Coalition? Yes. Referendum? Probably not.

Unfortunately Rhodri Morgan has won the vote at the special Welsh Labour party conference, convened to vote on coalition with Plaid Cymru.

If members of Plaid’s national council also back the deal today, a coalition will be formed early next week- that now looks like a foregone conclusion.

A coalition containing two parties with pretty different manifesto promises and aims, with one budget to pay for them all, does not sound like a recipe for stable government

But Morgan’s comments regarding the the timing of a referendum on full lawmaking powers for the Assembly, a key Plaid Cymru demand, are quite interesting:

"The One Wales [coalition] document states quite clearly that we will, in good faith, do the groundwork necessary for a referendum, while at the same time testing the waters of Welsh public opinion to make sure we don’t get into another 1979 or even a 1997 situation, given how narrow that result was."

In other words a referendum on the question of further devolution of powers to the Welsh Assembly, will be only held if *public opinion* is suggesting a largish majority "yes" vote?

Apparently, as Welsh Secretary Peter Hain confirms:

said a referendum would be held "when the conditions were right for one". He added, "That means there has to be a strong cross-party consensus of the pro-devolution parties, and public opinion has to be in place to vote yes. That’s the party’s policy, and we’ll have to see how that proceeds."

So, not only "public opinion" has to be favourable, but there also has to be "a strong cross-party consensus of the pro-devolution parties"?

With those kind of caveats, I really doubt that this referendum will ever the light of day.