Shhh ...
Don't tell anyone but someone seems to have spilled the beans during this afternoon's meeting of the Finance Committee.
It looks as though the Welsh Assembly Government has a £140m of money left over, sitting with the Treasury in London, unspent from previous years - money that they could, if they chose, spend on capital projects - like building and repairing schools, though probably not on setting up Welsh language newspapers.
There's a further £65m available for revenue funding, which could be spent on setting up Welsh language newspapers.
Now we knew there WAS a pot but not how much was in it.
What does the Assembly Government plan to do with it? "Spend it ... on priority areas over the next three years".
Good scrutiny: you can't beat it.
I'm Betsan Powys, 91Èȱ¬ Wales' political editor. I'll be blogging the inside track on .
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Great...lets set up another large devolved Assembly committee (convention?) headed up by a world class civil servant to decide how to spend it. Iconically down the Bay.
*75% of those polled in a recent 91Èȱ¬ poll thought that Sara Edwards was being kept prisoner in the beer cellar under 91Èȱ¬ LLandaff. 86% thought she was on a long holiday in Kosovo(a) .
I do enjoy reading your regular entries which give a facinating insight into what goes on behined the scenes of our political engine room. However I can not help thinking that possible a few pictures would add to the enjoyment of your readers.
Maybe we should start using the funds we have available to answer some of our transport problems, maybe build a dual carriageway and co-joined railway from South to North Wales?
Was this another oversight by Peter Hain because he was too busy schmoosing to Labour Party members in his bid to be Deputy Leader?
Another example of why we in Wales should govern our own country.
Many worthwhile projects struggle to find match-funding for EU money. Could I suggest this treasury money be used to support such projects, this would, in effect, roughly double its value.
NB - As an ex WEFO employee, would be grateful if you could withold my name.
Now that this windfall money has been "found", I hope the Assembly will do the honourable thing and commit £20 million of the money to Barry Regeneration.
Why? That's because the Assembly is taking £60 million out of Barry from the sale of land at Barry Waterfront.
This means that the Assembly will take more out of Barry than it put in as a pump primer to kickstart the regeneration.
Pride In Barry has been asking for a £20 million commitment so that funding certainty will enable projects to be commenced.
Pride In Barry has been raising the issue of Waterfront monies for over 3 years and has recently Petitioned the Petitions Committee.
In those 3 years, we have never received an unequivocal response and it really is time for that now, especially now such a large sum of money has materialised.
Now that this windfall money has been "found", I hope the Assembly will do the honourable thing and commit £20 million of the money to Barry Regeneration.
Why? That's because the Assembly is taking £60 million out of Barry from the sale of land at Barry Waterfront.
This means that the Assembly will take more out of Barry than it put in as a pump primer to kickstart the regeneration.
Pride In Barry has been asking for a £20 million commitment so that funding certainty will enable projects to be commenced.
Pride In Barry has been raising the issue of Waterfront monies for over 3 years and has recently Petitioned the Petitions Committee.
In those 3 years, we have never received an unequivocal response and it really is time for that now, especially now such a large sum of money has materialised.
Very interesting. So why not spend some of it on a Welsh-language newspaper? This idea is welcomed and supported by many non-Welsh-speakers, who believe that Wales needs and deserves its own paper! But could it be that Plaid sees a Welsh-language daily paper as some sort of threat? To what, exactly? As a former Plaid (Cymru) member who has begun to believe that the party is now trying to step aside from its former support of the Welsh language, I am sceptical that Assembly minds will be changed on the subject - but quite clearly, Assembly budgets could be ...
This might explain why WAG officials are going mad trying to avoid any underspend this year, even if it means throwing money at anything that moves/doesnt move in these last few weeks of the financial year.