[Flipside]

LOL Oh, I see, actually, to be honest, I didn't include Wales because I'm ashamed to say I'm not sure what the political situation is there

The BBC seems to have a blind spot East of the River Severn No doubt you are under the yoke as heavily as the rest of the UK

[Grey Wolf]

I believe I heard somewhere that the Isle of Man has a very corrupt government.....

[pyro-manic]

Heh, don't worry Flipside - it's not that exciting. Usual crap - bickering over stupid things, under Blunkett's thumb with the ID cards etc., we want a full parliament (yeah, an "assembly" - woohoo! ) so we can actually make some laws. Some cretins at the EU even managed to leave us off the map entirely!

Political map is broadly Labour, but they took a beating at the last elections, and lost a load of councils to the Lib Dems, nationalists (Plaid Cymru) and a few Greens got in as well IIRC. Usual infighting and bickering, nothing special. The new Assembly building is costing silly money (over £40m last I heard, up from £10m originally),

Big issues here are employment - since the mining collapse, and the subsequent loss of the oil refineries in Pembrokeshire, the steelworks closures and basically all heavy industry disappearing, there's massive unemployment in the Valleys, which is now (IIRC) the poorest area in the country, and one of the poorest in Europe (we get a massive portion of the UK's Objective One money).  Education is on the down, crime (particularly drugs) is on the up, etc. Health is also very poor (IIRC 23% of working-age men say they have a long-term health problem), which also affects employment, and stretches the NHS even further. The Valleys are a huge, throbbing, stinking mess. Lucky I don't live there

Anything else?

Oh yeah, there's a fuss over a toll relief road for the M4 past Newport (a bit past the Severn Bridge), and locally to me, there are plans to build a big offshore windfarm about 4 miles off the coast. I fully support it, but the locals are going ape****, saying "it'll spoil the view and kill our tourist industry!" even though the tourists are all local anyway, and they won't even be visible from the beach!

Foot and Mouth ****ed things up royally a few years back - farming's a mess, some people are going ape**** about the hunting ban, chronic shortage of NHS dentists, the Burns Unit at Morriston Hospital in Swansea is closing (one of the leading places in the UK), etc. etc.

Any questions, I'll try to answer. Any foreigners go "hey, I know Wales - that's in England, isn't it?", I'll come round your house and beat you to death with a large fish.....

[Flipside]

Yeah, I'd heard about the assembly, Wales has been wanting that about as long as Ireland and Scotland did...

No offence to the Irish or Scottish members of this board, but for all the 'Terrorism cannot work' gibberish of Blairs, the only country in the British Isles that our government won't talk to about an assembly is the one that used the least 'Terrorism' to achieve it? Admittedly, Scotland stopped years and years ago, but I think there were some groups?

I like the Windfarms in Wales, it's always been a bit forward thinking about energy, theres a Water Power station in North Wales, in the Gwyneth Valley, but you can't tell, since it's completely invisible from above ground.

Yeah, I think Labour had better brace itself for next year, I think more than a bit of a slap in the face is coming with any luck. Problem is for England, that we don't have a 'National Party' as such, well, we have something called the British National Party, but the government made sure that was stamped as an abode for racists and thugs etc, and thus it became such. We can't even fly the George Cross again, they let us do it while the world cup was on, but there stamping it out again

I don't really care as such, it's just a bit of cloth, but I'm younger than most politicians and still realise the trouble singling out our flag could cause. Had it not been mentioned, they'd probably have vanished of their own accord anyway, just without the attention.

[pyro-manic]

Actually, there was a "terrorist" group back in the 60s and 70s - Welsh Liberation Army or something daft like that. There was a big fuss about them when prince Charles was going to be officially made Prince of Wales at Caernarvon Castle (whenever that was) - apparently the WLA was going to do something to him - blow him up, shoot him, cover him in paint, I dunno.

As for the assembly, it's working fine so far, it just doesn't have any real power in terms of setting taxes or making laws....

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Flipside
Yeah, I'd heard about the assembly, Wales has been wanting that about as long as Ireland and Scotland did...

No offence to the Irish or Scottish members of this board, but for all the 'Terrorism cannot work' gibberish of Blairs, the only country in the British Isles that our government won't talk to about an assembly is the one that used the least 'Terrorism' to achieve it? Admittedly, Scotland stopped years and years ago, but I think there were some groups?
 

Not really.... there was the SLA (who sent about 5 non-functioning letterbombs, 1 small vial of poison in the mail to Prince william and nicked some guns from TA bases in the 80s or so - i.e. done **** all) and a bunch of students who nicked the Stone of Destiny.  That's about it.

EDIT; of course, Scotland has a large set of Labour voters and sod-all Tory voters.... I wonder if that was a factor?

[Flipside]

Ah... must have got my sources confused, to be honest, I've got a horrible suspicion it was the WLA I was thinking of, I grew up in the 70's so chances are they were more prominent around that time.

[aldo_14]

Then, Scotland is the only one without a serious terrorist group and also  the only one with functional devolution.

[Flipside]

Yep, so I made a prime time pigs ear of that little comment....

[Clave]

There's only about seven people in Scotland anyway....  

[aldo_14]

 I'llhave you know it's at least 8.