A Good Night Out in the Valleys

Back in November I posted about the launch of National Theatre Wales, but tonight the curtain rose on its first ever production:

     

     Curtains up as National Theatre Wales' first play opens

It's good to see it up and running at last, not least because it means we now have something to stand alongside and complement the Welsh language Theatr Genedlathol Cymru, set up back in 2004. If we are serious about becoming a truly bilingual nation it is important that we promote and celebrate the many strands that contribute to our rich cultural diversity in both our languages.

I'm particularly proud that establishing an English language National Theatre for Wales was one of Plaid Cymru's manifesto pledges in the 2007 Assembly election, and that this was something that we managed to negotiate into the One Wales Agreement with Labour, who were opposed to the idea and had done nothing to set up an equivalent to Theatr Genedlathol Cymru in all the time they were in power before ... either when in coalition with the LibDems or in power on their own.

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But that's enough politics. This is a taste of what to expect:

     

And there's more information about this and future productions here.

Swansea to Cork ... again

It's been a while coming, but it looks like the new Swansea-Cork ferry is now operational.

     

Yes, it will probably do more for the economy of south west Ireland than it will do for that of Wales ... but even so it will still bring benefits to Wales. And every car or truck it takes off the roads west of Swansea will reduce pollution, make those roads that much safer to use, and reduce the need for those roads to be widened. Those are very welcome benefits.

Congratulations to those who have fought so hard to get the service reinstated. I wish the Fastnet Line every success and hope it will be a permanent part of our transport infrastructure.

An unjust way to do justice

There's breaking news about the decision by the Labour Government in Westminster to refuse to allow bilingual juries in Wales. So far the story is only available in Welsh, here:

     'Na' i reithgorau dwyieithog

This matter has been on the agenda for some years, and the Ministry of Justice has been continually putting off the decision, as mentioned here. Yet despite previous positive indications the last statement by Jack Straw did appear to signal something more negative. So perhaps it shouldn't be such a surprise.

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But that doesn't make it any less unjust. At present many lawyers specifically advise clients not to choose to testify in Welsh for this very reason. This, for example, is from a lecture by Justice Roderick Evans, the Senior Presiding Judge for Wales.

In every jury case in which I was involved as counsel and in which a witness on the side which I was instructed to represent indicated a preference to give evidence in Welsh, I advised that that witness would be at a substantial disadvantage in giving evidence in Welsh because of the disadvantages of presenting evidence to a jury via a translator. I know that I was not alone in giving such advice, and now as a judge I am aware of cases in which witnesses who would prefer to give evidence in Welsh give their evidence to a jury in English because of the need for translation.

Lecture to the Centre for Welsh Legal Affairs, 2006

The injustice is even more pronounced because of the unequality of the way Welsh is being treated in comparison with English. If any juror is summoned who does not understand sufficient English to be able to follow the case, s/he will be discharged. So why should that same principle not apply to Welsh?

It is simply not sufficient to say, as the MoJ maintains, that translation facilities are provided. The crucial issue is that a jury makes decisons about any case based on the credibility of the witnesses who give evidence.

In most cases, a witness's credibility is primarily determined by the way they answer questions ... especially when put under pressure in cross examination. Their tone of voice, frankness, confidence, hesitation, evasion or defensiveness are important ways in which any jury decides if a person is telling the truth or not. How can this be done if the jury doesn't understand Welsh?

Any translation will be several seconds late, in a voice different from that of the witness. How would a jury member who relies on such a translation decide whether a witness's body language matched what they said?

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So there should be no issue of principle at stake. However that does not mean there won't be practical matters to address in arranging pools of Welsh speaking jurors. In Wales as a whole, only about 12% of the population were fluent in Welsh at the time of the last census, so there needs to be a practical and workable way of determining who they are beforehand, rather than filtering them out when they arrive for jury service.

The simplest way would be to ask that question as part of the annual electoral registration process, not least because the form already includes a question about age for jury purposes. Putting another tick box on the form is not going to lead to any inconvenience or cost any money.

And of course the jury would still be random. Although the size of the pool of Welsh speakers will vary from area to area, the likelihood of a trial involving significant use of Welsh is going to be correspondingly higher in areas with higher proportions of Welsh speakers. In areas where there are fewer Welsh speakers the answer would be to hold trials with significant use of Welsh in a batch every couple of months or so, or to move the trial to a place where there is a higher concentration of Welsh speakers.

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So today's decision by the Ministry of Justice is not only fundamentally wrong in principle, but willfully ignores the very simple and practical steps that could be taken to make it possible to summons the necessary pools of bilingual jurors.

The use of Welsh in Courts is a matter that has not been devolved to the Assembly. This outrageous decision shows why it should be. But even without that it is a decision that I hope—and indeed expect—will be reversed by the next UK government. Despite their other faults, the Tories do have a relatively good track record on language issues. The way they react to this decision will show how committed they are to a system of justice that can be fair and just to everybody in Wales, irrespective of whether they choose to use English or Welsh.

Pulling levers

Just for those who like to blame devolution for Wales' undoubtedly poor economic indicators, this clip from last week's Sharp End should be a timely reminder of where the real responsibility for this situation lies.

     

Alun Cairns was asked whether he was sure he was doing the right thing in wanting to be an MP, especially in light of the fact that people in Wales held MPs in much lower esteem than elsewhere in the UK. His reply was:

Absolutely right. My greatest interest is the economy and business and that's where the powers lie for economy and business really, where I'd like to be able to make a contribution to the constituency.

... When you look at the economy and business and in terms of overcoming deprivation, child poverty and those sorts of issues, it is Westminster that has most of the levers and that's really what can make the biggest influence and difference to the Vale of Glamorgan and other constituencies.

So just remember this next time you hear Alun Cairns or any other Tory criticizing the Welsh Government for Wales' poor economic performance, or why levels of deprivation and child poverty are so bad.

If you're a Tory, the obvious answer is to aim to get elected to Westminster in the hope of being able to hold one of those levers ... although that's something which is just as true for Labour politicians as well. But isn't the much more sensible idea to move the levers to Wales, so that we can take responsibility for these things for ourselves?

New Welsh-medium schools in Swansea

A few years ago now, Swansea was one of the first local authorities to conduct a survey asking whether parents of very young children wanted them to have a Welsh-medium education when they reached school age. It wasn't particularly publicized at the time and I first heard of it almost a year later, when it was mentioned in this news release on the RhAG website. The headline figures were that 28% of parents wanted to send their children to WM schools no matter how far they had to travel, but that this figure would rise to 38% if a WM school were available within easy travel distance.

I wrote about it on the WalesOnline forum, crunching some numbers from documents on the Swansea website to conclude that, even using the worst case figures, Swansea would need to open some new WM schools:

The number of children in primary education in Swansea is set to reduce from the current 17,611 to 17,364 in 2011 ... an overall reduction of about 250 in three years. This means it should be possible to close a couple of English-medium schools (because the total demand for EM education will fall by 700 in the same three years and Swansea already has more than 3,200 surplus primary places) and convert them to WM with minimal inconvenience.

MH on WalesOnline Forum - 16 September 2008

A few months later, in March 2009, Heini Gruffudd of RhAG published this paper on where new WM schools were most badly needed. This was no doubt in response to the fact that Swansea themselves had not come up with any public proposals for new WM schools ... even though the original survey had been done in 2007. It was good that Swansea conducted the survey in the first place, but it is a pointless exercise unless they are then prepared to act on its findings.

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In the meantime Swansea, along with most other local authorities in Wales, were faced with a huge number of surplus of spaces in their schools, meaning that some schools would need to be closed. They put forward proposals for closing three primaries—Cwm, Arfryn and Llanmorlais—in March 2009, but because of objections each of these was eventually referred to the Education minister in the Welsh Government for a final decision. On Friday, Leighton Andrews made the first of these decisions, as reported here:

     Cwm School closure is confirmed
     Welsh Assembly Government agrees to close Cwm Primary School

As might be expected, the people who objected to the proposal won't be happy with the final decision. But the fact is that Cwm Primary is only about 300m away from Cwm Glas Primary, which is itself just about large enough for the children from both schools. The decision was inevitable.

     

The picture above shows Cwm Primary, Cwm Glas Primary is below.

     

No school closure decision is easy, but what has happened does open up a solution to Swansea's problem of where to open at least one much-needed WM school. At present there is no WM school at all in East Swansea, at least not until you get as far north as YGG Lôn Las in Llansamlet. The RhAG report I linked to shows that a considerable number of children from Bon-y-maen have to travel 2km or more to get to YGG Lôn Las, and that some even travel 6km or so from St Thomas:

74 children from Bonymaen attend Lôn-las and 20 from St. Thomas. 9 children from St. Thomas attend Bryn-y-môr. 103 children from these areas suggests that there are sufficient numbers here to support a Welsh medium school, and quick growth could be anticipated.

So we have the bizarre situation where some parents are up in arms because their children will have to travel a maximum extra distance of just over 300m to get to Cwm Glas, while there are easily enough local children in Bon-y-maen who are currently having to travel many times further by bus or car to get to the closest WM school, but who would be able to walk if the Cwm buildings were to become a WM school. And for the community as a whole it's surely better for the buildings to remain in use, for they will be just as much available for community use outside school hours as they are now. To me, it's an obvious solution to a pressing problem.

Cwm Primary is closing simply because the numbers wanting EM education do not justify two EM schools with so many surplus places in such close proximity to each other ... but its closure opens up the opportunity for Swansea to provide more WM places in accordance with the wishes of the 28% of parents that want it for their children.

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At just about the same time as the closure of Cwm was confirmed, Swansea announced some other plans for the expansion of WM education:

More Swansea school closure plans announced

As part of the council's plans to shakeup education in the city Pentrepoeth Infants and Juniors, and Graig Infants schools will close and a new all-through primary school will open on the Pentrepoeth sites.

... If the plans are given the go-ahead, the council wants to open a Welsh Medium school on the vacated Graig school to meet what councillor Mike Day, cabinet member for education, called "the continually growing demand for Welsh Medium education in the area."

... Current figures from Swansea Council show that there is enough capacity in a new primary school incorporating facilities at Pentrepoeth infants and juniors to include children from Graig infants.

Graig Infants currently has 51 full time pupils, but capacity for 113
Pentrepoeth Infants has 98 pupils with capacity for 123
Pentrepoeth Juniors has 239 pupils and capacity for 276

Evening Post - 6 March 2010

As the figures show, the children currently at Craig infants can be accommodated at a combined Pentrepoeth Primary School. It is just over 600m away. The current Graig Infants is more than half empty and although, as the picture below shows, it isn't big Morriston has the most crying need for more WM provision. There are no WM schools in Morriston, but last year there were over a hundred children from Morriston travelling outside the area to get a WM education.

     

So this isn't really a closure. Converting Graig Infants to a small WM primary will comfortably fill what is currently a very under-used school with local children. To me, it again seems obvious. It's perhaps smaller than would be ideal ... but Swansea aren't coming up with any other ideas.

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In conclusion, Swansea conducted their initial survey in 2007, but no new WM schools have been opened in response to that survey (Llwynderw was already under construction). Therefore plans for the next few WM schools are long overdue.

The decision to close Cwm opens the very real possibility of a new WM school being set up in September this year. That is an opportunity that must not be missed. Swansea's intention is for the Pentrepoeth/Graig reorganization to happen by 2011. That's possible but not definite, because the decision making process can take a long time if the matter has to be referred to the Assembly.

And there are some other possibilities ... but they will depend on the outcome of decisions which have not yet been taken.

Guto Bebb

Not so long ago Guto Bebb, the Tory candidate for Aberconwy, wrote a couple of posts about tax and borrowing powers for Wales. In the first he said:

The fundamental dishonesty of the debate surrounding Barnett in Wales is the fact that Plaid Cymru continually make wildly exaggerated claims about the unfairness of the current formula without ever attempting to explain what would happen if their stated aim of an Independent Wales was to be achieved.

Think about it. No Union = No Barnett Formula. Plaid Cymru claim that the current shortfall is hugely unfair to Wales. The current shortfall has been identified by Holtham as spending of £112 per head via the Assembly block grant rather than the £114 per head which Holtham thinks it should be if the needs based analysis used to distribute money to the English regions was utilised here in Wales. What would be the shortfall if the stated Plaid Cymru aim of independence was achieved? They never seem to be willing to respond to that question and their Honorary President conspicuously failed to address the issue last night when I made these very points.

The lesson is clear. When Plaid talk about Barnett ask them what they would do to make-up the shortfall if Barnett did not exist because that is the ultimate aim of their policy of independence.

Not much that Guto writes is that relevant, but this included several references to Plaid and posed some direct questions. So I replied with a comment based around what I said in this post:

     Holtham: Taxes and Barnett

I checked his blog again today as a result of reading this post by Alwyn ap Huw, and saw that Mr Bebb had simply deleted it. It appears he's very good at throwing out accusations, and of course he's quite entitled to put his fingers in his ears so that he can't hear any reply ... but it is something else to stop anybody who reads his blog seeing the reply.

Aberconwy is going to be a tight contest between Plaid and the Tories, but one that I think Phil Edwards will win. One of the things that will swing it for Plaid is that the Tories do seem to have made a rather unfortunate choice of candidate.

The Message from Llandudno

 
     

Sadly not mine, but one of my favourites. And particularly appropriate as their conference was held at Llandudno this weekend. The Tories may get a few things right, and I'll give them credit when they do ... but they get much, much more wrong.

Actually, there's an ulterior motive for this post. If I've set things up properly, the new button below should enable people to retweet any posts they particularly like. If it doesn't work, please let me know.