Yesterday I watched Andrew Marr interviewing David Cameron (available on iPlayer if anyone wants to watch it). When pushed about where Conservatives would make cost savings he said that there were only two defeinite areas for now - ID cards (agree with him there) and 'Regional Government'.
Later in the programme he elaborated further by saying that Conservatives would abolish Regional Development Agencies and Regional Assemblies. Now the last time I looked there was only one Regional Assembly in England (for London), so was he sneaking out a new policy to abolish the Welsh Assembly?
This is the problem with the current devolution settlement - we have to go jump through hoops just to get a referendum on more powers - but in the meantime Westminster can simply abolish the Assembly on a whim.
We dont need more assymetric devolution - what we need is SOVEREIGNTY!
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Yeah, I saw that and came to the same conclusions. He was all very positive, we're going to take power out of the hands of central govt, etc, then he went and said they're cutting "regional assemblies and other pointless bureaucracies". So exactly where IS power going to go, if not centrally, if not regionally?
Dangerous talk, all the more dangerous by his nice suit and smarmy smile. The people of Wales shouldn't be fooled, voting Tory just to get at Labour : voting Tory is as bad for Wales in 2009 as it was in 1979.
There are nine English regional Assemblies, or "leaders’ boards". The London one is the only elected assembly, the rest are appointed
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_Assemblies_in_England
Alwyn - I was aware of these boards, but had no idea that they were referred to Assemblies - all the more reason to get ours renamed.
But I also notice in the Wikipedia article that these are due to be abolished in 2010 anyway - so in which case whate does Dave have in mind??
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