Boasting about failure

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Those campaigning for the UK to remain in the EU have consistently warned that Wales would lose EU funding if we were to leave, whilst those arguing in favour of exit have countered that, if the UK did not need to pay large sums of money to ‘Brussels’, the UK government could pass the same funding directly to Wales.  There’s an element of truth to both of those positions, but I’ve always thought that the first, which amounts to telling us that we can trust the EU more than we can trust the UK Government, was a curious line of argument for anyone in the UK Government to take.

At least one member of the ‘out’ brigade has changed tack somewhat in recent days.  Priti Patel has pointed out that there’s no guarantee of EU funds for Wales after 2020 even if we remain in the EU.  Whilst elements of her argument strike me as stretching credibility (Turkey a member by 2020?  I don’t think so.), her basic point is sound; there can no more be any guarantee of continuing support fro EU funding than there can be of support from the UK Government. 

However what really struck me was the response of the Labour MP, Stephen Doughty, who said “… that no other part of the UK benefits as much from EU membership as Wales does and there is no real reason for us to believe that will change.”  That displays a remarkable lack of ambition, not to say a lack of faith in the Welsh (Labour) Government.  The whole purpose of EU funding is to help Wales reach a similar level of economic activity and success as other parts of the EU; the funding is not supposed to be open-ended.

I want Wales to get to a position where we no longer need such EU funding; I want governments in Wales and the UK to use the funding effectively and productively to bring about change.  It’s clear that all the parties involved in spending EU funding have failed on that score to date, but when members of the governing party are telling us, in effect, that they see no reason at all to believe that they can ever achieve that, it merely underlines, yet again, the extent of their own failure.

What's the real issue?

Tweet I thought that this story was rather confused and confusing when I read it first; and after re-reading it, I haven’t changed my mind.  There is a lack of clarity about whether the problem is where the powers lie, whether it’s about what is done with those powers, or whether it’s simply about spending priorities.

The headline claims that failure to devolve more road safety powers to Wales is costing lives on Welsh roads because the numbers of deaths and serious injuries have fallen more slowly here.  But the reasons for that are less than entirely clear – lack of devolution surely means that the policies being followed in Wales are the same as those in England - the question about why they have a different result is more complicated than simply where the power lies.

And later in the story, the director of the RAC which is the organisation behind the report says that “The UK risks breaking apart in terms of road safety policy with different administrations having varying levels of power, funding and political will to deal with death and injury on the highways”, which sounded to me more like an argument for less devolution than more - in direct contradiction of the headline.

In essence, the detail of the criticism seems to be more about whether the Welsh Government is spending enough on road safety than about where the power lies, but that looks more like a criticism of the Welsh Government for not setting the same spending priorities as England than of any lack of devolution.  It’s an argument for consistent central decision making rather than for more devolution.

And that, perhaps brings us to the nub of the issue here – as on so many issues, there is a lack of understanding of the fact that the very existence of devolved administrations inevitably means that there will be differences in outcomes in the different countries of the UK.  I don’t say that to defend a situation where Wales is failing to reduce deaths and injuries on roads as quickly as England; no-one would want to defend that.

Comparisons with what happens elsewhere are inevitable and entirely proper, and with England being so close, it’s the obvious point of comparison.  The RAC are right to draw attention to the divergence in outcomes, and it is something which should concern us.  I’m not sure that the story sheds much light on the answer though – calling on the Welsh Government to spend more in any area where it is underperforming (whilst it has no control of its total revenue) is easy; saying from where the cash should come is a great deal harder.

Can ministers solve the education problems?

Tweet This report on Tuesday drew attention to the failure – to date at least – of the Welsh Government’s Literary and Numeracy Framework.  Whilst the spokeswoman for the Government tried her best to skirt around the problems by referring to the report as a “timely reminder that there is still much to do”, it seems to me that the fact of failure so far is unarguable.  The question is about the causes of the failure and what, if anything, can be done to redeem it.

Plaid’s education spokesman, Simon Thomas made a very telling point when he said that “As is so often the case, the principles behind Welsh Government strategies are sound but ministers find it difficult to ensure delivery of their policies on the ground”.  I’m not so sure, however, about the unstated implication that different ministers, or ministers of another party, might be able to do better.  It’s at least conceivable that his statement may be true in the more generic way in which it reads.

I remember a lecturer on a course I attended some years ago talking about leading change in organisations as being like throwing pebbles into a pond.  Initiating one change (throwing in a single pebble) leads to a nice set of concentric rings as the ‘wave’ of change spreads evenly out across the whole pond.  Initiating two changes gives two nice concentric rings, but the interference pattern which they cause means that sometimes the change waves reinforce each other, but at others they actually cancel each other out.  Initiating a large number of changes (throwing in a whole handful of pebbles) simply results in complete chaos.

And that perhaps underlines the response of Elaine Edwards of UCAC, as quoted in the report, who said that “Our members have faced a barrage of new initiatives in recent years…”  Another point well made.

Part of the underlying problem facing our education system is certainly the short-term view taken by politicians in general, who will always, and inevitably, have an eye to the next election.  Those in power need to be seen to be ‘doing something’ to address the problems; those in opposition need to be seen to be saying that they would do better – and if they do get their hands on power, existing initiatives are reversed and new ones kicked off.

But perhaps a more serious issue, to return to the point which Simon Thomas made, is whether any minister of any party actually can solve the problems by means of central directives and initiatives.  It’s a very managerialist stance to take, and I’m sceptical at best about managerialism.  But in education, we also have a system where authority is spread across a number of different organisations, and ministers don’t sit at the top of a neat hierarchy in any event.  What if the expectation that government ministers can put things right is unrealistic in the first place?

Ultimately, success or failure in education is something which surely depends heavily on the ability and motivation of teachers to teach and the desire of the learners to learn.  If either, or both, of those are a problem, then producing ever lengthier and more detailed tomes of guidance, and a host of new initiatives with fancy names, are likely to do more harm than good.  Might it be that concentrating more on the motivation of both educators and learners might do more to improve things than trying to micro-manage the detail from afar?  

It might not be good politics through…

GVA and GDHI

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There are times when I find myself agreeing with both sides in an argument and end up scratching my head as to whether they’re arguing about the right thing.  Today’s extensive coverage in the Western Mail’s Business section of the GVA vs. GDHI argument is a case in point.

The Welsh Government has chosen to adopt GDHI as its headline economic measure and the Western Mail set about finding people to explain why that was the wrong measure to adopt.  They half succeeded.

The Welsh Government argues that GDHI is a better measure of people’s real wealth, whereas a number of economists argue that GVA is a better measure of economic performance.  It seems to me that they’re both right.  The argument isn’t really about what the ‘best measure’ is, but about what it is we’re trying to measure and why.  It was a question which was skated round, rather.

If we are setting out to measure the relative wealth of people in Wales compared to the UK average, then I’d agree that the Welsh Government has probably selected the best measure to do that.  What it is not, however, is an effective measure of Welsh economic performance.  Because it includes all household income, it includes the fiscal transfer which results from the taxation and benefit system, which to some extent hides or disguises underlying economic performance.

That highlights an interesting point in itself.  It is theoretically possible for Wales to reach 100% of the UK average for GDHI with absolutely no underlying improvement in the Welsh economy, simply by increasing the redistributive impact of taxes and benefits - and without any action at all from the Welsh Government.  I can’t conceive of any UK Government actually doing that, but that doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be done.  It might even satisfy many people in Wales that we were getting a ‘fair deal’; but it wouldn’t really mean that the Welsh economy was successful.

On the other hand, if we want to measure underlying success, then GVA is a much better measure.  It tells us the extent to which we are paying our way rather than depending on fiscal transfers.

The question that needs to be asked – and really doesn’t seem to have been probed in any depth – is why the Welsh Government feels that measuring household wealth is better than measuring the state of the Welsh economy.  Why measure equality of wealth rather than equality of performance?  Surely anyone concerned about the Welsh economy would be more interested in measuring to what extent we are economically self-sufficient – even if we never actually decide to turn that into political independence?

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the measure has been chosen primarily because it makes the numbers look better.  That would make it another victory for spin over substance.

Don't follow London

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That the UK Government spends more on transport infrastructure for London than it does on the rest of the UK wasn’t really a surprise, although the extent of the skew was higher than many might have expected.  It gives a rather different context to the oft-repeated claim that Wales benefits from the government’s largesse at the expense of the South East – here is an example of the opposite; the South East benefitting from government largesse at the expense of Wales.

I was far from convinced about some of the reasons being advanced for the mismatch, but there’s nothing wrong, in principle, with the fact that a mismatch exists.  Any attempt to share out spending on the basis of need will always lead to a differential pattern of spending in different areas; the question is not whether differentials are wrong, but whether they’re based on a fair assessment of need.  We should never expect the spend per head to be anywhere near identical across different areas and regions.

There is also a lesson here for Wales.  Before we shout too much about all the goodies going to London at the expense of the rest of the UK, we should examine the way in which infrastructure is being handled more locally.  There has been a marked tendency of late for people to call for high levels of spend in the South East of Wales – on things like the suggested metro network and the M4 relief road.

I’m not opposed to the first of those schemes, although the second is much more questionable to say the least.  But there is a danger that in promoting such grand schemes we reproduce in Wales exactly that about which we complain at a UK level, and other parts of Wales get left behind.  Just as we urge the UK Government to take a less London-centric viewpoint, so we also need to ensure that the Welsh Government doesn’t simply take a Cardiff-centric viewpoint.

Small sums, much fuss

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Council and Government budgets are lengthy and complex, and I very much doubt whether more than a handful of those who vote on them can honestly say that they really know exactly what they’re voting for or against.  They have to pretend that they do, of course.  That’s politics.

There’s also a natural human tendency to concentrate on what we can easily grasp.  In one of my first meetings as a new councillor in 1979, I remember sitting in a council Personnel Committee and being stunned at how much debate there was about the expenditure of a few hundred pounds on a course here or there for a member of staff, whilst across the Council, expenditures of millions of pounds were nodded through with no scrutiny at all.

It doesn’t surprise me, therefore, that the political debate on the Assembly’s budget has concentrated on comparatively small sums rather than on the main thrust of the budget (a point which was also made on the Bevan Foundation blog today).

It’s partly down to the difficulty which most of us have with grasping a large and complex set of numbers; but it’s also partly about the difficulty of expressing complex alternatives to the public through the media.  Simple points hit home more readily than complicated debates.

One of the issues which has been thrown to the fore this year has been about the extent to which the Government is right to use its reserves to maintain expenditure.  (I’ll admit that I hadn’t understood until reading the Bevan Foundation article that the use of these reserves was a matter for the UK Treasury rather than the Welsh Government.  Update:  See comment from Peter Black below; this appears to be a misunderstanding by the author of the post at the Bevan Foundation.)

‘Reserves’ are always a thorny issue when budgets are discussed.  Typically, oppositions suggest that they should be used and ruling parties like to sit on them for a rainy day (or, more cynically, an election year).  There isn’t a ‘right’ amount to hold in reserve; whether using them is a ‘prudent way of trying to maintain services’ (or reduce precepts) in difficult times or a ‘raid on the piggy bank’ is a matter of opinion rather than fact.

What parties are trying to do in concentrating on the (comparatively) small, of course, is to use specific comprehensible examples to display their own values and approach.  I can’t help wondering, though, whether there isn’t a parallel with that Personnel Committee all those years ago.  Are the big sums really getting the scrutiny that they deserve?

Tendering Linguistics

Tweet Increasingly, tendering for public sector work in Wales involves the use of electronic facilities, such as those promoted by Value Wales, an arm of the Welsh Government.  In principle, it's a sensible way to go, and I found myself registering as a supplier last week in order to express an interest in a particular contract.

The website actually permits registration in English or in Welsh - in theory.  And it's an example of why so many people end up saying 'why bother, I may as well just do it in English'.  It's only half-translated, which means that some of the questions are in Welsh, and others are in English only.  Most of the drop-down options lists are in English only as well.  And for me, the absolute gem was the screen I got at the end confirming my registration:






































Apart from the interesting observations that American and English are apparently considered to be two different languages, and that there seems to be a word missing in both of them, Welsh doesn't even get included, even for those who have tried to register in Welsh.  The order of appearance of the languages also conveys a subtle message about the likely location of suppliers to the Welsh public sector.

For all the rhetoric emanating from the government, it's sometimes hard to believe that they are really serious about encouraging indigenous suppliers, let alone those who choose to operate through the medium of Welsh.

Electrification - let's get on with it

Tweet My initial reaction when I read the part of today's story about the electrification of the mainline was a degree of outrage at the idea that the UK Government would ask the Assembly Government to pay part of the costs.  But then I asked myself whether this expenditure is Barnettised or not - and I have to admit that I don't actually know the answer to that.  If this is additional UK expenditure, over and above the existing transport budget, then the reaction stands; but if the expenditure is coming out of the English transport budget for which Wales has already had, or will be receiving, a Barnett share, then it it not entirely unreasonable for the UK Government to start talking to the Welsh Government about a contribution.

What is absolutely clear, though, is that asking the Welsh Government to pay a proportion is not a way of delivering the project for "less than the £1bn initially estimated", which seems to be the UK Government's starting point.  Paying out of different pots is simply not the same thing as reducing the cost - and disingenuous is an understatement for the suggestion that it is.

I'm clear that there is a good case for electrification - greater reliability, lower maintenance costs, less pollution.  It helps meet emissions targets (depending on how the electricity is generated), and it helps the switch from road to rail.  And there's a good case for the timing; with the rolling stock needing replacement in the next few years, failure to electrify now condemns us to another 40 years of diesel powered railways.  Electrifying the whole railway network as rapidly as possible is something which deserves support.

I'm not entirely convinced that 20 minutes off the journey time makes as much difference as some seem to suggest.  Certainly I, like most other people, like to get from A to B as rapidly as possible, but when I was travelling fairly regularly from South Wales to London it was the lack of certainty about the arrival time which was much more of a concern to me.  Having to catch a train an hour earlier 'just in case' is a real deterrent.

And I'd like to see research which indicates that this will have the massive impact on economic growth which some seem to imply - particularly if the Welsh Government is serious about switching its economic strategy to development of indigenous companies.  I'm not suggesting that it won't have an impact, merely that the impact may have been somewhat exaggerated.

And we simply don't need to exaggerate or play the victim; the project stands up without that.

Economic Renewal

Tweet I've never understood why governments can't write reports and strategies in simple clear language, and keep them brief while they're at it. Perhaps they just don't want people to read the actual documents, just listen to the spin.

The Economic Renewal document published yesterday is a case in point. The core of it – which could probably have been written in considerably less than half the number of words actually used – is a quite exciting departure from traditional economic policy in Wales. So why, oh why make it so lengthy and difficult to read? There's just so much unnecessary verbiage (and if you want a classic example, try the definition of innovation in the second column on page 30!).

I have a personal dislike of 'taking forward agendas' as a phrase; I suppose that it's intended to sound dynamic, but the phrase doesn't do it for me. And this document is full of taking things forward - agendas, actions, lessons and challenges - they're all going to be 'taken forward'.

Enough of a rant; down to the substance. I entirely welcome the shift from seeking to attract increasingly scarce footloose multi-nationals to growing and nurturing our own companies at home, as well as the shift from a grant-driven culture to an enabling approach.

It has often seemed to me that senior business people in Wales have been quick to criticise the 'dependency culture' when it applies to people receiving benefits, but demand more of it when it comes to grants to businesses. A simple market approach says that if a business isn't viable without a government handout; then it just isn't viable.

There is a 'but' of course. Wales has been using grants (to the dismay of some English regions which haven't been able to match them) to give us an edge over other areas, and it remains to be seen whether removal of that edge will damage Wales. Given that the Welsh economy has still lagged behind, despite having that advantage, I'm not convinced that it actually gave us that much of an edge in the first place.

The Welsh government has done a lot already, and is planning to do more, to roll out an advanced broadband infrastructure in Wales. They shouldn't really need to, of course, and it grieves me to see taxpayers' money going to large companies like BT which ought to be making this investment themselves. I'd personally prefer to see a much higher level of public service obligation placed upon them; but since we don't have the power to do that, and it isn't going to happen any time soon, it's better for us to spend the money and get on with it than not. It just means that that money is not then available for other projects, sadly.

The idea of trying to focus attention and support on those industries and areas where we particularly want to see development is one I welcome. It is, of course, in line with what Plaid were saying in our Economic Plan back in the late 1960s, and as far as pro-active activity is concerned, it has to be better than a scatter-gun approach. Whether they have hit the right sectors is a moot point, which I'm sure that some will argue with. I'd hope that that is something that can be reviewed over time.

The test of the strategy will come when difficult decisions have to be taken. What happens if a significant employer gets into difficulties and starts asking for handouts? What happens if a business not in one of the target sectors is seeking assistance? There's no easy answer to this sort of question, and only time will tell, but at least the government now have a framework in which to consider them.

PS. One thing slightly alarmed me in the document, although it wasn't directly related to the economic strategy as such. At the bottom of page 25, there is a reference to "the introduction of a clear and transparent fees policy for post-16 education and training". Fees for post-16 education?? A mistake, surely.