History and Law-Making powers of the Welsh Assembly

The Welsh government did not always have a separate government from the United Kingdom until the Welsh referendum of 1997. The Assembly was created by the government of Wales Acts 1998, which followed a referendum in 1997. The Welsh referendum was a policy commitment of the UK Labour Party and was held on the 18th September of 1997. The referendum asked people whether they agree that the Wales should have their own welsh assembly government or not.

At the end of the vote 50.3% of 1,112,117 people who voted which means that 559,419 people wanted the welsh assembly to exists while 552,698 (49.7%) of people did not want the welsh assembly to exist. Although a significant percentage of the Welsh people did not want the establishment of the welsh Assembly it was created anyway and its official building is called Senedd and is located in Cardiff bay.

 

Since the referendum succeeded the Welsh assembly has been able to create a Welsh government and parliament. However, the assembly had no power to carry out primary legislation until a little law making power was attained by the Government of Wales Act 2006. Eventually, on the 3rd of march, 2011 there was another referendum to vote whether the Welsh assembly should have the power to decide on situations on a wider range of matters in order to work in the best interest of the welsh people and the vote was also a yes.

References

bbcnews (2011) welsh referendum analysis: wales united in clear vote Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-12653025 (Accessed: 8th November, 2013)

http://www.assemblywales.org/abthome/role-of-assembly-how-it-works/history-welsh-devolution.htm (no date) (Accessed 8th November, 2013)

http://wales.gov.uk/legislation/referendumpowers/referendumjourney/1997referendum/?lang=en (no date) (Accessed: 8th November, 2013)