Tools downed at strategy factory
It's quite easy, said the First Minister, for a government to turn itself into a "strategy factory".
"You know," told last month's Welsh Labour conference, "creating an endless stream of strategies without there being any product at the end of it.
"I want this to change and change radically".
It turns out it's not as easy as he thought. A promised manufacturing strategy will not now be published ahead of the Welsh elections in May.
Not that the Welsh assembly government is short of a strategy or two. It even appears to have a strategy for strategies. There is a dedicated strategieson its website.
There is a violence against women strategy, a strategy for woodlands, another for fuel poverty. Then there's the major events strategy.
"The gypsy traveller team within the Welsh assembly government have developed a draft gypsy traveller strategy".
There is a Welsh medium education strategy, a climate change strategy and "Better Ö÷²¥´óÐãs for Wales - our strategy for Welsh housing."
There is the .
There are strategies for the built environment and for youth services. There's an environment strategy and a strategy for developing school-based counselling services for children and young people.
We are three years into the 10-year substance abuse strategy; there's a biomass strategy for Wales, a strategy for old people, a community nursing strategy and a
location strategy.
The "strategy factory" has clearly been working overtime: do let me know if I've missed any out.
Hello. I'm David Cornock and I'm parliamentary correspondent for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Wales. This is the blog for the latest news and gossip from the Westminster village - with a Welsh accent.
Comment number 1.
At 26th Mar 2011, corum-populo-2010 wrote:Well said! Endless strategies do appear to be the main strategy of Welsh politicians to keep their jobs by avoiding any 'perceived unpopular strategy' by Welsh politician's strategic strategists?
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Comment number 2.
At 26th Mar 2011, sionnyn wrote:Do they have a strategy for managing their strategies?
Management jargon should have no place in Welsh government! It has infected us from Whitehall. What is wrong with the good old word PLAN?
Except that a plane always has an outcome that is measurable, within a certain period of time, while a 'strategy' is open ended!
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Comment number 3.
At 27th Mar 2011, RW49 wrote:Labour in Wales have only one viable 'strategy' and that is to stay in power for ever come what may and regardless of outcomes no matter how comparitively bad they are. No excuses now mind, perhaps they'll need a 'strategy' for that.
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