Monetary Reform in Wales

An inaugural meeting of the Welsh Assembly’s Cross-Party Group on Monetary Reform has taken place on Tuesday 13th November 2012 in Cardiff.

Justin Lilley, one of our key supporters in Wales has written a brief account of the event:

It was pleasing to see so many AMs (7) and members of the public attending the presentation, which was very informative, easy to comprehend and refreshingly put together by Ben Dyson. The arguments in favor of money reform are growing in strength as no other viable alternatives seem to get to the root of the problem. A word which Ben did extremely well to avoid for the most part of his presentation – DEBT.

Those in attendance made valid points and asked probing questions. There was a substantial amount of energy and enthusiasm in the room. Thanks must go to Darren Millar, Catherine Evans and  to Julie Morgan.

The cross party group has been assigned the task of brainstorming and developing points for future discussion with Darren and the other AMs, outlining three areas to focus on.

1) How to promote awareness and understanding about the role of money creation in the Welsh economy. The room responded with a desire to be helped in building the relationship with the Welsh media and we hope this can be facilitated by the Assembly.

2) What innovative solutions can we generate in Wales for Wales that are realizable and will have some positive effect. Members of the group were keen for the primary focus to remain on money reform and not to be distracted by community currencies or other initiatives.

3) How can we in Wales help to promote the ‘conversation’ in Westminster considering that banking is not a devolved issue at the present time.

At least we can look at the Assembly in Wales and say they are taking positive steps towards the modernizing money discussion, are willing to think creatively but sadly they are ultimately only able to do so much. The rest will have to come from Westminster and we are coming up to the point where the Government will have to act one way or the other as the time of the banking inquiry looms nearer.

Some of the solutions raised include the (re)structuring of a Bank of Wales, a Welsh Pound akin to the Bristol Pound, further community currencies, education on digital currencies like Bitcoin,  a shift towards a resource based economy

Whatever happens, this discussion will continue and the circumstances in the UK economy, the Euro and the Globe will all impact how the group and the ideas evolve. Ben Dyson and Positive Money can be sure that they have the attention of the Assembly and we now need to ensure that we build on that momentum and the rest of Wales gets to hear about it so we can use the Welsh voice to petition for this much needed and common sense reform.

We have two announcements:

Due to parties leaving the presentation at different times, we did not receive the full list of email addresses so anyone who wishes to be on the email list for involvement in the group should email positivetrigger@gmail.com

Since the trip to the Welsh Assembly a couple of meetings have been held with the organizer of sovereignwales.com and we are planning to meet on Tuesdays from 7pm in the North Star on North Road, Cardiff. All are welcome to attend and join in on the brainstorming, research and discussion.

Watch the video of Ben Dyson’s presentation here.