A test of Kevin Madge's leadership - Updated

Update 10 July

The archived version of yesterday's meeting is now online, and it is clear from watching that Emlyn Dole's amendment was as follows:

"That the Council resolves to support the view of Welsh Government as outlined within Paragraph 17 of Welsh Government guidance 'Providing indemnities to Members and officers of relevant authorities 2006', [which] prohibits the funding of Members and officers at public expense to bring about defamation proceedings against third parties".

This produced a mild attack of panic in the acting Head of Law who wanted to know if this resolution was forward-looking or retrospective.

The Council cannot legislate retrospectively, as Emlyn recognised, but if it could the amendment if successful would have opened up the possibility of Mr James having to pay back the indemnity along with possible career-terminating implications for Mrs Rees Jones.

As it was the amendment was lost.

One other interesting snippet from the archive came rather earlier when councillors were paying tribute to Roger Jones, who is retiring as Director of Resources. The WLGA observers may have spotted that the Chair, Daff Davies, turns to the Chief Executive to warn him that Cllr Siân Caiach wishes to speak, presumably to seek guidance as to whether this should be allowed.

We cannot see Mr James's response, but presumably it was a nod of assent. Later on when the Chief Executive had finished his rant about Jacqui Thompson, and Cllr Caiach was seeking to raise a point of information, the advice coming from the left of the Chair appears to have been rather less indulgent.

There in a nutshell is governance as we have come to know it.

Update 12.30 

Kevin Madge's leadership was tested, and it will come as no surprise that it was found wanting. After reading badly from a pre-prepared script, he put on an angry voice and said that everybody had had enough of this and it was time to move on. Despite Carwyn Jones's unequivocal condemnation of the stance taken by the council yesterday, Kevin Madge proposed accepting the report put together by senior officers rejecting the WAO's findings.

There followed a very confused to-ing and fro-ing across the chamber, with various different motions being put forward. Eventually the combined forces of the Independents and Labour voted in favour of a fudge proposed by Cllr Calum Higgins to "note" the letter from Lesley Griffiths and the officers' views as set out in the accompanying report. A separate motion put forward by Cllr Emlyn Dole (Plaid) calling for the council to accept the WAO findings was rejected by the same coalition.

The upshot of this is that the council ended up in no-man's land, and the only way the matter could ever be resolved is if it went to court. That is unlikely ever to happen, and the infamous libel indemnity clause will remain suspended indefinitely (but not abolished).

All of this was observed by members of the WLGA governance panel, who must have noticed that councillors failed to tackle the ticking time bomb of senior officers who have once again got away with sticking two fingers up to the Wales Audit Office.

Just how hostile Mr James and his allies are to interference from the WAO (or any other external body) was made apparent a little earlier when he and other officers left the chamber while councillors dealt with a highly technical report on pensions, saying that if he did not leave, the council might well be landed with another bill from the WAO.

This is not quite the final word on this sorry saga because still to come is a response from the Local Government Minister, Lesley Griffiths, to a request from Rhodri Glyn Thomas (Plaid) that she clarifies the Welsh Government's position in the light of Carmarthenshire's novel interpretation of her letter.

Kevin Madge had an opportunity here to cut the council's over-mighty officers and Meryl Gravell down to size, knowing that he had the support of Carwyn Jones. He funked it, and was left looking weak by the most junior Labour councillor, Calum Higgins, who came up with the fudge that got the officers off the hook.

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Yesterday was one of the most dramatic days in the history of the Welsh Assembly, with the sacking of Alun Davies from the post of Minister of the Environment after he was caught red-handed trying to smear political opponents, something which Welsh Labour is very good at.

But the drama did not stop there. Later in the day the Minister for Local Government, Lesley Griffiths, replied timidly to a question from Rhodri Glyn Thomas (Plaid) about Carmarthenshire County Council's attempts to reject the findings of the Wales Audit Office. Her officials were looking into it, she said.

Shortly afterwards her boss, Carwyn Jones, faced a similar question from Rhodri Glyn and was rather less inclined to beat about the bush. You can see the exchange (in Welsh) here, starting at 38 minutes 40 seconds.

Rhodri Glyn asked the First Minister if he agreed that it was extremely important that local authorities accept the findings of the Wales Audit Office, and would he join him in condemning Carmarthenshire County Council's attempts to justify the libel indemnity, and make it very clear that challenging the findings of the WAO is completely unacceptable.

Here is a translation of the First Minister's response:

"Scrutiny is extremely important, of course. This is something which was said in the Williams report, namely that there is too often a feeling that public bodies facing criticism try to say that they are not at fault. Williams says that it is extremely important that public bodies accept criticism made by the Auditor and don't say that it is some kind of misunderstanding and that they are not to blame. This is an important part of setting out the way ahead.

"As far as the situation in Carmarthenshire is concerned, I think that I am right to say that we, as a Government, have said that it is not right to give any kind of indemnity for what happened in Carmarthenshire. At the end of the day, this is something for Carmarthenshire County Council, and it is extremely important that councils make sure that they do not put officers in a situation where they receive indemnities of this kind in connection with court cases. I think that this has been said before."

In a few hours time Carmarthenshire County Council is due to meet to discuss a report put together by the acting Head of Law, Mrs Rees Jones, and the Director of Resources, Roger Jones, which argues that the council was right all the way along to pursue the course it did, that the Wales Audit Office is wrong, and that the Welsh Government supports this view.

Shortly before that report was published, the Chief Executive himself weighed in with a message to council staff saying the same thing only in even more exaggerated and misleading terms.

We will see how they attempt to wriggle out of the latest mess of their own making, but surely the point has now finally been reached where serious questions have to be asked about the judgement, competence and motivation of some of the most senior officers.

Carwyn Jones's comments leave Mrs Linda Rees Jones looking very exposed indeed, but councillors are not off the hook either.

Carwyn Jones is a seasoned lawyer who chooses his words carefully. When he says that "officers should not be put in a position where they receive indemnities of this kind", he is clearly referring to a decision made by councillors on the Executive Board, led at the time by Cllr Meryl Gravell, with Labour's Kevin Madge as her deputy.

Cllr Gravell continues to exercise enormous and often very damaging influence behind the scenes, so this criticism leaves the Labour Party in Carmarthenshire is a very awkward place.

It is said that Kevin Madge feels "trapped" as council leader between the conflicting demands of the Independents, Welsh Labour and his own supporters in the council. How he responds to Carwyn Jones's blunt criticism will be one of the biggest tests of leadership he has so far faced.

Clarifying the clarification - Updated

Update

Within seconds of this post going out, news has come in that the First Minister, Carwyn Jones, has given Carmarthenshire County Council a very public ticking off for its refusal to accept criticism, saying that it should accept the Wales Audit Office reports and that the Welsh Government did not agree with the indemnity.

Carwyn has had a pretty bad day, what with one thing and another, and he was already doing a pretty good impression of a bear with a sore head, so the timing of some pertinent questions from Rhodri Glyn Thomas about the Labour-run Best Council in Wales won't have improved his temper.

More to follow.

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The Western Mail today picked up on Carmarthenshire County Council's latest attempt to wriggle out of the unlawful libel indemnity mess by getting councillors to give their blessing to an agenda item at tomorrow's meeting of the full council, in which senior officers put a bizarre interpretation on a letter from Lesley Griffiths, Minister for Local Government, with Mr James telling his troops that the letter backs up his claim that he was right all along.

The Minister has now confirmed that she has asked her officials to take a look at what the Council has done with her letter.

Let's hope that it does not take them two months, which is how long it took them to write back to Dave Gilbert, Carmarthenshire's Deputy Chief Executive, when he asked for clarification back in March.

An interesting aspect of tomorrow's meeting will be whether Labour and Independent councillors are daft enough to give the Chief Executive's innovative legal manoeuvrings their seal of approval, especially since the WLGA panel set up to review governance in the local authority will apparently be watching proceedings from the public gallery.

Although their presence is likely to ensure that everyone is on their best behaviour, there are hours of archived film footage of council meetings from the last year for them to peruse with lots and lots of interesting examples of governance Carmarthenshire style.



 

Dear Dave....

Update 7 July

Readers will have noticed the rather exasperated tone of Lesley Griffiths' letter below, and that it took her two months to reply to Dave Gilbert's question.

She will probably not be best pleased that more letters are now winging their way to Cardiff asking her to confirm Carmarthenshire County Council's view that she has given them a thumbs up in the matter of the libel indemnity.

Elsewhere there is growing anger that senior council officers seem to have decided to ignore the near-unanimous support given by councillors back in April to the Census Working Group's recommendations on the Welsh language.

Expect a lively meeting of the full council on Wednesday.

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If Carmarthenshire County Council's free newspaper is popularly known as Pravda, the internal staff newsletter Y Gair ('The Word') would be more accurately called The Pyongyang Times. As we saw a couple of days ago, the most recent edition came with a message to the toiling masses from the Dear Leader who took a whole page to deal with what he called the "minor matters" of the pension payment and libel indemnity scandals.

On the subject of the libel indemnity, Mr James wrote:

The Council has refused to accept the Wales Audit Office report and has subsequently confirmed with Welsh Government that the Council does have the powers to grant such indemnities.  

That seems pretty clear, doesn't it?

Fortunately we have not had to wait very long to find out what the Welsh Government actually said.

In a letter dated 6 May from Lesley Griffiths, Minister for Local Government, to Deputy Chief Executive Dave Gilbert,  the minister wrote:

________________

"Dear Dave

"Thank you for your letter of 4 March requesting I clarify the law in relation to the granting of an indemnity for meeting the cost of a defamation counterclaim.

"I am unable to comment on a decision taken by Carmarthenshire County Council about which I do not have all the facts. I am also unsighted in respect of the reports which went to Members. In any event, this is not a matter in which you should expect me to provide legal advice when the issue of statutory interpretation is clearly a matter for the courts.

"Nevertheless I have asked my officials to review the Local Authorities (Indemnities for Members and Officers) (Wales) Order 2006 and the accompanying Welsh Government guidance, Providing indemnities to members and officers of relevant authorities (2006). The guidance makes reference to the provisions which enable Local Authorities to issue indemnities to their officers and Members. Paragraphs 17 to 19 of the guidance explain the Welsh Ministers' view in relation to the provision of indemnities for defamation proceedings. The guidance notes the risk of offering such indemnities by relying on section 111 of the Local Government Act 1972.

"I have nothing to add to this guidance and neither do I think the guidance nor the secondary legislation requires any amendment or clarification. It is for the Council to satisfy itself and others it has acted within the powers available."

_________________

Hands up all those who think that Ms Griffiths was giving Carmarthenshire County Council the all clear.

No, I thought not.

But the Chief Executive and the acting Head of Law and Administration reckon that this is a ringing endorsement of their actions.

 

In a report which will go before full council next week, they have another pop at the Appointed Auditor and the Wales Audit Office:

It is surprising that the Appointed Auditor states that it is not the role of Welsh Government to provide a definitive statement of the law when in fact Welsh Government is a law-maker. 

Hang on a minute, didn't the Minister say that interpretation was a matter for the courts as well?

As for the Auditor's view that Welsh Ministers clearly intended to prohibit indemnities to bring actions for defamation, Mrs Rees Jones says this is stuff and nonsense:

The Minister’s confirmation that Welsh Government’s intention is as set out in its 2006 Guidance means that the 2006 Order was introduced as additional powers for local authorities as opposed to being an Order to remove the s. 111 (1) Local Government Act 1972 powers which already existed.

So there we are then. The Welsh Government has given Carmarthenshire County Council the thumbs up, the unlawful pension payment was perfectly lawful because Mr James and other senior officers were forced out of the Dyfed pension fund, and the whole thing never cost us a penny.

As Caebrwyn pointed out the other day, this makes for a very promising start to the much trumpeted review of governance in County Hall.

Carmarthenshire residents have not seen this much scorn and derision heaped on an external public body since the Council tore a strip off the Ombudsman for Public Services.

Yn eisiau: Cyfarwyddwr Gofal Cymdeithasol, Iechyd a Thai (£112,00-£120,000)

Ydych chi'n darllen The Sunday Times? Ydych chi am symud i Sir Gaerfyrddin (yn Wales) ac am ennill hyd at £120,000 y flwyddyn gyda phensiwn hael fel Cyfarwyddwr Gofal Cymdeithasol, Iechyd a Thai? Ydych? Wel, cysylltwch â Mr Mark James, Neuadd y Sir, am sgwrs anffurfiol - yn Saesneg wrth gwrs - i drafod y cyfle cyffrous 'ma sy wedi codi yn sgil ymddeoliad y cyfarwyddwr presennol, dyn di-Gymraeg o Ogledd Iwerddon.

Er bod pob un o'r cynghorwyr heblaw am Anthony 'Whitey' Davies (Annibynnol) a Theressa Bowen (etholwyd dan faner Llafur cyn ffoi o dan amgylchiadau rhyfedd i'r Annibendods) wedi pleidleisio ym mis Ebrill o blaid argymhellion i Gymreigio'r Cyngor Sir a gweinyddu'n fewnol trwy gyfrwng y Gymraeg, yn y Times y cyhoeddwyd hysbyseb uniaith Saesneg.

Yn ôl y Times, bydd croeso mawr i fenywod ac ymgeiswyr o leiafrifoedd ethnig, ond does dim sôn am y Gymraeg, er bod yr hysbyseb ar wefan y Cyngor yn dweud bod sgiliau cyfathrebu yn Gymraeg yn "hanfodol" ar lefel 2, h.y. medru cyfarch pobl yn Gymraeg ("bore da") ac ynganu enwau a thermau perthnasol ("iechyd da").

Ond peidiwch â phoeni da chwi os na allwch ddweud "bore da" - fe gewch chi hyfforddiant ar ôl cael eich penodi.

Ie, mae Mr James wedi dychwelyd, a busnes fel arfer yw hi.

Minor matters

The latest edition of "Y Gair", Carmarthenshire County Council's in-house newsletter for staff, contains a message from the Chief Executive. 

Ignoring the abuse of apostrophes, there are a couple of points which may surprise some readers, and possibly the Wales Audit Office. 

First is the claim that the Welsh Government has apparently confirmed Mr James's view that the Council did have power to grant him an indemnity to bring an action for libel, contrary to what the Wales Audit Office found.

Second is the claim that changes to HMRC rules on pensions for senior officers (i.e. top earners) "forced" them out of the local government pension scheme, that the scheme was introduced on the condition that it did not cost the Council any additional money (in truth it cost the Council a small fortune), and that there was nothing intrinsically unlawful about it. Eagle-eyed readers will note that Mr James says that the scheme has been withdrawn "for now".

In other words, a complete and total rejection of the Wales Audit Office's findings.

________________

"It has been some months since I have penned an article for Y Gair.  During that time, the Council found itself in the headlines and in the middle of a political row.  As with all such matters people take the opportunity to grab media attention for their own ends, irrespective of the facts of the matter. 

"There were two matters raised by the Wales Audit Office.  The first was whether the Council could indemnify an officer in respect of proceedings for defamation.  The legal advice the Council had from two QC’s (sic) was very clear, it could indemnify its’ (sic) officers in exceptional cases.  They granted that indemnity to me, as Chief Executive, on behalf of the officers, to not only defend an action for defamation brought by a local blogger, but to counter sue.  Following a six day trial last year, the blogger’s action against the Council was thrown out in its entirety.  In turn, she was found guilty of unlawful defamation, harassment, attempting to pervert the course of justice and generally being so dishonest that her own insurance company cancelled the policy to underwrite her legal action and the judge said that he would not believe a word she said unless it was backed up by evidence, other than her own words.

"The Council has refused to accept the Wales Audit Office report and has subsequently confirmed with Welsh Government that  the Council does have the powers to grant such indemnities.  The Auditor was wrong in the Council’s view.

"On the second matter, the Council had agreed to make a payment to senior officers equivalent to pension contributions where such officers were forced to leave the pension scheme because of new restrictions by the Government.  This was on condition it did not cost the Council any money.  Many employers make similar arrangements and whilst of itself not intrinsically unlawful, there were some procedural deficiencies in how the decision was taken and the Council decided to withdraw this scheme for now. 

"Some politicians felt there had been criminal wrongdoing and asked the police to investigate.  This, they did and were subsequently fully satisfied that there had been no such wrongdoing.  I said publicly at the time that I was utterly convinced that no officers had done anything wrong, but in order that no one could subsequently allege that I had attempted to influence any investigation I would be “out of office” until the matter was concluded.

"Can I place on record my sincere thanks and appreciation for all of you who got in touch, by email, letter, card, phone or in person, to offer your support.  It was very much appreciated. 

"The  Council can hopefully put this hiatus behind it and now move on.  The Council has excellent services which are highly valued by our residents.  Our Education and Social Care services are second to none.  Our investment in housing is delighting our tenants and in schools, is delighting teachers and students alike.

"Our refuse and cleansing services are the envy of many councils and our fantastic regeneration of our County is widely respected across Wales and England.

"I am extremely proud of what we together have achieved in Carmarthenshire and I am certainly not prepared to allow our County to be talked down because of these minor matters."

Council governance review - some more food for thought

If the WLGA panel which is about to start looking at governance in Carmarthenshire is going to do a thorough job, it will certainly have its work cut out gathering evidence and talking to "key partners and stakeholders" over the next month.

Following on from the letter written by Caebrwyn and Cneifiwr which concentrated on the council's constitution, here is some more food for thought for Mr Byron Davies and his colleagues.

Some of Carmarthenshire's failings can be put down to the cabinet system of local government which concentrates power in a very few hands, and the poor calibre of some of the councillors themselves. No amount of "member development" and training courses can turn those sows' ears into silk purses.

These problems are not unique to Carmarthenshire, but apply to local government across Wales.

What is unusual about Carmarthenshire, however, is that these factors have combined with the extreme longevity of a few key players at the top of the council. The chief executive, some of his hand-picked team of senior officers and some key members of the cabinet (known in Carmarthenshire as the Executive Board) have been running the council for the best part of 15 years.

Stability is a good thing, and so too sometimes is having people at the top who know, trust and even like each other, but the flip side of that coin can be an arrogant and self-perpetuating oligarchy which is never wrong, and where cronyism takes root.


All of that is outside the remit of the review panel, but the symptoms of it are not.

So here are some more areas for the panel to consider.

The Appointments Process

Last year the process of appointing a new technical services director was derailed by one senior councillor after pressure was brought to bear from outside the cross-party committee responsible for making the appointment. This not only wasted a lot of time and money, but constituted gross interference in the democratic process.

It was not the first time that questions have been raised about the appointment of senior officers. On a previous occasion the normal procedures were bypassed and an acting director of education was brought in through the back door.

The current head of administration and law has been in post now for several years in an acting capacity, and councillors have not been given an opportunity to decide for themselves who should occupy this very important role.

With a large proportion of the council's senior officers about to go into retirement, it is vital that the appointments process is cleaned up. It is for elected councillors to decide who to appoint to these posts, and the process is meant to ensure not only that the best candidate gets the job, but also that senior officers enjoy cross-party support and don't owe their jobs to particular individuals or factions.

The Monitoring Officer

In addition to other responsibilities, the Head of Administration and Law is also the council's Monitoring Officer. Monitoring officers have a number of duties, including overseeing the constitution (see previous post for what has gone wrong there) and ensuring that the actions and decisions of the council comply with the law.

The role of Monitoring Officer is one of the few statutory posts in local government, the others being head of paid service or chief executive, and chief financial officer. By law, the chief executive and monitoring officer cannot be the same person, the idea being that having a separate monitoring officer will ensure that there are checks and balances in place to prevent abuse of power.

When you have an acting head of administration and law and monitoring officer who has not been through the normal appointments process and who reports to and depends on the chief executive for their next pay cheque, you have to wonder how sound those checks and balances really are.

There have been countless disputes about the constitution and standing orders over the last few years. On how many occasions has the Monitoring Officer come down with a ruling which does not favour the executive over backbench and opposition councillors? Answer: none.

Carmarthenshire is not unique in this either (see Pembrokeshire), but by accident or design we have ended up with a monitoring officer who, fairly or unfairly, is widely perceived to be little more than a legal fixer for the boss.

The closest this arrangement came to being upset was the recent scandal over the pension and libel indemnity payments to the chief executive. These were branded unlawful by the Wales Audit Office, and the Monitoring Officer was very closely involved in both.

Bearing in mind that one of the monitoring officer's primary duties is to ensure that the council acts within the law, acceptance of the WAO's findings would have had very serious consequences for the monitoring officer and others, and so Carmarthenshire County Council refused to acknowledge that the payments were unlawful, and it went to great lengths, and huge expense, to avoid accepting that what it did was contrary to law.

In what looks for all the world like political fudge, the WLGA "will not consider the specific issues of the WAO's recent Public Interest Reports", but they will "form part of the evidence base".


Press and PR

One area of the council's activities which has repeatedly come under fire is its press office. There have been complaints about its behaviour and partisan output for years. These include attacks on opposition politicians and others outside the council, and attempts to bully and bludgeon newspapers into refraining from criticism of the council. All are well documented, and not once has any action been taken to discipline the culprits.

During the recent scandals over the unlawful pension and libel indemnity payments, the press office launched a string of attacks on the integrity of the Wales Audit Office itself. Again, no action has been taken.

The press office is in reality nothing more than the public manifestation of the image-obsessed, never-wrong culture which has developed at the top of the council.

It is no coincidence that Carmarthenshire has ended up with a chief executive who has by far the highest media profile of any local authority boss in Wales. The chief executive of Ceredigion, Bronwen Morgan, may not be loved and admired by the public, but then outside the council hardly anyone has ever heard of her.

One result of the obsession with the media is that Mr James has appeared to cross the line which separates civil servants from politicians. And that in turn has undermined the integrity of both senior officers and the council itself.

Whistleblowers

Social services is the most challenging and difficult part of the council's responsibilities. It employs large numbers of people and is responsible for the welfare of many more. There is no doubt that the overwhelming majority of staff are hard working and dedicated, but in any operation of this size things will sometimes go wrong.

We all know how badly things can go wrong from other local authorities, and that makes it all the more important that there is a culture and robust processes in place to ensure that whistleblowers can come forward.

In recent years there have been three known cases of whistleblowers, and all three have ended up being dragged through disciplinary procedures, employment tribunals or had to take their cases to the Ombudsman.

What message does that send to staff who witness abuse, bullying and criminality? Doing the right thing all too often means that you will have a very heavy price to pay.

The best known of the whistleblower cases involves Delyth Jenkins, whose story has been documented extensively on this blog and Carmarthenshire Planning. It is hard for anyone who reads the material, and most particularly the press reports and council's own published meeting minutes, not to conclude that the main priority of some of the senior officers and councillors involved was PR management.

Delyth was treated appallingly badly, and her life nearly destroyed. Nobody was prosecuted, and nearly all of those involved directly or in management were later rewarded with promotions.

And that brings us back full circle to the difference between effective management and leadership and an oligarchy whose main objectives are self-preservation and protecting their image.

Jonathan Edwards - Remembering the First World War

The focus of yesterday's celebrations - and they were described by the BBC as celebrations - of Armed Forces Day was Scotland as that country prepares to vote on independence in the referendum on 18 September.

Armed Forces Day was set up by Gordon Brown and Tony Blair supposedly to remember the contribution of the men and women of the armed forces. What we got yesterday was heavy-handed political jingoism, marching bands, fighter jets and lots of flag waving, including a display of a parachutist carrying a gigantic union jack.

All that on the centenary of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the event which triggered World War One.

The generations which took part in and remembered World War One have all gone now, but I know from talking to my grandparents and others that their memories were not of pomp and military glory, but an overwhelming sense of loss and the senseless waste of young lives.

The outbreak of the First World War was commemorated in the House of Commons last week, and below is the full text of a speech delivered by Jonathan Edwards MP. It deserves a wider audience.

___________

I would like to associate myself with comments made by honourable Members on all sides of this House in paying tribute to the millions of people – of all nationalities – who lost their lives during the First World War.


I must admit, however, that I have been somewhat uncomfortable with the way in which debates surrounding the commemorations of the ‘great war’ have been framed in recent months.

At the end of October 2012, my colleague, the honourable Member for Arfon [Hywel Williams], and I tabled an Early Day Motion criticising the government’s decision to spend £50 million on plans to commemorate the centenary of the beginning of the war, in an attempt, as the Prime Minister put it, to replicate the same national “spirit” as the Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

We argued then that, keeping in mind that an estimated 10 million soldiers and seven million civilians lost their lives during or as a result of the conflict, not to mention the millions who were injured or left in mourning, any attempt to observe the centenary in a positive manner would be deeply insensitive.

This should not be, as some have argued, an opportunity to celebrate the ‘best of British’ spirit; it should not be used as an excuse to redraft the national curriculum so that schoolchildren in England at least are taught a skewed, victorious version of history.

The First World War should rather be remembered as the unnecessary massacre that it was: it was, after all, the first industrialised war of its kind, and marked the first time that chemical gas, machine guns, and tanks were used on this scale. Men and boys rushed to enlist, thinking that it would “all be over by Christmas”. The military leaders who led them into battle were utterly unprepared for how long the conflict would last, or what horrors ‘trench warfare’ would bring about.

And the fate which awaited them, as Wilfred Owen had it, was that they “die[d] as cattle” – truly, the sheer numbers of the dead meant that the army was forced to review the way in which dead soldiers were buried: rather than mass burials and unmarked graves, each soldier’s name was recorded, and then engraved on the war memorials which are to be found in villages and towns throughout Europe.

In another of Owen’s celebrated poems, ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’, the poet exposes “the old lie” that it is sweet and noble to die for one’s country. But quite apart from the horrendous ways in which the young men died – which, of course, was what the poet was referring to in his closing couplet – the war itself was not a war sprung from noble causes. It was instead inspired by competing imperial foreign policies. Speaking at an event in Bosnia and Herzegovina earlier this month, the Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire argued that:

“The shot fired in Sarajevo a century ago set off, like a starting pistol, a race for power, two global wars, a Cold War, a century of immense, rapid explosion of death and destruction.”

The worst lie of all was that it would be the “war to end all wars”: in hindsight, the end of that conflict in 1918 only marked the prelude to mass unemployment, depression, and eventually a Second World War.

During a period of convalescence in July 1917, the soldier and poet, Siegfried Sassoon, wrote a letter renouncing the war effort to his commanding officer. Copies of the letter, under the title ‘Finished with the War: A Soldier’s Declaration’, were printed in newspapers and his words were quoted during a debate in this place by Hastings Lees-Smith MP.

In his letter, Sassoon lamented the fact that: “the war upon which [he] entered as a war of defence and liberation ha[d] now become a war of aggression and conquest.”

Sassoon said,

“I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed.”

Sassoon only escaped a court martial by being diagnosed with shell-shock, and was declared unfit for service.

A year later, the English Officer Charles Carrington said that, “England was beastly in 1918 … Envy, hatred, malice and all uncharitableness, fear and cruelty born of fear, seemed the dominant passions of the leaders of nations in those days.”

Hardly a sentiment worth commemorating.

Yet a recent editorial in the Irish Times summarises the political capital of the debate rather well. The piece, published on 18th June, points out that: “[T]he first World War has been a battle for the control of memory as much as it has been about remembering those who were killed.”

It also argues that: “Today, the fight to control history continues, since the war is seen through the prism of the growing debate about the need to define and assert “British values” in a changing cultural landscape.”
This is perhaps what Jeremy Paxman had in mind when he commented recently that: “The events now are so built upon by writers and attitudinisers and propaganda that the actual events seem submerged.”

It is fitting, of course, that part of the commemorations will include the reopening of the Imperial War Museum. The museum fulfils a highly important role in educating generations about the realities of war, and it should be commended for the work it does. But we should not forget that when the museum first opened on 9th June 1920, the Chairman of the museum, the Rt Hon Sir Alfred Mond MP, said that: “The museum was not conceived as a monument to military glory, but rather as a record of toil and sacrifice.”

Those in public life today would do well to keep this in mind.

During debates on the Imperial War Museum Act (1920), Commander Joseph Kenworthy MP had said:
“We should forbid our children to have anything to do with the pomp and glamour and the bestiality of the late War, which has led to the death of millions of men. I refuse to vote a penny of public money to commemorate such suicidal madness of civilisation as that which was shown in the late War.”

A distinction should be made, of course, between celebrating the “pomp and glamour and … bestiality” of war, and commemorating those who died. I am firmly in support of the campaign to erect a Welsh Memorial in Flanders, which has already raised over £100,000 of its £150,000 target. I understand that the Welsh Government has also pledged money to the project. The memorial, which will be made from stone donated by Graig Yr Hesg Quarry in Pontypridd, will be unveiled during a ceremony on 16th August this year.

In May, my colleague, the Rt Hon Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd [Elfyn Llwyd], hosted a reception in this place to raise awareness of the campaign in parliament. I was glad to lend my support then and to do so again now.

Because it is only right that a memorial of this kind should be in place. More than 20,000 Welsh men died during the war, and every village in Wales was left in mourning.

Over 4,000 Welshmen died in Mametz Wood alone in July 1916 – most from Monmouthshire and Brecknockshire – indeed, it is bitterly ironic that some of those killed had survived the mining disaster in Senghennydd in 1913. I know that Owen Sheers has written a poem about Mametz, which is now on the GCSE curriculum, and that his play Mametz is being staged by the National Theatre of Wales this week in Usk.

It is pertinent, though, that the new memorial will be in Flanders, where the majority of Welshmen lost their lives – including our celebrated poet, Hedd Wyn.

“Hedd Wyn” was the pen name of Ellis Humphrey Evans, who was awarded the prestigious ‘Chair’ prize in the Eisteddfod of 1917 for his winning awdl, ‘Yr Arwr’, or ‘The Hero’. Evans was killed during the Battle of Passchendaele on 31st July 1917. During the chairing ceremony the following September, when his poem was declared the winner, it was also announced that he had died in battle, and the chair was draped in a black cloak. Ever since, Evans has been referred to as ‘Bardd y Gadair Ddu’, ‘The Bard of the Black Chair’. In a moving poem of that name, R. Williams Parry imagines that the arms of the chair itself are reaching, “mewn hedd hir am un ni ddaw” (“in everlasting peace, for one who will never come”). I should note that the English meaning of “Hedd Wyn” is white, or blessed, peace.

I would of course wish to associate myself with tributes being made to those who died – and believe that it is only right that their sacrifice should be commemorated.

But, as my colleague and I argued in our EDM, it would surely be more appropriate to commemorate the end of the war in 2018 rather than its beginning.

In Goodbye to All That (1929), Robert Graves said of the Armistice, “The news sent me out walking alone along the dyke above the marshes of Rhuddlan (an ancient battlefield, the Flodden of Wales), cursing and sobbing and thinking of the dead.”

Even peace, for some, served only to emphasise the futility of the war and the senselessness of so many dead.

This year’s commemorations should provide an opportunity for sombre reflection, for pausing and for remembering those who died.

But we should not forget the pity of war and the pointlessness of the conflict which began in 1914.

As history has shown, it was far from being the “war to end all wars”.
I’d like to end by quoting an englyn, by William Ambrose (Emrys):

“Celfyddyd o hyd mewn hedd — aed yn uwch
O dan nawdd tangnefedd;
Segurdod yw clod y cledd,
A’i rwd yw ei anrhydedd.”

The closing couplet translates as:

“Idleness is the glory of the sword
And rust is its distinction”.

Diolch yn fawr.

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Here is a beautiful setting of the R Williams Parry poem performed by Meibion Prysor.

A second-hand tyre salesman

Someone who clearly knows a thing or two about the mysterious Gill tyre business posted a comment on an earlier piece about Nathan Gill, the recently elected Ukip MEP, to say that the tyres were all legally disposed of. While it is accepted that that was the case, Anon's comments overlook several important points:

1. It was the Environment Agency Wales which took out an enforcement order to have the tyres legally disposed of. Disposal was supervised by both the EAW and the county council. It was not exactly done voluntarily. An interesting FOI would be how much this cost the EAW and the council.

2. How many houses in built-up areas have 5,000 tyres in their back gardens?

3. Nathan Gill was in business with the occupants of this house just a few miles from his own home, and one of the occupants was his mother. The property itself is a large Victorian house run as a B&B. The website has a great many pictures of the house and surroundings, all copyright of Nathan Gill, so either way it is reasonable to assume that our MEP was a frequent visitor. Did he ever wonder what all those tyres were doing there?

4. North Wales police raided a second property in conjunction with the illegal tyre stash a few miles away in Llangefni where Nathan Gill lives. Perhaps that was just a coincidence. Perhaps Anon would like to tell us more?

Not only were the tyres being stored illegally, but it is clear from news reports at the time (Daily Post and BBC, October 2011) that the authorities had reason to believe this was part of a scam to ship used and worn tyres to Ghana where they would presumably have been sold and re-used.

A lynch mob and a gooseberry bush

News even more shocking than the rumoured defection of Ken Rees to Ukip has come in from Llansteffan, where the Community Council has passed a motion of no confidence in Cllr Daff Davies, affectionately known as Elmer Fudd.

Press Release

Last night, Llansteffan and Llanybri Community Councillors voted in favour of a ‘NO CONFIDENCE’ motion in their Community Council Chairman, Councillor David ‘Daff’ Davies.

The motion of no confidence was directly linked to Cllr Davies’ conduct and perceived influence in the recent controversial decision by County Councillors to over-rule planning officers and vote in favour of a 45m commercial wind turbine at Mwche Farm, Llansteffan.

This Wind Turbine, will become a permanent blight on one of Wales’ most iconic landscapes.  A world renowned view that was made famous by Wales’ most famous son, Dylan Thomas.

Llansteffan and Llanybri Community Councillors strongly opposed the proposal when it was brought to the group during consultation, yet Councillor Davies continued to fully back and publicly support the application.  With numerous complaints from residents over the lack of representation and blatant disrespect for his constituents, questions were being raised over the conduct of the Community Council as a whole.

Community Councillor David Hunter called for the motion of NO CONFIDENCE: ‘I have called this motion as I believe you have brought Llansteffan and Llanybri Community Council into disrepute’.

He further stressed that the vote in a motion of no confidence is not in the capacity as County Councillor, but only in capacity as Community Councillor.

Councillor Davies read a pre-prepared statement in his defence:

‘I can tell you quite categorically that I have not taken any money in a brown envelope or any other colour envelope’.  He further challenged anyone who has said this to provide hard evidence.

In regards to his bias towards the applicant and his personal friend he added: ‘I supported the application as I didn’t feel the objectors had any grounds’.  Councillor Davies went on to reiterate professional and government bodies that did not object to the wind turbine.  He also stated that there has been many single wind turbine applications across Carmarthenshire that have all been approved.

Following Councillor Davies’ statement and prior to the vote, a request for questions from the public was made by interim Chair Community Councillor, Carys Jones. Proceedings were quickly hushed by Councillor Davies who blatantly refused to be questioned by what he termed a ‘Kangaroo Court’.

All but one of the Community Councillors were in favour of the motion of no confidence.

Community Councillor Alan Cooper objected to the motion as he ‘believed the Community Council are at fault and should not have forced Daff Davies to be Chair when he was also Chair of the County Council.

Community Councillor Cooper went on to say that by being Chairman of both Community and County Council’s put pressure onto his role and forced a conflict of interest.

It was highlighted that Councillor Davies had every opportunity to stand down in his position at anytime during, or prior to this process in order to avoid any conflict of interest.

Community Councillors also voted in favour to form a sub-committee to fully investigate the conduct of Councillor Davies and report any finding back to the Community Council on the 21st July 2014.

Following the vote of no confidence, he continued his derogatory onslaught stating: ‘I’ve already chosen my tree in Llanybri, it’s a gooseberry tree…its only that high (Knee high)..so you’ll have to wait some time before you see me hang!’

Councillor Davies is now seeking legal guidance before deciding his next steps.

A Ukip defection in Llanelli

On the face of it the LibDems and Ukip are poles (no pun intended) apart politically, with the LibDems claiming to be the most pro-European of the unionist parties. So rumours that Ken Rees, the veteran LibDem from Llanelli, has told his party friends that he has joined Ukip may take some by surprise.

When it comes to switching political allegiances Ken has form, however. Back in 2008 it is understood that he promised Plaid Cymru he would support the Plaid group on the council if one of the two Plaid candidates in his former ward stood down and gave him a better chance of being elected.

Not long after being elected, Ken threw in his lot with Meryl Gravell's Independents, but crashed to fifth place in the 2012 county council elections and lost the LibDems' only seat on the council.

It is being whispered that he hopes to make another comeback as a Ukip Assembly Member in the 2016 elections.

A letter to the Editor

Update 26 June

It is understood that Daniel Hurford of the WLGA has offered himself as a contact. Anyone wishing to send in their views or suggestions can e-mail to:  Daniel.Hurford@wlga.gov.uk

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The following letter from two of Carmarthenshire's bloggers has appeared in the South Wales Guardian, and we hope that, whatever readers' political views, they will join us and make their views known about what sort of County Council they want to see.

"Dear Editor

Carmarthenshire County Council  has announced that it will be beginning a review of its governance arrangements in the near future. On the face of it, this sounds like a very dry and technical subject, but it goes to the heart of what sort of local government we want.

Readers of the South Wales Guardian will know that Carmarthenshire County Council has been through a very turbulent year and has often made the headlines for all the wrong reasons. The Council Leader, Kevin Madge, has gone on record as saying that he would like a fresh start, and we think that the review which has just been announced is an opportunity for the council to do just that.

Although the review panel will be talking to councillors and officers, we feel strongly that they should also listen to the views of the public in Carmarthenshire, and we would like to encourage everyone who cares about local government and the services it provides to write in and give their views on what needs to change.

Local government directly affects all of us in our daily lives, often more so than what happens in the Welsh Assembly or Westminster. It is responsible for education, social services, the roads, waste and the environment, planning, public health and much else besides. Only a minority of voters turns out to vote in council elections, and many councils are effectively run year in, year out by the same old faces. They are often less than welcoming when their actions and decisions are questioned by the press and public. That needs to change.

In Carmarthenshire a recent survey commissioned by the Welsh Government showed that more people than in any other part of Wales felt that they were unable to influence council decisions.

In recent years the constitution which governs the democratic functions of the council has been amended many times, and the cumulative effect of these changes has been to reduce the ability of ordinary councillors to scrutinise the actions of the governing board and senior officers.

Not long ago a request from opposition and backbench councillors to get the council to consult them on charges for sports facilities in the south of the county was rejected by a senior officer as an attempt at “micro-managing” executive decisions. On another occasion a planning officer rejected a request for a report on traffic and road safety in connection with a planning application saying that it was the council’s policy only to publish what it was legally obliged to publish. On several occasions in the last year the council executive has refused to allow debate or questions on a number of serious matters.

We believe that the default should be set to “open”, with the council withholding only what it is legally prevented from publishing.

Here are some of the changes we would like to see:

• ·         Encouraging public participation, with time set aside for public questions and answers at monthly meetings and a much simplified procedure for submitting questions.

• ·         Restoring urgent items to the agenda to enable councillors to raise pressing matters with the executive.

• ·         Set aside a part of meetings of the full council with an open session of questions for the Leader and members of the Executive Board.

• ·         Removing unreasonable restrictions on the numbers of signatures councillors need before they can submit a motion.

• ·         Restoring recorded votes in committees so that members of the public can see how councillors voted on controversial matters.

• ·         Extend filming to all committees, and the Planning Committee in particular. If this cannot be done for reasons of cost, the council should allow members of the public to record these public meetings.

• ·         There should be fewer meetings held behind closed doors and independent opinion sought whenever the council applies the so-called “public interest test” before excluding press and public.

• ·         The registers of interests for councillors and senior officers should be published online and updated.

• ·         The Business Management Group which makes important decisions on council business should publish its minutes as a matter of course.

• ·         Details of councillors’ attendance records should be published online.

• ·         Carmarthenshire should follow the example set by Monmouthshire and publish details of council spending online.

• ·         Groups bringing petitions to Council should be heard by the full council, and ordinary backbench councillors should be given an opportunity to speak on the petition.

A former US Supreme Court justice once said “sunshine is the best disinfectant” when it came to ensuring good government, and we believe it is time for Carmarthenshire County Council to pull back the curtains at County Hall and let the light in.

Jacqui Thompson, Llanwrda

Richard Vale, Newcastle Emlyn