I AM INDEBTED TO ‘STAN’ OF THE NEATH FERRET FOR HELP IN WRITING THIS PIECE
The name Malik will be familiar to regular readers of this blog if only because of Naz Malik, former boss of race relations charity and Labour agitprop outfit the All Wales Ethnic Minority Association (AWEMA). I have written about Naz Malik more than once, so to refresh your memories you might care to work back from this post of September 8th, 2014, published shortly after the end of Malik’s trial.
One of the major issues exposed by the AWEMA scandal was that of nepotism, though of course this is no crime. Indeed, it’s the cornerstone of the family business; but beyond that sphere the favouring of relatives will be judged on the company’s performance, and investors or shareholders will demand changes in the management if it is felt that nepotism is responsible for declining performance and falling profits. Yet in a publicly-funded body, where the money just keeps rolling in, and with no criteria by which to judge performance, it becomes almost inevitable that nepotism will flourish unchecked.
Nepotism goes some way to explaining what went wrong with AWEMA. At CEO was Naz Malik; then there was daughter Tegwen, whose salary shot up from £20,469 in January 2008 to £50,052 in August 2011 for no apparent reason; while another who worked for AWEMA was Naz Malik’s daughter-in-law Ourania Chatsiou who, along with her sister-in-law, was, bizarrely, among the creditors when the funding plug was pulled early in 2012. Though the major creditor, the ‘Welsh’ Government, recently wrote off most of the £300,000 it was still owed by AWEMA. Naz Malik’s wife, Bronwen, and son, Gwion Iqbal, were also involved with AWEMA, as ‘volunteers’.
Another thread in the AWEMA saga is the Malik family links to the Labour Party. The patriarch himself had entertained hopes of standing for the party, and could be relied on to use the public profile he’d gained from Labour-funded AWEMA to regularly attack ‘racist’ Welsh nationalists. The aforementioned scion of the House, Gwion Iqbal, stood for the party in the elections to the Notional Assembly of 2011. (There used to be a photo available on the internet of Gwion Iqbal canvassing with First Minister Carwyn Jones, but unsurprisingly it seems to have disappeared.)
Something else that always troubled me about AWEMA was the bland statement made on the Charity Commission website that, in addition to operating in Wales, AWEMA had a presence in Kenya and Pakistan! Remember, we were dealing here with EU and UK money allocated to Wales, and yet no one thought to question why AWEMA claimed to be using that money overseas. One answer of course is that Naz Malik had been born in Nairobi to parents of Pakistani, or pre-Partition Indian, heritage. As had Naz Malik’s sister, Fahro. Or rather, that explains the family’s background; while the lack of concern in official quarters can probably be explained by the Labour Party connection.
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I first became aware of Fahro Malik when I saw a link to a charity called Lynk Reach Ltd (Charity No: 1104188) on the AWEMA website. (Lynk Reach Ltd was removed from the Charity Commission Register on January 14th this year.) Its charitable objective was “To advance the education of children and young people 0 – 25 (sic), primarily but not exclusively in London”. There was also a company called Lynk Reach Ltd (Company No: 04678217) Incorporated on the 25th of February 2003. Strangely, Fahro Malik seems not to have been a director of this company, though among the founders was an Anthony Malcolm Finch, a headmaster, who was Fahro Malik’s husband. Finch wrote an internet restaurant guide and died suddenly in February 2007. Someone who joined the company later was Zoe Samia Malik-Kemp. Lynk Reach Ltd is now dissolved.
A connected company was Lynk Ray Ltd (Company No: 04261595) which pre-dates Lynk Reach Ltd, having been Incorporated on July 30th 2001. The founding directors were Anthony Malcolm Finch and Fahro Malik. This company is also dissolved. Finally, we have Lynk Write Ltd, Incorporated June 19th 2003 (Company No: 04804457). The only two directors were Fahro Malik and Anthony Malcolm Finch. This company is also dissolved. The most recent mention I can find for Fahro Malik is on the London Writers’ Café website, from where the photograph comes.
Fahro Malik has escaped the notoriety of brother Naz and the Swansea branch of the clan, but still leaves behind a failed charity and dissolved companies owing money to some poor bugger. Fahro may also regret involving her other brother, Munir, with Lynk Ray Ltd as a director and company secretary from August 3rd, 2007 until the company dissolved, probably towards the end of June, 2013. That’s right, another brother, of whose existence I was unaware until it was brought to my attention by Stan of Neath Ferret. So what’s Munir’s story?
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Munir Malik is another Labour Party stalwart, and has served a couple of non-consecutive terms as a councillor in Bexley, south east London . . . though since his brush with fame he has been deselected from his Thamesmead East ward. To explain . . .
In addition to the Labour Party, for which he also stood as a candidate in the London region Euro elections of 1999 and 2004, Munir Malik was involved with the Co-op Group, serving as a regional representative before being elevated to the National Board. His wife, Kathryn Smith, another Labour councillor in Bexley, was herself on the National Board of the Co-op Group from 1997 to 2008 and on the Board of the Co-op Bank from 2001 to 2009, where she worked with Paul Flowers, the drug-taking Methodist minister and former Co-op Bank chairman. (Also known as ‘the Crystal Methodist’.) Kathryn Smith left the Co-op Bank in 2009 to stand as Labour & Co-operative candidate for Gravesham in the 2010 General Election. A seat that the Tories had won in 2005 by just 654 votes became a safe Tory seat in 2010, with a majority of 9,312. Labour’s loss of votes may have been connected with Smith being done for drunk driving just days before the poll.
Misfortune continued to dog the Malik-Smith household when Munir Malik was forced to resign from the Co-operative Group Board for telling fibs about his qualifications. To be specific, when running for election to the Board he claimed to be a chartered accountant . . . ‘Oh no he’s not!’ said the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, ‘and only members of the ICAEW are allowed to call themselves chartered accountants’. Munir sought to explain away this little inconsistency by arguing that what he meant to say was that he had been a chartered accountant . . . until he was struck off for bankruptcy in 1991, and had simply forgotten to prefix his qualification with ‘former’. Something of a habit, apparently, for the ICAEW claimed to have previously warned him to stop claiming to be a chartered accountant. Though Malik countered with: “All my working life has been spent as a former chartered accountant”. Um, yes . . . exactly!
All so predictable, and familiar, for as this Daily Mail piece on the Malik / Flowers fiasco puts it, “Malik belongs to what one insider described as a closed group who have come to dominate the Co-op despite its democratic structure of elected boards” and later, “Former City Minister Lord Myners was appointed to assess the Co-op Group’s system of elections and appointments. He resigned last week in the face of bitter resistance from board members but plans to complete his review”. Sound familiar? Of course it does, for this is another dysfunctional and undemocratic element of the great ‘Labour Movement’, another that preaches democracy but has never seen any need to practice it, especially for its internal procedures. We could be talking here about ‘Welsh’ Labour . . . and we soon will be!
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So where are they now? Well, it seems that the Malik womenfolk have retreated to academia and scholarly pursuits. Fahro Malik, as she told the London Writers’ Café website, is probably researching the family’s journey from the Punjab village of Rohtas via Kenya to Wales and England. Tegwen Malik, Naz’s daughter, is carrying out research in biomimetics (don’t ask me!) at Swansea University, while Naz’s daughter-in-law, Ourania Chatsiou, is also at Swansea Uni, doing post-graduate work. Which serves to remind us, yet again, of the close links between the Labour Party and higher education in Wales, and the mutual back-scratching.
Some of you reading this may be ‘uncomfortable’ with the fact that so many of those dealt with belong to ethnic minorities. Get over it! I’m writing about the Maliks not because of their race, colour or religion but because a) they’ve done wrong, b) they all seem to have Labour Party connections, c) despite the shit they get themselves into, they seem to come up smelling of roses, which, d) allows me to expose, yet again, the squalid relationships between the Labour Party, the Third Sector, academe and other spheres of our national life.
So you mustn’t think that nepotism is confined to persons of Pakistani origin from East Africa, no, no, no, no, no. This is a Labour Party problem, something encountered wherever Labour has power and, more importantly, where Labour has control over funding. For we don’t need to leave Swansea Bay to find celebrated current examples of nepotism encouraged or condoned by ‘Welsh’ Labour where the principals are all of impeccably white and Christian backgrounds.
Let us return to Swansea University, and this time the School of Management. There, the Dean, one Nigel F. Piercy, has appointed his son Niall as Pro-Dean for Research, and his love interest, Nikala Lane, as a Reader in Marketing and Strategy. Partly as a result of this blatant nepotism, and partly by being a bit of an arsehole, Piercy has contrived to alienate just about everybody he is supposed to be working with. Yet his position seems secure.
From the Mumbles Road campus one can look across the bay to Port Talbot where, on May 7th, the electors of the Aberavon constituency will be expected to put on their blinkers, empty their minds, and troop like zombies into the polling stations, there they will grasp the stubby brown pencil on a string and come momentarily to life when they see on the ballot paper the magic name KINNOCK. Tears of gratitude will flow as they recall how young Stephen was not parachuted in – as malcontents allege – but walked all the way from his Copenhagen home to vie for the honour of representing Aberavon (‘it is Aberavon, is it?’) and was chosen only after an open and keenly-contested selection process that lasted months.
Because, boys and girls, that’s how the Labour Party operates, and don’t let anybody tell you different. The Labour Party is, to the best interests of Wales . . . what the Ku Klux Klan is to good race relations, what Japanese cuisine is to whales, what the conquistadors were to the civilisations of Mesoamerica, what the iceberg was to the Titanic, what the driving maul is to modern rugby, what the CIA is to privacy, what Rhyl is to Welsh cultural identity, what the Sinclair C5 was to motoring, what China is to Tibet . . . In short, a disaster.
Following on from yesterday’s spat in various junk media about Nazis in rural Wales, I noticed that your good friend Mr Shipton surfaced in support of the Plaid man and to give a mild bollocking to the Labour candidate, a Cardi currently serving as a councillor in Cardiff. First impressions suggest that your mate Martin possesses an open mind and is a stickler for fair play. However given our prior knowledge, it crosses my mind that the Labour man has “loser” written all over him and Shipton is delivering the party machine’s Sicilian kiss to the boy in advance of the electorate formally double tapping him on May 7th.
My initial interpretation was that Shipton is Labour and Labour wants Plaid rather than Lib Dems to win Ceredigion. I say that because every LD hold brings nearer another Tory-Lib Dem coalition, whereas of course Plaid is more likely to go into coalition with Labour.
Another interpretation is that this ‘Nazi’ fabrication by the Cambrian News (or someone) is – once examined – such utter bollocks that it is becoming more and more unsustainable by the hour, and Shipton is making himself look good by landing a punch on an opponent who’s increasingly groggy.
It’s only a matter of time before Hain has to apologise.
just seen the story about that Labour muppet standing in Ceredigion what a nine carat fruit cake ! Man must have been sniffing up both nostrils to draw attention to Parker knowing full well that his remarks were in an entirely different class of stupidity, especially as he has “matured” into an even bigger crock of shit ! Any trace of comments from Hain and Campbell ? Probably not.
If you’re going to attack a car you throw a brick through the windscreen, or you pour paint stripper over the bodywork, but Tippex! That is truly weird. I’d like to more about Huw Thomas . . . or maybe I wouldn’t.
This turned up on Llais y Sais today !
Would-be MP defends comments claiming English immigrants to rural Wales are racists ‘trying to get away from black people’ – Wales Online
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/would-be-mp-defends-comments-claiming-9000339
It relates to comments made by Plaid candidate M Parker way back in 2001, no doubt a wet attempt to make him look like a bit hostile to English ( he’s an Anglo himself ! ) However his views in 2001 were extremely healthy – observing that most white flight Anglos were Nazi/BNP racist shit bags imposing their dirty culture on Ceredigion ( and other parts of the West Coast )
Would be nice to see Plaid Cymru now publicly thank Llais Y Sais for digging up this gem and then to restate it as underpinning their policy on Anglo Migration for the next 10 years. Parker is welcome as he seems to have adjusted/adapted/integrated so serves as a good role model, but towns like Aber and Mach have huge numbers of drifters and colons who have no intention of fitting in, just imposing their sickening Anglo conurbation accents and values on the locals.
Exactly. The real issue is not what Mike Parker said back in 2001 but the problem of racist, white flight English. But Plaid Cymru won’t deal with this subject. Nor will the ‘Welsh’ media.
WalesOnline seems to be more excited by the fact that the local Labour candidate has unearthed this “gem” from his rival’s (very dim & distant) past ! And your old pals on the West caost seem to have got in on it by quoting in the present tense something what ‘appened years ago !
http://www.golwg360.com/newyddion/gwleidyddiaeth/182809-mike-parker-a-nazis-ceredigion
Mike Parker a ‘Nazis’ Ceredigion – Newyddion – Golwg360. Cambrian News front page reproduced by Golwg.
Bloody pathetic, but so too are Plaid with their feeble “inclusive” bullshit when a robust statement defending the content of the original stance would have been far better. There is nothing wrong in highlighting the damage done by the Anglo Brit mewnlyfiad despite the presence of apologists and deniers in every walk of Welsh life. I have sent the Plaid H.Q a note stating my views, which will probably get ignored as I didn’t send it in English explaining that I am a lentil scoffing, tree hugging Anglo who desparately wants to be part of this great inclusive adventure that they have cobbled together to please any kind of wandering leftie without a political home to go to.
Jac your right on short of candidates, apart from the ones already mentioned by Stan there are two mother and son combinations on NPT, Marian Lewis and her son Ceri, Lella James and Ian.
In the recent past, Olga Jones and son in law Len, Arthur Davies and his daughter in law, not forgetting the Crowley family, former leader Noel, his brother Colin, and now Colins son Mathew.
Stan this is an excellent piece you wrote with Jac, but as a ferret, even a new one, you may have to crawl through the rotten and dirty boroughs, to be a top one.
Score is NINE to TWO. You lose “Gleep Bleep”!
For mystified readers – these figures are for SWANSEA Councillor couples only.
Nine Labour couples = eighteen Swansea Labour Councillors – over the past fifteen years of couples on this family orientated Council.
There are twenty two Unitary Councils in Wales can any one of the other twenty one beat this family affair?
I know we’ve got two couples on our (Neath Port Talbot) Council. A Harry and Paula, and a John and Sandra. You won’t be surprised that both are Welsh Labour. Historically on NPT I can’t help you. Maybe someone else can. I’m a newcomer to this game and only started playing a couple of years back when I fell off my rocking chair in shock when I read what my MP was claiming. I do know that couples turn up in quite a few other Councils as well, and the ones I’ve spotted are Welsh Labour too. Swansea seems particularly well blessed with keeping it in the family though.
It’s difficult to know how to interpret the number of couples in the Labour Party in Swansea. Is the Labour Party the route to connubial bliss, or is the party so short on candidates that it becomes a case of, ‘Your missus / hubby wouldn’t fancy standing, would she / he?’
GLEEP BLEEP, Claire Waller was absolutely no relative whatsoever of Sue Waller – that is a FACT – it was pure name coincidence. You should publicly apologise to both – Sue especially!
Score is NINE to TWO. You lose!
We all can quote at least nine Labour family dynasties like husbands and wives / partners to the Lib Dems two:- Tom & Doreen and June & Geoff and David & Sybil and the Seabournes and the Stuckeys and Derek R & Partner and David & Beverley and Bob & Uta and Roger & Paulette. You are “gleeping” off track – sidetracking from Jac o’ the North’s brilliant BLOG above about Labour and the Maliks above. What have you really got to say about the article posting above not the comments about comments?
Since when did married couples constitute a ‘dynasty’?
I am responding to your comments and if you go off at a tangent, that’s not my fault. Do you honestly think that you can post off-subject comments without others responding? Your failure to answer questions is noted.
Fantasy score in a non-existent game?
I stated my opinion about AWEMA in an earlier post on this blog.
Daley Gleephart (aka Daily Telegraph – Swansea Labour Party clone), I am grossly indebted to you for providing the link here (and above) http://www.swansea.gov.uk/article/2690/Local-government-elections which returns us to the main plank of Jac o’ the North’s Posting here – the Maliks and Labour. Your kind insertion of this link reminds us that your Labour Party selected a loser candidate in the Swansea general County Council election for Uplands Ward in year 2004 where GWION IQBAL MALIK stood for Labour and lost dismally with only 710 votes to four winning Lib Dems who averaged over 1270 votes each. This is further proof of how tied up the Maliks were / are with you and your Labour Swansea / Wales Party. Where is Iqbal now? Gleephart (aka Telegraph – pathetic user of an old Anagram) it’s time you curled up and slept with your pussy cat.
Dear, oh dear. The masked man spits bile.
Do you think that members of Labour in Swansea, Uplands had any reason not to select Gwion Iqbal Malik in 2004? If so, what reasons were there?
I notice that you haven’t commented on William Keith Morgan deserting Plaid Cymru and joining the Lib Dems.
If you’re against members of families getting involved in politics, why aren’t you raging about the daughters of Chris Holley and Sue Waller and the son of Richard ‘pick a party: any party’ Lewis?
For those unfamiliar with the Swansea area. Uplands is a Ward that has 4 Council seats. 1270 is 11.5% of the electorate.
The issue with the Maliks never was a simple one of children following parents into politics. The issue was the ‘family business’ AWEMA being funded by the party to which the Maliks belonged, which resulted in Labour-funded nepotism and other offences.
The masked man doesn’t see it that way.
Green Dragon you ask:- “But how plaid subsequently contrived to quickly lose every seat it had in swansea is something we havent quite been able to fathom?” (your words).
The answers are simple:- (1) Plaid pushed out its popular Leader KM at Cockett Ward to impose Price who lived out of County as Leader. He became a poodle to the Labour Group and the Tories in their unofficial PLC Coalition; (2) They had one member from Brynmill Ward at Cockett Ward; (3) Another Plaid Member for Cockett Ward was a Sketty Telephonist; (4) Dai Lloyd deserted his Council seat and had never tried to work with any other Councillors of any other party and always seemed to be in a silent rage and there was another member so insignificant he is not even remembered for anything not even his name. In the 2008 General Council Election Price spent lots of valuable Electioneering time in another Ward with an unpopular Candidate Plaid loser trying to unsuccessfully oust a winning Independent. By June 2008 Plaid was totally eliminated from Swansea Council and from the political scene locally. Former local people like John Ball & Matthew Mulcahy & Aled Gwyn & Abiah Roderick & Teulu Harris & Raymond Davies & Roy Jones were winners because the lived in their Wards and worked hard at being stalwart Ward Councillors. The days of such successful Plaid Councillors are gone, as now Leanne Wood contrives to mix Pink Welsh Red with English Pale Green to create a yucky sort of unpalatable brown.
Thanks for that – and your last sentence paints a horrific mental picture – I can’t face food now !
“Today’s so-called socialists are generally a bunch of greedy grant and hand out guzzlers,who support Welsh Labour because they know that Labour will never switch off the cash flow regardless of merit, or lack of” writes Dafis, and unfortunately that’s probably a fair description of the dodgy relationship which exists between welsh labour and elements in the welsh third sector. Jac has highlighted this dodgy relationship a number of times before of course – as he does in this post – and the recent shenanigans that went on with regards to the ‘domestic violence’ bill in the senedd are perhaps deserving of mention in this regard too ( a matter covered very well by owen at http://www.oggybloggyogwr.com/2015/03/third-sector-bullying-criticised-by-ams.html )
No need to get your blood pressure up by the way Dafis, we’ve no reason to believe that portraits of milton friedman adorn your dining room wall or that ‘The road to Serfdom’ is among your regular choice of reading materials.
Youre obviously much better informed about events in swansea council than we are kevin, but we cant help feel youre being very harsh on Dai Lloyd there. It needs to be remembered that plaid had disappeared in swansea until Dai Lloyd started campaigning there in the 1990s, and within a couple of years of his election he was joined on swansea council by other plaid colleagues.
But how plaid subsequently contrived to quickly lose every seat it had in swansea is something we havent quite been able to fathom? Anymore than we can fathom how Dai found himself second on plaid’s regional list for the 2011 elections to the senedd? (and which would ultimately cost him his senedd seat of course).
City & County of Swansea Election Results 2004, 2008, 2012
http://www.swansea.gov.uk/article/2690/Local-government-elections
Note how William Keith Morgan (Plaid Cymru) wins a Cockett seat in 2004.
Note how William Keith Morgan (Lib Dem) wins a Cockett seat in 2008 along with 3 other Lib Dems.
Note how William Keith Morgan (Lib Dem) loses his Cockett seat in 2012 as do the other 3 Lib Dems.
Note Dai Lloyd (Plaid Cymru) gets 5th place in Cockett in 2012 ahead of the Lib Dems.
I like the quip ……….get your blood pressure up by the way Dafis, we’ve no reason to believe that portraits of milton friedman adorn your dining room wall or that ‘The road to Serfdom’ is among your regular choice of reading materials.”
Not any more ! Don’t remember what MF looked like, but we were fed a diet of assorted “schools” of economic theory by well meaning Economics tutors and even got as far as comparing and contrasting. However they didn’t like it much when one offered up comment like “this is all abstract shit …..and the empirical support is drawn from an era that no longer relates well to our present condition, particularly the political culture and climate”, or words to that effect ! But there again those teachers were themselves part of the overarching scheme to get us to swallow conventional bullshit and not depart too far from the prescribed orthodoxy. Well I’m glad to report that it failed a bit in my case !
Daley Gleephart (aka Daily Telegraph) has time to write to many, many Blogs so he cannot be a busy serving Swansea Councillor. He refers to “Private Eye” which did dedicate a prize to one former Swansea Councillor with the national UK Award for being the”UK Pornographer of the Year”, Daley Gleephart in his other postings elsewhere seems to hold cats with affection and knows a bit about Gonzo Journalism. This brings two EX Swansea Councillors to mind, but it could be anyone. This needs closer examination and analysis for rational debate.
Green Dragon – not much point in smelling coffee if there’s no cake available despite numerous plans for sharing it ! Like – there’s your share but the plate is empty, so we’ll all have a millionth part of nothing.
Seriously though you are far to quick to jump in with the stock “Right Wing” denigration of anything that doesn’t conform with your dogma. As you are well aware most of the right wingers residing in Wales are to be found among the ranks of the Tories, LibDems, WelshLabour and UKIP who all tend to represent the traditional Anglo Brit supremacist “institutionally orientated” standpoint. Which is why we are in our present predicament. Add to that ripe mix the “pseudo Left”, including the modern Fascistic “we know best, thought police” within which cluster I would include many of the Green tendency and other white settler types that have drifted into our communities in ever increasing numbers. These folks tend to be very aware of rights but will nevertheless steadfastly ignore the native language and culture – odd or what ?. Indeed their actions, deliberately or otherwise, are generally harmful. Today’s so-called Left is an insult to the generations that worked really hard to foster a sense of community, real socialism meeting needs through mutual support. Today’s so-called socialists are generally a bunch of greedy grant and hand out guzzlers,who support Welsh Labour because they know that Labour will never switch off the cash flow regardless of merit, or lack of. So the traditional political spectrum is akin to a stick with 2 shitty ends.
Now if you wish to label as “Right Wing” those of us that are prepared to resist the influences of the traditional Anglo Brit establishments and this newer wave of damaging incomers then so be it. But be assured we do not pine for any Chicago school , or any other loopy Anglo American economic theory to rebuild our nation’s future. Much of the damage done to us in the last 40 years stems from some crackpot theories embraced willingly by the fashionable metropolitan elites and their accomplices, passed down from London to servants in Cardiff and elsewhere who have been far too anxious to uncritically adopt the posture that the latest fad and theory demanded.
I accept that the Green agenda offers some contribution to the recovery of this nation’s ability to thrive and prosper, but it is not the desired outcome of itself. It is via its coherent application as a part of a set of tools that we end up with a winning strategy, not by giving it, or any other single body of thought, the singular pedestal upon which you seem to place it.
Green Dragon – you have got it all totally wrong about Plaid Cymru Councillors on Swansea Council. Eleven years ago at the start of Cllr Holley’s eight year Administration, Plaid Cymru was asked to join the Lib Dems and Independents. They REFUSED saying they were going to take every issue as it arose. They could have had influence but the flunked it. Later on into the eight year Administration, Darren Price took Plaid Cymru together with Rene Kinzett and the Tories into unofficial Coalition with Labour. Price and Kinzett sat with Labour Leader Phillips and always voted together in what was called the unofficial PLC COALITION.. They then helped Labour to unseat all the lib Dem and Independent Chairs and Vice Chairs. They then took these positions themselves together with Labour and then pocketed the extra allowances. The only thing they could not take off Holley was the Cabinet due to constitutional rules. This seriously affected the way the Council was run – with Price and Kinzett with Phillips disrupting most progress. Now Price and Kinzett have deserted Swansea and Labour themselves have made Phillips a total yesterday man. Under Darren Price Plaid Cymru was destroyed of all credibility in Swansea. When Dai Lloyd was on Swansea Council he made a pathetic lonely angry little figure – making no friends or allies – he would not even share a Coffee or conversation in the Members’ Room. So much for a Doctor’s Bedside manner! Another point to make is – it seems apparent that Bethan Jenkins AM has never been seen in any events in Swansea. Green Dragon you cannot make up history. Green Dragon you are totally and absolutely wrong above.
It will be interesting to see who if anybody asks Leanne Wood’s rump group in Westminster to join a mish-mash coalition. If they are asked who will they join? Maybe they will just be ignored as insignificant!
That email, from an Independent Councillor, outlining a cunning plan for keeping Special Allowances was an embarrassment wasn’t it? Got a slot in ‘Private Eye’.
P.S. apologies there to Kevin for getting mixed up and replying using his surname and not his christian name.
Hint: Cefn Bryn is a hill in the Gower peninsula.
Also, there was an Independent Councillor, not part of the so-called ‘Independents @ Swansea’, who backed the Holley Wally Lib Dems. What a shower!
“However Plaid, and particularly its leadership ( not just Ms Wood) ,seem hell bent on this pseudo Leftie posture that does it no good at all” writes Dafis. Well that’s not how a lot of people seem to be viewing things after Leanne’s performance during the leaders debates last night. http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/plaid-leanne-debate-farage-hiv-8975174
When will these right wingers in Wales wake up and ‘smell the coffee’? Wales is a left leaning country – always has been and always will be. And those correspondents seemingly pining for a chicago boys type ‘shock doctrine’ to be inflicted on the Welsh economy are thankfully doomed to perennial disappointment. That is exactley what Thatcher tried in the 1980s – and she’s forever hated in Wales as a result.
Bryn youve got it wrong about Plaid Cymru in swansea – they didnt bolster either labour or the tories, but they did join a broad coalition with the lib dems and the independents. Something they now accept was a mistake and are unlikely to repeat again. And while you seem to dismiss the Greens dont forget they’ve been arguing in favour of a tidal lagoon in swansea bay – and for other parts of Wales too – for the last decade.
Wales may be a left-leaning country, that’s the problem.
wrong there Jac. There is a majority in Wales who will lean on anything – Labour, EU, Whitehall/London, even lamposts – if they think that it will generate a handout, benefit, grant etc. Dependency culture is not Left, not socialism, but a condition that is a woeful mix of self inflicted and external influences. Most of those influences are well documented on this site, some even turn up here and engage in dialogue.
G.D says Wales is left leaning, which again suits the type of rhetoric pushed by the Green cluster. However you don’t have to look too deeply to turn up some right beauties – Eco Fascists, part of the Green cluster who would dearly love to order everything that you do through your life cycle. Shades of that other “green” in a brown shirt, no polyester fleeces in those days. Maybe he can’t tell his left from right, ambidextrous, ‘armless ?
May I point out that while Companies House in Cardiff and the DVLA in Swansea, the two largest ‘public sector’ employers in Wales, neither consume taxpayers money. Both are self financing. In both cases, all costs of their activities are covered by fees paid by their customers.
Wales in micro:- I am told that it is Gateshead (never been there) that has the highest percentage of Public Sector workers in the UK I am further told that Swansea, Wales’ second city, has the second highest percentage of Public Sector workers in the UK. This could have been good years ago, as it was a sign of past success by drawing in huge numbers of decent jobs like the DVLA (Vehicle Licensing Centre for UK); two big Universities; a National Museum; the Wales Land Registry; two big Regional (not local) Hospitals; a National Literature Centre; a Divisional Police Station. People really do like coming to Swansea – Wales’ Premier League city. However, when Wales and the UK suffer public spending cuts it really hits Swansea hard. Swansea is run by a Labour Party only interested in its Party and not the people. The Lib Dems in Swansea are left stranded by Clegg. Plaid Cymru virtually deserted Swansea about ten years ago. So what hope for Swansea? Well for starters, the Swansea Labour Party now has better Leadership, away from Scousers and Students. If only the Lib Dems in Swansea could reform themselves as Welsh Liberals and breakaway from the collapsing yoke of the Clegg factor.
Swansea will have two new MPs in a few weeks. Let’s hope that whoever they are, that they fight for Swansea and not just surround themselves with paid “aides and joking researchers”” from their own families. As for Plaid Cymru – are there any of you out there capable of helping to run Swansea, unlike the last group of your Councillors who only sidled up with the Tories and Labour for their own personal benefit and then got kicked out and ran away into oblivion. Then there is UKIP and the Greens – well they don’t fit into anything of Swansea’s future.
Terry Matthews will be wise to pick a new team now and not keep the same stale old lot. Swansea Bay could rise again as a premier city based vision region.
Is Dafis serious above? Or more to the point is Plaid Cymru losing the plot by cuddling up to the Green Settlers?
The majority of people in Wales and the UK are well into recycling, which is highly commendable. Now Plaid Cymru has seemingly come out with a priority policy of “reuse” whatever this is. Recently I took some of my old clothes to a recycling bin. My wife said that even a desperate Tramp would not reuse and wear my old pants, but I said they could be shredded and recycled as insulation material as they had kept my private parts warm for years. Well you all know what hangs down as private parts inside a male pensioner’s pants. Well that’s what Leanne Wood talks most of the time – “a lot of old XXXXXXXX”. Plaid Cymru is just keen to be sen to be green to attract the newcomer voters who are disillusioned with mainstream politics in the places from where they escaped. This all fell apart in West Wales years ago when people voted for Cyfog Dafis on a pale Plaid Green bile ticket. Please Plaid Cymru have some dignity for your noble predecessors. Go down fighting, not squirming green garbage with those who have no concept of our past nor wish to build our future.
like I said KB : ……Time to shift away from out flanking the Greens and others on the Left and confronting real issues of national recovery.
When commenting elsewhere I have proposed that : ….”Ms Wood would do well to focus on creating a bit more “cake” before dwelling at length on how it is to be shared. Right now Wales is far too dependent on public sector driven activity, and there is no evidence to date that Plaid has any real grasp of how to shift that balance. Indeed their anxiety to out do the Greens and Labour to grab pole position on the Left is a source of concern when it comes to articulating a credible business led agenda for recovery. To date there has been far too much carping about money from London, Barnett and other assorted “begging bowl” related issues……….
I don’t wish to go on & on as this is a theme that I and many others have visited here and elsewhere on many occasions. However Plaid, and particularly its leadership ( not just Ms Wood) ,seem hell bent on this pseudo Leftie posture that does it no good at all
Anybody thought of writing an altrernative nationalist maniffesto? Maybe Plaid Glyndwr?
Just found this on Google news
http://www.rebnews.com/news/resource_efficiency/plaid_cymru_prioritises_reuse_recycling_its_general_election_manifesto.html
very laudable but hardly the main priority of the moment. Time to shift away from out flanking the Greens and others on the Left and confronting real issues of national recovery.
Love it!
Jac has once again written an excellent piece. I am grateful to him for the credits he has given me on it, but to be honest all I had found was the Munir Malik “lynk” to the others, and the Munir (and family) related stories. I strongly suspected he was Naz’s brother but it was Jac who clinched it and made it into the informative and entertaining piece we have in front of us.
And to think Jac’s bete noire was only recently awarded the Wales Media Award 2015 for Political Journalist of the Year. Yes, Martin Shipton picked up that award just this month, with Llais y Sais getting the accolade of Daily Newspaper of the Year, Wales Online winning News Website of the Year. I haven’t been able to confirm if Phil Parry or indeed the whole of the Three Shitstirrers were on the judging panel but whoever it was obviously doesn’t know “Jac Shit” (sorry – couldn’t resist it)about what makes a good political piece. Groucho Marx is supposed to have said “I don’t care to belong to any club that will have me as a member”, and I suspect that might be Jac’s response to these somewhat dubious honours picked up by Shipton and his buddies.
Excellent piece, you could have also looked up the Neath valley ,where Rons ex is standing, to follow that hard act.
I guarantee she wouldn’t be standing if she hadn’t left him and denounced him to the politburo.
The candidate was selected from others at a meeting of local Labour Party members using the Instant-Runoff Voting (IRV) system. A secret ballot with scrutinisers observing the count.
‘politburo’ /roar/
Was there anyone there who wasn’t a Labour Party member?
This is probably a cheek on your site, Jac but an article about the three Amazon warriors shortlisted for the Neath job is linked to here if anyone is interested. On balance Christina Rees was my preferred candidate being seemingly the only one who had done a proper day’s work once in her life. I didn’t get a vote though, you’ll not be surprised.
http://www.spanglefish.com/stan/news.asp?intent=viewstory&newsid=66008
Is there a political party that allows non-members the opportunity to participate in the selection of its candidates?
I meant independent scrutiny. And anyway, as us men of the world know, shortlists can be pre-configured as to leave only one real choice. And if that ain’t enough, then a bit of arm-twisting in favour of the preferred option and whispering against the others usually does the trick.
The candidates are present at the count and beforehand they have to address the members and answer questions. All candidates are given the same questions and no follow up questions from the floor are allowed. The candidates do not get to see or hear each others presentations. If a candidate does badly, the collective mood in the hall is almost tangible.
“If a candidate does badly, the collective mood in the hall is almost tangible” For that sentence to work “the collective mood” needs an adjective. Even so, you make a Labour selection meeting sound almost interesting. You should try your hand at fiction, something like Labour Party manifestos.
Daley has convinced me it is a completely transparent and even handed process. So much so I’m leaving my false teeth under the pillow tonight so the Tooth Fairy can leave me a few quid.
Must have changed totally then. Hain’s selection as a candidate was accompanied by messages from Kinnock’s office that he was “a friend”. And at the vote itself rehearsed questions were put to Hain by his sycophants to put him in a good light and curveball questions thrown at the next most likely to win by Hain’s own “talisman” Howard Davies, who became his agent. Don’t take my word for it. Hain himself says so in his book Outside In.
There are always a hundred ways to skin a cat no matter what process of “selection” is adopted.
Emotional aperture.
‘Tories question Labour Wales links to Awema charity’s boss’ – BBC News (Wales) 3 February 2012 Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-16881762
Labour (Wales) response “Andrew RT Davies’s attempt to muddy the waters with smear and innuendo should be viewed for what it clearly is – grubby politicking motivated by nothing more than a desire for a quick headline.”
Read back, see how many warnings were issued about Malik and AWEMA, and they were all ignored. Either the Labour Party in the Assembly is running the most inefficient regime I’ve ever come across, or they were turning a blind eye because of the Malik family’s links to the party and the potential for embarrassment. Many, many warnings, yet Malik fil is still a candidate in 2011. There’s only one interpretation.
A massive fur cup http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Wales_Ethnic_Minority_Association and one of many that have occurred in British politics.
Brilliant piece of writing. Credits to Stan and Jac. One piece unrelated – that needs explaining – you say that Munir Malik claimed wrongly to be a Chartered Account. This is disturbing however unless such false claims are made to make gains (which seems to be obvious in this case) they are not illegal if just claimed as a false title for eccentric prestige. Readers need to GOOGLE – Colonel Sir Arthur Edwin Turner-Thomas, VC, GC. Dist Service Medal & Knight of the Garter etc – yet he is none of these – he even uses a famous painting of Owain Glyndwr on his web site (without crediting the genuine artist Aneurin Jones!). His crony is Dr Myron Evans (Google Crackpotwatch) who claims to be everything in the scientific world including a bogus current Professor title. There is abundance of these cranks and none get charged with use of false titles – even abuse of falsely claiming a Victoria Cross and not even having served in the Boy Scouts!
But it is explained. Munir Malik claimed to be a chartered accountant to get onto the National Board of the Co-op, as you say in brackets, it’s “obvious” why he did it. And seeing as he had previously been warned it’s reasonable to assume that he had done on other occasions.