´óÏó´«Ã½

Half term and recess at the National Assembly comes to an end and in a finaI flourish, we turned yesterday into a day out in Aberystwyth. Ah yes, we know how to live.

A lot has changed since my student days in the 1980s - the view from the Arts Centre is the same, the price of a latte something else. Come to think of it, I don't think we'd even heard of a latte back then. Milky coffee in the Penguin or the Cabin did us fine and if we felt sophisticated, a slice of tahini shortbread from the Graig Cafe. My friend from the valleys, the one with a car, the attitude and the opportunity to get out of Aber to find out about exotic things like tahini put me on to that.

We hadn't heard of lattes but then, we hadn't heard of student debt either. We queued to pick up our grant cheques from the county council and left Aberystwyth with BAs and a clean-ish financial slate.

Ieuan Wyn Jones left Aberystwyth this weekend with something else - a bloody nose.

It was delivered by the national council who made it clear they won't buy at least one of the compromises born out of coalition government, the one that says non-means tested student subsidy will be abolished before the next Assembly election. They don't like it, they won't buy it and voted in favour of a motion put forward by the Westminster group reaffirming the party's opposition to top up fees and calling for any decision on a change of policy to be deferred until after the next Assemby election.

Cue the leader and Deputy First Minister spelling out to his own party that he wouldn't be able to deliver such a change in the government's plans. The coalition government's plans are that current fee levels will be maintained until 2009/10 but after that, non-means tested grants go. That means fewer people get grants but some of them who do get grants - because they can prove they really need grants - will get rather more in their pockets.

Ministers put forward an alternative motion, one that took account of the National Council's unease and pledged to review the issue. It was defeated.

So what?

What can the National Council actually do to hold the leadership to account? We're still trawling through looking for a definitive answer to that question. In the meantime this sentence is worth noting: "the group (of AMs) will decide on the policy line to be taken by members of the group in relation to matters being considered by the National assembly but within the framework of:

1.2i the policies of Plaid Cymru - the Party of Wales as decided by Conference or National Council".

Work that one out.

Is there an appetite to deliver something more meaningful than embarrassment for the leadership? No sign of that.

Is there a realistic prospect of Ieuan Wyn Jones and his Ministers trying to sell a different deal, a third way on student finances to each other, let alone their fellow members of cabinet? Let's see.

Is this simply a message in a bottle lobbed at the leadership by a party that knows some coalition compromises will be tougher to defend on the doorsteps than others come 2011? Adam Price MP puts it like this on : "The Labour Party is entitled to their policy but they have no right to impose it unilaterally on us as this was not envisaged in One Wales".

On the doorsteps of Aberystwyth and every other Aber and Llan come 2011 it would probably sound more like "they made us do it".

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• |
• |
• - What's this?