Stephen Crabb’s devolution dilemma

The Welsh Government runs Wales and the Westminster Government runs the UK. In his role as Secretary of State for Wales Preseli MP Stephen Crabb’s main job is to ensure effective co-operation between the two. At the moment he’s not doing too well.

Last week he published his draft Wales Bill that will devolve some new powers over energy, transport, and the organisation of elections. More importantly, it will fundamentally change the way legislative powers are devolved. Stephen Crabb’s intentions are good. He says he wants “a robust devolution settlement that works for the people of Wales.” So why are the other parties in the Assembly so strongly opposed to his proposals?

First Minster Carwyn Jones says the Bill amounts to an English veto on Welsh laws. He reckons that 14 of the 19 Bills the Assembly has passed since it acquired legislative powers would not have been possible under Stephen Crabb’s proposals. These include the ‘presumed consent’ system for organ donation that comes into force in December. “It means the Assembly not having a free hand in laws that have been devolved, without the consent of a Minister in Whitehall," according to Carwyn Jones. Meanwhile, the Presiding Officer Rosemary Butler has warned that unless the Wales Bill is changed substantially there will be calls for yet another one very soon.

As with most constitutional issues the devil is in the detail. Stephen Crabb describes the current system for devolving powers to the Assembly as “unstable and unclear” and he is right. In Scotland all functions are devolved apart from those that are reserved to Westminster such as defence and foreign affairs. On the other hand the National Assembly can only legislate where powers are specifically devolved. This has led to all manner of disputes about what the Assembly can and cannot do and has led UK Ministers and Welsh Ministers going to the courts on four expensive occasions to decide where power lies. 


Stephen Crabb wants Wales to have the Scottish system and in principle the other parties agree with him. The trouble is the legal processes of England and Wales are so deeply entangled that it is much more difficult to create the clear lines of responsibility that exist between London and Edinburgh. To do so would mean following Scotland by devolving responsibility for criminal and civil justice and creating a distinct legal jurisdiction.

But Stephen Crabb has set his face against this. In an interview with the Institute of Welsh Affairs’ journal Agenda this week he says he changed his mind about devolution as a result of the 2011 referendum, referring specifically his own constituency. "I didn't anticipate that people in Pembrokeshire were going to vote for full law-making powers for the Assembly in quite the way they did,” he said. “What that says is there has been a major shift in Welsh public sentiment about devolution since the first referendum in 1997.” However, it seems the shift is not enough for him to be brave enough to propose the stable and lasting devolution settlement he says he wants.

Wales needs a hydrogen highway

It is extraordinary to think that Wales was most connected internally and with the wider world a century ago, in the years leading up to World War I. In those days it was possible to travel from virtually any point in Wales to anywhere else of significant size by the main means of transport at the time – the railways. And as far as the wider world was concerned our major ports were connected with all points on the globe, with stocks of Welsh coal piled high in South America, Cape Town, China, Japan, and all points in between.

This was the high point of Welsh engagement with the wider world and it was no coincidence either that this was the most prosperous period in our history. It was also a high point for Welsh identity as well. The railways contributed significantly to the developing sense of Welsh nationhood in the golden Edwardian age.

Since then our communications have retreated to such an extent that we are now the most disconnected part of Britain, both within Wales as well as externally to the rest of the world. There is no doubt that this is contributing significantly to our economic problems.

This weekend I shall be speaking about this at Plaid Cymru’s conference in Aberystwyth. I will be seconding a motion being proposed by Cynog Dafis, the former AM and MP for Ceredigion and North Pembrokeshire, calling for a raft of policies to improve communications for Wales.

At present there is a tendency to link the north-east of Wales to Merseyside, mid Wales to the English Midlands, and the south-east to Bristol. Of course, we need good transport links with England to access the markets there for Welsh products. But we also need fast and effective links within Wales to counterbalance the pull to the east.

A glance at the Welsh road network reveals a ‘figure-of-eight’ pattern that links the four corners of the country. Improvements have been made to much of this network, though there remain significant gaps, for instance between Carmarthen and Aberystwyth. In any equivalent European country the network would be dual carriageway throughout. However, in Wales this is only the case along the east-west sections – the A55 across the northern coast, the M4 in the south and its extension to Carmarthen and St Clears– together with the A470 from Cardiff to Merthyr.

We should develop the ‘figure-of-eight’ spinal network by widening the roads to provide hard shoulders to give passing opportunities for faster moving traffic. These hard shoulders would also allow provision of a regular coach public transport service throughout the route. It should become known as a ‘Hydrogen Highway’ service with depots at regular intervals allowing the coaches to use this carbon friendly fuel.

Such innovative, practical and affordable policy thinking follows naturally from applying a national, one Wales perspective to our economic circumstances. That’s what we need, but it has been sadly lacking in Labour’s London-centric approach in the 16 long years it has been in charge of the Welsh Government.

Plaid’s vision for a 21st Century NHS

There is better integration of health and social care in agriculture than in the Welsh NHS is the view of Ceredigion AM Elin Jones. She was Minister for Rural Affairs in the coalition government in Cardiff Bay between 2007 and 2011 and for the last four years she has been Plaid’s Shadow Health Minister. Comparing her two roles in an important speech on the future of the NHS last week she said, “Farmers do the social care bit, and vets do the health care – and they do it in an integrated, effective way – even in times of crisis.”

Elin has put her finger on an urgent question that will touch the life of everybody reading this column. What happens to us when we reach older age? In the middle of the last century the NHS was designed for people of working age. Today’s problems of coping with large numbers of confused, ill and vulnerable older people didn’t exist then, simply because most people didn’t live into their eighties. Elin is right when she says we must fundamentally redesign the NHS to take account of this change.

She has come up with a costed plan that will abolish all social care charges for older people in three stages over two Assembly terms. A Plaid-led government would introduce free personal care for older people within two years, at a cost of £32 million. Within five years charges for people with a dementia diagnosis – including those for nursing and residential care - would be abolished, at a cost of £134 million. And all social care charges would be abolished within the second term of a Plaid government, at a remaining cost of £60 million. These commitments will be in Plaid’s manifesto for next year’s Assembly election.

Plaid would create a Community NHS, led by local authorities to be responsible for GP surgeries, community nursing teams and health professionals, community hospitals, mental health services, and adult social care. At the same time a single National Health Board would be created to run Wales’s 20 acute and specialist hospitals. The present Health Boards, including Hywel Dda, would be abolished. We do not need eight of them, together with their chief executives and management teams, to run an effective secondary care health service for a nation of just three million people.

What benefits would be gained from these changes? First, budgets for primary, community and social care would be protected. At present they are decided by the Health Boards and have to compete with the demands of the acute and specialist hospitals. The Health Boards, including our own, have consistently cut GP funding, the most effective front line against people requiring hospital treatment.

Second, out-of-hospital care, especially for the elderly, would be planned seamlessly and democratically. Third, the National Health Board would put in place a strategic and fair service for the Welsh population as a whole, ensuring that everyone can be reached by the emergency services within a reasonable time. As Elin says, “Our acute hospitals would continue to serve their localities and we would guarantee that every part of Wales would remain with an hour’s reach of life saving services.” For Pembrokeshire this would guarantee the continued provision of emergency services, including maternity care, at Withybush.

Puffin shuttle’s passport to paradise

Pembrokeshire's Puffin shuttle in action

For me summer always ends precisely on 27 September, the date that marks the end of the Puffin Shuttle’s daily forays around the Pembrokeshire coast. After that it can only be hailed on Thursdays and Saturdays during its winter schedule travelling between St Davids and Marloes.

The Puffin Bus travels a meandering route along St Bride’s Bay to the benefit of the walkers of the county’s glorious coastal path. First thing it sets out from St David’s, calling at Solva, Newgale, Nolton, Druidston, Broad Haven and Little Haven, and St Brides, coming to a halt at Marloes before returning to St Davids.

For me it is a passport for my favourite occupation of walking this stretch of the coastal path. Over the past 30 years and more I reckon I must have hiked it well over 500 times. I have walked it so often that it appears regularly in my dreams. If I can’t get to sleep I imagine I’m striding out on a particular section and count the landmarks before dropping off.

There is something magical where the sea meets the land, sky and weather in an ever-changing vista. Partly it is the light that, in my experience, is only matched on the west coast of Ireland and along the Lleyn peninsula in north Wales. It explains why Pembrokeshire is home to so many artists.

Spring is a joy when the whites, blues, pinks and reds of the wild flowers and the bright yellow of the gorse carpet the land with a veritable rainbow of colour. At the height of summer the tall grass and hot damp air deliver a heady experience better than any beverage I know. Even in winter walking in the gales that hammer the coast is an exhilarating thing to do. Rough seas, dark threatening clouds and driving rain will transport you from the day to day. 

Walking the path on a regular basis inevitably reveals the permanent inhabitants. The bird life is extraordinarily varied. Apart from the swooping seabirds there are finches, tits, and curlews, plus the occasional wren, robin and blackbird. The best place for skylarks is St Brides where if you lie in the grass for long enough you’ll see them against the sky before they plummet to the earth.

Rabbits are common. Occasionally a badger appears. Late one evening I was startled by one in Bluebell Wood near Little Haven. I don’t know who was most taken aback, he (or she) or me. For a split second we stared at each other before the badger dived into the scrub below. At this time of year you might see a newly born seal pup in a closed stony inlet anywhere along the southern part of the coast. Once I caught a glimpse of a line of dolphins, from a cliff north of Broad Haven, skimming through the water with their dorsal fins occasionally breaking surface.

So as autumn turns to winter and the days ahead are shortening, I’m looking forward to 3 May next year when the Puffin Shuttle begins its schedule seven days a week and summer begins.

Questions Dr Trounce should answer

 “We heard of no serious clinical incidence that has occurred as a result of the changes.” This is what Dr John Trounce, a Consultant Paediatrician in Brighton who chaired the Review Team that looked into the removal of consultant-led maternity services from Withybush to Carmarthen a year ago, told the Hywel Dda Health Board meeting in Llanelli last week.

This emphatic reassurance added to the claim made in the report itself: “We found services in general to be safe with improving outcomes and better compliance with professional standards.”

Yet the report largely discounts the 830 responses the Review Team received from members of the public. Which is extraordinary given that Sue Eardly, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health’s Head of Reviews, described the number as “a massive response”.

So at the meeting of the Hywel Dda Health Board in Llanelli’s Prince Phillip Hospital on Thursday last week, I asked the Board’s chair Bernadine Rees whether, as a member of the public, I could be allowed to ask Dr Trounce a question. Reluctantly she allowed me one.

“Are you expecting us to believe that out of the 830 responses you received not one, not even one, led you to question whether there have been any safety issues with the removal of consultant led maternity care and the Special Care Bay Unit from Withybush Hospital to Glangwili in Carmarthen?” I asked. 

I observed a look of consternation bordering on panic pass across Dr Trounce’s face as I put this question. He claimed that all the responses were taken fully into account before stalling and referring to Sue Eardley who was sitting alongside him.

The concerns articulated in the responses were “colourful” and “felt emotionally” was the way she put it. Then she added: “In terms of outcomes there were three incidents that were serious.”

It is clear that the Review Team largely dismissed the public responses they received directly in response to their call for evidence. Their report sidelines the worries about safety they heard as merely being “fear of the unknown”. Instead they prefer to rely on data collected by the Hywel Dda Health Board itself. “The picture of actual patient experience gathered by the Health Board is significantly more positive that that expressed by campaigners in the social and mainstream media or at public meetings,” says the Review report.

That is hardly surprising. After all the Health Board could not be expected to highlight criticisms of itself. But not only that the report attacks the public who have been responding. It refers to “negative messages from the well organised public lobby” which, it says, have been inadequately countered by the Health Board. The result, it claims, is that many staff were left “feeling unsupported and anxious”.

If Bernadine Rees had allowed me some more questions I would have asked Dr Trounce whether he personally had analysed all the 830 public responses he received? Did he think of speaking to any of those people whose experience suggested safety issues had arisen? We need answers to these questions. Meanwhile anyone who thinks the submission they made to the Review Team ought to receive wider circulation should send it to the Pembrokeshire Herald.