Just before I nip off, I'd like to post a few quotes from an article on red pepper from Leanne Wood:
In Wales and Scotland, the left has grasped the opportunities offered by devolution. We have worked to develop a progressive civic nationalism. Our desire for social justice and equality forms an intrinsic part of our demand for further devolution. And by electing progressive civic nationalists, people in Scotland and Wales have shown that there is a growing recognition that the British union is not working for them.
Plaid Cymru and the SNP are introducing social policies that are clearly to the left of New Labour. Both parties are opposed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the removal of civil liberties in the name of security (including the introduction of ID cards) and Trident. Both parties have more progressive attitudes towards criminality and substance dependants and both are pro-council housing. Of course there is always more to be done – but what we are seeing are the beginnings of an alternative politics. Our civic nationalism is anti-imperialist, anti-racist and pro-social justice.
8 comments:
... and one might add 'ours (as in Plaid Cymru) is a policy of national economic disaster that will further cause Welsh people to leave Wales in droves in search of work and further undermine the great goal of meaningful indepedence for Wales'.
anon.
If you are happy to call yourself Plaid, then why hide behind a veil? Why not stand up and be counted at National Council next month and offer the alternatives?
Unlike Labour or the Tories, Plaid welcomes debate and has frequent arguments on such issues. Also unlike Labour and the Tories, our members decide policy and cannot be overruled.
This is of course assuming that you are not lying through your teeth about party support.
So let's here your options, then.
There's been a few "national economic disasters" in modern Welsh history, but none were a result of Plaid policy. Wales is damn lucky to have a competent politician like Ieuan Wyn Jones holding the economic portfolio at this time of global crisis, frankly.
I beg to differ, Wales is currently in a big economic mess not withstanding the current world wide economic woes - Wales 'enjoyed' a low GVA per head economy before the current sub-prime fiasco. A lot has been written recently about the low conversion rate of Welsh university research into registered patents. Plaid seems incapable of doing even simple things to address basic economic problems that are within its domain to fix - as you say, Ieuan Wyn Jones has the economic portfolio.
Plaid seems incapable of doing even simple things to address basic economic problems that are within its domain to fix -
That is manifestly untrue.
I beg to differ, Wales is currently in a big economic mess not withstanding the current world wide economic woes
And Plaid have been in government for a year. Were you expecting instant miracles?
If I might ask, what is Plaid doing to fix the appalling registered patent output from Welsh universities? That is a problem easily addressed and is an issue that is vital to the future of Wales. If Wales is to be the smart country that Plaid says it should be, how is this going to happen while Plaid presses for no significant action to fix this problem.
I really fail to see why the commercialisation of everything is important, there are many things that should never be patented - such as business methods and software processes.
You clearly seem to think that patenting everything is a panacea - it isn't.
Plaid are doing well in Government but the main leavers of macro economic policy are in the hands of the UK government and even then their control is limited in the global crisis.
The fact is that Wales has suffered from years of outward migration of skills and talents and has suffered under successive economic policies that has rendered the country marginal and excluded.
The issue is not "patenting everything" but patenting at a reasonable level. While Wales has an underperforming economy (especially in terms of low GVA per head of population) we should not be giving away Welsh intellectual property. You would have a serious point if WAG is directly too many resources to protecting IP output.
When Wales has a high GVA economy this issue will be less of an issue. But right now, the University of Wales is grossly underperforming. I am not blaming any university in Wales, researchers do what they are essentially guided to do: publish their work, their careers depend on it. But when there is a mechanism for both publishing discoveries and simultaneously filing for patent protection it seems sensible, if not prudent given the state of the Welsh economy/low wage Welsh economy, to do both. Meanwhile the stats clearly show that the WAG is ignoring the issue. The reality is WAG would not have to spend vast sums on protecting IP, the issue is one of awareness and more careful husbandry of current spend.
There is a country in the Middle East that is now filing patents based on student research. This country is awash with oil, but it is looking ahead - to the post-oil era. Meanwhile, universities in former third world countries are out-performing Wales in their issued/registered patent output rate, not just by a few percentage points, but significantly more than 100%. Such universities will build a huge endowment to fund more research which will lead to new discoveries. Meanwhile, absent direction from WAG Wales will remain dependent on London for money while it continues to ignore the obvious: protection of Welsh innovation/discoveries. Only the former Welsh Medical School (now part of Cardiff University) has a decent set of issued patents.
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