BGW2 EV6

3 July 2005

Annwyl Dafydd

Thank you for your letter about the Committee considering the white paper on 'Better Governance for Wales'. I hasten to send a few written thoughts, although I would be prepared to give oral evidence in the (unlikely) event that your committee would find it useful.

The White Paper makes three main proposals and I find myself in broad agreement with both the first and third.

1. The proposed changes in the executive structure (pp. 11 -16), distinguishing clearly between the Assembly and its government, are unquestionably right and remove a major anomaly in the original scheme, perhaps drawn unwisely from the analogy of local government. They also would make the role of the civil service far clearer and more satisfactory.
2. I agree also with what is proposed for electoral matters (pp. 28 -9) although for the STV system could also be explored, while I tend to agree with the Richard Commission report that 80 assembly members would be preferable to 60 given the burden that AMs have to bear. I suppose finance is a major factor here.
3. However, on the second proposal regarding the assembly's legislative powers (pp. 19 -26), the White Paper is (predictably?) disappointing. It reflects both the extreme caution of the Welsh Labour MPs regarding the role of Assembly members, and perhaps a wider lack of self-confidence going back in modern Welsh history to the earliest devolution proposals in the 1886 -92 parliament, a time when Scotland had already re-acquired its Secretary of State, an achievement which it took Wales nearly 80 years to match. The Richard Commission made a strong and intellectually coherent critique of the inadequacy of Welsh law-making processes and made the case for the Assembly having primary legislative powers in a way that commanded wide assent amongst those (eg the London Constitution Unit) who take a special interest in these matters. I declare an interest here because gave evidence to the Richard Commission myself in July 2003 and the report happened to follow very much the same lines as I suggested at that time, and which I have also argued elsewhere, including in the Lords. Such proposals as making more use of secondary legislative powers, using Orders in Council to enhance the Assembly's role and developing the current settlement in devolved areas in other detailed respects are, of course, helpful in many ways, but they avoid entirely the logic of the case of giving Wales's devolved assembly powers of legislative change as vested in the Scottish Parliament. They are cautious, piecemeal and fall short of real devolution. In addition, the current mess in Welsh legislative processes would continue (eg having Welsh clauses scattered through 'English' measures like currants in a bun, as happened with the Communications Bill, or the totally disastrous case of the Children's Act of 2004 which allowed the English Commissioner to interfere in Welsh matters, with a different vision of human rights and much reduced powers). Until the Welsh Assembly has primary powers, this confusion will continue.

There are, in my view, at least two major reason for having Welsh devolution at all.

(a) To have an all-Welsh view, followed by executive action driven by Welsh interests and perceptions, on issues that concern the domestic interests of the people of Wales.

(b) To allow for possible divergence, variety and pluralism in public policy between the different parts of the United Kingdom (including perhaps in some future incarnation some kind of regionalism in England).

Under the White Paper, neither would be achieved. It takes refuge in a board generalization (para 3.8) that there is no consensus at present for full law-making powers. No evidence is offered and in itself the judgement is of no value. There is polling material to provide alternative conclusions.

We would also continue to have the wholly anomalous role of a Secretary of State (no personal implication of any kind is meant here) acting as a possible filter, rival or roadblock to a democratically elected Welsh assembly. The Lords Select Committee on the Consultation, of which I was then a member, urged in its report in 2002 that the Secretaries of State for Scotland and Wales be abolished, and new national/regional remits be given to the Secretary for Constitutional Affairs. The Scottish Secretaryship of State now has all the vigour and dynamism of the Doge’s Grand Council in the later states of the Venetian empire. It is disappointing for Wales that his proposal has not found favour and that the Department for Constitutional Affairs since its inception two years ago has been so inert and lacking in pro-active energy in this area.

As a Welsh historian and one who has never been a nationalist, I hope very much that your Committee can at least state the case for something much bolder - and far more democratic and accountable - than what is proposed in the White Paper. It takes the argument forward but, like patriotism, it is not enough.

Gyda phob dymuniad da

Kenneth O. Morgan (Prof. Lord Morgan of Aberdyfi)

Rt. Hon. The Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas, PC, AM