Lover's Tiff

A final note for now, it seems that two of our small world's heavyweights, Most Improved/Best New Blog and Sauregurkenzeit Award winner Pippa Wagstaff and Best Welsh Political and Best Welsh Nationalist Blog Ordovicius have a bit of a lover's tiff going, with Welsh Ramblings also getting in the mix.

Pippa's Monarchist post set it off and I have to say I can see where the criticism came from. While there's clearly an argument to be made for the Monarchy, it's not the one Pippa made, and it's certainly not one that needs to be preached with such arrogance. And while we all enjoy the occasional bash at the Lord of Wales that is our Presiding Officer, when Pippa labels him the "self-appointed Lord Protector" in a pro-Charlie post, you have to ask who she's talking about, our elected AM and Presiding Officer or the bloke who was given his title at birth?

I don't know, I always assumed Miss Wagstaff Presents to be a Tory blog at heart, but with
subtlety and wit and with a clear dedication to not preaching a party line (unlike plenty of Plaid and Labour blogs). There seems to be a bit less of the former and a bit more of the latter recently, I do hope it's only a short blip.

Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc

Pippa posts over at Miss Wagstaff Presents about the story on the BBC and the Mule about the 5% rise in the number of prescriptions dispensed in Wales in the first year since Labour's free prescriptions policy. It seems that Pippa, along with opposition politicians, sees this as an indictment of the policy:

Miss Wagstaff: the Welsh Assembly Gimmick Government's main gimmick - in order to make it stand out from Westminster - isn't quite going to plan.

Lib Dem Jenny Randerson: The cost of this gimmick will be with Welsh patients for generations. While millionaires claim their free paracetamol, the health service will continue to be to stretched to provide life saving services.

Yes yes, good story, at least it is if you ignore the facts. This is the fifth year on the trot that the number of prescriptions rose. In the year before charges were abolished there was a 4% increase (see here). So how on earth is this increase an indictment of the Labour free prescriptions policy when similar increases occurred the previous four years?

Oh and Jenny, "welsh millionaires claim their free paracetamol"? Yeah, right, THAT'S what's eating up the budget!