Plaid-Labour in Budget deal.

So its Plaid who did the deal with Labour over the  £15bn Welsh Assembly Budget.

The BBC reports that .....

The Labour-Plaid deal adds an extra £20m to the draft budget for next year to spend on apprenticeships for 16-24-year-olds.The same amount has been included in indicative plans for the following year and there will be an attempt to secure EU funding to boost the commitment.
Science parkThe two sides also agreed £10m of capital over two years for a science park involving Bangor and Aberystwyth universities.

BBC  8 November 2012 

Interestingly Gareth Hughes comments on his Blog

So the price of the deal is £25m a year over two years. £5m more than last year’s deal with the Liberal Democrats.
The £20m accord with the Liberal Democrats last year was described by Plaid as the “Lib Dems have sold their support very cheaply."
So the going rate in Welsh politics between a good deal and one that is cheap is £5m. So there you have it. The formula for agreeing budgets in Wales.

Of course Gareth being a Labour supporter doesn't tell us what he thinks an opposition should seek in any deal and we are not talking coalition here so any wish list from an opposition party is limited.

At some time the budget had to be passed and although Labour does not have a majority it is by far the largest Party and should be allowed to set the agenda though not complete control it.

Structure
Members	60
Political groups	Government      Labour (30) Opposition Parties      Conservative (14)      Plaid Cymru (11)      Liberal Democrat (5)

I'm not saying that a party that doesn't have a majority should be able to simply pass its draft budget, but there must be a limit to what the opposition can ask.

Indeed the problem is that the opposition simply use the annual draft budget  it to calls for more expenditure on Health and Education popular with the public politically. But these two departments  already take up the vast majority of the Assembly expenditure and how much can be taking from other sources in order that La Pasionaria can have a decent sound bite and her colleague Peter Black a chance to spin on his blog?

It may be that Plaid have sold their support cheaply but not I think worthlessly and the money is going to areas which are neglected.

Only a Plaid spin doctor would claim this a brilliant deal but it may be the best under the circumstances.

However before the oppositions attack the deal perhaps they can tel us where they drew the line in the sand with Labour and whether it it wasn't simply a call for more money for the NHS.

Labour Malicious or Incompetent on the Budget Opposition vote?

Labour have failed to back the first vote by the opposition parties against the ConLib budget.


In the Debate last week ED Balls give the impression that Labour would be taking he lead on this

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation
AMENDMENT OF THE LAW

Debate resumed (Order, 21 March).

On the Cut in the 50p Tax rate

Ed Balls: There will be a vote next week, and we will vote against the 50p change. It is the wrong tax cut at the wrong time. I have always said that no tax rate is set in stone, but how can anyone believe it is right to take tax credits from working families, child benefit from middle-income families and more tax from pensioners, but give £10,000, on average, to every top rate taxpayer in the country? If there were a general election tomorrow, our manifesto would state clearly that we would reverse it. That is the clearest answer I will give.
On the Granny Tax

Ed Balls: I will make it absolutely clear: we will vote against the change in the Budget debates and I hope that he will join us in the Lobby. We will vote against it, but the Chancellor knows very well that I will not go through every tax rate, relief, allowance or spending commitment and make commitments for three years’ time. But if the election were called tomorrow, our manifesto would be clear—we would rescind the measure and the Government would go ahead with it. That is the difference.

But when it came to the vote on a Plaid-SNP motion opposing the budget Measures Labour apart for two MPs were nowhere to be seen.

Those voting against the ConLib goverment's budget were...

DUP
Gregory Campbell - East Londonderry
Jeffrey Donaldson - Lagan Valley
Nigel Dodds - Belfast North
William McCrea - South Antrim
Ian Paisley, Jr. - North Antrim
Jim Shannon - Strangford
David Simpson - Upper Bann
Sammy Wilson - East Antrim
SDLP
Mark Durkan - Foyle
Alasdair McDonnell - Belfast South
Margaret Ritchie -South Down
Indpemdent (N.I)
Sylvia Eileen Hermon, - North Down
Green
Caroline Lucus – Brighton Pavilion
SNP 

Stewart Hosie - Dundee East

Angus MacNeil - Na h-Eileanan an Iar
Angus Robertson -Moray
Eilidh Whiteford - Banff and Buchan
Michael Weir- Angus (Teller) 

Peter Wishart - Perth and North Perthshire (Teller)
Plaid Cymru
Jonathan Edwards - Carmarthen East and Dinefwr
Hywel Williams-Arfon
Labour 

Paul Flynn - Newport West 

Dennis Skinner - Bolsover 

Some interesting fact   comes from them in the NO lobby

Apart from the 5 absentee Sinn Fein MPs and Plaids's Elfyn Llwyd (Who must have a reason to be absent) . Every single Opposition MP outside Labour voted against the budget.

Only two MPs's from English Constituencies   Dennis Skinner and  Caroline Lucus  voted No. The only true opposition to the Government coming from those Parties who so not fight English seats (Except the Greens) and one would suspect UKIP would vote with the government .

So why did Labour abstain

According  to an advisor to Ed Balls, the Shadow Chancellor,  Labour had made a "screw-up" by not voting with the rest of the opposition against the Con Lib plans to cut the top rate of tax for the highest earners.

I think that it was simply due to the fact that Labour expect to take the lead in all opposition votes and will not countenance supporting an amendment made by any other party . They at first hoped the vote will go unnoticed and and when it became clear tried the screw up excuse preferring to appear incompetent rather than malicious.

If the DUP and SDLP can walk through the same Lobby on this its pathetic that the so called official opposition . Why  couldn't Labour?

Ed Balls and his Whips must answer the Question

Where Labour MPs Advised/Ordered not to vote with the rest of the opposition Parties?

If not . Are Labour MPs so Lazy they can't vote without being informed by the Whips that a vote has been called?

What would their reaction had been if they had proposed the No vote and  Plaid and SNP MPs had enbloc failed to vote with them.?

Labour defends Wales from ConLibs? Don't make me Laugh.

An interesting response to the Budget in the Western Mail  yesterday from Pontypridd Labour MP Owen Smith  which you can read here.

It was a reasonable attack on the ConLib budget and at times you could easily replace Plaid for Labour in the text.But his call for a plan B when his own party doesn’t have any plans for the UK in the economic crisis let alone Wales beggars belief

.As he says,

"And what about Wales? 

We barely merited a mention in the speech – the words Wales or Welsh don’t feature at all among the 51,379 words that make up the Chancellor’s 126-page plan for growth".

How many times in the Labour Budgets 1997 -2010 was Wales mentioned, how many specific projects were proposed with a Welsh Flavour were there? Of course devolution means that much have been passed to the Welsh Assembly ,but Wales has always been ignored in Westminster Budgets with very few proposals targeted to the plight of the Welsh in any economic crisis..

It seems that in opposition Labour Welsh MPs have decided to wave the Draig Goch .relying on the idea of “Clear Red Water” separating Wales from Westminster and the cuts or at least giving the impression that under Labour things would be done differently.

Own Smith is a new MP so he can't be held responsible for the fact that the majority of Labours Welsh MPs in the last government did nothing on the excesses s of the Banks, did nothing to reverse the Thatcher attack on the Unions and failed to rebuild the manufacturing base in Wales decimated by the Thatcher government in its effort to woo Middle England.

Smith writes.

"Mrs Gillan should recall from her time in Wales that we’re a shrewd lot and recognise a swindle when we see one".

Unfortunately we can't We swallowed the Tony Blair swindle and we will probably swallow Labour new “Welsh Identify”.

This will be in evidence in the Assembly throughout the ConLib government and there will be the occasional outburst from Westminster MPs whilst making sure to keep in Ed Millibands good books and be prepared to slapped down by Peter Hain if they go to far. But such independence will disappear like morning dew once they get their bottoms on the government benches again and any possible rebel will be riding in a ministerial car.

Mind you if Welsh Labour were prepared to accept Carwyn Jones as the leader of Welsh Labour and make Hain (or his successor) somehow subordinate to him it would be a start.