Apologies for not doing it sooner but I left the house at 6am this morning for a trip to North Wales and have only just arrived back.
Overall, it was an interesting evening and many thanks to Hugh James for inviting me.
My one and only complaint was the format, which meant that it was not so much a debate as a speech, followed by question and answer session with very little time for the panelists to put any views across in any real detail.
Of course, that did not apply to the Deputy First Minister, who was given around fifteen minutes to set out his stall for the ERP and then the rest of us were given one minute to respond. We were then peppered with questions from the audience on a range of matters.
It did get quite heated on occasion as the Minister continued to try and toe the party line about all 190,000 firms in Wales would benefit from his policy of high speed broadband as opposed to the 10,000 that WAG currently works with.
The fact that the vast majority of the 190,000 are one man bands in sectors that will benefit very little from high speed broadband seemed to have passed his briefing people by, as did the statistics that a small number of companies will always create the majority of jobs.
Tellingly, he did not respond to the question whether inward investors would also have to repay any grants or why only Welsh companies in six sectors would qualify for financial support.
Tellingly, he did not respond to the question whether inward investors would also have to repay any grants or why only Welsh companies in six sectors would qualify for financial support.
However, what was most disappointing was the Minister’s attitude towards devolution.
At a time when the funding of universities is critical and he had emphasised the importance of higher education to the economy, I challenged him to raise the issue of devolving university research funding to Wales with the UK Government, thus releasing a further £120 million for university research in Wales.
At a time when the funding of universities is critical and he had emphasised the importance of higher education to the economy, I challenged him to raise the issue of devolving university research funding to Wales with the UK Government, thus releasing a further £120 million for university research in Wales.
This he refused to do, stating that, in his opinion, there was enough research going on in Wales and that what was needed was to commercialise more ideas.
Yes, incredibly, the leader of Plaid Cymru - the Party of Wales - refused the option to devolve more funding to Wales!
Yes, incredibly, the leader of Plaid Cymru - the Party of Wales - refused the option to devolve more funding to Wales!
And the debate was over. I was disappointed that I didn’t get to use the red hot information I wanted to on the evening but that can wait until the newspaper column on Saturday.
On reflection, I was slightly miffed at not being given any real opportunity to put my point of view across as you would in any normal debate but I am more than happy to engage in a second round at any time as long as I get more than one minute to put my view across!
One other thing - I know some of audience from last night are regular observers of this blog so would value your opinions on the evening and how it went.
One other thing - I know some of audience from last night are regular observers of this blog so would value your opinions on the evening and how it went.
