I missed the Plaid Conference due to domestic commitments, but, caught Leanne Wood AM, Leader of Plaid Cymru's conference speech. Here it is in full, it's well worth watching and has plenty of ideas and the plenty of the vision we need to rebuild our country.
2012-09-14-PlaidConference-LeanneWood from M H on Vimeo.
Showing posts with label Leanne Wood AM. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Leanne Wood AM. Show all posts
Sunday, 16 September 2012
Friday, 24 June 2011
FOOD FOR THOUGHT?
Oxfam Cymru claim half of Welsh people have changed their eating habits in the last two years, with 39% having to do so because food prices have rocketed.They suggest that more people in financial distress are approaching food banks for free, short-term supplies (as previously blogged by Leanne Wood AM). The OXFAM survey, which is part of a global study into eating habits in the last two years, comes after the Office for National Statistics revealed rising food inflation was escalating the cost of living.
The hard statistics reveal that a range of foods have undergone sharp rises, with prices of meat up 5.1%, fish up 11.4%, bread and cereals up 5.8%, mineral waters, juices and soft drinks up by 10.3% and jams by 7.5%. Oxfam Cymru says only 60% of Welsh respondents reported having enough to eat on a daily basis – with 39% saying they got enough, most or some of the time. They pointed to global figures, which showed an average 61% getting enough to eat all the time, indicating the Welsh statistics were part of a global problem.
A number of issues are going to impact on food prices, here and in the rest of the world. There is Climate Change, which as temperatures rise, will lead to a fall in crop yields – potentially we are talking of up-to half of their current levels in some African countries. At the same time, extreme weather events like heat waves, droughts and floods will get worse and become more frequent, and the seasons that people rely on to grow crops will get even more unpredictable.
Across the world governments have dragged their feet for too long. We need to start dealing with a situation that's only going to get more urgent. The food price spikes of 2008 are partially related to and being aggravated by land grabs, as wealthy companies have invested heavily in cheap agricultural land in poor countries, often for commercial use. The land that is sold is actually being used by poor families to grow food in many cases.
Poor farmers and their families are often forcibly evicted with little or no warning or compensation, and to make things worse often the land is either left idle by investors who know it will only grow in value, or actually used in ways that reduce food production. So it's time for effective global rules to get land grabs under control – rules which ensure local communities see the benefits of investments and which help make sure that governments provide secure access to land for smallholder farmers, and especially women.
After decades of progress, the number of people without enough to eat is actually increasing, and food price spikes are a big part of the problem. That's because, when you spend up to 75% of your weekly income on food – as many poor families are forced to do – sudden rises have an especially destructive effect. Price spikes have many causes including the changing climate, oil prices, dysfunctional commodities markets, biofuels policies that turn potentially productive crop-lands into fuel for cars rather than fuel for people. Oxfam and a number of other agencies conclusions is that we are facing a whole new challenge.
It's time for governments to actually work together to deal with food price crises effectively and to tackle the problems that mean millions of people can't afford enough to eat. After the best part of one hundred years of so of crop yield increases, crop yields are beginning to flat-line partially because intensive farming can only go so far. We need to focus on the huge untapped potential of small-scale farmers in developing countries and especially of women, who often do most of the work for often scant reward.
The reality is that some 500 million small farms put the food on the plates of some two billion people (one in three of our planets population). With effective government support and a focus on sustainable techniques, productivity can soar. In Vietnam, for instance, the number of hungry people has halved in just 12 years – a transformation which was kick-started by government investment in small farmers previously disadvantaged by the old Soviet style collective farms. It's time to change the way that we in Wales and the rest of the world thinks about growing food.
The hard statistics reveal that a range of foods have undergone sharp rises, with prices of meat up 5.1%, fish up 11.4%, bread and cereals up 5.8%, mineral waters, juices and soft drinks up by 10.3% and jams by 7.5%. Oxfam Cymru says only 60% of Welsh respondents reported having enough to eat on a daily basis – with 39% saying they got enough, most or some of the time. They pointed to global figures, which showed an average 61% getting enough to eat all the time, indicating the Welsh statistics were part of a global problem.
A number of issues are going to impact on food prices, here and in the rest of the world. There is Climate Change, which as temperatures rise, will lead to a fall in crop yields – potentially we are talking of up-to half of their current levels in some African countries. At the same time, extreme weather events like heat waves, droughts and floods will get worse and become more frequent, and the seasons that people rely on to grow crops will get even more unpredictable.
Across the world governments have dragged their feet for too long. We need to start dealing with a situation that's only going to get more urgent. The food price spikes of 2008 are partially related to and being aggravated by land grabs, as wealthy companies have invested heavily in cheap agricultural land in poor countries, often for commercial use. The land that is sold is actually being used by poor families to grow food in many cases.
Poor farmers and their families are often forcibly evicted with little or no warning or compensation, and to make things worse often the land is either left idle by investors who know it will only grow in value, or actually used in ways that reduce food production. So it's time for effective global rules to get land grabs under control – rules which ensure local communities see the benefits of investments and which help make sure that governments provide secure access to land for smallholder farmers, and especially women.
After decades of progress, the number of people without enough to eat is actually increasing, and food price spikes are a big part of the problem. That's because, when you spend up to 75% of your weekly income on food – as many poor families are forced to do – sudden rises have an especially destructive effect. Price spikes have many causes including the changing climate, oil prices, dysfunctional commodities markets, biofuels policies that turn potentially productive crop-lands into fuel for cars rather than fuel for people. Oxfam and a number of other agencies conclusions is that we are facing a whole new challenge.
It's time for governments to actually work together to deal with food price crises effectively and to tackle the problems that mean millions of people can't afford enough to eat. After the best part of one hundred years of so of crop yield increases, crop yields are beginning to flat-line partially because intensive farming can only go so far. We need to focus on the huge untapped potential of small-scale farmers in developing countries and especially of women, who often do most of the work for often scant reward.
The reality is that some 500 million small farms put the food on the plates of some two billion people (one in three of our planets population). With effective government support and a focus on sustainable techniques, productivity can soar. In Vietnam, for instance, the number of hungry people has halved in just 12 years – a transformation which was kick-started by government investment in small farmers previously disadvantaged by the old Soviet style collective farms. It's time to change the way that we in Wales and the rest of the world thinks about growing food.
Friday, 27 May 2011
FOOD SECURITY
We should spare a thought or three to the matter of 'food security' - food security you may ask? Yes, not energy security, but Food security which is nothing new, in 1996, the World Food Summit defined food security as existing “when all people at all times have access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life”. The World Health Organisation (WHO) acknowledge that the concept of food security is defined as including both physical and economic access to food that meets people's dietary needs as well as their food preferences. All very fine and day you may say, but, what does that have to do with us?
Well, a lot actually, especially as the UK produces 73% of ‘indigenous-type foods’, and is about 60% self-sufficient when exports and local consumption are set against production. UK consumers spend an average of £420 per household on food each year that they then throw away, or 4.1M tonnes of food nationally. Every day we bin 4.4 Million apples, 5.1 Million potatoes, 2.8 Million tomatoes and 1.6 Million bananas. 2009 Wrap data suggests £12 Billion pounds worth is binned every year in the UK, or around £680 for the average family when drinks and liquid food is included. In Wales as previously noted by Leanne Wood Plaid AM, South Wales Central, serious efforts are being made to cut waste.
We need to think about locally sourced food stuffs and to take a long hard look at the way the market for food in the UK operates. In the UK, we are when compared with 10 years ago, now importing nearly half our butter from abroad, cheese imports are also up, around 60 percent over the last ten years. We are importing those products that have added-value and are exporting the low-value milk products which are then ironically turned back into butter, yoghurt, etc and sold back to us.
This is madness; this is what happens in the Third World, where countries export their raw commodities cheaply and then have little choice but to buy back the manufactured products that are made from their own raw materials. Successive UK Governments both Conservative and New Labour have sat back and quietly allowed this to happen.
The rise in global food prices will have an impact on the cost of living and the prices we pay for our food. The cost of Global food prices quietly rose to a new high in December last year, according to the UN's Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO). Its Food Price Index went above the previous record of 2008 that saw prices spark riots in several countries. Soaring sugar, cereal and oil prices had driven the rise, the report said.
The index (produced by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) measures monthly price changes for a food basket composed of dairy, meat and sugar, cereals and oilseeds, averaged 214.7 points last month, up from 206 points in November and also noted that prices had risen for six consecutive months.
At the end of the day, ever rising food prices (and ever rising transportation costs) will bring little benefit to our own or more distant food producers because they are being short changed by the Supermarkets (and some of their suppliers).
Well, a lot actually, especially as the UK produces 73% of ‘indigenous-type foods’, and is about 60% self-sufficient when exports and local consumption are set against production. UK consumers spend an average of £420 per household on food each year that they then throw away, or 4.1M tonnes of food nationally. Every day we bin 4.4 Million apples, 5.1 Million potatoes, 2.8 Million tomatoes and 1.6 Million bananas. 2009 Wrap data suggests £12 Billion pounds worth is binned every year in the UK, or around £680 for the average family when drinks and liquid food is included. In Wales as previously noted by Leanne Wood Plaid AM, South Wales Central, serious efforts are being made to cut waste.
We need to think about locally sourced food stuffs and to take a long hard look at the way the market for food in the UK operates. In the UK, we are when compared with 10 years ago, now importing nearly half our butter from abroad, cheese imports are also up, around 60 percent over the last ten years. We are importing those products that have added-value and are exporting the low-value milk products which are then ironically turned back into butter, yoghurt, etc and sold back to us.
This is madness; this is what happens in the Third World, where countries export their raw commodities cheaply and then have little choice but to buy back the manufactured products that are made from their own raw materials. Successive UK Governments both Conservative and New Labour have sat back and quietly allowed this to happen.
The rise in global food prices will have an impact on the cost of living and the prices we pay for our food. The cost of Global food prices quietly rose to a new high in December last year, according to the UN's Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO). Its Food Price Index went above the previous record of 2008 that saw prices spark riots in several countries. Soaring sugar, cereal and oil prices had driven the rise, the report said.
The index (produced by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) measures monthly price changes for a food basket composed of dairy, meat and sugar, cereals and oilseeds, averaged 214.7 points last month, up from 206 points in November and also noted that prices had risen for six consecutive months.
At the end of the day, ever rising food prices (and ever rising transportation costs) will bring little benefit to our own or more distant food producers because they are being short changed by the Supermarkets (and some of their suppliers).
Sunday, 27 March 2011
AMBITION IS CRITICAL
Plaid's spring conference was interesting, with a real air of ambition and aspiration for this nation, as opposed to party political self interest. I caught a number of key-note speakers including Nerys Evans, Helen Mary Jones, Leanne Wood and Ieuan Wyn Jones, but, it was Ron Davies, Plaid's Caerphilly Assembly candidate who, in my opinion hit the nail on the head, when he said:
"The limits to our ambitions should only be set by the people of Wales. This process of building our democracy and a better Wales which goes with it should both challenge us and reassure us. We in Plaid speak for an increasing majority who want a greater degree of self government. After all, we as a party have done so much to get us where we are today."
He rightly laid into Shadow Secretary of State Peter Hain.
"It was so kind and generous of Peter Hain to remind us right at the start of the campaign that we wouldn't be having a referendum at all if it were not for Plaid.
"I am not entirely convinced his intervention was intended to foster inter-party unity in the driver for a 'Yes' vote. In fact, I am not all convinced.
"If ever there was a case of getting your retaliation in first that was one. As far as the Labour Party is concerned when it is a choice between party interest or national interest there is only one winner.
"Peter Hain knew full well how de-stabilising his comments could have been but the calculation was 'so what, there's a party game to be played'. Ill-judged and mistimed maybe, but you were right, Peter. Without Plaid there would have been no referendum on 3rd March."
The former Welsh Secretary said that Labour had failed to stand up for Wales during its years in office.
"Pity they didn't stand up for Wales for the last 10 years and help rebuild our economy or get fair funding for public services. They couldn't even stand up to their own backbenchers and get us a proper Parliament. Now Labour is adrift. Values abandoned, no direction, no strategy, no plan. They won't even acknowledge how deep our economic and social crisis is. Just spin and excuses."
Leanne Wood AM, was also spot on when she said that its time for Wales to control its own resources. One of the key themes of this weekend's Plaid Cymru conference was the economy. Our economy is in a poor state and not getting better despite billions of euro-cash being poured in.
We cannot allow or afford for the Welsh economy to continue to decline over the next five - this is not an acceptable option. We need fresh ideas and need to make best use of the new legislative powers (such as they are) to make sure that the next National Assembly punches well above its weight and begins to really deliver for all parts of Wales following the Welsh Election on May 5th.
"The limits to our ambitions should only be set by the people of Wales. This process of building our democracy and a better Wales which goes with it should both challenge us and reassure us. We in Plaid speak for an increasing majority who want a greater degree of self government. After all, we as a party have done so much to get us where we are today."
He rightly laid into Shadow Secretary of State Peter Hain.
"It was so kind and generous of Peter Hain to remind us right at the start of the campaign that we wouldn't be having a referendum at all if it were not for Plaid.
"I am not entirely convinced his intervention was intended to foster inter-party unity in the driver for a 'Yes' vote. In fact, I am not all convinced.
"If ever there was a case of getting your retaliation in first that was one. As far as the Labour Party is concerned when it is a choice between party interest or national interest there is only one winner.
"Peter Hain knew full well how de-stabilising his comments could have been but the calculation was 'so what, there's a party game to be played'. Ill-judged and mistimed maybe, but you were right, Peter. Without Plaid there would have been no referendum on 3rd March."
The former Welsh Secretary said that Labour had failed to stand up for Wales during its years in office.
"Pity they didn't stand up for Wales for the last 10 years and help rebuild our economy or get fair funding for public services. They couldn't even stand up to their own backbenchers and get us a proper Parliament. Now Labour is adrift. Values abandoned, no direction, no strategy, no plan. They won't even acknowledge how deep our economic and social crisis is. Just spin and excuses."
Leanne Wood AM, was also spot on when she said that its time for Wales to control its own resources. One of the key themes of this weekend's Plaid Cymru conference was the economy. Our economy is in a poor state and not getting better despite billions of euro-cash being poured in.
We cannot allow or afford for the Welsh economy to continue to decline over the next five - this is not an acceptable option. We need fresh ideas and need to make best use of the new legislative powers (such as they are) to make sure that the next National Assembly punches well above its weight and begins to really deliver for all parts of Wales following the Welsh Election on May 5th.
Saturday, 16 October 2010
SAVE THE PASSPORT OFFICE RALLY
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| Plaid's Leanne Wood AM, South Wales Central - speaking at the rally. |
Friday, 30 July 2010
A NICE LITTLE EARNER!
ALMOST £18 million of taxpayers' money has been handed to the operator of the Severn Bridges for repairs to the old Severn Bridge, the Department of Transport (DoT) has admitted. South Wales Central Plaid Assembly Members Chris Franks and Leanne Wood received a letter from the DoT which revealed that taxpayers have footed the bill for treatment to corrosion on the main cable and repairs to the cantilever edges of the M48 bridge.
This is a result of the concession agreement which was signed with bridge operator Severn River Crossing Plc (SRC) in 1992, which stated that the UK Government is liable for latent or pre-existing defects. The corrosion and damaged cantilever edges are seen to fall within these brackets with the cost of treating them £17,871,666 since 2005/06. This is likely to rise to £21 million by next May. This is despite tolls to cross both Severn crossings rising to £5.50 for a car and £16.40 for a truck.
The Plaid Cymru AMs hit out, Leanne Wood saying: "While a private firm reaps the profits from the substantial toll charges to get into Wales, the public is left to pick up the tab for essential repairs associated with pre-existing defects." The Plaid AMs noted that some £225, 733,000 SRC has made in toll revenues from both bridges since 2006. Chris Franks AM called it "astonishing" that tax payers are bearing the cost while Ms Wood called it a "very bad business deal". Leanne said: "The reverberations of this contract clause are being felt some 18 years later."
The Highways Agency, on whose behalf SRC operates the bridge, said: "The risks for defects that existed prior to the concession were not transferred to SRC as this would have resulted in significantly higher tolls." He said when the contract was signed, risks could not be quantified and no latent defects were identified until 2005/06. Further costs of £3.8 million are expected for this financial year to tackle the problems.
This is a result of the concession agreement which was signed with bridge operator Severn River Crossing Plc (SRC) in 1992, which stated that the UK Government is liable for latent or pre-existing defects. The corrosion and damaged cantilever edges are seen to fall within these brackets with the cost of treating them £17,871,666 since 2005/06. This is likely to rise to £21 million by next May. This is despite tolls to cross both Severn crossings rising to £5.50 for a car and £16.40 for a truck.
The Plaid Cymru AMs hit out, Leanne Wood saying: "While a private firm reaps the profits from the substantial toll charges to get into Wales, the public is left to pick up the tab for essential repairs associated with pre-existing defects." The Plaid AMs noted that some £225, 733,000 SRC has made in toll revenues from both bridges since 2006. Chris Franks AM called it "astonishing" that tax payers are bearing the cost while Ms Wood called it a "very bad business deal". Leanne said: "The reverberations of this contract clause are being felt some 18 years later."
The Highways Agency, on whose behalf SRC operates the bridge, said: "The risks for defects that existed prior to the concession were not transferred to SRC as this would have resulted in significantly higher tolls." He said when the contract was signed, risks could not be quantified and no latent defects were identified until 2005/06. Further costs of £3.8 million are expected for this financial year to tackle the problems.
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