Cymru Yfory – Tomorrow’s Wales was established in July 2004, under the Chairmanship of The Archbishop of Wales, as a positive response to the recommendations of the Richard Commission Report, published in March 2004, with the hope of encouraging and supporting wider discussion in Welsh society of its recommendations on the powers of the National Assembly for Wales.
It is a cross-party, cross-sector, multi-faith body bringing together a wide range of Welsh civil society actors, who serve on the Executive in a peronal capacity.
TOMORROW'S WALES AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
Our objectives are to:
- Encourage the implementation of the Richard Commission recommendations;
- Encourage Welsh civil society and the Welsh public to participate in an informed and open debate on Wales's constitutional future;
- Encourage interest within Welsh civil society in politics more generally, and to encourahe civil society to engage with the national Assmebly for Wales.
In 2007, we published our handbook 'The New National Assembly for Wales - a guide', designed as a 'layman's guide' to the National Assembly for Wales's new powers and precedures. Currently, we are in the process of publishing a series of Devolution Briefing Papers which cover a wide range of issues relevant to the future of devolution in Wales, and which are intended to inform the current debate.
GET READY FOR THE BIG DEBATE
The One Wales Government is committed to ensuring primary legislative powers for the National Assembly funder Part 4 of the Government of Wales Act 2006, and to hold a referendum on this matter by not later that May 2011. To prepare the ground for this an All-Wales Convention, chaired by Sir Emyr Jones Parry, will lead a national debate on the case for primary legislative powers.
Tomorrow's Wales strongly supports the granting of primary legislative powers to the Assembly. This will facilitate the implementation of policies that are appropriate for Wales and will be a means of developing our national life. The existing arrangements, while providing useful additional powers, are too limited, over-complex, time-consuming and depend on the UK Parliament's agreement all the way.
We want to see a constitutional settlement that will be stable, transparent, effective and will respect the Assembly's autonomy. In order to ensure this, the following matters, not included in the 2006 Act, are in our view crucial. The Assembly needs:
* 80 Assembly Members (AMs). 60 AMs (45 not including ministers) are insufficient for effective legislation and scrutiny of the actions of Government;
* A system of electing AMs that is fairer and more proportionate than the current one. The Richard Commission recommended the use of the Single Transferable Vote (STV). The system of voting must be re-examined;
* A seperate juristiction for Wales to be established as in the case of Scotland and Northern Ireland;
* A general power to legislate (as is the system in Scotland), rather than the current long list of devolved responsibilities;
* A better system of funding its expenditure. the current system is unfair to Wales and deficient in terms of accountability to the electros.
It is our view that these steps need to be implemented as soon as possible to give us effective governence in Wales.
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