THEY are saying Plaid will cut the health budget when the exact opposite is true.

Plaid will increase it in two ways, by savings and by extra money!

Labour are describing the savings as cuts.

They do not mention that the ‘cut’ money goes straight back into health or the extra money that Plaid will choose to invest.

This is an attempt to smear and deceive. It is ugly politics, it does three things: lBrings politics into disrepute so that especially young people are disgusted and do not even vote.

lIt treats the public like fools who will swallow slander and smears.

lBut even worse it rejects a health plan that anyone reading it can see would work, and is desperately needed.

I have just reluctantly thrown away a fat glossy full-colour brochure from Hywel Dda saying simply how marvellous the Trust is. It is pure self marketing, and, as these brochures must go to many people who like me who did not ask for them, a monumental waste of money.

I read that our health trusts spend millions on marketing and Hywel Dda spent £1.3 million on consultancy in a year. If the managers need advice they can ask the staff who are not being listened to. The staff can point to endless management layers holding endless meetings achieving nothing visible.

If Plaid cut this sort of thing nobody would be less healthy. If they spent the money on doctors and other health professionals, many would be able to see who are waiting up to a year for a simple eye operation, others would have their baby with the family around, feeling happy and safe instead of hurtling along motorways looking for a hospital with a bed for them.

I am sad for those who vote Labour out of loyalty. Loyalty is a good thing, but not blind servility. I am sad for those who do not like Labour but like Conservatives less and see it as necessary to vote for a party they do not want in, just to keep another out.

No wonder politics is seen in the UK as a dead scab on civic life. It can be changed.

All of these would help: Ability to recall failing politicians, votes for 16 year olds, proportional representation, the honest facts publicly available showing where government fails and money has been wasted, and government meetings to be in places like village halls.

Then there is the secretive civil service, talk about dead crusts. Reform needed? More like an eruption! Send the civil service to college to learn afresh how to serve the public openly.

Luckily all of this is in one Party’s manifesto, Plaid’s.

It is quite astonishing. Just read it before choosing your next government for Wales.

VICKY MOLLER

Plaid Candidate for Mid and West Wales