TAPER AND THE WELSH
SIR.—Your Westminster Commentary in your issue of February 15 contains slighting references to the Debate on Welsh Affairs. Your commentator said this debate was especially tiresome because 'there seemed to be a conspiracy on both .sines of the House, and on both front benches, to pretend that the problems of Wales are in some way different from, and even more important than, the problems of any other area of the British Isles. . .
No Welsh Member would claim that Welsh prob- lems arc more important than those of England or Scotland, and • it is true that many problems are common to all three countries. Most Welsh Members regard the present arrangement for the discussion of Welsh Affairs as unsatisfactory. This is because only one day is allocated in the Parliamentary year for debating the whole range of subjects covered in the Government's Annual White Paper on Wales.
Wales is a nation, and successive Governments have given due recognition of this, and if your com- mentator is unaware that there are distinct Welsh problems, then his competence to comment upon political affairs must be in serious doubt.
Your commentator's ignorance and lack of perci- pience are to be deplored. This is the kind of mental- ity which does nothing but fan Nationalist fever in Wales and elsewhere.
Those who read the Official Report of the Welsh Debate on February 11 and your commentator's articles side by side will soon conclude who is the chauvinist.—Yours faithfully.
CLEDWYN HUGHES House of. Commons, SW 1
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