Sunday 18 October 2009

Legg letters latest (sort of)

This won't come as news to those of you who've already had your weekly dose of Dragon's Eye, but some don't catch the programme until BBC Parliament airs it on Sunday and others record it to watch at their leisure. (Spoiler alert as they say on movie previews)

A gold star to my colleague Bethan James who succeeded where I - and a Plaid Cymru spin doctor - failed in getting to the bottom of the tensions between  members of the joint Plaid/SNP parliamentary party at Westminster.

The SNP, you will recall, announced that they would publish their letters from Sir Thomas Legg, while Plaid were rather less keen to open their envelopes for the media.

The Plaid Cymru parliamentary leader, Elfyn Llwyd, has now explained all to Bethan: "Curiously, they [the SNP] did this without discussing it with us and had we known beforehand we would have considered doing it but frankly these are enquiries at this stage and people may think there is no smoke without fire but that is not right.

"Several of the enquiries I know from speaking to Members of Parliament are incorrect."

The Meirionnydd Nant Conwy MP himself is prepared to pay back a few hundred pounds as he is not going to query Sir Thomas's questions about his own expenses.

He''ll be among a few dozen MPs who arrive for the state opening of Parliament on November 18 with one eye on matters along the M4 as Sir Emyr Jones Parry has chosen that date to present his report on the Welsh Assembly's powers.

With the next parliamentary session due to be curtailed by the general election, it may be touch and go which is delivered first - Gordon Brown's legislative programme or the proposed referendum to increase the Assembly's powers.

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