29/03/2011

An interesting Conundrum for Labour in the North.

With the polls looking up for Labour, the chances of a Labour list seat in North Wales is zilch, nada, F*** all!

The only way that Labour can gain a list seat in the North is if the North West constituency vote collapses under a Tory landslide - that is not going to happen!.

Any Labour list vote is going to be a wasted vote, so how should Labour supporters in the north use their list vote?

I suspect that the vast majority will waste their second vote on Labour, without realising that they could actually make a difference if they think about their second vote.

Those who like the coalition between Plaid and Labour could make a difference by giving Plaid their second vote in order to ensure a bigger Plaid (and smaller Tory /Lib Dem) representation.

On the other hand Labour supporters who hate the Assembly might consider lending their second vote to anti Assembly UKIP!

Either way it makes more sense than wasting the list vote on Labour when the maths says that Labour can never, ever gain a list seat in the Northern region!

If I supported either UKIP or Plaid I would be making hay on the fact that a second vote for Labour is a wasted voet in all but the Mid Wales Region. Neither appears to be doing so - silly buggers!

25/03/2011

Ieuan says No to a 2011 Rainbow!

I notice a rather intriguing coincidence about Royal events affecting Assembly elections. This year the Royal Story that threatens to overshadow coverage of the election is the April Wedding of Wills and Kate. In April 2007 the Royal story that knocked the election off the front page of the Western Mail was Wills and Kate splitting up.

See what a difference that just one term of a Plaid lead one Wales Government can achieve! Love restored, harmony and reconciliation abound and a happy ending to a Fairy story.

This reconciliation was, of course, one of Plaid's main manifesto policies in 2007 (see page 244) and proves what a Plaid driven Welsh Government can achieve; which is why Plaid is fighting the next Assembly Election under the slogan We are the best lap dogs for Labour.

16/03/2011

50,000 New Welsh Jobs. What a Stupid Idea!

In a speech in Cardiff yesterday Ieuan Wyn Jones outlined plans to raise money that could be used to fund 50,000 new jobs in Wales over the next 4 years. Given the high levels of unemployment in Wales and the need to reinvigorate the Welsh economy, one would have thought that such a scheme would be welcomed by all. The only grounds that I can think of for opposing plans for such a massive and much needed jobs boost would be if opponents could come up with a better scheme for creating even more jobs.

Unfortunately all the other three parties' responses to the plans were of the typically childish, name calling, negative type which we have come to expect from those quarters.

Liberal Democrat AM Jenny Randerson said: This is a typical Plaid Cymru pie in the sky policy.

Nick Bourn, the Leader of the Conservatives thinks that the plan is irrelevant.

And Labour's Owen Smith MP dismisses the plan with the rather odd comment if a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

All of which sound to me like dismissing a policy just because another party thought of it first; dismissing the possibility of job creation and economic revival for petty party reasons.

If 50,000 new jobs and economic revival are seen as pie in the sky; irrelevant or too good to be true by the other parties – why on earth should anybody vote for them?

I would have hoped that Welsh Labour, the Welsh Conservatives and the Welsh Liberal Democrats had greater aspirations for Wales than to dismiss plans to increase employment and kick start our economy in negative sound bites!


Wales deserves better.

15/03/2011

Deus Samolidi ex Machina?

This is the first PPB offered by the SNP for the May 5th elections:




I am not impresed, it reminds me of the Deus ex Machina of ancient Greek and Latin drama, a good story with a bad ending, where a god in the machine comes down to say it all ended happily ever after! Ych a fi. I hope that the SNP has better to offer than Salmond as the god in the Machine of Scots politics!

Having said that, where are the Welsh PPB's from all parties?

Time is short. There are votes to be won. But with only a few weeks to go the election campaign seems to be a non starter at the moment.

Time to pull the finger out?

05/03/2011

Gracious in defeat

As the only person to apply for lead campaign status for the NO campaign, I am disgusted that Rachel Banner was invited to give a post result speech in the Senedd but that I wasn't even invited to the count.

Had I had the invite this is what I would have said in my "response to the result speech":
I give the Yes campaign hearty congratulations on a tremendous victory. I was, honestly shocked by the fact that the Yes victory was so decisive; I didn't expect the result to be so clear cut. The results in Flintshire, in Denbighshire, in Powys and even in Monmouthshire (where 321 voters who forgot to vote yes are kicking themselves today) bowled me over. It was beyond my wildest expectations.

I should also like to thank the quarter of a million people who voted in support of my No! It's not good enough! campaign. I knew that many thought that the referendum question was the wrong one; that it didn't offer equality with the Scottish Parliament or the Northern Ireland Assembly; but I hadn't expected as many as a quarter of a million people to agree with me in the ballot box.

I empathise with the 65% of the electorate who chose not to vote because what was being offered was so insignificant that it wasn't worth voting for. I give them my 100% assurance that the campaign starts now to ensure that the next referendum (in 2012, if not sooner) will offer them an option that is well worth going out to vote Yes for!

04/03/2011

Wales says Yes

With four results still to declare Wales has said Yes, the result in the Rhondda having just taken the Yes vote over the 402,594 threshold needed to win.

01/03/2011

A Poll and a Pinch of Salt

The results of the recent ITV YouGov poll were published on S4C's Y Byd ar Bedwar tonight. The opinion poll suggests that 67% of us will vote yes and 33% will vote no; this seems over optimistic to me; I would have expected the vote to be much, much closer.

Even odder is the poll's suggestion that turn out will be a whopping 56%!

I tend to agree with Jac of the North's assessment of the campaign so far:
"Rugby players say Yes', Business says Yes', 'Man at bus stop says "what referendum?"'

I haven't seen any enthusiasm for either side's argument, the vast majority of my friends and acquaintances either don't know or don't care about the issue.

OK YouGov have done a scientific poll, I have just heard what the people in the shop and the pub have said, but my expectation is that turnout will be about 30% and that the split will be about 51% 49%, but I wouldn't want to commit to which side will win which percentage.

I hope that YouGov is right and that I'm wrong but if I was in charge of either side I would neither rest on my laurels or throw in the towel based on what appears to me to be a rather iffy poll finding.