I'm glad that a Liberal Democrat leaflet has woken up Cllr Anthony Taylor (junior, as his fellow-Labour chairs like to refer to him in council, to distinguish him from SDP's Tony Taylor) to the imminence of the Euro elections. I was beginning to fear that Labour was taking their vote for granted. We do need a public dialogue about these elections, or the winners will be apathy or extreme parties.
He disputes a statement in the leaflet that the Labour/Plaid Welsh Assembly Government is planning to spend £40m on government offices. Well, I am not an AM (nor is Cllr Taylor), so I shall leave it to someone more knowledgeable to confirm or deny his charge.
However, I assume that the writers of the Liberal Democrat leaflet (which I admit I have not seen) based their text on such statements as this from Betsan Powys's Blog:
"All of which gives the news that the Assembly Government is planning to spend £41.8 million on modernising its headquarters in Cathays Park the stench of dreadful timing, the appearance of a government that is planning to refurbish its ivory tower. After all it's our money. It all comes from the core budget and "shouldn't they spend it on opening a new school or hospital?" (A pound for each time visitors to the £70million Senedd have asked me that and the noughts would be adding up nicely by now)."
We are so used to Labour double- or even treble-counting their expenditure on social services, that it comes as a surprise to find one of their number denying that they are spending any money at all.
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I am aware that plans to upgrade Cathays Park are under active consideration by civil servants but that is far from being the same as a political decision actually being taken to implement it which the leaflet implies.
As for the Euros. I can only speak for the Aberavon Constituency but we are certainly not taking anything for granted - to do so would be arrogance of the highest order. We have covered a large part of the constituency door knocking and leafleting already - in fact we were out and about earlier tonight in Sandfields East. These are obviously tough times for any Labour activist but given the recent furore over MPs expenses, things are going a lot better than we might have first thought.
Congratulations on the Deputy Leadership, by the way.
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