Bethan Jenkins AC/AM Blog

The Assembly budget got through today without much fuss. To be honest I did expect the opposition parties to be much more bruising, but we left the chamber with a little graze compared to what I was prepared for. There was over 17 amendments from the opposition against the budget, yet not one single effort to even suggest where they would change the budget lines to coincide with where they believe the money should go, or any inclination as to how they would do things differently. Fair enough to scrutinise and criticise -because that’s what being in opposition is about, but there wasn’t much depth to their arguments. Jenny Randerson and the Lib dems tried to say that we were spending money on gimmicks, which is of course untrue-and this coming from a party which proposed free toothbrushes for children if they came to power. Please, give me strength!

I am pleased however that all parties are in agreement that we have had a raw deal from Westminster, and that this is inevitably affecting our ability to balance out resources across the board. This line of argument has been driven all along from our MP’s in Westminster, so we are leading the agenda yet again! I did expect some Labour backbenchers to kick up more of a fuss than they did- naming no names, of course. The very Labour backbenchers that are finding common ground with the Tories at the moment. Interesting times lie ahead that is for sure….