Lee Waters MS

...see what your opponents are saying. On a Sunday morning rather than turning to Andrew Rawnsley or Will Hutton to reinforce your prejudices, perhaps you should have a look at what most people are reading. Never a bad philosophy, but this morning more apt than ever. Over in the News of the World the well connected and respected Fraser Nelson lets rip on the Welfare State. "No civilised country should rely on immigrants to do the work, while paying its own people to claim dole in council estates" Mr Nelson writes. Today's op-ed is based on a report by the Centre for Social Justice (Iain Duncan Smith's deceptively titled outfit) which called for £100 Billion worth of spending cuts. It is a familiar right-wing populist assault on single mothers. Here's what he says: A girl who does 30 hours hard graft on the minimum wage has a disposable income of just £61 a week. With one child on benefits, she gets a house and £131 a week. With two kids: £186 a week. Three: £236 a...

Posted on the Bevan Foundation blog on March 2nd 209 Ever since he bumped his head in the shower on holiday things haven't been going Nick Bourne's way. The latest mis-step is perhaps the most serious though. Having opted against going to Westminster it is unlikely that Jonathan Morgan will content himself for long with Chairing the Audit Committee and being a 'mate' on the backbenches. As the messy reshuffle unfolded Mr Morgan was attending an awards lunch in Cardiff's Hilton to celebrate emerging Welsh Leaders. The ambitious AM listened as the guest speaker offered the following characerisation of leadership: "A good leader is someone who surrounds themselves with people who are better than they are at certain things and does not feel threatened". From where I was sitting I couldn't see if he was smiling.