I’m 
kicking off 2023 with thoughts on independence; more exactly, the kind of independence being offered by those who’ll be gathering in the Brangwyn Hall, Swansea, on the 28th of this month.
Ah! the Brangwyn Hall. I remember being slung out of there many years ago. It was a Labour Party do, with that son of Abersychan, Roy Jenkins, topping the bill. (Ere he and others left to form the SDP.)
Anyway, Woy had got to the bit in his peroration where he proclaimed to the assembly that he too was Welsh . . . at which point a young Jac jumped up and shouted ‘You’re no Welshman!’ (My outburst may have contained an expletive attributive.)
I was immediately attacked by some old crow sitting behind me, who laid into me with her umbrella! A possible headline from the Evening Post flashed through my mind – ‘Nationalist yob beaten to death by umbrella-wielding Labour granny’.
I was saved from this undignified and premature fate by the ‘stewards’ (i.e. Labour heavies) dragging me off towards the huge front doors. With a few reminders along the way that my contribution was not appreciated. (‘Troublemaker, ew are!’)
Happy days!
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‘PROGRESSIVE’ MELIN DRAFOD
In this section I shall refer more than once to the briefly successful far Left takeover of YesCymru in 2020 and 2021.
I wrote about this extensively at the time and so, to catch up with what I wrote, type ‘YesCymru’ in the search box atop the sidebar.
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The event later this month in the Brangwyn is organised by think tank Melin Drafod. And you don’t need to think too hard to realise what anyone attending is likely to hear.
All the speakers are on the Left. Or the far Left. Or the Woke Left. Call it what you will.
But ‘progressive’ is the label behind which they all hide nowadays. Such a nice word, harmless and unthreatening. Who among us could object to ‘progress‘?
Me. Because I recognise rebranded Marxism.
Helping me appreciate that the ‘progress’ demanded by those who’ll gather where a young Jac was assaulted by a Bolshie harridan is worrying.
But let Melin Drafod speak for itself:
‘Not independence for its own sake’. What is that trying to say – patriotism is not enough? Or is it a veiled threat to scupper any form of independence that doesn’t meet with the approval of the far Left?
There is so much to read into that section.
My views on ‘climate change’ are well known – it’s not happening. The myth is being kept alive by ‘environmentalists’ and others who’ve staked their reputations on it and can’t afford to backtrack, with supranational bodies thinking ‘global warming’ gives them the excuse to control human behaviour worldwide.
And does anyone seriously believe that racism is a ‘scourge’ in modern Wales? Who but the seriously unhinged could insult us by equating Wales in 2023 with Arkansas or the Transvaal a few decades back?
Only perhaps those with a vested interest in using the allegation of ‘racism’ to slander political opponents and to promote their own interests.
The latter might apply to Melin Drafod National Committee member Harriet Protheroe-Soltani, of the Wales Refugee Council. Like all third sector bodies, this one thrives by inventing or exaggerating a problem – and then demanding funding to tackle that problem.
Ms Protheroe-Soltani of Momentum was also employed by YesCymru when it fell briefly under the control of the far Left in 2020 / 2021.
Sam Coates is another member of the National Committee.
His Twitter account tells that he is a socialist first, then a Welshman. Which would appear to bear out that for these ‘progressives’ Wales comes second to their ideological priorities.
Significantly, perhaps, there’s no mention of independence.
And, again, it’s worth returning to the far Left takeover of YesCymru, for Coates wrote this essay in July 2021, and it’s revealing. (Available here in pdf format.) Not just about Coates but about the others who’ll be at the Brangwyn later this month.
He writes: ‘In 2017, I rocked up to the Hen Coleg yn Aberystwyth on a baking hot day to attend YesCymru’s AGM. It was a friendly room of about 50 people, mostly middle age, and mostly white.’
‘Mostly white’ – in a country that is 95% White! Would Coates and the comrades be happier if YesCymru was a majority non-White organisation, and therefore grotesquely unrepresentative of Wales?
As unrepresentative as those who’ll be at the Brangwyn Hall.
Referring to the rigged YesCymru elections of May 2021 that saw the far Left briefly take control, Coates writes: ‘Hundreds of members attended the online event, and used a voting tool used by many other political organisations to choose members of the new Central Committee’.
It would appear that when he wrote of those ‘hundreds’ voting Coates had forgotten that a few paragraphs earlier he’d talked of YesCymru having 18,000 members. Presenting us with the obvious question: why were just 2-3% of the members able / allowed to vote?
But let’s remember some of the tweets from ‘progressives’ celebrating victory!
Coates’ whole essay is an apology for an attempted far Left takeover; and it’s riddled with inaccuracies, misrepresentations and outright lies.
The other members of Melin Drafod’s National Committee seem to be Plaid Cymru members, and others who were involved in the near-destruction of YesCymru in 2021. I’m thinking of Llywelyn ap Gwilym, and Siôn Jobbins, Chair of YesCymru who eventually jumped ship.
Then we have Elin Hywel and Colin Nosworthy of Undod, the source of so much of the poison that almost finished off YesCymru.
And of course there are one or two on the National Committee from the Labour Party.
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WHO’S COMING TO THE SUMMIT AND WHO’S NOT INVITED?
Let’s start by listing those political parties and organisations that are not invited by Melin Drafod (or whoever) to the portentously dubbed ‘Independence Summit’.
First off, there’s the party to which I belong, Gwlad. Then there’s Propel. There’s also the Sovereign Party / Plaid Sofren. So without going too far, we’ve already found three registered political parties, with councillors, made up of serious and experienced people, with all three parties committed to Welsh independence.
So why didn’t Melin Drafod invite them?
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The listed speakers are advertised as follows . . .
‘Anthony Slaughter (Wales Green Party Leader), Adam Price MS (Plaid Cymru Leader), Cllr Rachel Garrick (Welsh Labour for Independence), Sam Coates (Undod), Gwern Evans (YesCymru), Luke Fletcher MS, Mirain Owen (Cymdeithas yr Iaith) and others’.
So let’s begin with Slaughter, and remind everyone that there is no Wales Green Party! There is only the Wales branch of the Green Party of England.
In 2018 Green Party members in Wales had the chance to create a separate Wales Green Party, they voted not to. The main reason for that was that most Green Party members in Wales are English.
Then, last year, the Green Party of England in Wales claimed to be in favour of Welsh independence! Plaid Cymru fell for it and was happy to enter some sort of agreement with them.
No individual, group, or party, sincere about Welsh independence, should even talk to a colonialist outfit that refuses to even recognise the existence of our country.
Plaid Cymru I’ll leave until last.
‘Welsh Labour for Independence’ (WLfI) is another piece of nonsense. Labour is a Unionist party. Any Labour member who wants independence is in the wrong party. Maybe some now realise that.
But is (WLfI) the same as Labour for an Independent Wales (LfIW)? Or, and this is the frightening bit – are there two of them!
During the struggle for YesCymru LfIW was prominent in undermining sensible committee members and replacing them with some real nutters. Working from the shadows was Rob Lloyd of Prestatyn, while out there on the Welshpool barricades was Benji Gwalchmai.
Where are they now? How I miss them!
We already know all we need to know about Sam Coates and Undod.
Luke Fletcher is a Plaid Cymru Senedd Member. With a beard.
YesCymru is represented by Gwern Gwynfil Evans. He was announced as YC’s first-ever full-time CEO in September. The piece I’ve linked to says he has ‘a business background’. Which is true; one of his companies was Dissolved in the very month he was appointed.
Yet he brings another Aberystwyth connection to the party. Which I’ll explore shortly.
Cymdeithas yr Iaith is not worth dwelling on. Hopelessly Woke it overlaps with Undod and other far Left groups like Plaid Cymru’s youth wing, Plaid Ifanc, where pronouns are of paramount importance.
So, finally, let’s give some thought to Plaid Cymru which, in most people’s eyes, is ‘the nationalist party’, and the leading voice for Welsh independence.
On the one hand, Plaid activists seem to be more at home at Gay Pride parades than at marches for independence; while the party is being eaten away from the inside by a combination of back-stabbing and sexual misbehaviour.
The party tries to keep things under wraps but news of the obsession with other people’s ‘bits’ inevitably reaches the public domain.
MS Rhys ab Owen was suspended a few months ago for unwanted sexual advances to a female. But he was only suspended after the party had sat on the case for some time in the hope the complainant would go away.
Last month, the party’s chief executive, Carl Harris, finally stepped down after it emerged he had made unwanted sexual advances to a young party worker.
When it’s like this at the top of the party – and I mean, the very top – then no one should be surprised that lower down the pecking order we find bizarre behaviour.
The image below (which I pixelated) is of someone who works for a Plaid Cymru MS showing what he proposes to do when he catches whoever is behind an anonymous ‘I know what you did!’ Twitter account accusing him of . . .
And, yes, that is a crowbar.
No wonder a former Plaid Cymru Police and Crime Commissioner recently called on party leader Adam Price to resign.
Plaid Cymru is a mess, however you look at it, and from top to bottom. To say it’s lost its way would be wrong . . . for that would suggest Plaid’s leadership in recent decades ever knew where it was going.
I think Plaid Cymru is now too far gone for the change of leadership Arfon Jones calls for to make any difference. My view is that Plaid should do the honest thing and merge with Labour.
They deserve each other.
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RUM, REGGAE, AND ‘AN UNTAINTED, LEFT-WING, WELSH ALTERNATIVE’
I mentioned earlier that Aberystwyth businessman, Gwern Evans, is CEO of YesCymru. And he’s not the only one speaking at the Brangwyn bash from that lovely town where a dashing young blade spent a weekend in the police cells.
Happy days!
For Melin Drafod Chair, Dr Talat Chaudhri is mayor of the town. Also living in Aber’ is secretary Mererid Boswell, and former chair of YesCymru, Siôn Jobbins.
UPDATE: I am indebted to Jon Coles for telling us that Colin Nosworthy is a press officer for Aberystwyth University.
And there may be others with Aberystwyth connections. Not Sam Coates, obviously; not after his chastening experience of stumbling into a gathering of the Llanbadarn chapter of the Afrikaner Broederbond.
However you cut it, Aber’ will be over-represented at this Swansea gig. And then I came across something last week, which is intriguing, but needs an intro.
There is an intermittent column in the Cambrian News by a Gareth James.
This was the piece drawn to my attention, last November. It contained this line: ‘Like it or not, mid Wales is woke, for mid Wales is about sharing mid Wales with everyone’, plus a few passages that the source interpreted as threats against those who refused to accept Wokeness.
Then, a couple of weeks later, came this extraordinary piece calling for Dyfed Powys Police to be more ‘woke’, following what the writer interpreted as racial profiling that targets his sons. (Here in pdf format.)
You’ll also see, at the top of the article ‘The View from the Vaults’, these being the Weston Vaults pub in Aberystwyth. Now renamed Irie’s Rum Bar and Reggae Lounge.
Gareth James, the man in the picture, runs the bar. This piece from the Cambrian News last September makes that clear. What you see above is something of a resurrection, for Irie’s closed in March 2016, apparently for good.
The building that houses the Rum Bar is owned by Cyngor Ceredigion. Do councils normally buy pubs? This other Land Registry title document tells us that a lease was taken out (or taken over) in April 2015 by Irie’s (Aberystwyth) Ltd.
Aberystwyth is a fairly small town, so I’d be surprised if the ‘progressives’ of YesCymru, Melin Drafod, etc, don’t frequent a bar run by a man who wants Plod to be more Woke.
A consideration that brings us to the most recent contribution from Gareth James, that appeared in the Cambrian News last week. (Available here in pdf format.) Also available on Irie’s Blog.
Another long, rambling piece, but when I read the final paragraph a light went on in my head – a new political party that is ‘an untainted, left-wing, Welsh alternative’.
Is Gareth James trying to tell us something?
Is this what Talat Chaudhri, Sam Coates and the rest have in mind? Is this what Melin Drafod is hoping comes out of the Brangwyn Hall meeting?
Whether it’s a new party or simply closer co-operation between existing far Left groups, this Independence Summit looks like another attempt by the far Left to take over the independence movement.
If so, then it becomes the duty of those of us with a broader view of Wales to challenge these people. For if it became accepted among the general public that these fanatics are the only ones wanting independence then Wales is finished.
Independence must promise, and deliver, the inclusivity the far Left always demands of others but never practices itself.
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CONCLUSION
I have warned many times before, and I make no apologies for doing so again, that what these Green-Woke-Leftists want is independence for a small country whose politicians can then be bullied and blackmailed into implementing their fantasies.
This capture from the website of Labour for an Independent Wales reminds us that, for them, independence is simply the route to socialism.
It’ll be something like the Wales we know today: a country falling apart at the seams because weak politicians are dominated by lobbyists, pressure groups and third sector organisations. But it’ll be a hell of a lot worse!
There’ll be nothing in it for you and me, Dai. For our people; or for our Wales.
Blwyddyn Newydd Dda!
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‘Progressive’ denotes a move towards a better future, ‘reactionary’ a move away from it. What ‘better’ means is defined by ‘theory’. It really is that empty-headed. ‘Progressive’ is used these days as a sort of political garlic to ward off accusations of being a bit fash.
I love the Left’s misuse of the word ‘progressive’. Ask one indivdually what that means and they have absolutely no idea and when you pin them they usually retreat behind ” I know what it means to me” – a position they are then unable to expand further from if you keep pressing (nailed a senior Plaid Cymru councillor and activist onn Ynys Mon/Angleset over that in public when he used the phrase and he stomped off in a huff)
All ‘progressive’ means in a political context is a change. In that context (the correct one) the nazis were progressive, the bolsheviks were progressive, Cromwell was progressive, Pol Pot was, and every change of government or regime in the UK or anywhere else since time immemorial has been.
The pseudo-socialist jamboree at the Brangwyn comes nearer, the 28th I think. I wonder whether anyone present on the day will have the nuts to raise Neil McEvoy’s recent criticism of the Bay regime and most of its Opposition –
“The #BayBubble political class (they are all the same, regardless of Party), virtue signal for marketing purposes, but act differently in practice.”
A gathering of open minded folk would welcome the kind of person who makes such a point as it stimulates a healthy reevaluation of what our representative democracy is all about, or not about. Or does McEvoy’s comment apply just as much to the dwellers of sundry nouveau fascist echo chambers located mostly in our towns and cities but with an occasional bunker out in the wilds who will make up most of the attendance at the Brangwyn? .
I’m sure that I added a post script to the above comment later yesterday but here I go again, perhaps not verbatim probably more bilious. Neil McEvoy’s comment about the antics and posturing of the Bay Bubble was most timely. Later in the day I read elsewhere that the idle gaggle that passes for our national “leadership” group are busy engineering a most welcome c.10% uplift to their business allowances which have already taken a jolly good spanking with trips to Canada and other places. This is the same group of sincere poseurs who would have you, me and likes of NHS workers believe that money is tight due to the meanness of those awful Tories in London. Yet they have the means to look after the select few down the Bay. They just know how to make us love them at times like this.
This excellent BLOG has been dormant now for two days. I will add something here out of context just to wake up everybody.
The Wales Senedd Opposition has got its dentures into challenging the reason and cost of Labour First Minister Drakeford’s freebie trip to the world cup soccer finals in Quatar. Quite rightly so, but when is this tame conniving Opposition going to get its few real teeth into challenging the serious devolved issues facing Wales.
Such as follies of Energy Policies, and the Housing Crisis caused by Second Homes, and the Wales Health Service, and Welsh Ambulance Crisis, and the future of Welsh Agriculture, and getting real jobs instead of funding a massive Third Public Sector of jobs for the favoured boys and girls thriving for weird minority sects, and then blaming farmers for Pollution and not the overloaded sewage outlets. Welsh Labour is surrounded by a tame Opposition of little butties. This Opposition needs to throw away its dentures and sharpen its few remaining teeth. They are nearly all as bad as each other.
Whilst at it, why does this tame Opposition in Cardiff not ask how much it cost to send Labour Senedd Minister Julies James to the recent Canadian COP Conference. How many went with her from the Senedd in terms of Members and Officers and carriers for her large hand bag. Unfortunately, she was not a national representative of a free nation, so did she get to give a main platform contribution oration, or was she relegated to the regional status fringe events to claim that Wales is a worldwide global planet leader in aiming to soon become carbon free with a jumbled energy policy.
I take the view that many of the important issues you have raised can be explained by the interesting graphic published on the side bar of Jac’s blog, suggesting that Welsh Government is now under new management – World Economic Forum: unelected technocrats.
Governments don’t rule their countries any more, financial institutions, World Health, World Economic institute do.
They pull all strings
Opinion Polling For December
http://thepeoplesflag.blogspot.com/2023/01/opinion-polling-for-december-2022.html
It costs an arm and a leg to hire the Brangwyn Hall, Swansea, for any event, and extra for the Bar Facility. It is a fact that one of Swansea’s two Universities stopped holding its traditional Graduation Ceremonies there because of the very high cost. For high standard Musical Events, especially for Song, it has some of the finest acoustics in Wales, but for a conference those acoustics are not needed. The Brangwyn Hall has a capacity of about 800 seats. So who is funding this obscure Melin Drafod Group for the many many hundreds of £ pounds to hire this Hall and do they really expect 800 attendees?
Something sinister about who is funding them this big £ money. Has anyone got the answer? I hope they’ve not sourced money from the Senedd via the infamous Welsh Public Sector – our money. A small village Hall in Welsh speaking Cwm Twrch would have sufficed Melin Drafod more than ample enough. Swansea Council who own the Brangwyn will openly tell any enquirer of an example cost of a Saturday Conference hire.
I think it would be a good idea for as many members of Yes Cymru as possible to turn up at the Yes Cymru Big Summit and ensure the leadership concentrates on its objective. Independence, not disappear done a rabbit hole of campaigning on issues however worthy that are not to do with independence. Yes Cymru claims to be a non party political body which is what it needs to be if it is to get anywhere.. I renewed my membership which cost £5. There is another charge to attend this Summit. We need a n effective campaign for CYMRU RYDD!
But it’s not the YesCymru Summit, Keith. It’s organised by far Left Melin Drafod with YesCymru being one among a number of invited speakers. Is this trying to suggest that YC is just one voice among many in the indy movement? And with the other recognised voices all being on the Left this then suggests that the drive for Welsh independence is entirely a Leftist initiative.
Is Yes Cymru a PLC?
I don’t know. What do you suggest would be the relevance of that status?
Interesting exchange of views earlier with N Singleton and yourself about the WDA, its effectiveness at various times and some of the factors that impinged upon it. People like David Eifion Thomas pop up on your tweet column with observations about the economy, and it is evident that there are many more people out there who really care about the things that matter for our long term sustainability as a nation and as a functioning economy. The things that will hold us together, not divide us.
One thing for sure, you won’t get much discussion about the sustainability of our real economy at that hot air event at the Brangwyn unless some tosser starts screaming that he wants a bigger share of a decreasing national cake to be devoted to obscure minority interests. No doubt some of the output from that crazy fest will end up in Drakeford’s to-do list within a few months. He too is just as big a deviant nut as that cross section of freaks on display at the end of this month.
When I hear Leftists and third sector operators bang on about independence I ask myself, ‘Do they realise that the money they get given now comes from the block grant, and with independence that block grant would end?’
Solidarity amongst the ‘oppressed’ worldwide comes before nationhood to these people. They’ve even dropped a grammatical clanger in their name. Melin Drafod is I assume, a Google-translation of Discussion Mill, properly translated as Melin Drafodaeth. So their first and most egregious virtue signal is as obvious as the red nose on a tramp’s face.
Your assumption is incorrect.
In your Tweet column D Eifion Thomas reports that -The Welsh Government’s economic performance over 20yrs has been woeful. Wales’ GDP per head in 2019 remained, as in 1999, a quarter lower than the UK.
In 2001, first minister Rhodri Morgan said “A key target is to improve GDP per capita in Wales. Welsh Labour failing targets.
Yet the big event on Jan 28th will focus on anything but our miserable economic performance. Imbeciles playing at being radical.
Throughout the 1980’s, 1990’s and early 2000’s, Wales “punched hugely above it’s weight” in economic activity terms, attracting in those decades an average 22% of all inward investment into the UK. The Welsh Development Agency (WDA) was the envy of every other economic development operation in the UK, and beyond. It is unbelievably ironic to reprise Rhodri Morgan’s 2001 comment, when it was HE who single handedly scrapped the WDA so that he could wield sole political control over the Agency. The reason for this was that he wanted the WDA to award grants to his wife’s Cardiff constituency, without comprehending that Cardiff was not an “Assisted Area” under EU regulations, so that it would be illegal (under EU regulations) to do so. This was pointed out to Morgan, who completely lost it with the WDA’s CEO, slammed the phone down, then called back ten minutes later to announce that he was scrapping the WDA and putting economic development under direct Welsh Assembly control. This was in 2004, and the WDA was scrapped with effect from April 2006.
I have it on very good authority that the WDA’s CEO said to Morgan in his response to Morgan’s 2004 belligerence – “congratulations First Minister, you have just ruined the economy of Wales.”
Since 2006, Wales share of UK inward investment has collapsed and for the last 15 years has been 2%.
QED.
I’d heard something similar. No question that the WDA was good at what it did. But it’s still just a branch factory economy with more branch factories.
The priority then, and now, is to build up an indigenous economy. Labour is never going to do it. Neither is Plaid Cymru. Or the Greens. Or any of the ‘progressives’ I discussed in this post.
Eulogising about the WDA misses the point that it was running out of gas by the time Rhodri had his hissy fit. Too many of its high profile job creating inward investments were closing or cutting back and the distinct lack of urgency in promoting native businesses was pissing off a lot of us out in the real world . Boys and girls at WDA H.Q liked flying off to distant locations not so keen on wet days up the upper Rhymney Valley
It should be remembered that the WDA (begat from the Board of Trade following the Aberfan disaster) was originally solely tasked with the reclamation of coal tips. It’s remit was then extended into developing properties to accommodate jobs, on the reclaimed tips, at the same time promoting the creation/importation of such jobs. Sadly, over the years, the WDA over extended it’s remit by involving dozens of employees in (usually unsuccessful) training schemes and a myriad of other non-job/non-wealth creating exercises (including a significant amount of world wide junketing). However, it’s principal wealth creating/job creating innovations still continued until brought to a shuddering halt by Rhodri Morgan in 2004. That principal remit has never been replaced, and the much respected and successful world wide WDA brand was lost. What is Wales’ world wide brand today?
Didn’t see much innovation by 1997/99. 1997 saw the arrival of the Blair circus and 99 the creation of the Assembly. By then the globalist surge was under way with Western leaders rushing to suck up to China and business leaders getting excited over the “low cost opportunities” presented by China and the “liberated” countries of Eastern Europe. Horrific rush of lemmings over the cliff edge and I stood there watching it in utter disbelief. At the same time advances in consumer electronics technology led to huge cuts at Sony, closure of Hitachi and radical slim down of Panasonic. Knock on effects wiped out big chunks of supply chains which had become overly dependent on those customers. WDA did launch its usual crop of initiatives in attempts to secure new markets with modest success as those too had become hooked on off shore cheap labour, like automotive buzzing off to E. Europe.
Rhodri’s decision to knock the WDA on the head was all about power and control. Like a lot of other politicians he could not resist sticking his big nose into stuff he didn’t understand. He had past form as he had engaged in an abusive vendetta against an earlier chairman of the Agency who had been appointed by Mad Maggie and had little or no chance of surviving when another style of madness took over. He proceeded to integrate the surviving Agency staff into a Welsh government department where they were allowed to bumble along looking for ways to tackle the new world environment without any serious or worthwhile guidance or vision from the top.
On reflection much of this recent history is an object lesson in not relying much on government initiatives. The WDA served a purpose but it too failed to make the strategic adjustment needed at the mid 90’s onwards. Too many assumptions that others might change or businesses might innovate were made time after time but not enough of the new stuff was forthcoming. Most significantly, perhaps, the Agency and its successor government departments have struggled to come to terms with the challenges of enabling the growth of native SME’s into high performing entities. It was always a lot easier and more high profile to dish out loads of money to big name corporates from elsewhere. That mindset lingers on today in the Drakeford regime’s willingness to hand over grants and assets to green grant-grabbers and other visiting carpetbaggers.
Rant over.
Would ‘an earlier chairman of the Agency who had been appointed by Mad Maggie’ be a reference to Dr Gwyn Jones?
That’s the boy. Maggie’s blue eyed boy although there was some baggage littering his background too, allegedly. Flamboyant character, which appealed to the Tory boss-lady of the 80’s
Don’t apologise for the rant, Dafis. You and NS and Jac are spot on. You 3 and me makes 4 people who realise that the end of the WDA was the end of a glad confident era, and of vast significance. Just to cheer everyone up on the worst day of the year here is the WDA version of ‘Cwm Rhondda’.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eozO09thrE
Yes the WDA did run out of steam, but did the rest of the Indy movement have to lose energy and focus? Jac’s post explains why. But the real failing was when Dafydd Wigley was sidelined in 2000-2006 and we 4 and the whole of mainstream Indy did nothing for perhaps 2 decades. Jac of the North blog a very honourable exception, though.That Reform can come straight in at 7% in Wales and leave Propel and Gwlad combined in the also-rans does show how serious the failure has been.
Reform did well out of the incessant movement of their main demographic across Y Clawdd and a slice of indigenous Tories. Add to that the disaffected Labour voter who got seriously pissed off with the late Blair and Brown era, followed by the drip Milliband. That does not excuse Plaid’s failure to mop us a share of the disaffected Labour voters but they misjudged what those voters really wanted – mostly to do with Jobs, the economy, and public services. Instead Plaid went off on one and they are still accelerating around the walls of that echo chamber of theirs engaging in bigger delusions with each passing leadership team. I put it down to those guys preferring life in permanent opposition enjoying the trappings of a job in Y Senedd without the serious work of digging a nation out of a deep hole.
Hi Jac, I’m a swansea Jac and I do enjoy reading your articles.
But I am not convinced that Wales should be independent, for reasons 1 affordability, 2 I don’t believe we have the right people for the job, 3 look at the mess we’re in now and the total waste of money unaccounted.
If you can convince me I would gladly support an independent Wales.
Before devolution it could have been argued, ‘But look at the mess we’re in – how could independence be any worse?’ But after 24 years of ruinous devolution the argument for Wales having more power, or being independent, is seriously undermined. With the far Left so well-entrenched in Corruption Bay independence would be a disaster if it just meant the same people with even more power.
But this is the very reason that the far Left now wants independence. They’ve had a taste and their mouths are watering at the prospect of even more power. Private cars banned; unlimited immigration; more wind turbines; compulsory jabs for this, that and t’other; silencing ‘misinformation’; brain implants (‘Brought to you by the WEF!’), and a trans clinic – ‘All ages welcome!’ – in every neighbourhood and village.
‘Economy! What economy? Only White supremacist, fascist, transphobe, capitalists talk about economies.’
The only way out of this mess is to make people realise that independence dos NOT mean more of the same . . . only worse. It can also mean something different, something better. It’s an uphill struggle, not because the audience for the message isn’t there, it is, but because the message will be stifled. By those currently benefitting from corrupt devolution, those who want ‘progressive’ independence, and of course our masters in London.
One almighty brush, which will never happen. Get rid of the senydd permanently
Familiar questions, with familiar answers.
1. If Wales can’t afford independence, that’s an indictment of unionism, not an endorsement. It’s not true though. Wales, like Ireland, would prosper once no longer contributing to the overhead costs of the British State.
2. We do. They’re just not in post, and never can be under the current system. Independence implies seeing a healthy dose of political Darwinism applied to Wales’ rulers. I’ll get the popcorn.
3. Westminster happily pays for the pantomime as a distraction. Independence would be a punch in the mouth for anyone bleating that ‘Wales needs more resources’. Wales has fantastic resources and they need to be in the hands of people who know what to do with them.
That’s the first problem like any other business the staff.
Secondly the balls to get rid of all the hangers on
The Senedd is an arm of the British State. That simple phrase encapsulates everything for my money.
Apparently when the WDA was in existence the inward investment was in the region of 20% now 1%. Don’t get me wrong there was maybe a lot of unnecessary costs incurred but now 1 % and still unnecessary costs
I frequently put the following comment on numerous and various “progressive” podcast sites e.g. Novara Media, Momentum, Socialist Campaign Group etc. etc. but have not ever received a constructive argued response (except for “but whatabout, whatabout Tories etc). The comment is “socialism has been around for 100+ years and has a 100% failure rate wherever it’s been tried.”
I guess the failure rate is down to human nature. Leaders end up being utterly undermined either by corruption or poor administration of their policies, or both. Often the population might find the ideals of socialism attractive but when confronted with the diversion of resources and the tax burden of delivery they decide that the effort ain’t worth it.
Shame really but humans are not much different to the animals in being competitive, greedy, discriminatory, even predatory. Indeed it’s arguable that some animals behave far better towards their own species.
Animal Farm QED.
We have a lot to thank popular movements for though, within a market economy paradigm of course, but still far removed from the Victorian way of doing things.
My take is that beyond a small commune where everyone is family or otherwise intimately acquainted, the heavy hand of the all-powerful state is needed to force individuals to prioritise what is at that stage an abstract concept, ‘the people’, in other words that said same state.
You will get the best out of people when the carrot is theirs and their family’s happiness and wellbeing; you never will when it’s the benefit of the state, and especially not on pain of a disappearance to the gulags.
Good article. It tells us the range of distorted thinkers that are likely to lead the parade on the day. The more interesting information would be who is pulling their strings? This lot on display are an assortment of inward looking echo chamber inhabitants which makes Stalin’s crew look like a bunch of free thinkers. None of them strikes me as anything akin to an original thinker, a thought leader. There again these are all movements whose direction of thought changes frequently so thought leadership is probably some remote range of sources that they stumble upon while exchanging new slogans or spending time on social media attacking old ladies who may be flavour of the month for daring to challenge some zany sacrosanct thoughts.
However I keep coming back to who gains the most from having these weirdos inhabiting the Welsh political space? I remain in the dark on much of this crap but given the lack of criticism from sources well known for their willingness to chuck it about, like the Welsh Tories and the Welsh Labour regime, I am inclined to accept the theory that those 2 bastions of Unionism are quite happy to feed this particular infection as it does harm to the cause of true liberation from that Unionist yoke. Maybe the clue is in the word Undod.
As you suggest, Dafis, these people tend to be sloganisers, drawn to every fresh lunacy that crosses the Pond. Yet there is a certain consistency in that every one of these lunacies is intended to weaken Western society.
So while Labour and Tories may welcome the damage these ‘progressives’ do to the independence cause it’s a rather short-sighted approach. But then, when dealing with Drakeford and those around him, you only have to suggest something is ‘radical’ and ‘inclusive’ for them to start reaching for the funding.
If Jac wants to know why The Sovereign Party / Plaid Sofren wasn’t invited I can tell him. They stood in four wards in Cardiff in the Welsh local elections 2022 (Riverside, Pentwyn, Plasnewydd and Llandaf) and got a grand total of 135 votes out of 48237 votes cast in those four wards.
That’s fewer people than watch the Aberflyarf reserves B team playing rugby in Llangodknowswhere on a wet Candlesmas evening when the local pubs are giving away free beer.
So probably not representative of public opinion in Wales ???
How many votes have Undod and Melin Drafod amassed?
The only parties that hit the ground running are those with established politicians involved and plenty of publicity. An example would be Roy Jenkins’ SDP (David Owen, Shirley Williams, Bill Rodgers). In the age of managed mainstream media a new party has a hell of a struggle to get its message out. Even Alba is finding it difficult in Scotland despite being led by Alex Salmond.
But my point, ‘Yann Pierre’ – and I’m sure it didn’t escape a man of your perspicacity – is that we again see the far Left trying to monopolise the independence movement. And if that happens then they will destroy it. The mistake they make is believing that people in Wales who vote Labour are socialists, and share their ‘progressive’ agenda. We both know that’s bollocks.
But to conclude with political parties, and irrespective of how many votes they get, should the Green Party of England have been invited?
@Yann Pierre Mann
We were hoping for a better result in the Cardiff 2022 local elections for sure but didn’t get it this time – that’s democracy. The Sovereign party stands by its principles regardless of how many votes it may or may not get. See more here: https://thesovereignparty.wales/
If its voting numbers you want to focus on rather than ideas, rights and principles then it may interest you to know that the party got almost 3,000 votes in the 2021 Welsh elections where we stood as ‘No More Lockdowns’ under the same principles of protecting and promoting the fundamental rights of Welsh citizens from lockdowns and other unlawful restrictions. The party won more votes than up to 5 other parties in the two south Wales regions where it stood. We also won a seat in the Senedd parallel election for 11-15 year olds. Not bad for a party with very limited funding and zero mainstream publicity.
It’s good to see an article discussing all these things and it’s great that there are a plurality of new Welsh political parties in Wales offering people different options – perhaps suggesting that the Senedd should have a 100% proportional representative system in the very near future.
Perhaps also Wales needs to have these political divergences as outlined in this article so that the more constructive and common ground elements from across the spectrum can form general alliances and work together more effectively and with better understanding in the future, for the sake of Wales.
“Ask not what your country can do for you……….”
The Gwlad and Propel parties were not invited as far as I know. Both won seats at council elections in May 22.
Colin Nosworthy is a press officer for Aber Uni
Well, well; yet another Aber’ connection.
Hope they don’t have a vote on the fox hunting ban or one speaker might be slightly at odds with the rest.
Do tell!
I’m quite surprised to see anyone use the term Woke in earnest. I think I’ve literally only ever seen it used in the pejorative, a bit like ‘chav’, or ‘bum’!
Someone should set up a satirical presence on social media, ‘Conservative and Unionists for Indy’.
Sorry, that wasn’t meant to be in reply to anything.
Words are losing all meaning. You know that when Marxism can describe itself as ‘progressive’; when excluding everyone but the minority that agrees with you is ‘inclusive’; and when men who ‘identify’ as women can enter women-only writing competitions.
‘Liberal’ is probably the most confusing one. Classical and modern liberals are about as diametrically opposed as you can get!
Do you think disdain for the left is why people vote for odious little toadies like Alun Cairns? Perhaps, I at least like to think, holding their noses whilst doing so? The ‘least of two evils’ / ‘not wishing to rock the boat’ vote and the inertia it produces is a big boulder to chisel. I have an Irish Republican friend, she sends me a Sinn Fein calendar for Xmas each year, full on Easter lilies, practicing Catholic, the works. Wants to remain in the Union. I said, what, Boris, the Queen, and the House of Lords as your rulers??? Her response: “Cheaper.” She’s happy with her Irish passport.