Westminster isn't working for Wales. Disgrace if electrification to Swansea ditched https://t.co/rnkT2ZZz7u— Jonathan Edwards (@JonathanPlaid) July 19, 2017
Showing posts with label #Plaid17. Show all posts
Showing posts with label #Plaid17. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 19, 2017
WORKING FOR WALES?
Friday, June 23, 2017
INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF POLICING
Our Leader in Westminster, @LSRPlaid calls for an independent review of police resources. Home Secretary "cannot see the need" for it. pic.twitter.com/VBsOLeA2O8— Plaid Cymru (@Plaid_Cymru) June 22, 2017
Saturday, June 10, 2017
STANDING UP FOR WALES
Mae @BenMLake wedi ennill #Ceredigion i Blaid Cymru / Ben Lake has won Ceredigion for Plaid Cymru #Plaid17 pic.twitter.com/bjRQvEj5L1— Plaid Cymru (@Plaid_Cymru) June 9, 2017
Congratulations to @LSRPlaid on being re-elected MP with Plaid Cymru's highest ever vote in #DwyforMeirionnydd #Plaid17 pic.twitter.com/aQVZO5GwoH— Plaid Cymru (@Plaid_Cymru) June 9, 2017
Llongyfarchiadau i @HywelPlaidCymru ar gael ei ailethol / Congratulations to Hywel Williams re-elected as MP #Plaid17 pic.twitter.com/XJ6CNyrfu8— Plaid Cymru (@Plaid_Cymru) June 9, 2017
Llongyfarchiadau i @JonathanPlaid ar gael ei ailethol / Congratulations to Jonathan Edwards re-elected as MP #Plaid17 #GE2017 pic.twitter.com/UImxnXzW1z— Plaid Cymru (@Plaid_Cymru) June 9, 2017
Wednesday, June 7, 2017
MAKE WALES MATTER
Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood said:
“Wales does not decide UK election results.
“Voting Labour, time and time again, cannot stop Tory governments from being formed.
“That is why I'm calling on people to reject the arrogance.
“Don't let people tell you that voting for Plaid Cymru is a “wasted vote”.
“We've had MPs for fifty years.
“Not once have we put the Tories into government or voted to keep them in power. Not once.
“For Wales to win, there is another choice we need to make.
“We need to make a positive choice.
“To put Wales onto the political landscape.“And the only way we can do this is by voting for the Party of Wales.”
NO FRIENDS OF WALES
It has long been recognised that the Labour Party much like the Conservative Party are “no friends of Wales”. Recently highlighting the party’s voting record in Westminster, Plaid Cymru’s incumbent in Carmarthen East & Dinefwr, Jonathan Edwards, accused the Labour Party of “double dealing” with politicians willing to deceive voters in order to win their votes.
The Labour Party of turning a blind eye to its record in the Welsh Government – voting against scrapping zero hour contracts, charging students £9,000 a year for their education and failing to keep public services in the public’s hands.
Voting for the Labour Party would be voting by tombola, says Mr Edwards, who says Labour MPs spend more time attacking their own leader than they do standing up to Theresa May.
- The Labour Party says it is opposed to the spending cuts imposed by the Tories in Westminster but they voted with the Tories to implement £30 billion of spending cuts, focussed mainly on welfare benefits;
- The Labour Party manifesto includes a commitment to scrap zero hour contracts but they opposed Plaid Cymru’s efforts to scrap compulsory zero hour contracts in Wales on seven separate occasions;
- The Labour Party voted to double the income of the royal family despite austerity measures for the rest of the country;
- The Labour Party voted with the Tories to reduce tax credit payments for the lowest paid workers;
- The Labour Party manifesto includes a commitment to devolve policing to Wales, but their MPs have repeatedly opposed Plaid Cymru efforts to do so;
- The Labour Party voted with the Tories to cut benefits for disabled people and those with long-term illnesses;
- The Labour Party didn’t show up to vote to ensure the Prime Minister had to take into account the objectives of Wales when conducting negotiations with the EU;
- The Labour Party voted against requiring future trade deals to have the approval of each of the four countries in the UK and instead voted for London to dictate terms;
Jonathan Edwards said:
“Every election the Labour Party says the same thing – that they are the party that can stop the Tories and that they will stand up for Wales but it is deeds not words that matter. Voting Labour doesn't stop the Tories - it gives us the status quo.
“Actions speak louder than words and the Labour Party's record speaks for itself.
"Labour is no friend of Wales’. When they do bother to turn up to vote, more often than not they vote against Wales’ interests, not with them.
“In Scotland they are working alongside the Tories in councils and are working together to win Westminster seats between them. Jeremy Corbyn himself has consistently voted against devolution – keeping Welsh natural resources in the hands of Westminster politicians; keeping Wales as dependent as possible on Westminster. It was a Labour Shadow Secretary of State for Wales that ensured the cross-party consensus on strengthening Welsh democracy was torpedoed through the so-called St David’s Day Process.
“Whether Jeremy Corbyn likes it or not, his MPs vote with the Tories when it comes to helping the poorest. Labour voted for the £30 billion package of spending cuts that was primarily focussed on capping welfare payments to those who need it. They voted to reduce tax credit payments for the lowest paid despite supporting a vote to double the income of the royal family.
“Their manifesto says they want free tuition fees but they could do this today in Wales where they govern. Instead, Welsh students are charged £9,000 a year to go to university, thanks to Labour. They say they want to scrap zero hour contracts but they have had seven separate opportunities to do so in Wales and on each occasion, they either abstained or voted against Plaid Cymru.
“Their manifesto says they are in favour of devolving policing but they have consistently opposed this when it has come to voting on it. In fact the incumbent Labour candidate in the Rhondda said this week that he opposes it, despite it being in his manifesto.
“Putting a cross next to Labour in this election would be voting by tombola. Will you get a Corbynista, a Blairite or a Brownite? The only thing that’s certain with the Labour Party is that they will always have to answer to their head office in London, and never to the people who elect them.
“Even if Jeremy Corbyn were to be Prime Minister, the only way to force him to take notice of Wales - to remember that we exist and to deliver on crucial projects that have been ignored by successive Tory and Labour governments, is to make sure there’s a strong, loud and united block of Plaid Cymru MPs in the House of Commons, standing up for Wales at all times.
“Scotland has its block in Westminster. Wales needs its own Welsh block.
“The only way to ensure our railways are electrified, that the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon is delivered and that a road network fit for the 21st century is built across Wales is to vote for Plaid Cymru, the party of Wales.”
Labour's
voting record can be found at the following links:
Tuesday, June 6, 2017
Siân Damon for Monmouth
 |
| Siân Damon for Monmouth |
We know that Wales faces big challenges because the
UK is heading for momentous change. Successive governments over the past 15 or
so years, Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrats in coalition, have created
a society where everything is about the individual – about personal finance and
self. That Policy has divided society; listening to each
other, community values and working together have been replaced by fear and
austerity.
Plaid Cymru is the only party that works in and for
Wales and its people and is not bossed from Westminster. Without your voice,
Wales is being treated like a neglected county of England. We must have strong
representation in the Westminster parliament to defend our people and our
country. Plaid is the only party that will fight for fair
incomes for Welsh farmers, more money for the health service in Wales and
support new industries. For the people of Wales today and for future
generations, vote for a community party based on fairness and equal opportunity.
Monday, June 5, 2017
SILENCE IS LABOUR
The
old legal concept that silence implies consent, which had existed since ancient
times, was weakened when the Conservative government's moved to undermine the
'right to silence' in the late 1980's and 1990's. Yet more locally it has
survived amongst local Labour politicians in Newport, especially in relation to
the destruction of Newport's University.
Seeking
votes prior to successive polling days local Labour politicians this year have
endeavoured to make much of the potential of Newport's knowledge quarter, in
and around the riverside campus of the University of South Wales. The city
should take strides to develop its reputation of excellence when it comes to
cyber security. Yet the case put by Labour is undermined by what happened to
our city's University and their tacit consent in its destruction.
The
demise of the former University of Newport, absorbed and asset stripped by the
former University of Glamorgan, as a result of a combination of greed,
stupidity, bad decisions and perhaps a failure on the part of the former
management to understand how politics in Wales works, has done many of the
former employees and the City of Newport few favours.
Despite
the spin this was no merger, simply the removal of an educational rival and an
asset stripping exercise, driven by a desperately ambitious Vice Chancellor
(although admittedly sitting in the House of Lords as a Peer would not necessarily be the
height of most people's ambitions).
In
fairness to the former Management of the former University of Glamorgan, it can
be said that they played a blinder, maximising the benefits of a close working relationship
with Leighton Andrews, silencing the former board of governors, etc. All of those photo opportunities, dinners, freebies, etc for LA clearly paid off in the end. No wonder he needed to use the government
limousine so much, prior to his eventual and much deserved electoral demise.
The
same cannot be said for the former University of Newport, which regularly
expended significant sums, to feed a rag tag bunch of Labour cronies (from
various levels within the Labour machine) to little avail. When in trouble and
seeking help the best they got was silence from a wide range of local Labour
members at various levels - from Newport City Council, the National Assembly
and Westminster.
So
much for cultivating 'political influence' when it came to the crunch loyalty
to the Labour machine counted more than any desire the save a significant local
employer (600+ jobs) in Newport (and across the former county if Gwent) and a
financial contributor to the local / regional economy (to the tune of £120
million a year).
The failure of local Labour elected' to speak out and to help our former University survive in its hour of need speaks volumes for the reality of the Party formerly know as New Labour in Wales. When it comes to the crunch party interests will always cone before community interests - something that should be remembered before casting our votes on June 8th.
Thursday, June 1, 2017
CALL FOR INDEPENDENT AUDIT OF SECURITY
Plaid Cymru says Wales
has potential to become cyber security centre of excellence, and has called for
an independent audit of Welsh security resilience in the wake of a string of
cyber security attacks on the public sector and the terrorist attack in
Manchester last week.
The party’s candidate in Carmarthen East
and Dinefwr, Jonathan Edwards, says that the decade of cut-backs on
public spending has left our public sector at risk of cyber-attacks and that
our security services’ ability to prevent terrorist atrocities like the
Manchester attack should be independently audited, rather than investigated
internally.
The NHS in England was crippled by a
global cyber-attack last month in which hackers demanded a ransom after
infiltrating the health service’s antiquated computer service. The NHS in Wales
was not affected but in an earlier incident in March, thousands of Welsh NHS
staff’s details were stolen in a hack on a private contractor.
Plaid Cymru warned in 2015 that almost
20,000 NHS computers in Wales were at risk of being hacked as Microsoft ended
support for the operating system ‘Windows XP’ being used by the NHS.
It is suggested by terrorism experts that
there are 500 potential terrorist plots against the UK thought to be current at
any one time with 3000 people under investigation by the security services.
There are a further 20,000 people identified as having sympathies with
so-called Islamic State. Full surveillance on one person requires 24 officers
in two 12 hour shifts. If all 3000 people under investigation were subject to
full surveillance it would require 72,000 officers which is an impossible task.
An independent audit would look at what resources would be needed in order to
keep Wales safe.
Wales has expertise in cyber-security and
is home to a National Cyber Security Academy in south east Wales. Mr Edwards
believes Wales should build on its expertise and ensure Wales becomes a centre
of excellence for cyber-security, not only strengthening our defences but also
creating high-value, well-paid jobs.
Jonathan
Edwards said:
“Keeping Wales safe and secure must be our top priority as politicians
and making sure our country is adequately resourced to be able to resist the
modern-day threats we now face is crucial.
“Plaid Cymru warned two years ago that our public sector is at risk of
cyber-attacks and although the Welsh NHS evaded the crosshairs of those who
attacked the English Health Service this time, there is no doubt that our NHS
and other public organisations must reinforce their defences.
“How we ensure our country and its people are safe is a matter of constant
evolution and modernisation. The threats we face today are of a different
nature to the threats we faced three years ago, let alone a decade ago. There
are clear questions to be asked about how well-equipped our security services
are in dealing with the threat of terrorism and I question whether the best way
to answer those questions is for the security services to investigate
themselves. We must carry out an independent audit of how well-equipped,
well-prepared and how resilient our country is.
“Experts suggest that the number of people across the British State who
are under investigation at any one time is around 3000 and on top of that there
are some 20,000 people who sympathise with organisations such as so-called
Islamic State. To keep just one person under full surveillance requires 24
officers in two 12-hour shifts. It is clearly not feasible to expect that every
potential person of interest to be under surveillance.
“The Tories are also intent on scaling back our police forces at a time
when they should be being bolstered. If the Tories have their way after this
election, the Welsh police forces will be £32 million a year worse off. We have
to defend our police forces from this cut and the best way to do that is to
devolve the police forces to Wales which would not only protect them from the
Tory cut but also automatically lead to a £25 million boost to their finances
every year. A difference of £57 million a year.
“We must also audit our public sector’s resilience to cyber-attacks. We are
lucky to have the skills in Wales already through the National Cyber Security
Academy and we should build on that. We could make Wales a cluster of expertise
in digital security – not only bolstering our defences against cyber-attacks
but also creating high-value, well-paid jobs in Wales. The Cyber Security
Summit should be being held in Wales where the expertise is, not in London. The
London parties will never think to make use of Wales’ expertise – they will
always just focus on London and the south east of England. That’s why we need
Plaid Cymru in Westminster, standing up for Wales and making sure Whitehall
remembers that it is there to serve four countries, not just one.
“What we cannot do is carry on as we are – hoping that we’ll cope when we are attacked again. An independent audit is a necessary step in determining what measures need to be put in place to keep Wales safe and secure.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)