Yes, but not yet

Cake cutting
Do Assembly Members deserve an 8.3% increase in their pay?

A resounding ‘Yes’. The job has changed and the gap between their pay and MPs is too wide. Should they take the money now? 'No" They should postpone it. MPs did and took only a 1.9% rise. The wounds of the present pay round of 2% increase to low paid public service workers are too raw and too recent.

AMs could tough it out. But they will pay dearly for it in public resentment.  One surprising supporter of the 8.3% rise was the editorial in the South Wales Argus. Instead of the usual populist condemnation of all that the Assembly does, they produced a rational balanced argument that was fair to AMs. It’s unnerving and unprecedented. What’s going on?

One chilling thought that might disturb my fellow Welsh MPs is that if the responsibility cake has been divided to give the Senedd a bigger slice, is Westminster’s slice smaller?  What’s the logical outcome for Welsh MPs?

Party games
So all parties want to increase the taxes on booze.

That’s now certain to be one of the budget announcements. The Tories are playing a strange game. They probably got wind of what the Chancellor was likely to announce and they are climbing on the bandwagon, which has yet to leave the stable.

The LibDems tried on again today with a promise to cut tax on smoothies and other fruit drinks.  Alistair Darling dropped his hint to one national newspaper.

It’s all about opposition parties spraying their scent on popular policies. On Wednesday they will claim that the Government is pinching their ideas.

The game is getting tedious. When can we return to real politics when parties disagreed instead of all rushing to inhabit the mushy middle marshes of the centre?

The wages of sin

GlaxoSmithCalamity is in deep trouble. So why did Gordon Brown offer them an accolade?

Two devastating reports have proved that their main anti-depressants drugs are useless and lethal. They have been found guilty of denying information to drug regulators that could have saved lives.

In Ireland the extent of other calamities are being revealed.  They are cutting 100 jobs in their Cork factory because of a drop in sales of their diabetes drug Avandia after it was linked with a 43% increase in the risk of heart attacks.

Already they have falling sales globally for their other products including the anti-depressant Seroxat, congenital heart treatment Coreg and Parkinson's medicine Requip.

Yet JP Garnier, CEO, GlaxoSmithKline was appointed to Gordon Brown's International Business Advisory Council. He was appointed in 2006 for a three-year term.

What could his speciality in the advice department be, reducing sales, how to conceal safety procedures, sacking staff, developing a deaf ear to the deaths of clients, or peddling killer drugs for profit?

Lost weekend
My planned work programme today has been destroyed.

I had left a gap to see Wales win the Triple Crown. What a great team they are. For my money they are better that the 2005 Grand Slam winners. Then it was down to work time. Not much point in watching England slam Scotland. But after watching the first five minutes my interest was captured. A thoroughly deserved win for Scotland against a demoralised and broken English side.

Chelsea demolishing Barnsley was likely to be a predictable sparking display of Chelsea’s skills over a gutsy Barnsley. It’s off to work time. Again I was riveted and saw every minute of a great Barnsley performance.

That’s Saturday gone. I’ll get down to work tomorrow – except when Cardiff City are playing, of course..... Perhaps Monday.