Murphy to examine transfers of power

Mar 12 2008 by Tomos Livingstone, Western Mail

THE Wales Office is to review the working of the new devolution settlement amid disquiet from MPs over how transfers of power to the Assembly are scrutinised.

The informal look at the procedure comes nearly a year after the introduction of the system, which Ministers admit is complex.

The Assembly Government now requests permission to legislate in a policy area from Westminster, which grants it after a vote – leaving the Welsh administration free to pass its own laws. Since it was introduced there have been six such requests from Cardiff Bay, but there have been complaints from MPs that the process is cumbersome, and that the Welsh Affairs Select Committee, which scrutinises the process, is overloaded.

Alun Michael, the Cardiff South and Penarth MP, said yesterday, “Frankly it’s been a bit of a nightmare but goodwill on both sides has made it work.”

The system would be swept away in the event of a “yes” vote in a referendum on a Welsh parliament, but doubts persist on whether a pledge to hold such a poll by 2011 will be met.

Welsh Secretary Paul Murphy told MPs on the Welsh Affairs committee yesterday, “I think it’s absolutely vital for us to sit back in a couple of months time and have a look at how things have gone since this new, quite complicated, procedure has come into operation.”

He said an increasing focus on cross-border issues was “a recognition that devolution was here to stay”, and he added he did not want to see “an iron curtain, or a fortress Wales” mentality developing in Welsh politics.