Cheryl Gillan's attitude

I've just downloaded Cheryl Gillan's interview with Bethan Rhys Roberts on yesterday's Good Morning Wales. I did it because of this story in today's Western Mail about her attitude to holding the Westminster and Senedd elections on the same date in 2015. This is the relevant extract:

     

I wrote about the clash in this post last week, and it has been raised by a number of other people too, so Cheryl Gillan can really have no excuse for not having thought about it.

Her attitude was that she saw no particular problem in holding these two elections on the same day. She rejected any suggestion that there was a problem by saying:

Well I'm awfully sorry, but I think you can hold two elections on one day.

And she repeated almost exactly the same words later, in fact she emphatically said she didn't foresee the election being moved to avoid the clash. This should ring some very loud alarm bells, for the effect will be to drown out any discussion of Welsh issues because the media will concentrate on Westminster issues. Hywel Williams put it well:

Running these two elections at the same time, with the UK election dominating the media to the detriment of the Assembly election, would prove hugely unfair and confusing to the electorate in Wales.

It would be an injustice to voters in Wales if their coverage was dominated by UK and many England-only issues, while pushing so many important devolved issues to the sidelines.

The most important factor when deciding timetables for such important elections must be the interest of voters. I'm sure that the Electoral Commission would have concerns about how this would impact on voters too.

And of course the same is just as true for Scotland.

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I was impressed with the way that Bethan Rhys Roberts handled the interview. She was able to press for an answer on a number of issues that Cheryl Gillan was clearly uncomfortable about and wanted to avoid. The interview showed that she had very little to say after her limited supply of stock answers had been played out.

     

One thing that stood out for me was how willing Gillan was to shift between "I am Welsh, you know" and "That's got nothing to do with me, it's up to the people of Wales to decide."

For example, why should she be so keen on the St Tathan development, telling us that she supported it completely, not least because it would benefit, in her words, "our economy in Wales" but on the subject of the referendum on primary lawmaking powers say that she had no particular view and wouldn't campaign one way or the other because it wasn't something for her, but something for the people of Wales to decide?

Not quite hypocrisy, but certainly a very large dose of double standards.

She can't have it both ways. It is appropriate for a "governor general" to remain constitutionally neutral, and not express political views. But if s/he does that, s/he can hardly then start expressing political views on some subjects but not others. It shows that the Tories' view on how to govern Wales has not changed. This is now the sixth Secretary of State we have had imposed on us by a Tory prime minister in Westminster: we have had Peter Thomas in the seventies under Heath; Peter Walker under Thatcher; David Hunt, John Redwood and William Hague under Major; and now Cheryl Gillan under Cameron. Not a single one of them elected by anybody in Wales. Nicholas Edwards was the only exception.

Not so long ago, one of the Tory catchphrases was that it was the job of politicians to represent people in either Westminster or Cardiff Bay, not for them to represent the government in Westminster or Cardiff Bay to the people. Yet this is exactly what the Tories have done. I don't wish Cheryl Gillan any ill on a personal level, but her appointment was a mistake and she needs to be replaced.