Pethau Bychain

Dim blog go iawn heddiw, ond dwi jyst eisau dweud i pawb dwi'n cefnogi Dydd Pethau Bychain . Mae'n dydd i dweud rhywbeth yn Gymraeg ar lein. Dwi'n meddwl mae'n syniad da, ac yn y dyfodol byddaf yn trio'n galetach! (Diwrnod hir, sori!)



For those who don't understand Welsh here's an explanation.

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PFI Timebomb

It has recently emerged that the NHS in England faces a total bill of £65 billion for Private Finance Initiative (PFI) hospitals. PFI was invented by the Tories and promoted by New Labour as a means of pumping private money into public institutions. PFI is not dissimilar to borrowing huge sums of money over 25 or 30 years on a credit card with a punitive APR.

For some English NHS Trusts, repayments on these debts amounted to 10% of turnover. When the NHS is being squeezed and pressured into making savings, inevitably at the expense of jobs and services, paying back the the PFI debt will be prioritised. The GMB union have warned this is just the tip of the iceberg with the total cost of all PFI projects - around 650 in number - coming to an astonishing £230 billion. They said this equated to £9,300 per taxpayer and predicted it would not be paid off until 2048.

In Wales, because we have an Assembly, we've been able to do things differently. Welsh NHS Trusts do not have the same PFI debt as some of their English counterparts. PFI may have been attractive financially in the early days, it has been largely shunned here in Wales, in recognition of the long term problems it can cause for the public sector. When Plaid entered into coalition government in 2007, the rejection of PFI in the NHS was a crucial component of the One Wales agreement.

Now it has emerged that the cost of the MOD-promoted, PFI-funded, Armed Forces Training college planned for St Athan, has increased by £3 billion since 2008 to £14 billion. Doesn't this show that schemes like this are unaffordable in the long term and serve only to risk mortgaging the future of our children?

Speaking Welsh at the National Eisteddfod

It was great to be able to pop across to the National Eisteddfod in Ebbw Vale this month. It was billed as an Eisteddfod for the whole of the Heads of the Valley area so I hope people from the Rhondda were able to go along and sample some unique Welsh culture. The week seemed to be a great success with record attendance numbers recorded on the Sunday, weather that was more good than bad and a significant shot in the arm for the local economy.

There were many highlights for me over the days that I visited but the stand-out moment has to be meeting the granddaughter of the legendary singer and political activist, Paul Robeson. I was introduced to Susan Robeson (pictured above) following an excellent lecture that focused on the meeting that took place between her grandfather and Aneurin Bevan at the National Eisteddfod of 1958; which was the last time the event was held in Ebbw Vale.

Mr Robeson, an internationally renowned singer and actor from New Jersey, was also a beacon of light for working class people and the oppressed the world over. A special place in his heart was reserved for the miners of South Wales and the welcome received by Susan Robeson at the Maes is testament to her grandfather’s lasting legacy.

Although I have been to the Eisteddfod many times before, this was the first time I have had the confidence to properly use my Welsh language skills in conversation. What made this Eisteddfod different was a week I recently spent at a Welsh language learners’ ‘bootcamp’ in the glorious Ceredigion seaside village of Tresaith. Over the course of seven days, spoken English was prohibited and we were only allowed to communicate in Welsh. Tutors from the ‘Say Something in Welsh’ course, who organised the ‘bootcamp’, were on hand to help overcome any difficulties. I managed to survive the week and was surprised how much Welsh was in my head, I just needed the confidence to use it. I would wholeheartedly recommend the course, and the internet podcasts from Say Something in Welsh, to any learner.

Another Burberry Own Goal

I found it hard to contain my anger earlier this month when I learned of the obscene pay package that has been awarded to Burberry boss Angela Ahrendts.

Following their immoral decision to cast aside decades of hard work and loyalty from their 300-strong Treorci workforce by moving production to China in 2007, I had hoped we wouldn’t be hearing from these supposed bastions of Britishness again.

The dust has barely settled on the monumental PR disaster in Treorci, but the company has been at it again this week. In a move that is sure to reinforce many people’s disdain for Burberry, Ms Ahrendts received salary, bonus and benefits – including an unspecified clothing allowance – of £3.2m for the year to the end of March. In addition she received matching share and option payouts worth £2.9m.

This cash windfall, worth more than £6 million, could have been used to keep production in South Wales. Instead, the profits from selling out a dedicated workforce, that stuck by the company through thick and thin, have been ‘trousered’ by one person.

I can't imagine how the former Troerci workers, some of who have devoted all of their working life to Burberry, are feeling now. This is yet another example of the greed of the fat cats being placed before the very people that allowed them to make a profit in the first place.

The cutlure of excessive bonuses was an obvious factor in the cause of the recent banking collapse. It handsomely rewarded banking executives for playing a high-risk, high reward strategy. It has been referred to as casino capitalism. That it is still being tolerated, beggars belief.

It is interesting that the companies that are taking a more principled attitude to the way they treat their workforce; John Lewis and Admiral Insurance are two names that spring to mind, are the ones that seem to be doing very well despite the difficult economic situation.

Perhaps Ms Ahrendts and the rest of the overpaid fat cats, from whatever sector of industry they work in, should take heed.

Higher Equality Something to be Proud Of

‘Ageing, health and wealth – the differences across the UK,’ produced by The Office for National Statistics (ONS) recently gave several reasons to be cheerful for those of us living and working in Wales. Levels of inequality are lower here than anywhere else in the UK. Not only has Wales the lowest variation in household income in the UK, but it has seen the greatest increase in average income; rising 16% over the three-year period between 2004/05.

Some other facets of the report show there is more work to be done; for example, far too many children that are brought up in jobless households.

Good news overall? Not for the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). David Rosser, the director of the CBI in Wales, said that this report provides evidence that Wales needs to attract more entrepreneurs and people with higher salaries. Mr Rosser was joined by along with JoJo Maman Bébé founder Laura Tenison in using the report as evidence that Wales needs more super rich people.

Living in a country where equality is greater than anywhere else in the UK should not be derided. Do families struggling to make ends meet in inner city areas such as Bethnal Green or Canning Town feel blessed that the region in which they live has such a high concentration of high earners? Its doubtful.

I'm not sure why the thoughts of the CBI were given such prominence in the Western Mail’s front page story on the ONS report with the headline 'Lack of Top Earners Holding Wales Back.' As the Joseph Rowntree Foundation suggested much further down in the report, Wales does have bigger worries than a dearth of super-rich business men and women.

Common Sense Cuts

It was refreshing to hear the Howard League for Penal Reform and the probation officers’ union, Napo, bring a bit of common sense to the public debate this week on how best to cut the budget deficit. Both suggested abolishing short prison sentences on the basis that they serve no purpose whatsoever.

As unpalatable as it may be to some not to impose custodial sentences for offences such as ABH, theft and motoring, the hard facts bear this out as a win-win policy. Napo's figures show that 74% of prisoners serving terms of less than 12 months were reconvicted within two years. On the other hand, the chances of reconviction are lowered significantly if the offender is given an intensive supervision order in the community, allied with any programme to tackle underlying problems such as problematic substance use, anger or violence.

The Prison Governors' Association also waded into the debate by backing the abolition of short sentences. Eoin McLennan-Murray, the Association’s president, said small jail terms were ill-judged and stemmed from Britain’s "love affair with custody." We can only hope that this government will be an improvement on the last, which saw the prison population almost double in a decade, despite falling crime. But its not possible to forget Michael Howard’s tenure as Home Secretary.

The cost savings of such a change in sentencing guidelines may be just enough to get George Osborne’s ears to prick up. The difference between jailing offenders for 12 months or less and imposing community rehabilitation programmes is huge – anything up to £300 million per year. If the new government really wanted to find ways to save money that do not affect the most vulnerable people, they should have been prepared to take seriously proposals like the abolition of short prison sentences, as advocated by the people working in the field.

I'll declare an interest in this debate because I worked as a probation officer before my election to the Assembly and I've retained associate membership of Napo. As a probation officers in the valleys, we saw too often the same faces - usually young men who had been jailed briefly for petty offences and not had any form of rehabilitation whilst inside because there simply was not enough time. Prisons hardens many young people. It certainly makes them more likely to re-offend. We regularly saw many first-time offenders jailed for less than 12 months lose everything sometimes for just a few weeks inside; their home, their job and, in some cases, their relationship and kids. Has society improved for having punished this person with a short prison sentence? I would argue the reverse is the case.

In the old days, the Lib Dems stood for fairer and evidence-based criminal justice. They are now in government and committed to making huge cuts. This is a saving that could be made with very little pain. It should be a no-brainer. Somehow, I don't think it'll be as simple as that.

Robin Hood in reverse

Plenty of people knew that the Tories would be devastating for Wales if they gained power at the UK general election and so it proved with George Gideon Osborne’s ‘reverse Robin Hood’ budget on Tuesday. He has taken from the poorest while leaving the richest relatively untouched.

Mr Osborne prefaced his bombshell by saying his budget was “tough, but fair.” This old Etonian millionaire should ask himself if it is fair on pensioners who cannot afford to heat their homes as well as eat properly through the winter to increase the most regressive of all taxes, VAT, to 20%. Is it fair that child benefit, housing benefit, and family tax credits have all been targeted in measures that will see £11 billion taken out of the welfare system?

Is it fair that so many public sector workers will inevitably lose their jobs with Osborne’s vow to cut Government departments, with a few exceptions, by 25% over four years? Plaid believes this will signal 60,000 job losses in Wales alone. What will this do to our economy?

Yet the bankers, who by-and-large caused the financial meltdown, appear to have got off scot-free. There is to be no curbing of the bonus culture that rewards short-term risk at the expense of long-term stability. At the end of last year, the National Audit Office calculated that the cost of bailing out the banks had, so far, reached a staggering £850 billion. Now that tax-payers money is being used to prop up so many of these institutions, why isn’t the UK Government being firmer and more punitive towards them and their obscene profits? The reason is that the Tory party has always existed, and always will, to preserve the wealth of the few while paying nothing more than lip-service to the needs of the many.

But what of the Liberal Democrats, the sheepish collaborators in this coalition? Millions of people voted for their promise of fairer politics. Those voters must feel utterly betrayed now. Clegg and his cronies have allowed their mouths to be stuffed with gold.

The Con/Dem Government have now set out their stall and given us a taste of what we can expect over the course of their parliament. It is up to us now to make sure their plans to rob the poor and give to the rich are not allowed to get through with ease.