The recently published report of the All Wales Convention has recommended that we should move rapidly to propose in a referendum that the National Assembly has primary law making powers over all devolved matters.
This proposal should be enthusiastically supported by all – primarily because it will hardly make a jot of difference to the capacity of Government in Wales to make a difference to the lives we lead and the public services we get.
Governments have a range of tools to achieve their policy objectives. They make budgets: deciding which programmes of health, education, environmental management and transport will best meet our needs, deciding who gets what and how much. They employ people and issue contracts to implement those programmes. Government is a profoundly political process as it prioritises competing interests and tries to engage citizens in making its programmes more effective. Government is devilishly complex administrative process in which so many policies falter though inadequately designed implementation.
The tool that is rarely necessary for devolved Governments in Wales is the power to make new laws. Think back over the past decade and try to identify one significant policy that was not implemented because of a lack of legal powers. I can’t. As with all Governments, there may have been a lack of imagination, a lack of will, an inability to engage and convince citizens, a lack of resources, an inadequate administrative capacity – but so rarely has there been a lack of legislative powers to achieve an identified purpose
Significantly the Jones Parry Report assumes that legislative powers are important and references a lot of lawyers who say that is so; but no evidence is given. So why is the argument over the location of legislative powers, objectively irrelevant, so significant for some parts of our political elite?
Westminster parliamentarians have long been led into the belief that their role in making laws is important and that should it be lost then something significant has happened to the British Constitution. But look at the Bills in last week’s Queen’s speech – proposed laws which would require Governments to seek more equality, budget more prudently and provide better schools. These are things that Governments should just do; the proposed bills are entirely totemic and any enthusiasm for preventing the devolution of such law making powers is a mere fetish. If MPs made less law they might be better able to challenge the executive action of Governments in waging wars, regulating bankers, implementing fair taxes and benefits.
There are ‘devo enthusiasts’ for whom primary law making powers have acquired the same totemic status. For many such people the complex realities of actual government and politics are too messy to grapple with; far better to imagine, like a John Lennon song, a world in which legal competence somehow resolves every tension and achieves every purpose .
Let’s get on and devolve primary law making powers so that there is clarity of responsibility and no more lame excuses. Hopefully once a Welsh Assembly has more complete legislative powers then a Welsh Assembly Government will decide to legislate less and achieve more.
Jeff Jones 6:15 pm on 23 November, 2009 Permalink
Couldn’t agree with you more Paul. The fact that the Scottish Parliament has passed so many new acts hasn’t necessarily made Scotland a better country for most Scots. Look at the issue with the Sprinkler LCO. For many people it is a classic example of what is wrong with the present system because it has taken so long to get any where near becoming a law. Yet if the you read the literature on the benefits of domestic sprinklers, the example always used is that of Scottsdale, Arizona. New buildings in Scottsdale have to sprinklers installed but it has nothing to do with the Federal government or the state of Arizona. The measure was introduced by a city ordinance. In other words a local government by law which probably had its origins in the election manifesto of the locally directly elected Mayor . It was probably introduced in weeks rather than months.
Not only should there be primary legislative powers but the Assembly’s accountability to the electorate would also be increased in my opinion if it had some form of revenue raising powers. ‘No taxation without represenation’ might have been the slogan of American colonists in the 18th century but in the 21st century we should not have ‘representation without taxation.’
Full primary law making powers should also be accompanied by a complete reform of the electorate system to reflect that the Assembly is different from Westminster. Whether or not a person is a member of the Assembly should depend on whether that person can gain the support of the voters not on where they are placed on a closed list by a dwindling band of party members in areas which were established to directly elected members of the European Parliament.
David Walters 1:07 pm on 24 November, 2009 Permalink
“Think back over the past decade and try to identify one significant policy that was not implemented because of a lack of legal powers.”
Which party or individual would have gone into an election with a policy that they legally couldn’t implement? Surely the policies that have been implemented are those which can be implemented within the present system and not those that can’t
Mike Cridland 5:15 pm on 2 December, 2009 Permalink
How many children in Wales go to schools that are in a poor state of repair, where the kids use text books that are out of date.
My stepson made a valid point to me the other day he attended a school in Cardiff he could not understand (as a American) why the schools were falling down, where asbestos ceilings were coming down.
Then illustrated the difference with the high school that he attended in a rural backwater in Kansas with no money. the school was new and well maintained with up to date books. there was a school therapist. the local school district is in the whole, but still they put their kids first, and that with 60% of the funding coming from property taxes.so my point what is law making powers going to do with a crappy infrastructure and where local government do not have the money to make the difference!