Shock by-election victory for Plaid

So many by-elections at the moment that it's hard to keep track. Is it possible to exaggerate their significance? Yes, but sometimes they can't be ignored, and the the by-election result in Rheidol ward in Aberystwyth is a case in point.

Why did the Liberal Democrats lose that by-election? Is it because they are holding on by the skin of their teeth to power in coalition with independents against Plaid, who are by far the largest party on the local authority? Is it because they have a non-existent UK and Welsh leadership? Is it because they are slipping in the polls?

Well, it's probably a combination of those factors, but there must be something major going on when Plaid Cymru overturn a 300 vote majority in one of the Lib-Dem's safest seats on Ceredigion council with a 21 percent swing in their favour. But are there even more significant statistics than that? Well, yes, the Conservatives have attempted to argue that they are gaining support in many areas in West Wales - their result? 17 votes. And Labour's? 36 votes.

Labour's divisions exposed?

I've been called a member of Plaid's praetorian guard, the finest Roman soliders, but it doesn't take a general to work out that these are not great times for the Labour party.

The party of Bevan, Jim Griffiths and Tony Benn, has an honourable tradition. That is why I used to have far more respect for Labour than the other London parties. That is until they abandoned the people they once fought for: the children and pensioners living in poverty, the lowest earners, and trade unionists.

The pinnacle of Labourism was the Attlee government, a fine government that delivered the vision of a state the protected the most vulnerable from the savages of liberal and Tory governments that allowed capitalism to nearly destroy us in the thirties, but since then we have seen severely disappointing Labour party UK governments.

They have turned from a party of the working class into a party that stands for everything, but no-one. They have become a party that loves the market, and fails to reign it in for the good of the people. The question now is: what is the point of the Labour party?

Why vote for a party that raises taxes on the working poor, by scrapping the 10% tax band? Why vote for a party that believes in keeping people in prison without charge for 6 weeks? Why vote for a party that cuts inheritance tax for the richest few percent of the population?

Labour in Westminster is authoritarian, promotes inequality, is responsible for rising child and pensioner poverty and has promoted corporate greed - allowing the city of London to lend to people who couldn't afford it, just to perpetuate a housing and consumer boom.

So Don Touhig's outburst against the One Wales government yesterday, has to be viewed in the context of his voting record and the government he has supported.

He has:

Voted strongly for introducing ID cards.
Voted strongly for introducing foundation hospitals.
Voted strongly for introducing student top-up fees.
Voted very strongly for Labour's anti-terrorism laws.
Voted very strongly for the Iraq war.
Voted very strongly against an investigation into the Iraq war.
Voted very strongly for replacing Trident.

In other words, he has a supported the New Labour government to the full. He has supported a government that has allowed the short term profits of speculators on the financial markets to come before the good of the working classes.

Shame on him.

That is why it is time for good elements of the Labour Party in Wales to abandon his type. It is only by splitting from these self-serving London Labour MPs, who don't represent the values of the working classes or the traditional values of the Labour party any more than many Tories, that the good progressive sections of the labour movement can deliver their vision of a more equal country.

Touhig, so you oppose the One Wales government?

Is it because they oppose the expensive waste that is the private initiative? Or is because you want to force people to pay for their prescriptions? Or is it because you want students to pay unlimited tuition fees? Or is it because you don't want nurses to receive their full pay?

Touhig, you are nothing but a political dinosaur. Shame on you. Shame on you. Shame on you.

And by the way, in case you missed it, here's a very interesting article from Adam Price about the first year of the One Wales government.

Touhig says Plaid 'running rings around Labour'

Today the BBC reports senior MP Don Touhig as saying that Plaid are 'running rings around Labour' in the One Wales Government. I'm sorry Normal Mouth, but I told you so.

This is what Touhig says:

"...so far as the Labour Party is concerned, I warned a year ago that if we went into coalition with the nationalists they'd have their greatest advance in 50 years.

"That is what they have had.

"They've practically run rings around us politically. They've been very skilled, much more skilled at it than we have.

"They've exploited their position in the assembly very well to make sure that the people believe that advances and changes and benefits to Wales are coming from them and not from the Labour Party.

"We're too dull, we haven't done that."

We have had the Labour group leader on Blaenau Gwent council complaining, Kim Howells and other unnamed senior councillors mouthing off in the press. For those of you who questioned at my previous blog posts, I think these latest comments vindicate my previous analysis that Plaid are dominating the One Wales Government. Even senior Labour MPs agree with me.

Can things get any worse for Labour?

For those of you who haven't seen the newspapers today, here are some links to coverage in the Western Mail and the South Wales Echo, which makes bad reading for Labour:

"WELSH Labour is planning to tear up the way the party has been organised since its constitution was revised in 1918.

The drastic changes proposed appear to reflect alarm within the party at declining membership levels."

The report of the Labour party concludes:

"If we are to avert further decline we need to radically change our structure."

On top of that Vaughan Roderick exposes fears amongst the grassroots of Labour that Plaid is dominating the One Wales government:

"Talk to most Labour AMs and sooner or later they'll complain about Plaid ministers hogging the limelight and the comparative low profiles of some Labour's own cabinet members"

"With Plaid openly talking of leading the next assembly government, the feeling that Labour has handed its rival much-needed credibility might well increase."

Plaid Cymru's New Welsh agenda

I think Labour might be getting a little annoyed what with Plaid trying to take credit for all the One Wales Government's successes. Here's what's on WalesOnline.

From a Labour standpoint, I would have been annoyed about their online video, but this starts to take the biscuit, where are Huw Lewis and Lynne Neagle where you need them?

Vaughan Roderick and Betsan Powys have both blogged about it.

Tories try to steal Plaid/SNP fuel policy

They say imitation is the highest form of flattery, in which case the English Tories adoption of Plaid Cymru / SNP policy today should be welcomed.

After failing to support a Plaid/SNP proposal to introduce a 'fuel price regulator' this week in Westminster, George Osbourne, Treasury Spokesperson for the English Conservatives, is now arguing for an almost indistinguishably different policy of a "fair fuel stabiliser". So, he won't vote for a 'fuel price regulator', but will argue for a 'fuel stabliser', I wonder why.

The Obama / Ieuan Wyn Jones connection

Interesting report in the Western Mail today, illustrating the connection between Plaid leader Ieuan Wyn Jones' constituency of Ynys Mon and Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama:

DEMOCRATIC presidential hopeful Barack Obama may be the direct descendant of an American pioneer born in Anglesey in the 18th century.

If elected in November, he will make history as the first black President of the United States.

However, genealogists have gathered evidence which suggests his mother’s family are descended from Welsh trailblazers who founded the Radnor township in Ohio.

Anglesey’s Plaid Cymru Assembly Member, Deputy First Minister Ieuan Wyn Jones, responded to the news by inviting the candidate to the constituency.

He said: “If these links have been established, I would very much like to invite Barack Obama to Anglesey to the home of his ancestors where he could rediscover his Welsh roots.

“The Welsh have contributed in so many ways to shaping America’s past and present – not least by the fact that so many of those who signed the American Declaration of Independence were Welsh or of Welsh descent.

“If he came to Wales, I certainly think he’d empathise with the politics of hope and change that are enshrined in the new programme of government in Wales.”

Research by William Addams Reitwiesner, one of the internet’s best-known genealogists, suggests that Mr Obama’s great - great - great - great-great- great-grandparents were Henry and Margaret Perry.

It is believed they left Anglesey to build a new life in the United States close to the beginning of the 19th century.

Anglesey is listed as the birthplace of their son, Robert, who was born in 1786 and died in 1852.

The 1880 History of Delaware and Ohio states: “The first marriage in the township was that of Robert Perry, who wooed and won the fair Sarah Hoskins. The ceremony took place in the log cabin of Richard Hoskins in 1808, and was performed by the Rev Cloud, a Methodist minister, who had travelled all the way from Franklinton for that purpose.”

The 1880 history records that Henry Perry was persuaded by fellow Welshman David Pugh to leave Baltimore and found a settlement in Radnor in 1803.

With sons Ebenezer, 15, and Levi, 13, he travelled more than 500 miles before starting the hard work of clearing land and building a log cabin.

The next year, he left his sons in charge of the homestead and returned by foot to Baltimore to bring his wife, Margaret, and the rest of the Welsh-speaking family to their new home.

The Welsh language thrived in the community as new migrants arrived. The visit of an itinerant preacher to the Perry home also ensured that Methodism flourished.

Robert Perry is listed as the superintendent of the Sunday School.

The early settlers traded with Wyandot and Shawanee Indians. A confrontation over a stolen handkerchief nearly ended in serious violence, but was defused when the two sides “smoked the pipe of peace with assurances of mutual friendship”.

Both Margaret Perry and Robert were buried in Radnor cemetery.

Genealogists have struggled to trace Obama’s Kenyan roots but have been fascinated by his European ancestry.

Last year it emerged he is a distant cousin of both President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. The New England Historic Genealogical Society also found that he and Hollywood star Brad Pitt share a common ancestor who died in 1769.

The Baltimore Sun built on Mr Reitwiesner’s research – which he insists should be considered a “first draft” – and found evidence his great-great- great-great grandfather George Washington Overall had owned two slaves.

Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton said: “While a relative owned slaves, another fought for the Union in the Civil War. And it is a true measure of progress that the descendant of a slave owner would come to marry a student from Kenya and produce a son who would grow up to be a candidate for president of the United States.”

Mr Obama this year defeated Hillary Clinton, a Methodist also of Welsh descent, for the Democrat nomination.