A BAD DECISION

The Con Dem Government is dead wrong to nearly halve employment at the Newport's Passport Office. Sadly this announcement has been long expected, the retention of the customer service centre and the complaints and correspondence parts of the Passport Office (which will save around 150 jobs) will do nothing to prevent the loss of the 120 jobs which are too be cut. A Newport City Council report which assessed the impact of the Passport Office on Newport stated that it was worth £25 million a year to the local economy.

Only last year, Newport was included in a list of cities most likely to take a big hit from the cuts being made in London by the Tories and Lib Dems - and this announcement of job loses only reinforces that. The jobs and services provided are critical to Newport's local economy. The real danger is that the Con Dem's see the partial closure as unfinished business, how much longer before they have another go? This bad decision was made in London, not by the people of Wales, who understandably want to see a fully functioning passport office in their own country. Unless responsibility for the passport office is devolved to Wales, we will continue to have no real defence against decisions made in London.

At one well attended public rally we were all treated to Newport's Labour MP's condemnation of what the Con Dem's were doing. Now what has remained unspoken throughout the long and well supported campaign to retain the passport office, is that the decision to reduce civil service numbers to save money was made in Westminster by a Labour Government, well before the Con Dem coalition was formed and well before the last Westminster election took place. The Civil Service does little without being told what to do, so who in the last Labour Government started the wheels turning, other than probably a Labour Minster?

SAVE THE PASSPORT OFFICE RALLY

Plaid's Leanne Wood AM, South Wales Central - speaking at the rally. 

The march and rally calling for Newport's Passport Office and save the 300 jobs was held in Newport today (Saturday 16th October) was well organised, well attended and well supported. The event which was organised by the PCS union began around 11am outside the Westgate Hotel and then the march went down Skinner Street, Upper Dock Street, Corn Street and Commercial Street before ending with a rally in John Frost Square addressed by elected members from the National Assembly, the Westminster Parliament, Newport City Council and the PCS and the RMT Trade Unions. It was a rousing, very colourful start to what will be a hard fought campaign to save Newport's Passport Office. Sign the South Wales Argus Petition.

MAXIMISING THE PROFITS...

News that Southern Railway (one of the privatised rail franchise holders) has opted to forget the facilities on its latest trains running on the Portsmouth to Brighton service should not come as a surprise. The company said trains would run in areas with short journeys where most people travel for less than half an hour. For the record (on a good day) a journey from Portsmouth to Brighton can take up to an hour-and-a-half. Southern Railways said the new trains, which should be introduced in December, have been designed to create more space for passengers (and boost profits).

Oddly enough this news has not gone down particularly well, with the Independent rail passenger watchdog Passenger Focus saying that the decision was a blow for passengers who were elderly, had medical conditions and travelled with children. The Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers' union (RMT) said on a journey of that length it was "unacceptable". Once we abandoned control of key elements of the public transport infrastructure to the whims of the market then this is part of the price that we all will begin to pay. Watch this space for future developments...