Triumphant Conservatives blast local Plaid Group ‘all talk and no budget’

“All talk and no budget” is how Plaid Cymru have been branded after failing to present an alternate budget that local Conservatives say was ‘promised’.

Yesterday’s Full Council meeting, where the Conservative / Independent alliance saw their budget plans approved, had an alternative budget presented by the Welsh Labour group, that was supported by Plaid Cymru Councillors (you can read our full meeting report here).

Don Sturgeon, Chairman of Wrexham Conservatives, reacted to last night’s meeting saying: “In October last year Plaid Cymru sent out press releases and made much play on social media about their proposed alternative budget with Group Leader Cllr Marc Jones stating ‘The Plaid Cymru group of councillors have since said they would be putting forward alternative proposals and said they welcomed input from council workers, service users and everyone with a positive suggestion to maintain and improve frontline services.‘

“Plaid Cymru invited ‘Crowd-sourced’ alternatives from council workers and local residents to help them form their alternative budget. This budget was never presented, with Cllr Marc Jones and Cllr Gwenfair Jones not even speaking at the meeting.”

Mr Sturgeon carried on to say: “What have they done with the information they received from local people and council officers that got in touch? They’ve taken all the publicity that they could over their much lauded alternative budget and have simply failed to deliver.”

“They have offered no alternatives, no new fresh ideas, no new way of doing things. They made a promise, they failed.”

“All they had to offer on the night was to sit quietly and support Labour’s shambolic alternative budget that simply used the councils reserves putting children’s services at risk.”

Referring to the several special Scrutiny meetings held after Plaid Cymru ‘called in’ the budget, Mr Sturgeon added:

“They ‘called in’ many budget proposals to scrutiny which of course is welcome as part of a democratic process and challenge but when it came to the crucial vote they produced nothing. All that scrutiny didn’t give them a single different idea to bring forward.”