WLGA Annual Conference Debates - 'Wales, the most politically unimportant part of the UK'
24 June 2011
WLGA Annual Conference 2011
Academic experts and think-tank organisations have debated the political importance of Wales in the UK context and the role public services have to play.
Panel representatives included Visiting Professor Gerald Holtham and Professor George Boyne from Cardiff Business School, Institute of Welsh Affairs, Dr Eurfyl al Gwilym and Victoria Winkler, Director of the Bevan Foundation.
Debate highlights:
Visiting Professor Gerald Holtham
“The subject of today’s debate is actually my own quote played back to me. Whilst this comment was said with some flippancy there is some truth in it. My reasons for that are that we don’t have many MPs, we don’t have many marginal seats so we don’t swing governments and we don’t have many “threat” points compared to Scotland example. To further prove my point, if the English formula for funding public services was applied to Wales then Wales would get more, but there has been no reaction to this fact from the UK Government. Wales has also faded from the centre of UK politics in terms of personalities.”
“We must accept what we have got and do something about it not sit around and complain.”
Dr Eurfyl Ap Gwilym
He backed many of the points presented by Gerald Holtham, particularly the statistical evidence to support the case for why Wales is particularly unimportant in the UK context.
His presentation focussed on to whom are we important? He said “Wales is important to us – the people of Wales”
Professor George Boyne
Prof Boyne feels that the case has been made about Wales being unimportant but said that the critical issue is “ what can we do about it?”
He answered “create prosperity and create jobs. We need to think about the public sector in a different way. It can be strategically important. We should look at the public sector making a positive difference to growth if it’s directed at infrastructure and education. Wales could be role model.”
Director Victoria Winkler
“The May elections changed Wales from being the most unimportant to – potentially – being the most important part of the UK. Two years ago, the colour of the majority party in Wales’s government matched the colour of the UK Government – Now, all that has changed and Wales is the only part of the UK that now has a Labour government".
“Wales having the only Labour administration is hugely important, because the policies being pursued in Wales are now starkly different to those of the Westminster government. How Wales’s public services perform compared with those in England will not therefore just be a matter of interest to 5% of the UK’s population who receive them. the delivery of Wales’s services could well be of interest across the whole of the UK, because the comparison of Wales with England is essentially a real-life trial between two very different ideologies - between public sector-ism on the one hand, and private or third sector delivery on the other. We are living in an experiment.“
“The stakes are high. If public services here perform less well than in England, then UK parties – of all colours - are likely to conclude that the ‘Wales public sector model’ doesn’t work. Indeed if Welsh services are seen to have failed the era of public service itself could well be over. The private sector model will have been proven to be superior.”
On the other hand, if the approach in Wales is successful, with faster improvements in educational achievement than in England or shorter NHS waiting times, for example, then we might expect public sector services to enjoy a renaissance in political agendas. The ‘old’ model will have triumphed.
The spotlight then should be on how well Wales’s public services perform – or not – because what is in question is not the wellbeing of 3 million people on the western edge of Europe but the future shape of politics in the UK. Wales, without question, is therefore NOT the most politically unimportant part of the UK. “Its contribution in the development of 21st century politics could be as significant as its contribution in the last”.
End