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Lord Richard
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Gentlemen, good morning, and thank you
very much for coming. We are very grateful to you. We
have been seeing an awful lot of people and it is very
helpful for the people to come who are prepared to expose
their views to us.
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What I would ask you to do first
of all, if you would be so kind, is to introduce yourselves
for the sake of the record and then if each group here
represented, could perhaps speak for 5 or 6 minutes
and introduce the subject from their particular point
of view and then we will perhaps pursue what issues
we think would be helpful.
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Alan Schwartz
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My name is Alan Schwartz and I see
that I am down as the Chairman of the South Wales Jewish
Representative Council. This is a group of various
bodies within the Jewish community. The Jewish community
of Wales numbers probably less than a thousand,
around about 1,000; roughly about the same number as
the Hindu community and there are about 14 different
bodies that we represent in the South Wales Jewish Representative
Council, but apart from that I am also on the executive
of the Cardiff Interfaith Association, the Cardiff Council
of Christians and Jews, the Interfaith Network, which
is the national body of the Interfaith Council, and
also we are dealing at the moment with a mapping
project to find out effectively where all the religious
communities exist throughout the whole country and this
is a form of project with which I am involved with
a small number of us, and also of course, most
importantly, on the Wales Interfaith Council. I am the
Jewish representative on the Wales Interfaith Council.
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From a Jewish point of view --
speaking from a Jewish point of view -- I would
say that almost all the community in South Wales, as
I am intimately connected with all of them, know that
I am connected with the Welsh Interfaith Council and
have a fair knowledge about what actually goes
on, as they do about all the other associations I am
represented with. I am also actually represented with
two other national bodies, and that is a body which
is at the beginning of a relationship between the
Jewish and Muslim communities and also the Three Phased
Forum which is Jewish, Christian and Muslim --
I am sorry to put Jewish first – Jewish, Christian
and Muslim, and also that is the nascent organisation,
but really we are starting to get more understanding
between them there.
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Lord Richard
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Thank you very much. We will come back
on the issues.
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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I will give my presentation in Welsh
if that is acceptable.
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Fy enw yw’r Parchedig Aled Edwards
ac rwyf yn gweithio fel y swyddog cyswllt rhwng Cytûn
a’r Cynulliad Cenedlaethol. Mae CYTÛN, fel y gwelwch,
yn cynrychioli 11 o eglwysi ac enwadau sy’n amrywio
o’r Catholigion i’r Crynwyr. Gofynnwyd i mi
heddiw gyfleu barn CYTÛN, eglwysi a dwy eglwys yn arbennig
sydd wedi dod i gasgliad pendant am bwerau’r Cynulliad
yn y dyfodol. Rwyf hefyd yn gwasanaethu cymunedau ffydd
Cymru ar Gyngor Partneriaeth Sector Gwirfoddol y Cynulliad
Cenedlaethol. Mae’n ofynnol i mi weithredu fel
cyswllt rhwng Cyngor Partneriaeth y Sector Gwirfoddol
a Chyngor Aml-ffydd Cymru. Hynny, yn gryno, yw fy swyddogaeth
yn y cyflwyniad hwn
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Interpretation:
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My name is the Reverend Aled Edwards
and I work as the liaison officer between Churches
Together in Wales and the National Assembly. (CYTÛN),
as you see, represents 11 churches and denominations
that range from the Catholics to the Quakers. I have
been asked today to convey the views of (CYTÛN), churches
and in particular, two churches that have come to a
firm conclusion concerning the future powers of the
Assembly. I also serve Wales’s faith communities
on the National Assembly’s Voluntary Sector Partnership
Council. I am required to act as a link between the
Voluntary Sector Partnership Council and the Inter Faith
Council for Wales. That, in a nutshell, is my role as
regards this presentation.
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Lord Richard
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Thank you very much indeed.
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Daniel Boucher
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My name is Daniel Boucher. I am the Evangelical
Alliance Churches National Assembly Liaison Officer.
The Evangelical Alliance (Wales) is an ecumenical body
within the Evangelical tradition that represents 20
plus denominations within Wales, and it is my job to
represent them to the National Assembly. I think
that probably will suffice.
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Lord Richard
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Thank you very much.
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Naran Patel
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My name is Naran Patel, and I am the
Hindu Community representative. I am also a member
of the Interfaith Council for Wales. We represent three
Hindu communities in Cardiff. We have a very small
number, just around 1,000, very similar to the Jewish
community.
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Saleem Kidwai
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My name is Saleem Kidwai. I am representing
the Muslim Council of Wales, which is an umbrella organisation
for about 53 Muslim organisations, mosques and other
associations throughout Wales.
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According to the new census performed,
78 per cent of the ethnic community from the
religious point of view, so 78 per cent of
the people are from the Muslim community. They come
from Albania to Zimbabwe, from every part of the world,
and I am also connected with the Association of Muslim
Professionals, which is a body bringing people
together on the professional arena.
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Lord Richard
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How many Muslims are on it?
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Saleem Kidwai
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According to the census, about 24,000.
I am also representing the Muslim Faith and United Faith
Council for Wales.
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Lord Richard
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Perhaps individually on behalf of the
organisations you could move on to the issues as far
as the Assembly is concerned, in relation to the Assembly,
how do you think it is working, how it can be improved.
Do you think the existing powers of the Assembly are
sufficient to be able to deal with the problems in your
own professional fields and really how you would like
to see improvement? Perhaps we could go in the order
in which we started.
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Alan Schwartz
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To give a background to the setting up
of the Welsh Interfaith Council, I think first
of all the whole thing started on January 1st
2000 when there was a big meeting at the Westminster
Hall in London, where all the faiths were in attendance.
People were making presentations and that particular
religion would introduce the member of the next religion
and it was the first time I had seen this on a national
scale. It was actually televised and it was the first
time it had been done. It was the first acknowledgement
that there were faith communities which were intimately
connected with the Government and with the United Kingdom
as a whole.
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I know that 9/11 sparked off a great
deal of interest, but I would say that the Welsh
Government, the Welsh Assembly as it was at the time,
certainly was very quick off the mark, and that was
Rhodri Morgan -- Rhodri's idea -- in getting
an Assembly started, getting a Welsh Interfaith
Council started, and not only that, putting it on a national
basis. In other words, not only was he having it connected
with the Assembly, but making it a sub-committee
of the Welsh Assembly.
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This is unique in this country because
you do not have that in England and you do not have
that in Scotland. Although there is a greater financial
support for the organisations, they are not a sub-committee
of the Assembly, and because of that -- or shall
we say in Parliament -- and in Wales what you have
are two meetings a year between not only the political
leaders but the Civil Service and all the major religions
and, although 9 religions are acknowledged by the Interfaith
UK Network, about 8 of them really exist around Wales
and those 8 are represented on those two council meetings
that we have a year, and I think we have now
had I think two or is it three meetings --
three meetings -- and they have been very interesting
because all the political leaders have had their input
and also the various religions, and in particular two
big points have come up: one is the introduction of
Muslim and faith schools in general but Muslim schools
in particular in Wales and also religious holidays,
which were acknowledged by Government bodies and by
the councils.
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Lord Richard
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Which was the missing one of the 9?
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Alan Schwartz
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Zalawestrians. There are not that many
of them and very hard to find. JJin is probably the
minority one. There are a few JJins around this
area.
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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If I may, I will give a brief
perspective on the issue. I will not go through
our submission in detail. Broadly speaking, what you
will find in our document is an emphasis first of all
on subsidiarity - that is bringing decisions as close
as you can to those they affect and we very much welcome
the intimacy and the openness of the Assembly to that
element.
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We have also noticed that there is an
opportunity post-devolution to impact very positively
on UK politics and European politics and to emphasise
‘solidarity’. There are other examples in
the paper, but the one I will highlight is that
during the objective one debate in Wales, not only did
‘additionality’ benefit Wales, but it probably
benefited deprived areas in England to the sum of about
£600 million. We would align ourselves very much
to the conviction of emphasising the needs of Wales,
but also benefiting the wider community.
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We have benefited enormously from the
activities of the Voluntary Sector Partnership Council,
not only in terms of broader issues such as that of
three year funding, which has been a huge help,
but also impacting upon issues vis-à-vis the UK; for
example, persuading the Home Office to waive the fee
on volunteers for the Criminal Records Bureau checks.
I know that the debate in Wales was part of a UK
debate, but still that particular emphasis was a very
positive one.
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Faith communities would share a concern
over one issue – the detaining of asylum seekers
in Cardiff prison. There was a consensus particularly
in Wales that this was not the way in which we would
want our people to be treated. There was a call for
change and it found expression through the Equal Opportunities
Committee in the Assembly. I think that we are
right in saying that the detainees in Wales' prisons
were removed several weeks before they were in Walton
and in other areas within the UK. We very much welcome
the intimacy and the closeness of the Assembly politics
within that particular context.
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We have found, in terms of the powers
of the Assembly, a degree of confusion. I will
not quote chapter and verse exactly on this, but we
did notice, for example, that the Assembly was given
powers over mink farms in Wales but that some powers
over the Welsh language were retained by Westminster.
We noted that we didn’t have any mink farms in
Wales, but that we did have the Welsh language.
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There is for us a huge issue of
being able to deal with a process which is very complicated,
because the Assembly's powers, as you know, will change
sometimes overnight and it is difficult to catch up
with what is happening.
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The one area that we felt we could give
a positive contribution here is to plead the case,
when primary legislation is passed, for a specific
‘Welsh’ clause to be inserted within every
UK legislation, so that we know what the impact is on
Wales. It is difficult at the moment to work through
acts of Parliament and to know what the powers of the
Assembly are.
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We have also very much welcomed the lack
of conflict experienced in the bulk of what the Assembly
does - in particular the work of the committees. We
have found that very positive - not just in its scrutiny
role, but in policy formation.
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You will find, from our perspective,
that some of our faith communities will not be able
to come to a common conviction about the Assembly's
powers because they do not believe that they have the
right to impose that on individuals or on congregations,
but two of our churches have come to a clear conviction
that the Assembly's powers should be increased. They
are the Presbyterian Church of Wales and also the Union
of the Welsh Independents. They have a long-standing
tradition of pleading that case. I merely note
that none of the other churches have come to the conclusion
that the Assembly's powers should not be increased.
They have remained silent on the issue.
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I hope that gives you a broad
parameter of where the (CYTÛN), churches stand.
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Daniel Boucher
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Well, as with Aled, the churches from
within the constituency that I represent have not
formed a common view on some of the big questions
as to whether the Assembly's powers should be increased
or not, so the contribution that I want to make
to this discussion is somewhat removed from that big
question but actually does touch on it, and it relates
to the whole issue of clarity and a form of politics
that is readily understandable.
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The Assembly it has been said has not
been as innovative as it might have been in the use
of its legislative powers and I know of at least
two Assembly Members who have gone on the record saying
that part of the reason for this is that the Assembly
members themselves do not fully understand their legislative
powers. I know of another Assembly Member who pleaded
with the voluntary sector when addressing them last
year to help Assembly Members think more creatively
about how to use their legislative powers more effectively.
There is no doubt to my mind that this difficulty is
not helped by the fact that the Assembly has powers,
not over entire subject areas, but over bits and pieces
within a subject area, which means the only way
in which you can find out what its powers are is through
that eminently readable tome, the Transfer of Function
Orders. This lack of clarity for the electorate and
for Assembly Members I do not think makes for efficient
and effective and hugely accountable Government. It
seems to me that one does not just avoid transparency
by being deliberately secretive. One can effectively
avoid transparency by circumventing it through tomes
whose magnitude render their content utterly impenetrable,
and anybody who has sat down with the Transfer of Function
Orders will be able to relate to that, and of course
the people of Wales have not sat down with it and so
they are not aware of what the powers of the Assembly
are, and I think this is a real problem for
the Assembly as it is currently organised and currently
structured.
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Whether the imperative, the clarity,
is sufficient enough to demand that the powers of the
Assembly are increased so that it has powers over entire
subject areas rather than powers through primary legislation
to Westminster in those areas, whether or not that decision
is made, it seems to me that if it is not made that
there is an imperative for this Commission to look very
seriously at how the powers of the Assembly can be made
more accessible and more readily understandable to the
people of Wales, to the electorate and also to Assembly
Members themselves and to people like me and Aled, who
have the job of working with Assembly Members in trying
to help them creatively develop policy for the nation.
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So I think that would be my main point
and I want to echo very much of what Aled has said
in terms of the accessibility of the Assembly. Assembly
Members are very accessible and that is great, and I think
we have found the whole style of politics in the Assembly
something to be welcomed. People have talked a lot
about the new politics. Of course, you cannot transcend
the inherently conflictual nature of the politics, and
if you did I think that would worry me, because
I would be a little bit concerned that free
speech was being squashed, but what you can do is use
organisational innovations to try and make politics
less conflictual, make it so that conflicts which are
not necessary do not happen, and I think the Partnership
Councils that have been developed have been very helpful
to that extent. The Partnership Council would go down
as one of those testimonies to an innovative way of
doing politics which we would applaud. Thank you.
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Lord Richard
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Thank you very much indeed.
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Naran Patel
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As I said earlier, we are a very
small community, and the community generally is not
politically minded; we have not got many politicians
in the community who they could approach and express
their community's views.
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Generally the community has come from
East Africa and India where the politics have been left
with the people who are more interested in politics.
People who have come here are normally generally hardworking
people. They like people with grass root work.
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With the Assembly we found that the current
members have been approachable, as Alan and Daniel have
said, but we do still find that if you want to approach
a certain subject and approach somebody we still
find ourselves lost as to whom to approach and how to
approach them, because we need somebody else like Alan
and Daniel to guide us.
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There are other difficulties that we
also find, that the powers that are there are quite
complicated. Myself even -- we find it very difficult
to understand as to which approach to take. Whether
we should have more powers or not, the Hindu faith communities
would stay away from those thoughts, because we would
not like to be politically involved in any area as such,
but when the powers are there we would like to use them.
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That is the general view of the Hindu
community.
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Sir Michael Wheeler Booth
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Could I just follow up that with
a short question, when you think of making representations
on a particular subject, do you tend to think of
Cardiff first or Westminster first?
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Naran Patel
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We would prefer to think of Cardiff first
and then Westminster, because since the Assembly was
set up we have approached the appropriate Ministers,
but the Ministers generally do not know the full rules
and regulations of the Assembly, so we have to find
other ways of doing it.
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Saleem Kidwai
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I would like to add what my colleagues
have said is what we find the Muslim community, that
the Assembly Members and the Ministers are very approachable.
We feel we can have somebody's face to the name whom
we can talk to but, again, the problem comes back to
whose has the power, what authority has it got and the
three problems which Muslim communities are still facing
and one is the Faith School, Muslim School, which I understand
has been with the local authorities, either the Local
Authority or the Assembly. It has not been separated
yet. We have approached both of them and they are putting
us on each others -- to go there and there, and
the other thing was the religious holidays which have
been brought to the Assembly and the First Minister
said it is out of his power because it comes within
the DTI Department. The Department of Trade and
Industry decides when holidays are given.
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The third one was the circumcision thing
which, along with the Jewish community, it is very important
for us, which is not done under the NHS, and David Melding
is sitting here, because we have approached him also
on this matter, because what we feel is that at the
moment that has been done by unauthorised people and
when the complications come it costs the NHS much more
to sort that out rather than doing it in the first place
and in the medical environment and it saves a lot
of money from the NHS.
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So these are the problems the community
is facing, but I think the major thing our community
has felt is the lack of communication about the Assembly
to the community, and when I say the Muslim community
I am sure the Hindu community will feel the same, that
our community is not aware what are the powers, or what
help, or when to approach the Assembly, what are their
remits and what is the remits of the MPs in Parliament,
and I think if we can have some sort of --
I am sure the Assembly has views, but it is much more
available to the community people probably something
in their languages would be very useful, what they have
got to offer and what they have achieved; not about
problems but also talk about success of the Assembly,
which I think could be brought to the attention
of the community, and at least the community then feels
they are a part of the community.
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Obviously we also want our representatives
now -- I am not talking about the Muslim; I am
talking about from the ethnic community -- in the
Assembly, but the community feels, as the community
particularly feels, that through election it would be
possible to get our representative in the Assembly,
and the only way would be on a regional basis and
it obviously depends on the political parties, but I
am sure there are other groups who would like some sort
of representation in the Assembly where their voices
could be heard, and we feel our community and the whole
ethnic community has a lot to offer in the political
process and I am glad that the Assembly is there, we
feel we are a pat of it and we would like to make
a positive contribution to it.
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Lord Richard
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Thank you very much indeed.
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I wonder if I could start off
by asking you about the practicalities. You have obviously
got a close-ish relationship with each other. Is
that on the basis of regular meetings, or is it on the
basis of seeing Ministers as and when you want to? Are
you a structure within the National Assembly structure?
Or how does it work?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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We find it works very well, both formally
and informally. Formally, we have the Partnership Council
and its biannual meetings with ministers.
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Lord Richard
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With individual Ministers?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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Yes, with individual Ministers, and that
has been very positive, and we have tried to spread
the work out. Daniel, my colleague, for example, would
go to the Edwina Hart meetings and then we would communicate
with each other about what went on in these meetings.
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The Christian community has also established
the practice of meeting with the First Minister once
every 6 months and that has been a very positive
experience for us.
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The thing that we have noticed is that,
in comparison with my colleagues in London or in Edinburgh,
when they ask us what happens when we want things done
in the Assembly. When I tell them all I do
is send an e-mail to the Minister or give him or her
a ring, they are surprised with that level of informality.
That is actually what happens, and was certainly the
case regarding the asylum seeker issue and the pioneering
refugee doctor scheme which basically flowed from sending
an e-mail to Jane Hunt. The formal structures work quite
well, but the informal day-to-day way of working is
also something quite creative.
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Lord Richard
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Who decides the agendas for your meetings?
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Alan Schwartz
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Both of us do.
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Lord Richard
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What sort of issues are raised? Give
us an example of the last meeting's agenda that you
want to talk about.
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Alan Schwartz
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We knew what we wanted to talk about,
but we did not know how the agenda was actually arranged.
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Lord Richard
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What was the issue?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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Can I give you an example?
We all felt that we needed to gather together with the
politicians and the faith leaders to discuss the possible
impact of the Iraq war; not in terms of the international
issue but how the war would affect the way in which
ethnic minorities and faith communities would be approached
in Wales. A particular was expressed that some of the
ethnic minorities had been badly handled by the press
and we wanted to come together to indicate our concern
about that.
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What tends to happen is that I, as
a co-ordinator, will ask the faith communities what
items they wish to discuss and discuss that with the
civil servants. Then we will communicate mainly by e-mail
and fix the agenda that way. We wanted to make a statement
about others not using faith as the reason for bigotry
in the light of international crisis. We drafted a policy
statement together, myself and the officials, and distributed
it. The formal statement was agreed at the Interfaith
Council. The way of working is very flexible. It depends
on what the faith communities want and just occasionally
the Assembly will want to know something of us as well.
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Lord Richard
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On your faith and bigotry point, why
should that go to the Assembly?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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Because there are contacts in the Assembly,
for example, with the Society of Editors in Wales. We
can also assess what is happening to certain minorities
in schools. There is a huge concern. Saleem is
more competent than I to deal with this issue, but the
way young Muslim people are treated in schools is an
issue. That is a local authority issue and a Wales
specific issue that we could deal with as is the way
in which, for example, asylum seeker and displaced people
are dealt with within the Health Service in Wales. That
is again a devolved issue. These are issues that we
can discuss with the Assembly, and while they may impact
on the UK legislation, they are primarily devolved issues.
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Lord Richard
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Really what you mean is that you are
looking at the sort of issues as they surface, for example
in your organisation, then seeing whether the Assembly
has the powers to deal with the issue and then going
and talking to the Assembly about it. That is the line.
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Daniel Boucher
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I think there is another dimension
inasmuch as bringing the different faith communities
together under one roof is quite a powerful statement
of the commitment to harmonious relationships between
ourselves, as indicated from the top of the faith communities,
and that is quite a powerful statement.
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Lord Richard
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That I understand, but it is the
relationship between that and the Assembly, whether
the Assembly needs it.
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Daniel Boucher
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That is the innovative part of the equation.
Obviously there have been interfaith councils before.
The innovative part of this development is its relationship
with the Assembly.
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Ted Rowlands
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Are you funded by the Assembly?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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The way in which it works is that the
National Assembly, through its Voluntary Sector Scheme
has a capacity fund and Faith occupies one slot in 21
of the multi-sector Partnership Council. So we do receive
limited funding to develop our faith network and the
Interfaith Council for Wales.
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Alan Schwartz
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£4,000.
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Vivienne Sugar
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I was very interested in the examples
Saleem gave, areas of confusion about powers, Muslim
schools, religious holidays, circumcision and wondered
whether there were any other examples, perhaps the right
to time for prayer and how that impacts with employment
law, or access to appropriate diet, and so on, and whether
what your feeling is about whether the Assembly has
sufficient power to have a general duty to promote
equality issues, because we have heard from one or two
other organisations, and perhaps this is not as clear,
the Assembly has a duty to promote sustainability
in the environment, but its duties on the whole broad
area of equal opportunities does not seem to be as clear
as you would want them to be.
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Alan Schwartz
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There would be one big issue: the
Muslim and Jewish problem and that is one of slaughter
of animals. I notice it was a very big article
in The Times last week concerning this and we do not
know what the situation regarding Wales is, because
there is the Kosher and Halal method of killing animals
which conflicts with the general idea that they want
to stop all of these methods in the UK in general, but
I do not know how it affects Wales and I do
not think any of the communities, either Muslim community
or the Jewish community, understand how it affects Wales.
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Peter Price
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You have mentioned a number of ways
in which you have been able to approach the Assembly
about different issues. Some of them have been UK views
that the Assembly has acted as a vehicle for getting
involved and making representations. Before the Assembly
where did you take those sort of issues? What sort of
channels were open to you and how did you use this?
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Alan Schwartz
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Well, I tell you very briefly, the
way we did it was all those issues were taken to the
representative of Wales, to bring it to their attention
and they would deal directly with the Government.
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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From the CYTÛN point of view, contact
with UK legislation was sought through the Churches’
Main Committee which discusses points deemed particularly
important to the Jewish and Christian faiths in terms
of the legislative processes. There has been a paradigm
shift. CYTÛN will remember one memorable meeting with
John Redwood a few years ago. It lasted about half
an hour. I am not being party political here, it is
just the nature of the beast! I am not referring
to John Redwood personally, but it was one of those
events where we condensed about 10 years of politics
into half an hour. That no longer happens in Wales and
I think that has been the huge paradigm shift in
the wake of devolution.
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What tended to happen is that churches
would make declarations and issue statements about issues
and that they would go straight into the political ether.
What I think is happening now is the Assembly is
becoming more attentive to churches and I think
MPs are as well. We are learning new skills and are
moving away from protest politics into process. That
has been a huge learning curve for us, not only
in terms of Welsh politics, but also in terms of the
way in which we relate to the UK. It should also be
said that the Secretary of State for Wales is also allowed
to sit on the Interfaith Council and Don Touhig has
represented him, so we do establish that two-way dialogue
vis-à-vis the Assembly and the Wales Office on the Interfaith
Council.
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Daniel Boucher
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One of the interesting points in response
to your question, because of course from my point of
view it did not exist before devolution, and I suppose
it is an interesting testimony to the way in which devolution
actually energises a Welsh civil society. Previously
all contact in Westminster would be made through the
Evangelical Alliance UK Westminster office in London
which has been lobbying Parliament for decades from
there.
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Naran Patel
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As far as the Hindu community was concerned,
I think there was very little communication. The
only person we would approach would be the local MP.
He would then perhaps approach the Secretary of State.
In my time, 30 years, we have never approached
the Secretary of State, or any of our community members.
We would normally approach the local MP.
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Tom Jones
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Roeddech chi, Aled, yn ymwneud â phroblemau’r
Swyddfa Cofnodion Troseddol, yr asiantaeth honno’n
benodol, yn enwedig o ran yr iaith Gymraeg. Ond beth
yn gyffredinol yw eich profiad o weithio gydag adrannau
yn Llundain y tu allan i’r Llywodraeth sy’n
gyfrifol am waith dyngarol yng Nghymru? A pha brofiad
gawsoch chi gyda’r Swyddfa Cofnodion Troseddol?
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Interpretation:
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You, Aled, were involved with the
problems with the Criminal Records Bureau, that agency,
particularly regarding the Welsh language, but what
generally is your experience of working with non-devolved
Government departments that are based in London that
are responsible for humanitarian work in Wales? And
what experience did you have with the Criminal Records
Bureau?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Anawsterau technegol. Yn y lle cyntaf,
y stori gadarnhaol oedd fod y Cyngor Partneriaeth wedi
darbwyllo’r Swyddfa Gartref, gydag eraill, wedi
anwybyddu’r ffioedd ar gyfer gwirfoddolwyr. Roedd
hynny’n gadarnhaol: yr anhawster oedd nad oedd
CRB yn deall anghenion Cymru. Dangoswyd hynny’n
bennaf yn eu hamharodrwydd i ddarparu ffurflenni Cymraeg.
Rydyn ni wedi darganfod bod rhai adrannau yn San Steffan
yn dda wrth redeg datganoli. Eraill heb fod yn dda.
Mae’r Adran Addysg, er enghraifft, yn dda, fel
y mae Iechyd. Yr adran sy’n achosi fwyaf o drafferth
yw‘r Swyddfa Gartref, a daeth hynny’n amlwg
yn yr achos hwn. Roedd amharodrwydd gwleidyddol yn y
Swyddfa Gartref i orfodi’r Swyddfa Cofnodion Troseddol
i ddarparu ffurflenni Cymraeg. Cymerodd lawer iawn o
bwysau i lwyddo i wneud hynny.
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Ar nodyn cadarnhaol gyda’r Cynulliad,
dechreusom ar y broses o sefydlu uned mewn gwirionedd
a fyddai’n ein helpu i ymgymryd â’r broses
o archwilio cofnodion troseddol. Ni fyddai hynny fyth
wedi digwydd cyn datganoli, a gobeithio y bydd yr uned
yn barod ac wrth ei gwaith erbyn mis Hydref. Felly,
mae hynny’n gadarnhaol iawn yn wir, ond mae’n
dibynnu pa adran sydd dan sylw. Mewn gwirionedd mae’n
dibynnu ar ba was sifil y digwyddwch ddod ar ei draws
ac ym mha adran. Cawsom anawsterau dychrynllyd gyda’r
Swyddfa Gartref, ac rwy’n credu y byddai rhannu’r
pwerau rhwng y Cynulliad a’r Swyddfa Gartref o
gymorth mawr. Roedd ariannu Wythnos Ffoaduriaid yng
Nghymru hefyd yn broblem. Wn i ddim a yw hynny’n
ateb eich cwestiwn.
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Interpretation:
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Technical difficulties. In the first
place, the positive story was that the Partnership Council
had persuaded the Home Office, with others, to waive
the fees for volunteers. That was positive, the difficulty
that the CRB did not understand the needs of Wales.
They showed that primarily by their unwillingness to
provide Welsh forms. We have discovered that some Whitehall
departments are good at running with devolution. Others
are not. The Education Department, for example, is good
as is Health. The department we find greatest difficulty
with is the Home Office and that became evident in this
case. There was a political unwillingness in the
Home Office to compel the Criminal Records Bureau to
provide forms in Welsh. It took a great deal of
pressure to succeed in doing that.
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On a positive note with the Assembly,
we actually started the process of establishing a unit
that would assist us in taking the process of criminal
records checks. That would never have occurred pre-devolution
and we hope that the unit will be up and running by October.
So that is very positive indeed, but it does depend
on which department it is. It just really depends on
which civil servant you strike upon and which department.
We had dreadful difficulties with the Home Office and
I think sharing out the powers between the Assembly
and the Home Office would be of great assistance. The
funding for Welsh Refugee Week was also an issue. I do
not know whether that answers the question.
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Tom Jones
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Diolch, Aled. Dau bwynt yn fyr: un am
y swyddfa. Os yw uned i gael ei sefydlu yng Nghymru,
o ble y daw’r arian ar gyfer y swyddfa honno? A
yw’r Swyddfa Gartref yn mynd i’w hariannu
, neu a fydd yr arian yn dod o gyllideb y Cynulliad?
Dyna yw un cwestiwn.
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Mae’r ail bwynt yn hollol wahanol.
Rwy’n adnabod yr eglwys Bresbyteraidd yn y dystiolaeth
hon a rhaid i mi ddatgan diddordeb yma fel Blaenor Methodist,
a oedd yn sôn am ddefnyddio’r deisebau yn yr Alban
ar gyfer mesurau. Sut fyddai hynny’n gweithio yng
Nghymru?
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Interpretation:
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Thank you, Aled. Two brief points:
one about the bureau. If a unit is going to be
established in Wales, where will that funding come for
that bureau? Is the Home Office going to fund it or
will the money be coming out of the Assembly's current
budget? That is one question.
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The second point is totally different.
I know the Presbyterian church in the evidence
here and I must declare an interest here as Methodist
Deacon here talked of the use of the petitions in Scotland
for bills. How would that work in Wales?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Yn gyntaf, o ran ariannu’r uned,
mae hwnnw wedi dod yn uniongyrchol o gronfa wirfoddoli’r
Cynulliad. Nid oes unrhyw nawdd o gwbl gan y Swyddfa
Gartref tuag at y gwaith hwn, a gallaf ddweud wrthych
fod hynny wedi rhoi pwysau ar y corff gwirfoddoli. Fodd
bynnag, mewn gwirionedd mae’n mynd i arbed miliynau
o bunnau i wirfoddolwyr yng Nghymru yn y pen draw. Beth
oedd eich ail gwestiwn, mae’n ddrwg gen i?
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Interpretation:
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Firstly, as regards funding the unit,
that has come straight out of the Assembly's volunteering
funds. There is no sponsorship at all from the Home
Office coming towards this work and I can tell
you that it has placed pressure on the volunteering
budget. It is however, going to actually save millions
of pounds for volunteers in Wales at the end of the
day. What was your second question, sorry?
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Tom Jones
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Y dulliau deisebu yn yr Alban i ddod
â’r bobl yn nes at y Llywodraeth.
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Interpretation:
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Regarding the petitioning methods
used in Scotland to bring the people closer to the Government.
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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In Welsh, then interpreted:
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Rwyf mewn cysylltiad parhaus â’m
cydweithwyr yn yr Alban, a’r fantais fawr sydd
ganddyn nhw yno yw eu bod, oherwydd bod ganddyn nhw
dref ddeddfwriaethol, yn gwybod pryd i ymyrryd. Yr anhawster
a welwn yng Nghymru yw nad ydym yn gwybod beth sy’n
digwydd. Gall polisi ymddangos yn ddisymwth heb unrhyw
gysylltiad â phroses agored. Rwy’n hollol sicr
y byddai’n beth da pe bae rhyw fath o broses. Fodd
bynnag, mae ein ffrindiau yn yr Alban yn dweud wrthym
bod y ffordd rydyn ni’n gwneud pethau yn Cynulliad
yn fwy hyblyg a phersonol. Hwyrach y byddai’r Cynulliad
yn elwa o broses ddeddfwriaethol ffurfiol a gallu cyflwyno
deisebau.
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Interpretation:
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I am in constant contact with my colleagues
in Scotland and the great advantage they have there
is, because they have a legislative process, they
know when to intervene. The difficulty we find in Wales
is that we do not know what is happening. A policy may
appear just out of the blue without any link to an open
process. I am quite certain that it would be a good
thing if there was some kind of process. However, our
friends in Scotland are telling us that the way in which
we do things in the Assembly is more flexible and more
personal. Perhaps the Assembly would benefit more from
a formal legislative process and being able to bring
petitions forward.
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Ted Rowlands
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I wonder if you could pursue --
you identified for us some of your key issues, and let
us take food as an example, the first one, and said
this demonstrates the profusion of power. Let us take
the faith schools first. Is it the argument of the First
Minister that it is a Local Authority issue and
not an Assembly issue or do both say that they do not
have the legislative power to establish faith schools?
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Alan Schwartz
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It depends where the problem arises.
I think I am going to ask Saleem to answer this
one.
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Ted Rowlands
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Saleem has gone. You are left on your
own!
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Daniel Boucher
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I can come in here. The Assembly's policy --
and it is not an constitutional power -- the question
is the Assembly given policy on the matters, and it
is not looking to go out of its way to establish faith
schools.
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Ted Rowlands
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That is all I wanted to establish.
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Tom Jones
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This is not an issue of legislative power.
This is an issue of priority or political inclination
by the Assembly.
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Daniel Boucher
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They have not said they will not.
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Alan Schwartz
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They put forward a very strong argument,
they put forward a very good paper, several good
papers, concerning setting up Muslim schools. At the
end of the day, it is quite clear that there is a delay
in the Assembly.
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Lord Richard
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They took the decision not to do it.
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Alan Schwartz
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No, I do not think they took the decision
not to do it. I think it is a bit put on the back
burner.
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Sir Michael Wheeler Booth
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A related issue has been reacting to September 11th
and the public perceptions and the popular perceptions
of Muslims in England and the Midlands and Yorkshire
were that there were cases of prejudice both in public
on occasions and in schools. Now that would seem to
me a very obvious example where you would want
to make your views known and where, indeed, the views
of those who are not the leaders in any faith or agnostic
should also be made public and representation made.
What actually happened on this issue?
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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What happened is we aired it formally
on the Council to begin with. There was a commitment
on behalf of the First Minister to then liaise as thoroughly
as he could with the police service in Wales to make
sure that was working well and also to speak to the
society of editors. One of the things we found which
I think is particular to Wales is that we have
not followed shall we say the agenda of the Daily Mail
and the Daily Express over these sorts of issues.
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The South Wales Echo has ploughed a very
different furrow in terms of its inter-racial coverage,
and that has come about in part not only from the voluntary
sector and faith communities saying, "We are going to
give you quality information. We are going to convey
the views of the faith communities". That was done very
well, and I think that was a crucial issue.
There was as well a degree of consultation with
local authorities in terms of how we responded, if you
like, to the situation in schools.
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I think the big plus for us was
that we could actually come together with all the key
players into the Interfaith Council and decide what
was to be done. I think that impacted on the way
in which the whole thing was approached in Wales.
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Alan Schwartz
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Yes. I think there was general consensus
that it was a good idea to set up the Muslim schools
and surprising as it may sound there is wholehearted
support from the Jewish community for the setting up
of the Muslim school. The Jewish community would not
want one in particular because we do not have that many
Jewish children.
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Where I think the real problems come
is from the local councils. We have noticed that, for
example -- and it does not particularly refer to
a Muslim school -- in a particular council
in Gwent there was opposition to the setting up of a mosque.
I will not name the town.
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Ted Rowlands
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The important point to establish is first
of all it was not an issue of primary legislative powers.
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What about issues of circumcision? Are
they a matter within the health argument debate,
within the Assembly and its arrangements, or is this
a matter of legislative capacity or incapacity?
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Alan Schwartz
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I cannot imagine why it should be
a legislative problem because from the Jewish point
of view it is called the Initiation Society where you
have a group of people which are all well-known,
all medically trained and they deal not only with the
Jewish children but with Muslim children as well, and
they are prepared to go anywhere throughout the country.
I think the Muslim problem is that there are certain
Muslim parents who do not want to use these particular
rabbis or, as they call them, Moils. They do not want
to use them. They want to use somebody from the Muslim
religion, who is Islam, and they are finding it difficult.
They are not trained in this country. Usually many of
them come from abroad, and it is the same problem you
have with documents coming from abroad doctors coming
from abroad; they do not have British qualifications.
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Ted Rowlands
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It is not a question of powers?
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Alan Schwartz
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No.
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Ted Rowlands
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What about the slaughter of animals?
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Alan Schwartz
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The slaughter of animals has not come
up yet.
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Ted Rowlands
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I can see it could be on the horizon.
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Alan Schwartz
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Yes, I can see it being on the horizon.
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Ted Rowlands
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Let us try to establish the legislative
or executive competence in relation to slaughter of
animals.
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Alan Schwartz
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I do not think it has actually been
discussed -- in fact I am certain it has not been
discussed -- within the Assembly yet, but you have
a similar sort of situation in Europe where you
have certain countries which will allow it and certain
countries will not allow it and therefore the populations
of those countries get their meat supplies from those
countries which do allow it. If the situation arose
in this country whereby the Parliament in London decided
that they would go along with the stopping of the slaughter
of animals by either the Filcher or the Halal system
they would look certainly towards the Scottish Parliament
and the Welsh Assembly to provide other legislation
so that it would be carried out.
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Huw Thomas
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That might well be a question of
powers.
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Alan Schwartz
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Yes, certainly.
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Ted Rowlands
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This is not subject to European directives
of any kind? It is not a European legislative issue?
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Alan Schwartz
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No.
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Dr Laura McAllister
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Can I ask you about the question
of representatives generally in terms of the profile
of the AMs and what that conveys to your own particular
communities, and I think there are cost cutting
issues here; ethnicity and religion are different but
overlapping in some degrees, but I just wonder,
have you any comments for us about the profile, the
overall profile of the AMs and what kind of messages
that sends out to your representative communities, whether
you think there should be any changes and what kind
of changes in terms of electoral methods?
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Alan Schwartz
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I would like the others to talk
first.
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Naran Patel
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Within the Hindu community I think
we have in the past not been able to approach anybody
else, even in the present situation we do not find many
MPs visiting the mosques, or the temples or other places
of worship to express their views or to ask us if we
have any problems. Perhaps they have not any time to
do it. But we would prefer if just once in a year
to approach the community to see whether there are any
problems that we would like to air them out. We have
got a vehicle now which is the Interfaith Council
where we do approach, and in the past this was not the
case, and I am wondering whether -- I do not want
the Interfaith Council of Wales to become just a talking
shop. We want some action to be done which would mean
they should have some powers to act upon. If they do
not know what powers they have then we will not know
what we can ask questions on.
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Daniel Boucher
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We certainly had a large number
of Assembly Members visiting churches who I represent,
so I think we are generally aware of them. I have
not had anyone raise questions about the representativeness
of the Assembly. I do not think I can bring
anything to bear on that side of this, but certainly
in terms of their profile and accessibility locally
I suppose my comments about accessibility earlier
were accessibility from the perspective of the lobbyist
being able to pursue Assembly Members in the lobby of
the Assembly, but I think in terms of local accessibility
it is there. If people take the initiative to ask Assembly
Members to come and visit, we have certainly never had
any problem when we have done that. Assembly Members
have been very ready and willing to engage with community
groups within the faith communities that we represent.
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Reverend Aled Edwards
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We would not, for example, look to count
the number of Christian heads in the Assembly. That
is not the way in which we approach the issue. What
we would look for is an accessibility concerning things
that are of concern to us within that representation.
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Again, concerning the legislative process.
The maintenance of churchyards is different in Wales
to England, in the sense that when you have a redundant
churchyard in England, it then becomes the responsibility
of the local authority. Thanks to Lloyd George that
does not happen in Wales and we have a huge financial
bill as a consequence of it. Now the question for
the churches is how do you then change this? Now what
we would find is that Sue Essex will be accessible,
I am sure. We will have a meeting with some of
the people to be able to discuss it through, but the
problem for us is that we will have to rely upon primary
legislation, either a private bill or play piggy
back on another Act of Parliament to get that process
through. We have already spoken to Don Touhig.
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That is the sort of problem that we have
in terms of accessing the process. In terms of
profiling accessibility, we know who the AMs are;
we go to them, and what we find is that they are very
open to being informed. I am sure Sue Essex, say, in
that case would say, "I haven't got a clue
what you are talking about" - and there is no reason
why she should. But she would be willing to be informed,
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