FM Wars IV - A New Hope

Mark the date in your calendar. May 11th was the day when Welsh politics became interesting as what was meant to be the formality of reinstating Carwyn Jones as First Minister took a shock turn.

Ynys Môn AM Rhun ap Iorwerth nominated Plaid Cymru Leader Leanne Wood as their challenger. Nothing interesting there but what followed was as all the Labour AMs naturally voted for Carwyn Jones and all the Plaid Cymru, Conservative and UKIP AMs voted for Leanne Wood. The sole Lib Dem AM, Kirsty Williams gave her vote to Carwyn in order to create a dead lock.

The vote finished 29-29. As is customary the Presiding Officer and Deputy Presiding Officer do not vote. Since they are from Plaid Cymru and Labour it wouldn't have made any difference at all.

As interesting as all this is I wanted to look at the claims from Labour that they had a clear mandate to govern.

Now I've already debunked the 'largest party myth' when Labour were banging on about it before the General Election in 2015 and the same rules stand here in Wales and Rhun ap Iorwerth mention it in the EBC article. I wont repeat myself or Rhun, I'll just post some sexy charts to show Labour's mandate for what it is.

This isn't a sexy chart, It's Carwyn having a blub. Source EBC

UKIP Bullshit - Severn Bridge tolls

May's election is not far off so we are going to see a steady stream of bullshit coming out of UKIP. Blog Menai has already spotted some bullshit from one of UKIP's Cardiff candidates but here's one straight from the top.

Nigel Farage reckons that he will lower or axe the Severn Bridge tolls. The problem with this is that the Severn Bridge tolls are not devolved. But that isn't going to stop UKIP dragging their knuckles all they way into Wales for a photo op.

Coming soon to a service station near you, Mr Farage's award winning snake oil - Share via twitter | facebook

'Vote UKIP' banned by Disqus

As you may be aware this page and others use the Disqus comments platform instead of the default system. For those of you who have signed up to Disqus you may have had an email recently telling you that 'Vote UKIP' are now following you.

Your email will have looked a little like this.

EU Election Results 2014

By now everyone should know that Wales has decided to send an English immigrant that hates immigrants and a Tory that lives in England to represent Wales in the EU. As well as those two we've also chosen one Labour and one Plaid Cymru. Wales, as a region of England, only has four MEPs. If Wales were an independent state then it's likely we'd have around 12 based on the fact we have roughly the same population as Lithuania.

Click to embiggen. Share via twitter | facebook

Bongo Bongo Land

When making a valid point it's important to remember what century you are in and use the appropriate language. As an example, if a left wing politician had commented "it doesn't appear right that billions are being given away in foreign aid and yet we have millions of people in the UK living in poverty. Having to feed their family with donated food from food banks, going hungry at winter because they were choosing to heat rather than eat" then no doubt many would agree.

But if you are a UKIP politician and you use terms like Bongo Bongo Land then no matter what message you try and put across it's not going to go down very well, apart from with the people who belong in a different era.

Tory Map of the World (Spitting Image)