Lee Waters

Posted on Left Foot Forward on May 10th 2012 If local councils are expected to provide a network of roads for cars, why not a network of routes for people to walk and cycle? That was the initial thought that sparked the campaign which yesterday saw the Welsh government announce plans to make Wales the first country in the world to place a legal duty on councils to provide a network of routes for ‘active travel’. If local councils are expected to provide a network of roads for cars, why not a network of routes for people to walk and cycle? That was the initial thought that sparked the campaign which yesterday saw the Welsh government announce plans to make Wales the first country in the world to place a legal duty on councils to provide a network of routes for ‘active travel’. As the bill’s ‘active travel’ title suggests, the proposal is as much about health policy as it is about transport. The NHS in Wales spends £1m every week treating obesity-related illness. As some of t...

Published in the Western Mail on 10 May 2012 Wales is to become the first country in the world to require councils to provide routes for walking and cycling  A stereotypical cyclist, Boris Johnson explained during the London mayoral campaign, is someone with whippet-thin brown legs or dreadlocks who charges around in Lycra, jumping lights. Not the most seductive role model. The sense that cycling is a fairly eccentric pursuit has been widespread, and confirmed by a major study last year which suggested that most people don’t regard cycling as something for them. “It is either a toy for children or a vehicle fit for the poor and or strange. For them cycling is a bit embarrassing” according to Dave Horton one of the research authors at Lancaster University. Hardly surprising really given that just 2% of journeys are by bike. By definition it is not something that most people do. But survey after survey has shown that it is something that many more people would consider ...

I'm no great fan of Tony Benn, but I was struck by a line of his quoted in Chris Mullin's diaries : radical reform has three stages. First those in favour are virulently denounced. Then it all goes quiet as it gradually dawns on the denouncers that change is inevitable. Finally, a year or two from now, no one will even be able to recall that they ever held a different view

Posted on Progress online on March 1st 2012 With the UK going though a period of flux who would bet against an independent Scotland in three years time? Of course, the prospect has countless permutations but for Labour’s there’s one that stands above others: without Scottish MPs, and with the significant cut in the number of Welsh MPs we’re now seeing, Labour could struggle to govern alone at Westminster again. But as the party still strives to the performance of Labour is Wales will become even more important in showing our values, and our competence to rule. As we’ve seen in recent weeks David Cameron will seize on any opportunity to shine a light on the party in Wales to score a point in Westminster. Labour in Wales therefore has a huge responsibility to our party across the UK to show the way. And to discharge that responsibility we’ve got to get serious. If we are going to be in Government in Wales for the long-term – either in coalition or on our own – we need to take a good h...

Posted on Wales Home on 11 October 2011 So, there’s to be another Commission to examine the future of devolution. Ken Hopkins would have approved. He died this summer. He was a complex man, and the epitome of the machine politician. Indeed, he wasn’t a ‘politician’ at all, a least not formally, which in a way proves the point. He was an apparatchik, and proud of it. After Labour’s traumatic defeat in 1992 Ken Hopkins was appointed to Chair the Party’s Policy Commission to review its policy on devolution. As Secretary of the Rhondda Labour Party, and one of Neil Kinnock’s ‘mates’, Hopkins was certain to come up with a dependable compromise which would not upset the Party establishment. And he duly did, the long forgotten ‘Shaping the Vision’. The reason I think of Ken today is something he said to me about the brief he was given. The purpose of the Commission, Welsh General Secretary Anita Gale told him, was “to occupy the troops”. There was five years until the next election, a...

Posted on This is My Truth on 9 September There can be little doubt that this is a radical Government. And one of its most radical innovations is almost upon us, and yet there has been very little debate in Wales about how it is going to work in practice. In a little over a year’s time we are going to elect a Police Commissioner to oversee each ofWales’ four police forces. Each will have the power to hire and fire Chief Constables. But equally significant will be the considerable informal power that they will exert. Democratic mandates being what they are, the Commissioners will become significant players on the Welsh political scene. They will undoubtedly want to shape the communities they serve as well as influencing the national debate. There has, inevitably, been strong opposition to the move by the Police Federation who fear it will lead to the politicization of the police force – a point reinforced by the existing Police Authorities and the Welsh Chief Constables who do not wi...

Posted on Wales Home on August 10th 2011 IT IS THE calm before the storm. With both Westminster and Cardiff Bay in recess the political scene appears tranquil, but storm clouds are gathering. And when the new Parliamentary boundaries are published for the rest of the UK next month they will erupt. A reduction in the number of MPs Wales sends to the House of Commons by a quarter is certain to unleash powerful and unpredictable weather within the political parties as politicians digest the implications of reshaped constituencies. As well as having profound implications for the nature of future UK Governments, the changes will have more immediate impacts on Welsh politics. Even though the detailed proposals for Wales will not now be published until January, the febrile Westminster atmosphere will make MPs jumpy. At a time when delicate political judgements will be required to decide the future funding arrangements for the Welsh Government, our MPs will be pre-occupied. Where ca...