I was amused today to hear Bob Ainsworth on the lunch time news talking about his trip to Afghanistan over the weekend. All the right messages about the need, the timing and of course the value of showing support. But the bit that really made me smile was his comments about the timing.

If I caught it correctly, and I was driving so may have made a mistake, he said that there was no relationship between the PM’s visit the day before and Brown’s appearance at the Chilcot Inquiry. He suggested that these visits were planned a long time in advance and suggestions about political gamesmanship were abject nonsense.

Directly after making that point he did admit that his own trip had of course been re-arranged a few times, and you’ve just got to wonder he was pulling the strings on that one. Why did it need the Prime Monster to visit Afghanistan to announce new vehicles for the Army, surely that is the role of the Defence Secretary, isn’t it?

Just like buses, you wait for ages for a Minister to turn up in Afghanistan and all of a sudden two come along in quick succession. And like some buses they are Bendy Buses: bending to fend off the growing sense of revulsion at the ongoing lack of support to the Military in prosecuting hugely unpopular wars.

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This is not a movie of Ben, but if he’d been offered the part I am sure he’d have accepted!

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The Sunday morning routine is an important part of my week: up reasonably early, coffee, Sunday Times, family still in bed and time to read in peace. Bliss. But last year I started to find that my reading only made me angry or disappointed in what was happening in our country and world.

But today I really wonder: can it get even more depressing? The Sunday Times report of the YouGov Poll that suggests that Gordon Brown may win the next election just has to be the most depressing piece of news I’ve read for a long, long time.

How can we be moving to a position whereby we re-elect a Government that has so clearly failed to deliver on so many policies, has failed to truly support our military from the outset of operations, has wasted billion on pounds on ridiculous initiatives as well as on banks and has lost of the confidence of just about everyone I talk to.

I’ve not spoken to anyone in recent months who is prepared to believe any of the statements that emanate from the mouth of Brown. So what is it that is causing the poll to suggest that he might stay in Downing Street? Are we blind, stupid or is there fear of the alternative?

Surely “the devil you know” argument is not a basis for political decision making.

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According to reports on the Beeb the Chief Exec of Cardiff Council received a 33% increase in salary last year, which coincidentally was his last year in the role as he then quit his job rather unexpectedly.

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It’s also pretty amazing to note that all but one local authority Chief Exec is paid over £100,000 per annum. That’s before they get add ons such as £10k for being a returning officer (how demanding can that be?) so it’s a nice little package all in all.

But is it justified, or perhaps more fundamentally, do we need quite so many of them anyway?

22 Ch Execs/Finance Directors/Social Service Directors/HR Wizards and so on surely has to be overkill for a nation of 3 million or so people.

Add to that the inefficiency of our police/fire/ambulance/health services and we really have a need for some fundamental reorganisation and rationalisation.

Sadly I see little appetite to really address these issues, but any party that admitted there was a real need for change and was prepared to address it would certainly get my vote.

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History has a habit of repeating itself and I can’t help but remember how it was in 1982 when the last Argentine threat to the Falkland Islands materialised.

We faced a Defence Review, or certainly serious discussions about the role of the Royal Navy in particular, and we had a Prime Minister who was definitely  ”under pressure” in terms of relationship with the country.

There can be little doubt that the 1982 invasion of the Falklands by Argentina helped transform the popularity of Margaret Thatcher and it also saved efforts to cut the Navy. Please let us not see a repeat of either again this year.

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“You’ve got to have surprise, and it’s binary: you’ve either surprised your enemy or he knows you’re coming. You can’t have a little bit of surprise.”

That was a key message during my early training in the Army: so why oh why have we heard all this week about the impending massive assault by Allied troops in Afghanistan? Surely the Taleban read the Telegraph and watch News 24 and might just have got an inkling we were on our way.

The world of war fighting has changed. Gen McCrystal, the US commander in Afghanistan has recognised that to win in Afghanistan it is probably better not to fight as that endangers innocent by-standers. Instead we are seeing a war that is being fought to win the ground and then through having enough local troops to stay on that ground, win the hearts and minds of the population.

The warnings of the build up to the attacks were, in my opinion, an attempt to avoid any fighting, they were designed to encourage the Taleban, or some of them anyway, to withdraw. This avoided civilian casualties as the territory was won, but it will also have given two critical additional benefits.

First: the Taleban were forced to move. This is disruptive and whilst in itself not critical will have lead to the second benefit which was opportunity for ambush of withdrawing enemy. It would be very surprising if there were no attacks on withdrawing fighters as they sought refuge elsewhere. Don’t however expect to hear much about these operations as they would have been conducted by elements of the military who don’t want to be in the papers.

In this new era of war fighting, it is clear that the old rules don’t apply It is to McCrystal’s credit that he sees the value of peaceful operations in order to generate peace in the long term. The locals are more likely to talk to you if you’ve not been shooting at them.

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As a little lad in the 60′s I was brought up on the spectacle of rugby that was London Welsh. Great games, great excitement and very often thumping rugby. All washed down with a barrel or two after the game.

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In those days, players were amateurs, they played for love of the game and also with respect for the opposition. Captains were not laden with press conferences to worry about, but they did undertake one very important and noble duty.

If and when an opposition player was injured, the captain would trot over to him to express concern, and in most instances would wish him well. On those rare occasions when someone had to leave the field, he would be applauded off by both sides as well as the crowd.

Yesterday at the Millennium Stadium Thom Evans received a very nasty injury that forced him to leave the field and be taken to hospital for neck surgery. Whilst he was being attended to, the Welsh team appeared to take no interest in his plight, and the Welsh captain did not make an effort to check on him. Shame on them all.

Being “professional” does not excuse anyone from showing respect to injured individuals and I hope that we see some shift back to old values again soon.

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Like many I am pretty disappointed in the Gordon Brown  & Piers Morgan love in that will be broadcast tomorrow night.

The programme contains private revelations: so private in fact that they have been on every news programme for the last 36 hours.

It shows a significant lack of judgement for ITV to make such a shameless plug for a failing Prime Minister and it is an appalling error of judgement for Brown to open up on some issues as he does, with so little time before the election.

ITV, Morgan and Brown: a hapless trio.

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This is going to be a bit of a rant, I’ll try to stay calm but the truth is I need to get this off my chest.

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Like many people I’ve got a gas central heating system and also, like a good number of people I’ve got – or rather been sold – a maintenance contract that covers “all you plumbing”. So on Friday night when we found water under our sink we phoned the Gas company to ask for help. The first response, to my wife, was that this wasn’t an emergency and they would get someone out on Monday sometime. We were given a reference number just to reassure us.

Not impressed with this answer, I called to explain that the water was causing damage. When I offered the reference number I was told that it wasn’t a Gas number, but a third party’s reference -  but they kindly upgraded the problem to an “Emergency” which meant that someone would call that night.

My wife went out and I stayed to await a plumber. He didn’t come! At just before 9, the usual knocking off time for a call centre, I called again to check on progress and was told that the job was scheduled for Monday morning. An exchange of opinions followed, after which I agreed to call again in the morning to set the ball rolling again.

Saturday: 08:00 I was on the phone and 15 minutes later had a new reference number for a new emergency. The plumber would be with us before 12. At 11:30 I called to check on progress and was advised that he was on his way. But would I like to insure my wiring. Er… not just now!

Within 2 minutes of putting the phone down the plumber called: he had only just been allocated the job, that is 3.5 hours after it had been rated an emergency for the second time.

When he arrived, 4 hours later, it tool him 2 minutes to decide that the job wasn’t covered by the insurance and that I’d need to get it fixed privately.

He then issued us a written quote for the work, but made it clear that he was not able, or allowed to do the work. Despite a number of questions we never did ascertain the purpose of the quote for work that could not be done.

Finally, on Monday morning we had a call from the same plumber who had now been allocated the original job from Friday night’s call. The work was allocated to him at around 11:00.

All in all a very poor performance from a company that takes a lot of money off me every year for both Gas and insurance. Is it all surprising that I rejected their sales pitch to insure my wiring when I was trying to get a leak fixed during the Saturday morning call.

I won’t divulge the name of the company, save to say that it is an anagram of “I Grabs Shit”!

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Now that the starting gun has been fired at the National Assembly for Wales to hold a referendum on “powers” I wasn’t sure if this left me feeling positive or not.

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For some strange reason I can’t help but think that the arguments are still all about process, the process of law making that is.

For the life of me I can’t see how we will be able to make any more laws, it’s just that the laws that will be made won’t have to go through a process involving MP’s. And they might, yes only might, get made faster.

So on the one hand I feel something positive will come from it: legislation for Wales, made in Wales.

But on the other hand I can’t help thinking that we are still missing the bigger picture. The Government of Wales Act appears to be such a dog’s dinner of legislation, rushed through with improper thought and scrutiny, that it needs to be serisouly overhauled or replaced.

Which leads me to my concern: the excitement over a referendum for more “powers” will be a smoke screen that takes away the focus for what we really need in Wales, namely a bigger review for the creation of an acceptable, workable and sustainable means of governing our country.

If the referendum does become a smokescreen then I’m not in favour of it, but will still be voting Yes.

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