In December, the three women leaders of Plaid Cymru – the Party of Wales, the Scottish National Party and the Green Party of England and Wales (Leanne Wood, Nicola Sturgeon and Natalie Bennett) agreed to join forces to oppose billions being wasted on the replacement of Britain’s Trident nuclear weapon system, calling instead for investment in communities, creating jobs and rebuilding the economy.
In the event of a hung parliament in May, with these three parties together potentially holding the balance of power, this co-operation could be crucial in ensuring investment in people not weapons.
According to the CND report ‘People Not Trident: The Economic Case Against Trident Replacement’, ‘only those who were alive in the 1930s will have experienced… deeper cuts in government spending… Housing, health, education and social security payments have all been cut. Pay and pensions, public sector jobs, even support for people with disabilities have been hit.’
A glaring exception to this austerity is, of course, the government’s commitment to replacing Trident.
Jill Evans, MEP and past chair of CND Cymru, noted: ‘It is a real reflection of warped priorities when huge sums of money can miraculously be found for nuclear weapons while thousands of families are forced to use food banks’.
Topics: Nuclear weapons
See more of: Wales