06/05/2008

Election Thoughts

This is a late post on my thoughts about the council elections, but inspired by The Prof's latest post.

Dylan thinks that there will be a Plaid Cymru / Llais Gwynedd coalition in Gwynedd!

I think that it is unlikely that Plaid and Llais will kiss and make up. If Llais was to co-operate with Plaid, having stood an election on a basically anti-Plaid ticket, they would look like real prats!

However, I suspect that the reason he might think that they are close is because they are both nationalist parties. Meaning that nationalists made a net gain of eight seats in Gwynedd last week. A bad night for Plaid, maybe, - but a good night for Welsh nationalism? Having nationalists in both government and opposition in Gwynedd will be interesting - will a nationalist debate enhance the cause or will a nationalist split wound it?

Dylan says that the Tories should exclude Plaid Cymru in Conwy as there is no political benefit whatsoever to the Conservatives to have them sitting in the cabinet.

Plaid and the Conservatives have served together in Conwy over the past four years. The fact that the Tories will want to exclude them this time has got nothing to do with sob stories in Gogarth. With Labour hemorrhaging votes and the most Labour part of Conwy having been swapped for a more Plaidish area in the new seat, the next Westminster election is going to be Tory v Plaid in Aberconwy. So it is probably not in either party's best interest for them to work together. However the Plaid group decided that they would not serve in a Tory led council - they have NOT been excluded by the Conservatives!

Looking at the wider picture Plaid has more county councillors today than it has ever had and gained more seats in Wales than the Lib Dems gained in both England and Wales. Interestingly half of the Lib Dems' total gains came from Wales. A good result for both Welsh parties on the whole.

BUT!

When people protest against Labour in Wales either Plaid and or / the Liberal Democrats should be making hay. Neither party (separately or jointly) made the sorts of gains they should have made in the wake of a Labour meltdown!

Next years Euro-elections might be a better indicator of the way the party winds are blowing, when the independents and the localistics won’t muddy the waters as much. However if the natural benefactors of protest votes don’t up the ante during the next twelve months, then the others the Greens, UKIP, the BNP, The Monster Raving Loonies etc might attract sufficient votes to allow Labour to retain its spare Welsh euro-seat.

4 comments:

  1. Having nationalists in both government and opposition in Gwynedd will be interesting - will a nationalist debate enhance the cause or will a nationalist split wound it?

    I doubt there will be many debates on the subject of nationalism.

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  2. I agree that it is unlikely that that there will be formal debates under the subject heading nationalism. Perhaps debate is too polite a word, I have little doubt that over the next four years there will be slanging matches where each side tries to prove that its argument on everything from bins to business support is more patriotic than the others. This will raise the profile of the national cause, I'm not sure if that will benefit nationalism or be detrimental to it

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  3. If you read the post, I never said that there would be a coalition between the two groups. I merely suggested "that Plaid Cymru in Gwynedd will make a formal arrangement with Llais Gwynedd, especially as many of the architects of the schools closure policy have lost their seats". However, it is clear that even that sort of agreement is beyond the two groups and that any sense of magnanimity seems to have been lost amongst both leaders in the wake of a vicious campaign.

    As for Plaid turning down the offer of going into coalition with the Conservatives, then you seemed to be talking to different people to me, but what do I know about Conwy politics :).

    Anyway, no decision has been yet been made and it could be that the Conservatives could yet end up NOT being part of the cabinet if the other parties decide to do a deal with Labour

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  4. There will indeed be some strange bedfellows by the end of next week. If it works, I wonder if the support for STV will grow? I certainly hope so.

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