Re Adam's Comments:
Adam was not just being critical of the makeup of Assembly Members, he was being critical of Western Politicians; his criticisms were aimed as much at Members of the Scottish Parliament, Members of the NI Assembly, UK MP's members of the Budestag, the US Congress, Parlement Français etc. He was not knocking the Assembly!
Re Druid's Comments on what Adam said:
Are all those Tory's really wealth makers?
If I inherit Dad's millions, Dad's business and Dad's circle of expert employees would I be a wealth maker? Would I have a real experience of business life? Or would I just be born with a silver spoon in my mouth with no real experience of wealth creation?
I suspect that too many members of the current and the former government have had the good fortune of inherited luck rather than having gone through the hard graft of creating their own luck!
Wales needs wealth creators desperately, but we are not going to get them through primogeniture, in the way that most of the Tory Cabinet has wealth, we are not going to get them from demonising the unemployed and getting them to pick up rubbish for a pound an hour in exchange for benefits either.
What we need are lateral thinking ways of enabling our unemployed to become entrepreneurs, rather than minimum wage slaves, an idea that is outwith the conception of both those with inherited wealth and those with socialist straightjackets!
For Wales to succeed it needs something better than Left/Right polarisation. Plaid use to talk about national self determination in order to avoid the I, word – self determination is not just national it has to be communal and personal too!
How we lift the people of Wales out of dependency on the British state into personal, communal and national self suficiency is the national challange that can not be answered through socialism or British unionism!
MOF - you seem to be painting me as a supporter of primogeniture and of demonising the unemployed - which is neither true nor an accurate description of the argument I made in the post you linked to.
ReplyDeleteIn my post I show how statistically the Assembly contains an over-representation of people who's only experience of life is of working in the public sector. I am in no way knocking public sector workers, just pointing out that their over-representation in the Assembly deprives the legislature of people from other walks of life with other life experiences.
The problems facing Welsh public life do not revolve around spending money, but in making more of it -- therefore it seems reasonable to ask (a) why aren't there more people in the Assembly with wealth creating experience; and (b) why do certain parties not attract more people from those backgrounds when there is a clear need for their experience. I imagine this is what Adam Price meant when he said parties are drawing politicians "from a vanishingly small gene-pool".
Finally I agree with you that (a) the same can in general be said of many legislatures throughout the world -- but as I am a Welsh blogger focussing on Welsh affairs I see no reason why I should not look at the Welsh Assembly; and (b) inheriting wealth does not automatically make you a 'wealth creator'.
When we've seen "wealth creators" (usually capitalist leeches whose main aim in life is to avoid paying taxes) going into government - think Lord Sainsbury, Digby Jones, Philip Green - they've usually been fucking useless.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is you can't run a nation as a business. Some of the most successful business Men/Women have had a string of failures and even bankruptcies before they make their fortunes.
ReplyDeleteBusiness means taking major risks but if you fail you can start again but its not so simple when you bankrupt a country you can't start a new one.
This is where the Druid is wrong, the idea that capitalists are wealth creators may be true, but they are also wealth losers.
We need people whose major interest when elected is the benefit of all the people not one section and hope this will trickle down to the rest of us.
Glynbeddau & Anon 10:59
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying that we need to 'ruled' by wealth creators, I'm saying (like Adam Price) that we need a wider range of experiences inside the Assembly -- including people who have generated wealth, not just spent it.
Furthermore, as Glynbeddau says, its true that wealth creators need to take risks, and yes many successful businesspeople failed before they succeeded. But surely they learned something important through that process? And surely it is to our advantage to be able to draw on the experience and knowledge of those people within the Assembly?
The Druid has got more important things to worry about!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1328968/Pagans-march--harmless-eccentrics-dangerous-cult.html
I've always been surprised by the Tory of Anglesey's eagerness to bend everything to his "wealth creating private sector" agenda.
ReplyDeleteI think the points you made were good, Alwyn. I would illustrate the same thing by asking whether a teacher who moves from teaching in a private school to teaching in a local authority school has suddenly moved from "generating wealth to spending it"; or whether a refuse collector who used to be employed by the council but now does the same job for a private company to which the council has outsourced the work has now suddenly started "creating wealth".
The ultimate irony is that a person who runs a private hospital will probably be held up as an example of success, but that someone who runs an NHS hospital will be called an overpaid and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.
MH - "I've always been surprised by the Tory of Anglesey's eagerness to bend everything to his "wealth creating private sector" agenda."
ReplyDeleteI see now reason why I should be derided for pointing out that we need a healthier and larger private sector in Wales, and that we need to have more people with business experience inside the Assembly. What is controversial about either of these statements?
Druid I agree we need a balance to govern and we also need people from all sectors.
ReplyDeleteAll sectors could learn from each other and when it comes to economic development then we need people who understand what this means in real terms and who can challenge the civil servants and SPADS.
There is nothing wrong with working for a profit, without that money the economy would die. Just as certain public services should stay that way publicall owned and managed - may I add though efficiently.
Read what I said again, Tory. I didn't deride you for "pointing out that we need a healthier and larger private sector in Wales". I derided you for you repeating the same old slogan about the private sector creating wealth and the public sector spending it. I gave examples to show how absurd such a rudimentary distinction is. You do nice graphics, but use them to show a very narrow and limited understanding of economic reality.
ReplyDeleteNeither do I see why business experience should be singled out as more important than any other sort of experience. Having a range of different experiences is what matters.
MH
ReplyDelete"Read what I said again, Tory."
Do I have to?
"Neither do I see why business experience should be singled out as more important than any other sort of experience. Having a range of different experiences is what matters."
Now its time for you to re-read what I said - both in my original post and above in this thread. Nowhere have I said business experience is "more important" than any other kind of experience. I said that there is an unbalance in the Assembly and that it would benefit from greater diversity. I know its easier for you to attack 'straw men' of your own creation rather than engage with the real argument, but please don't put words in my mouth.
It appears to me that both Alwyn and the Druid are saying the same thing, (apart from the asumption that the Druid is a Tory).
ReplyDeleteHis attacks on Labour and Plaid are inevitable as political power in both Anglesey and in Wales is held by Labour and Plaid. I'm sure that if the ConDem's were in power in Wales, and were making similar, (or worse) decisions then the Druid would attack their decisions too.
I agree with MH about the complexity of Private v Public service.
ReplyDeleteI have spent as much of my life working as a nurse in the public sector as I have in the private sector, the job was the same!
A service industry is nnot wealth creating in either sector, but I hope that I have made people better so that they can get back to work and I hope that I have relieved people of caring duties that have enabled them to work and create wealth rather than stay at home with sickly relations.
I have not been a wealth creator, per say, in either sector, but I have been an aid to wealth creation I hope.
Some of the Tory private business owners are farmers. Some farmers earn as little as £4K per annum from proper farm earnings but get more than £55K in grants and subsidies; are they private businesses and wealth creators, or benefit scroungers?
Arriva Cymru is a Welsh company that makes a healthy £10 million pound per year profit, but it gets a £150 million grant from the Assembly every year. So the capitalist service that it provides actually makes a £140 million loss every year.
Arriva is given a £10 million pound bung every year for pretending that a nationalised industry is privately owned for the sake of political expediency! Sorry but that isn't capitalism!
"Putting words into your mouth", Tory?
ReplyDeletePerhaps you might not feel the need to read things twice, but if anybody else cares to read your orginal post again, they will see that you were emphasizing the importance of just one type of experience at the expense of all others.
I know this is not a welcome opinion, but my belief is that business and commerce, vital as it is, makes up just one part of society. When everything in society is subordinated to the demands of commerce then you are not going to have a society where people look after each other and live balanced lives. There is nothing inherently wrong with a mixed economy in which both the state and market are in partnership.
ReplyDeleteThe majority of Welsh workers are wealth creators- working in the private sector. The problem is that their wages are too low.
"Arriva is given a £10 million pound bung every year for pretending that a nationalised industry is privately owned for the sake of political expediency! Sorry but that isn't capitalism!"
Amen, Alwyn. Nationalise the risk and privatise the profits. That's the failed consensus.
I have no comment to make on the talent pool of Western politicians.