With Simon Thomas dropping out of the Plaid leadership contest to support Elin Jones (Western Mail, February 6), the campaign should have become less of a one-horse race that Leanne Wood was guaranteed to win, but reading Elin’s “vision” on her website disappoints me.
Elin talks Wales down from the start, feeling she has to justify we are a nation.
She says our legal system is not a separate jurisdiction, that we can only legislate in a small number of areas, and that we have no tax-raising powers so are therefore a “quandary” with no “power and status”.
As a Master of Laws, I’d argue all of these are wrong. Since last May, Welsh laws have to receive Royal Assent from the Queen, which means that it is only a matter of time before a conflict between ‘Welsh law’ and ‘English and Welsh’ exists before the Supreme Court will have to determine whether Welsh law is to be treated on par with Scottish law.
In terms of tax-raising powers, the Assembly does have those. It can pass any law it wants on local government providing it doesn”t take away their law enforcement and civic responsibilities. This means it could decide to set council tax on a Wales-wide basis and order the local authorities to pay the tax they collect through the precept directly to the Welsh Government.
The Assembly is now a Parliament in all but name. Primary legislative powers are just that, and Elin needs to move with the times.