St Enoder Parish Youth Club

St Enoder Parish Council will be hosting an important consultation meeting on Wednesday 26th March about the Parish Youth Club. The meeting will take place at the Methodist Church Hall in Indian Queens and it will start at 6.30.

A Youth Club for teenagers in St Enoder Parish was launched in November, with sessions run by two trained youth workers from Cornwall Council.

The main purpose of the forthcoming meeting will be to find more about what young people from St Enoder Parish want to see provided in their locality.

One of the youth workers, Dan James has appealed to local teenagers to attend the meeting and have their say.

“12-19 years old? Nothing to do? Full of ideas on what there could be for you to do in your community? Why not take the opportunity to come along to Indian Queens Methodist Church Hall on Wednesday 26th March to meet local councillors and youth workers and have your say on what you want from your Youth Club.”

Parents are also invited to attend the meeting, as well as anyone who might be interested in helping out at the Youth Club as a volunteer.

Anyone who needs further information about the Youth Club or the meeting should call me on 07791 876607.

The Parish Council is also continuing to raise funding for a modest Youth Club building which will hopefully be placed in the Indian Queens Recreation Ground, providing a permanent base for local young people.

MK is campaigning for a National Assembly for Cornwall – not independence!

It is my view that “Towards a National Assembly of Cornwall” clearly sets out the nature of the new democratic settlement that MK is campaigning for.

The document states that:

“Mebyon Kernow has a manifesto commitment to the creation of a legislative National Assembly of Cornwall, with powers broadly equivalent to the present Scottish Parliament, through a “Government of Cornwall Act” … [securing] democratic control over most areas of domestic politics in Cornwall, and associated public expenditure.”

The document further states that:

“The National Assembly of Cornwall would not be independent of the UK – it would be an integral and empowered part of the governance of the United Kingdom.”

I fully appreciate how important it is for campaigners to be careful and precise in the language that they use. And as the leader of MK, I consider myself extremely focused on making sure that MK press statements and publications, as well as speeches, are well crafted and not open to misinterpretation.

I am therefore increasingly saddened at how MK’s campaign for greater self-government for Cornwall is being continuously misrepresented as a thrust for complete independence,

Only last week, a local journalist posted an on-line story which implied MK wanted the same powers as an “independent Scotland.”

And today a news story about MK in the Scotsman referred to us as an “independence party” with a “goal of independence.”

I have also been informed that the latest edition of The Big Issue includes a feature on, what it describes as a “whole host of regional secessionist groups” and “micro-independence movements across the UK,” which includes Mebyon Kernow – the Party for Cornwall.

Is it really too much to ask that MK policy position is reported accurately?

Liberal Democrats to support more powers for Cornwall?

It is my understanding that, at their Spring Conference in York (8th March), Liberal Democrats voted to devolve powers to Cornwall.

Their press release states that:

“It is now Liberal Democrat party policy to introduce a ‘Devolution Enabling Act whereby legislative devolution is available to Cornwall (recognising its historical, cultural and linguistic claim to autonomy).’

“It would allow Cornwall to demand and negotiate a package of law-making powers that would be transferred from Westminster to Cornwall. A Devolution Enabling Act would also allow London and other areas in England with a population of a million people or more to bid for their own law-making assembly if they wanted to.”

This is an interesting development, though the Liberal Democrats have been here before.

The Lib Dems contested the 2005 General Election and Cornwall County Council elections with a Cornish Manifesto, which included a commitment to a Cornish Assembly. And upon winning control of Cornwall County Council that year, they published a list of priorities that included a pledge to “establish detailed plans for a Cornish Assembly” within their first year of office. The Lib Dems did not take this pledge forward and instead pushed through the centralisation of local government in Cornwall.

Mebyon Kernow will be putting pressure on the Liberal Democrats on this issue in the coming weeks and calling on them to fully back MK’s campaign for a National Assembly for Cornwall, with powers broadly equivalent to the Scottish Parliament.

Gordon Brown outlines “power sharing UK” – but what about Cornwall?

The former Prime Minister Gordon Brown has today entered the debate on Scottish independence calling for, in the words of the BBC, a “move away from a centralised British system” to “one where nations shared power, risk and resources.”

Gordon Brown has apparently put forward six proposals, which have been reported as follows:

A new UK constitutional law to set out the purpose of the UK as pooling and sharing resources for the defence, security and well-being of the citizens of all four nations.

A constitutional guarantee of the permanence of the Scottish Parliament.

A new division of powers between Scotland and Westminster that gives Holyrood more powers in employment, health, transport and economic regeneration.

A new tax sharing agreement that balances the commitment of the UK to pool and share its resources with the need for accountability to the electors in all the places where money is spent.

New power-sharing partnerships to address shared problems on poverty, unemployment, housing need and the environment.

A “radical” transfer of powers downwards from Westminster and Edinburgh to local communities.

From my perspective, it is disappointing that a senior Labour figure – who was in government when over 50,000 declarations calling for a Cornish Assembly were presented to Tony Blair – is talking about the “defence, security and well-being” of the “citizens of all four nations” – meaning England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – and, once again, ignoring calls for the devolution of greater powers to Cornwall.

Western Morning News: “Cornish Assembly deserves a fair and unbiased hearing”

In Saturday’s edition of the Western Morning News, there was an extremely positive editorial comment about MK’s campaign for a Cornish Assembly. For those that didn’t see the article over the weekend, it was as follows:

Most people “east of the border” – as well as residents of Cornwall itself – may have been baffled by Mebyon Kernow’s St Piran’s Day call for a national assembly.

What can possibly be gained by creating a fresh tier of administration just five years after the establishment of the unitary authority?

But the truth is that despite its best efforts to be a one-size-fits-all super-authority, Cornwall Council remains deeply unpopular. Whether these criticisms are justified is almost beside the point: the reality is people feel it is neither representative, accountable or financially efficient.

The idea of a national assembly for Cornwall is nothing new, having been discussed for more than a century. In 2000, when 50,000 people signed a petition calling for an assembly, the move was supported by every MP in Cornwall, as well as Cornwall County Council, the district and borough councils and 28 town and parish councils. It even became a Liberal Democrat manifesto pledge – but we have come to learn how flimsy they can be. 

Perhaps the first reaction to the proposal is: “Surely Cornwall is too small.” But with a population of 536,000, Cornwall is larger than Iceland, Luxembourg and Malta, as well as numerous other semi-autonomous regions across Europe.

The second consideration might reasonably be cost. However, assembly supporters can produce figures to show that by abolishing a large number of unelected bodies and ensuring much of the business of government currently administered in Bristol and London is done in-house, it could actually cost less and create well-paid Cornish jobs in the process.

Under MK plans published in its consultation document, Towards a National Assembly of Cornwall, such a body would control the majority of the public sector, including the NHS and education.

We should not be afraid of looking at alternatives. What MK is suggesting is not some didactic pie-in-the-sky ideology, but simply the possibility of a pragmatic solution to an unpopular status quo. The purpose of its consultation document is to place the idea on the table in the hope that it will be discussed openly and maturely as part of a fact-based debate.

All of us are tired of the cynical rhetoric of London politicians. The least we can do is give the idea of a Cornish Assembly a fair and unbiased hearing.