The Powers of the National Assembly for Wales

Memorandum by Mr Silvan Jones

The National Assembly and the 'Democratic Deficit'
May I briefly refer Members of the Commission to what is, in my view, a serious political problem for the Assembly and one which I believe poses something of a handicap to the Assembly in its work along with the Assembly government? This is manifested in the form of a fairly widespread public indifference and even hostility towards the Assembly: what I call its 'democratic deficit'. However efficient the Assembly and its government turn out to be in terms of costs and benefits, they may still be widely seen as irrelevant or not worthwhile. The public's perception of the Assembly is what it is and not what we might like it to be. The difficult question is: has this anything to do with the powers of the Assembly, its rights and duties or its structure or with the way the Assembly works or with what the Assembly has or has not done in the past four years or so?
The Assembly was set up in 1999 in rather unpropitious political circumstances. At the 1997 referendum in Wales, the case for an Assembly was vigorously promoted by the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats and Plaid Cymru but the result was far from clear-cut in favour of an Assembly. Only a little over half the electorate even bothered to vote and the overall YES majority was just 0.6 per cent of the votes cast. Clearly, most of the electorate did not see the point of an Assembly. The geographical distribution of the votes was also such that all parts of Wales bordering England rejected an Assembly as did our capital city, Cardiff.

Thus, from the start, the Assembly has had to work in the face of a considerable shortfall in the support for its very existence: on this account the political legitimacy of the Assembly has been under question. It was hoped that the situation would improve in time as the Assembly got going but the evidence for this is not encouraging. One difficulty here is that unlike central government services such as social security benefits, the State pension and the police, many of the benefits of the Assembly are not directly or immediately observable or even measurable. At the same time, we have to ask in what way and to what extent can the benefits of the Assembly be attributed to the Assembly as such: after all, the old Welsh Office was not without its achievements, and at a lower overall cost.

The existing powers of the Assembly are quite extensive - at least, on paper - and I would maintain that as things are, the Assembly should be allowed to get on with its work, learn by experience and then perhaps do better. Nid da lle gellir gwell - my old school's motto - though this is sometimes easier said than done.
The craft of politics is not held in high esteem and, sad to say, I don't think that the party political divisions in the Assembly are of any help in this matter. For one thing the four competing parties in the Assembly do not provide a sufficient pool of talent to do proper justice to the institution of the Assembly and its government. I hesitate to make-a case for a greater number of Assembly members. We already have a plethora of politicians in Wales - town councillors, county councillors, AMs, MPs and MEPs'. Public apathy towards elections stems from diminishing returns even for democracy in the sense that we can have too much of a good thing. If anything, we might ask for a reduction in the number of MPs in Wales now that AMs have taken over a lot of their work. This also relates to Tam Dalyell's 'Midlothian question': why should Welsh MPs have any say on some English matters such as education and health when English MPs have no say on similar matters in Wales even. though their finance comes from the UK budget?

As well, there is now something of a dilemma at elections in Wales. Thus, a party candidate for Parliament may offer a particular policy on, say, education or health which differs in some important respect from the same party's candidate for the Assembly.

A more localised type of problem in Wales stems from what is seen as a predominantly south-Walian or Cardiff-based Assembly: North and even mid-Wales often feel 'out of things'. This is inevitable to some extent given the concentration of population in south Wales. Was there ever any serious consideration given to the siting of the Assembly in mid-Wales, say, in Welshpool or Newtown? The location of the Australian government in Canberra was seen as odd at first - away from the large centres of population - but is now seen as sensible.
Nor is the public always clear as to which government body is now responsible for certain government services - is it the local council, the Assembly or Westminster? This ties in with the problem of providing adequate information about the Assembly, what it can do and what it does. Apart from Welsh radio and TV - though TVs in north Wales may be tuned to Granada - reports about the Assembly appear in national papers only where there is some sensational Assembly event which may portray the Assembly in a poor light. Both the Western Mail and the Daily Post do carry reports, articles and features about the Assembly but these papers may not be widely taken by people who take national papers.

Those who press for more powers to be given to the Assembly claim that this would generate more public interest in the Assembly, reducing our 'democratic deficit'. The scope for more powers is not anything as large as is sometimes made out. We can forget about all macro-economic matters such as inflation, rates of interest and the exchange rate. Nor can the Assembly 'go it alone' on many cross-border matters such as the distribution of industry and transport policies.

Public interest would certainly be generated were the Assembly given the power to raise revenue of its own, say, in the form of a special tax in Wales. The administrative difficulties with such schemes could be formidable but there is one practical and inexpensive scheme, namely, for the Assembly to be able to precept local councils in the same way as police forces do for some of their money. This levy would be additional to the existing council tax and therefore unambiguously located in Wales, difficult to evade and is mildly progressive. In a rough and ready way, the public is aware of the cost of central and local government in terms of the various taxes it pays and, in principle and in some measure, the Assembly should be subject to a similar political discipline.
We should also ask whether, within its present powers, the Assembly could apply more effective influence on some Welsh issues. For instance, now that Welsh Water is no longer a share-holding company, the Assembly might play a role in its affairs other than merely to discuss or oversee its scheme of charges. The Assembly did discuss Welsh Water's domestic charges in February 2000 and expressed its opposition to compulsory metering but shortly afterwards, Welsh Water made metering compulsory for all new domestic connections.

In February 1999, the Devolution Unit of the Welsh Office issued a Guide to the Powers of the Assembly which had a sub-title, Making the Difference in Wales. In the-event, the Assembly has done some things differently from England but maybe simply in order to be different and not on account of different so-called needs in Wales. Take the free bus service for the elderly in Wales, widely enjoyed and the Assembly government taking all the credit for it. However, this cannot be in response to a special Welsh need since the case for a similar service can be made out for the elderly in the rest of the U.K.

One special problem in Wales has to do with the Welsh language. Though this can be spoken by only about one in five of the people of Wales, democratic government is not just about majority rule but having a proper regard for minority concerns. Technically, language is primarily a means of communication but it is also part of our history, culture and way of life. It's hard to see how the Assembly could do much more than what it is already doing for the Welsh language bearing in mind that the more spent on any one service means less for other services.
To sum up: as things are we cannot support any significant extension to the existing statutory powers of the Assembly apart from giving it power to raise some money of its own by a special tax in Wales. We think the Assembly already has enough on its plate if not more than enough but can it make itself more acceptable to the public in Wales other than by spin and gimmicks? This could be an uphill struggle but surely important for the health and vitality of democracy at this as with all levels of government.

March 2003