The commission looking at the future of Wales has really got people talking.
Last week the Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales published its report into how we can change how Wales is set up to try and better tackle the problems we face. It looked at a range of solutions such as more devolution, a federal set up for the UK and Welsh independence.
Co-chaired by the academic and former footballer Professor Laura McAllister and former Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan William it found that all solutions were viable but had different strengths and weaknesses. It also said that there needed to be urgent changes to the way that devolution was currently constituted meant it was in danger of collapse after attacks by the Conservative led UK Government. It called for policing, justice, rail services and infrastructure to be devolved to “protect Welsh devolution from attack”.
READ MORE: It's time to decide on the future we want for Wales
WalesOnline covered the launch of the report and it was analysed in the weekly Will Hayward Newsletter (which you can subscribe to under an exclusive offer here). There has been a real mixture of opinions on the future direction Wales could take and views on the report itself.
The Will Hayward Newsletter noted that changes were unlikely to come under the current Tory administration in London. However Nick commented on the newsletter that this wasn’t always the case.
He said: “While I wouldn't dispute the assessment either you or Prof McAllister make regarding the likelihood of the current Conservative UK Government in devolving more powers to Wales. I think it is interesting to note that the Wales Acts of 2011 & 2017, both of which significantly enhanced devolution, occurred under UK Conservative Governments.
“Furthermore, devolution in England to metro areas has, with the exception of London, happened entirely under the Conservatives with Labour, despite doing electorally well out of the arrangement, being slow to adopt support for decentralising power. Meanwhile, there has been little dispersal of power from the Senedd to the local level in Wales.”
Guto Owen commented on X that it was “good to see an emphasis on energy, infrastructure and Crown Estate in the report report. But the sky’s the limit for creating energy wealth to help run an economy in an indy Wales. Especially from our offshore wind plus hydrogen.”
The polls all suggest that Labour will be the largest party after the next general election. This begs the question of whether they will take any of the recommendations of this report on. The party has been characteristically non-committal when asked so far. Dan Lawrence posted: “When the Gordon Brown report was realised it didn't say too much on further devolution as they wanted to wait for this commission to report. Now it has I guess we'll see Labour beef up its proposals for the devo of policing, justice, rail infrastructure?”
This was echoed by Jeremy Brookman who said: “Devolution of policing, justice and rail infrastructure. These are areas Welsh Labour has wanted for quite a while now yet UK Labour hasn't committed to them. Can we really see them committing to them after this report? I personally don't think so but I guess we'll see.”
One of the co-authors of the report Professor Laura McAllister responded on her own social media to the comments by Conservative MP and former Wales secretary Robert Buckland where he said it would be “calamitous” to give more powers to Wales over justice. She wrote: “Over two years of considering detailed evidence from experts in justice & policing, plus forensic analysis against an objective matrix by a cross party Commission (upon which sat a prominent member of the Conservatives and a former Perm Sec), versus a personal judgement”. This was followed by a confused emoji.
Still others jumped on the fact that the report said that Welsh independence was “viable”. @AgeOfMeHammer wrote on X “Hopefully this gets the ball rolling on independence. 60 countries have left Westminster rule, and none have wanted to go back…”
Others however were not impressed with how the current Welsh Government managed the powers they already had. Commenting on the WalesOnline article regarding the report billywebb77 said : “Health system worst in the UK. Education worst in the UK. Economy worst in the UK...and you want to give these people MORE power?”
The commenters on the article were typically angry. Ridgeback3 wrote: “They looked at three options, surely there is a fourth option which should have been included to end devolution once and for all. To many people this would appear to be the best option. Devolution has been a total abject failure from the start… and has basically turned Wales into a woke dictatorship. Devolution has done nothing for Wales.”
Paul Anderson added on the same article: “I like being British and am very happy to be a part of the United Kingdom complete with its illustrious history. I am only 100% Welsh when it comes to sport.”
