Minister's 'snub' to the Welsh Language
Monday, April 16, 2007

Staying with the Welsh language theme today, it's interesting to note which Labour candidates have submitted English-only registrations for the forthcoming national assembly elections.

There's plenty of talk in Cardiff Bay of a nationalist/unionist split in the Labour party. And this may become all the more pronounced after the election as the end of Rhodri Morgan's tenure as leader grows ever closer. While Carwyn Jones, perhaps unbeknownst to himself, heads up the nationalist wing, the two AMs widely considered the stalwarts of the unionist camp are Leighton Andrews and Andrew Davies.

So it's intriguing to discover that Enterprise Minister Andrew Davies has not submitted a bilingual registration for the May 3rd ballot, unlike most of his colleagues up and down the country who will stand on a 'Labour Party/Y Blaid Lafur' ticket.

Unfortunately, the Rhondda Electoral Office does not publish its list of candidates online, so at the time of writing it's not possible to tell if Leighton Andrews has overlooked the Welsh language in a similar fashion. What's certain is that for Andrew Davies there's no going back; nominations are now closed. And with pundits already pointing to his Swansea West constituency as a possible upset he'll be kicking himself if voters, when staring at this monolingual appearance on the ballot paper, decide that's enough to swing their vote.
Andrew Davies' name as it appears on the official Swansea West ballot.


 The more common bilingual format, as used by Edwina Hart in the Gower.

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