Senedd Watch - May 2015

The Electoral Reform Society warned that Wales faced a “turnout time bomb” amongst under-25s due to falling interest in elections. They recommended reforms to how politics is taught in schools, and urgent legislation to extend the voting franchise to 16 year olds in time for the 2016 National Assembly election. It was confirmed...

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Pirate Party : Hoisting the Jolly Roger above Wales

Bridgend's voters were faced with a unique choice on May 7th. Maybe, in future, other Welsh voters will have the option too. (Pic : via Facebook) I doubt many people reading this will have heard of The Pirate Party. "Pirate politics" – the umbrella term used for such parties – is often hard to place on the traditional political...

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Bridge Over Troubled Water

While the Welsh Government and CBI have said the Newport M4 "Hart Bypass" will boost the economy, does the Port of Newport - which supports 3,000 jobs - stand to be one of the economic losers? (Pic : South Wales Argus) After Friends of the Earth Cymru's recent unsuccessful bid to stall the Newport M4 bypass, you would've...

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Hard Graphed

We're all familiar with the staple Lib Dem electoral tactic of using distorted graphs, but are some of our public bodies now starting to join in? (Pic : via Wikipedia) Yesterday, BBC Wales highlighted the findings of the latest Child Measurement Programme conducted by Public Health Wales (pdf). The programme weighs...

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Devolution : Last Stand of the Human Rights Act?

(Pic : via Flickr) One Conservative manifesto commitment prior to their election victory was the repeal of the Human Rights Act 1998 and its replacement with a "British Bill of Rights" - possibly including a subsequent full withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) if certain demands aren't met. The task...

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Environment Bill introduced

Carrier bags, greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity are amongst the areas targeted by a wide-ranging Environment Bill, which was introduced this week. Now that the election excitement is dying down, it's time to turn to more mundane matters.Hot on the heels of the Heritage Bill, Natural Resources Minister, Carl Sargeant...

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Westminster 2015 : The Post-Mortem

Why are we looking at five more Tory years when we could've had this? (Pic : Wales Online) In one final visit to the 2015 House of Commons election, it's worth looking in more detail at last Thursday's results in Wales - considering why it happened and what can be learned from it....

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Westminster 2015 : The Results

(Pic : Reuters via The Guardian) First thing's first - I can rip my crap predictions up. Predicting is a mug's game as the polling companies are finding out to their cost. As has been said elsewhere, it's the most surprising result in a UK election since 1992, even 194...

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Westminster 2015 : Predictions

Um.... Tonight's the night, so it's time for the real fun to begin.....

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New law to protect Welsh heritage sites

(Pic : castlewales.com) It seems like a while since the last one, but it's worth turning to the latest Bill which has been introduced to the National Assembly by Deputy Minister for Culture & Sport, Ken Skates (Lab, Clwyd South...

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Senedd/Election Watch - April 2015

Non-domestic rates (aka. business rates) were devolved to Wales on April 1st. Finance Minister, Jane Hutt (Lab, Vale of Glamorgan), said it provides “the opportunity to develop taxes that....reflect the needs, circumstances and priorities of the people of Wales." The National Assembly's Health & Social Care Committee sent...

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