Boris to rescue 'The Valleys'?

I am far from convinced by the idea floated by the Institute for Welsh Affairs of an elected Mayor for 'The Valleys'. It sounds like an idea from somebody who doesn't live in South Wales
(oh, it is!) It also sounds quite patronizing, and quite frankly if I should be excited about praising the system which elected Boris Johnson as Mayor of London then there is something seriously wrong! As Valleys Mam says in her impassioned blog on this issue, there are schemes to re- energise said communities already in place. Would a Boris-esque hero save 'The Valleys' from destruction and doom?

The whole point of devolution is to bring politics closer to the people. I certainly don't believe that another tier of government in the form of a Mayor is the answer to the question in relation to the development of the South Wales communities that are mentioned in the report.

And while we're on the subject, where do you actually stop when you talk about 'The Valleys'? There's been arguments over many a year now within valleys communities themselves about who are the real valleys communities (Yes, its true) Do we really want to open up that debate again?! ( I think of the old Aberdare, Rhondda hatred for one which stems from the Miners strikes.)

The fact that the report was launched in Cardiff says it all, really. It would also help if the Westminster government stopped their centralisation agenda of closing HMRC offices that provide key jobs for people in the South Wales area, stop closing Job Centre offices and moving all the positions to Cardiff, and stop actively working against the Welsh Assembly Government's agenda of seeking to devolve key offices to areas such as Merthyr Tydfil.

Let the debate continue.

Welsh women bloggers please stand up.

Everyone is starting to talk about who has the most political bloggers- is it Plaid, lib dems etc (its certainly not Labour in Wales that's for sure, although Labour are excellent at providing plenty of anonymous comments...)

Nevertheless, my plea is for more Welsh women to blog about Welsh politics. From scanning welshblogindex.blogspot.com I can only identify seven women bloggers- Betsan Powys, Miss Wagstaff, Heledd Fychan, Leanne Wood AM, Jill Evans MEP, Valleys Mam, and me. If there are more then let me know. Perhaps some of the other bloggers with pseudonyms are women, but I don't think they are. Jane Davidson AM started a blog on her myspace page before the election but that has fallen by the wayside, and some of the other women candidates for the National Assembly stopped blogging very soon after the May result.

It would give a different angle on the blogosphere if more women decided to blog, but I think many are put off by the mainly male orientated vibe that the blogosphere exudes. The remarks which are left in some of the comment boxes of various blogs are sexist on occasions- one comment talked about the weight of female politicians in a negative way, for example. Yes, I know that you will say that we should take it with a pinch of salt- and believe me I do, otherwise I would never blog again, but there has to be a positive way in which we can attract more women to the world of the blogs. In other fields of interest, women have embraced the blogosphere (often to the detriment of their personal lives) but here in Wales the phenomenon hasn't really taken off.

Considering that there are so many female politicians at the Assembly we should encourage a campaign to get more women blogging and contributing to the debate online. Only then can we rival Glyn Davies's infamous wet t-shirt competition blog entry a while back...