Plaid Cymru AM for South Wales West Dai Lloyd AM has questioned whether Nick Clegg and the “ConDem” government gave any consideration at all to the people of Wales when planning for a referendum on the AV voting system.
Raising the issue in business questions in the Senedd today Dai Lloyd said that despite the “ConDem’s” rhetoric of respect for Wales and the other devolved nations, this failure to take the fact that the vote would clash with the Welsh elections was more like disrespect.
Plaid AM for South Wales West, Dai Lloyd, said:
“It is clear that the leader of the Lib Dems and his ConDem colleagues gave no consideration at all to the people of Wales when planning for the AV referendum. In fact in his first radio interview on the issue, Clegg seemed only concerned with a clash with the English local elections.
“It is only a matter of weeks since the ConDem parties in the Assembly were arguing that holding a Welsh referendum on the same day as the Welsh election would be too confusing. And yet both the Tories and Lib Dems here now seem content to make the opposite argument with regard to their own referendum. They are happy to follow the script prepared by their London bosses – despite the blatant hypocrisy.
“The question that the Lib Dems and Tories in Wales have to answer is whether this is a deliberate attempt by their London bosses to undermine our national elections and those of Scotland and Northern Ireland or is it just the case that they didn’t consider or discuss our needs?
“It seems incredible to me that a referendum on a voting system that nobody really wants, and that nobody actually voted for should be allowed to impact upon our national democratic processes here in Wales.
“By failing to consult the administrations of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland over the planned date for holding a referendum on AV, it would seem that despite warm words the UK Government seems to be pursuing a disrespect agenda.”
