hardcore supporters as well as to your average, non-necessarily-republican John Doe on the street. And that’s what we need. We seem at the moment to be floundering between achieving electoral success and adhering to our party’s constitutional aims. We believe that as leader of the party, Leanne could do both.

Leanne is thought of as an excellent campaigner, not only focusing on local matters and getting into the newspapers, but also taking on national issues, and issues which aren’t necessarily affecting her constituents but are nevertheless of great import to our society. Put simply, she’s an all-rounder, who is more than able to communicate the party line to the electorate but is also capable of sticking to her principles.

This is why we want to support Leanne Wood AM as a candidate for the Plaid Cymru leadership election. We respect her decision not to declare her decision until Dr ap Gwilym publishes his review, but we hope that she does indeed decide to throw her hat into the ring.

For Wales,

CRhJ & JAH

The Western Mail is part of Media Wales, which also runs the South Wales Echo, the Wales and Sunday and other weekly titles throughout South Wales, which is in turn part of the Trinity Mirror group. Shipton argues that members of the National Union of Journalists in Wales have no faith in the management of Trinity Mirror:

[The group management of Trinity Mirror] appears to have no discernible strategy beyond the imposition of cuts to make the annual balance sheet look as healthy as possible. Inevitably, the cuts make it more difficult for those that remain to bring the papers out.

There have been ongoing redundancies and so-called ‘savings’ (i.e. cuts) at Media Wales for a good number of years now; since 2003 and this year, he believes that around 100 Media Wales jobs have been shed.

Naturally, this reduced number of journalists and the fact that Media Wales employees are responsible for providing stories for all of Media Wales’ titles, means that there are less people working on more stories. Inevitably, quality is affected. I don’t believe that any of us can look at the Western Mail and say, ‘Woah, this is an excellent paper.’ I think that Shipton realises that, but he puts the blame squarely at the door of Sly Bailey, the CEO of Trinity Mirror, as well as the fact that the group is heavily indebted – and he’s well within his right to do that.

Ms Bailey continues to take a humongous remuneration package – £1.71m in 2010, according to Shipton – while jobs are shed throughout the group. Fair? I think not.

Wales can ill afford to lose its daily newspaper. No matter what you think of the Western Mail, it is the only newspaper out there which focuses on Wales. As high the standard, you may argue, of the Guardian, the Daily Mail or the Indy, Wales is hardly a main focus.

I’m far from being an expert on this issue, but from what I can see, Ms Bailey’s position at Trinity Mirror is increasingly untenable, and as such, I would support what Shipton seems to suggest – it’s time for her to get the chop.

From one Welsh Political Twin to another, much love on your birthday. Enjoy your day… and looking forward to seeing you and RoMo imminently for a late night cup of tea.

Cerith x

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

While we cannot, morally, understand or support war, for whatever reason, that doesn’t mean we want any less to honour the men and women of every country and of every conflict who’ve laid down their lives in the name of their nation.

To make the ultimate sacrifice in the name of one’s country – even in war – is the single most noble act which any person can do, and on Remembrance Sunday 2011, we would both like to personally pay tribute to the men and women of Wales who have been killed and injured in wars all over this planet and throughout the years.

Our only hope is that one day, the world can be at peace. To end this post, we would like to quote the clergyman and political activist, A. J. Muste:

There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.

For Wales – CRhJ & JAH