Category Archives: Abolition Of Work

On Monday, January 11, Off-Broadways Red Bull Theater will premiere its live benefit reading of Twin-Cities playwright Carlyle Browns 1987 work The African Company Presents Richard III at 7:30 pm. The momentous drama, based on a true incident in the history of Americas first-known Black theater company in NYC, considers the issue of racial discrimination in the theater community in the early 19th century, six years before the final abolition of slavery in New York state in 1827, 42 years before the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863, and half a century before Black Americans had the right to vote.

The play is set in September 1821, when two rival theater companies in Manhattan one Black and one white simultaneously scheduled productions of Shakespeares Richard III. Established that year by retired West-Indian steamship steward William Henry Brown, The African Company where James Hewlett (the first African-American Shakespearean actor) and the legendary Ira Aldridge (who went on to achieve acclaim on the stages of London and throughout Europe) were among the principal players was attended by both Black and white audiences, drawing patrons away from Stephen Prices uptown white-owned Park Theatre. That popularity resulted in threats, bribery, false accusations, and manipulation of the law against The African Company, as the troupe made the decision to continue its performances.

Red Bulls Founding Artistic Director Jesse Berger noted, The battle in this country over who gets to tell Shakespeares stories and who should has raged . . . up to our present day. Carlyles play gives us a personal and poetic window through which to look in on our ever-present racially charged past, helping us better understand our own times, and how we all might think about who gets to tell whose stories.

The playwright also addressed the present-day relevance of his compelling subject. We now live in an era that is reflective of early 19th-century America. We are becoming a world as our early American world began, as a multicultural world. We are living in a world, where, at the very least, artists, anyway, are making culture out of cultures. And we are seeing in the world today not just a clash of cultures, but unification, Brown said. He went on to posit, Who owns Shakespeare one might ask? You might as well ask who has the right to breathe, to dream, to express themselves, to be themselves, to live in and make a meaningful contribution to their world. I submit to you that as human beings this is an obligation and responsibility for all of us.

The timely reading will be directed by Carl Cofield and performed by Clifton Duncan, Edward Gero, Dion Johnstone, Paul Niebanck, Antoinette Robinson, Craig Wallace, and Jessika D. Williams. It will be supplemented with an interactive post-performance Bull Session webinair discussing the play and its themes with Brown, Cofield, scholar Marvin Edward McAllister, and members of the company on Thursday, January 14, at 7:30 pm. Registrants will receive a link to participate in this vital conversation.

The African Company Presents Richard III streams live at 7:30 pm, on Monday, January 11. The event is free, but tax-deductible donations ($25 suggested) are welcome to support the ongoing work of Red Bull Theater. Advance reservations are recommended to receive a reminder with the link to the livestream. A recording of the reading will be available until 7 pm, on Friday, January 15.

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Red Bull Theater's reading of 'The African Company Presents Richard III' reflects on a real moment in Black history - DC Metro Theater Arts

Seyfarth Synopsis: Just before the holidays, the Department of Labors Wage-Hour Division issued its final pay regulations governing tipped employees. The final regulations, which were published December 22, 2020 and will be effective March 1, 2021, provide a ray of hope in what was an otherwise miserable 2020 for hospitality employers. The regulations codify the abolition of the 80/20 tip credit rule and guide the circumstances in which back-of-the-house employees can be included in tip pools. The regulations explicitly exclude managers and supervisors from taking a share of employees tips. In 2021, hospitality employers will have to watch how the courts interpret these regulations.

The End Of The 80/20 Rule?

The main course in the DOLs regulations, and one for which hospitality employers have grown hungry, is the end of the 80/20 rule at least from the DOL. The 80/20 rule has had a somewhat complicated recipe. As those familiar with the tip credit know, an employer can pay certain employees who receive tips from customers a wage below the minimum wage. This practice is permitted on the theory that the tips employees receive from customers will more than make up the difference. But doing so requires an employer to meet some technicalities, including that this tip credit can be taken only for the hours the employee spends working in a tipped occupation. So, for example, a server at a hotels restaurant can be paid the tip credit for the hours they spend as a server, but not for the hours they spend at the hotel as a maintenance employee. More difficult questions emerge, however, when the server spends part of their time on duties related to server duties, but that do not produce tips, such as cleaning or setting tables. Under DOL regulations, tipped employees are allowed to perform related duties occasionally, but the DOLs regulations have never defined those two terms.

To fill the plate, the DOL issued some opinion letters and then in 1988 the DOLs Field Operations Handbook an operations manual made available to investigators ultimately determined that a tipped employee could spend no more than 20% of their time on related duties (which remained undefined) and remain eligible to be paid under the tip credit. In other words, an employee would have to spend 80% of their time performing tipped job duties. The 80/20 dual jobs rule remained a little-known side dish until more than a dozen years ago, just after wage-hour collective and class litigation began its boom. As can be imagined, tip credit litigation blew up as well, with many cases generating seven-figure settlements centering on whether restaurant servers side work is a related duty and what percentage of time servers spend performing those duties.

In November 2018, the DOL sought to abolish the 80/20 rule through an opinion letter and a field assistance bulletin. In its place, the DOL explained that an employer may take a tip credit for time when an employee in a tipped occupation performs related non-tipped duties either contemporaneously with or for a reasonable time immediately before or after performing tipped duties. Under this rule, the DOL explained, when a tipped employee engages in a substantial amount of separate, non-tipped-related duties, such that they have effectively ceased to be engaged in a tipped occupation, the tip credit is no longer available. Further, the DOL defined related duties by stating that a non-tipped duty is presumed to be related to a tip-producing occupation if it is listed as a task of the tip-producing occupation in the Occupational Information Network O*NET.

Beginning in early 2019, however, as Seyfarth previously reported, district courts largely have refused to give it deference and have clung to the 80/20 rule. Several of them reasoned that the opinion letter and field assistance bulletin did not provide persuasive reasons for an abrupt change in position after decades of the 80/20 rule. Strangely, these district courts instead have chosen to defer to the no-longer-effective 80/20 rule, or have imposed it as a matter of judicial fiat.

Therefore, in the late 2019, the DOL issued a proposed regulation and then, last week, published final regulations that hopefully will be the death blow to the 80/20 rule. In doing so, the DOL largely restated, with some minor tweaks, the guidance from its November 2018 opinion letter and field assistance bulletin. Perhaps responding to some of the criticism of district courts, the DOL in these regulations sought to explain why it was abandoning the 80/20 rule. For example, among other reasons, it stated:

An employer of an employee who has significant non-tipped related duties which are inextricably intertwined with their tipped duties should not be forced to account for the time that employee spends doing those intertwined duties. Rather, such duties are generally properly considered a part of the employees tipped occupation, as is consistent with the statute.

It remains to be seen if district courts will defer to this guidance now that the DOL has officially codified the rule. They should, as this guidance is reasonable and went through lengthy notice-and-comment rulemaking. Further, employers must be mindful that some states (e.g, Connecticut, New Jersey) have enacted their own versions of the 80/20 rule, in which employers in those states will need to follow regardless of the DOLs new rule.

Back-of-House Staff May Collect Tips In Mandatory Nontraditional Tip Pools

In addition, the DOLs regulations also address amendments to the FLSA made in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018. The new regulations do not change longstanding regulations that apply to employers that take a tip credit under the FLSA. Employers that claim a tip credit must ensure that a mandatory traditional tip pool includes only workers who customarily and regularly receive tips. Under the new regulations, however, employers that do not claim a tip credit may now implement mandatory, nontraditional tip pools. In this scenario, tip pools may include employee who do not customarily and regularly receive tips, including back-of-house employees that may not be customer-facing, such as cooks and dishwashers.

Managers and Supervisors: Keep Your Hands Off Employees Tips!

The new regulations also explicitly prohibit managers and supervisors from keeping employees tips for any purposeeven in a nontraditional tip pool situation during which the employer does not take a tip credit and back-of-house employees are permitted to take a share of tips. In order to prevent employers from keep[ing] tips, the new regulations require employers who collect tips and redistribute them through a mandatory tip pool to redistribute the tips no less often than when it pays wages to avoid penalties. The regulations also require employers who collect tips and redistribute them through a mandatory tip pool to keep records of the same even if the employer does not take a tip credit.

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DOL Issues New Tip Regulations: Will 2020 Be The Last Year Of 80/20? - JD Supra

Prime Minister Yoshihide Sugas administration is gearing up to establish an agency that will lead the digital transformation of Japan.

But the key to success is for the agency to create a blueprint for Japans digitalization from administrative services to working with the private sector and nurturing engineers and have the necessary power to work toward that goal.

What needs to be done to prevent the digital agency from being another bureaucratic entity that will simply coordinate policies among relevant ministries?

The digital agency should become a strong organization which can function as a powerful control tower, with highly talented people gathering from both the public and private sectors, to lead the digitalization of the society as a whole, Suga said on Sept. 23 at a meeting of ministers involved in digital reform.

The government has created an office to prepare for the establishment of the agency, and unprecedented steps are being made, such as setting up an online platform to solicit opinions from the public.

But the success of the agency depends solely on whether it can indeed serve the role of a powerful control tower.

In order to achieve this goal, the agency should make its objective the digitalization of the Japanese society as a whole, and the agency should be positioned above other ministries and become a special zone for civil servants to secure human resources with cutting-edge skills and global perspectives.

First and foremost, the agency that will serve as the core of national cyberpower should aim at realizing digital transformation of Japanese society as a whole instead of limiting its role to integrating procurement of the ministries administrative systems.

Many industrialized nations have organizations similar to the digital agency, but their objectives and authorities differ.

The Government Digital Service, created in the United Kingdom in 2013 under Prime Minister David Camerons administration based on lessons learned from past failures regarding the governments systems procurement, is working progressively to digitalize administrative services under a thoroughly open and user-friendly approach, realizing agile development.

While the GDS can serve as a model for Japan in various aspects, its main role is limited to digitalizing government functions.

Some countries are trying to digitalize the whole society. In Singapore, for instance, the Smart Nation and Digital Government Office under the Prime Ministers Office works as the brains of the government to formulate policies in building a Smart Nation, including promoting cashless payments and use of digital data.

The Government Technology Agency implements the offices policies in cooperation with the private sector, as well as nurturing human resources adapting to the digital economy and providing digital tools for administrative services related to individuals and companies.

Putting aside the question of its surveillance society approach, Singapores digitalization reform provides a model for Japan in the sense that it is targeted at the whole society.

So what is the goal of Japans digital agency?

The Cabinet Secretariats National Strategy Office of Information and Communications Technology has been tackling the issue of different ministries operating systems with different specifications procured under different budget allocations.

But what is needed now is not only getting rid of the governments vertically segmented structure in terms of system designs or budgets, but also introducing meta-level strategic thinking and consolidating digital policies and plans which are currently conducted separately by ministries and agencies, such as the industry ministry working on industrial digitalization and cashless payments, the education ministry on digitalization of education, the internal affairs ministry on the My Number social security and tax number system, local governments on regional digitalization and so forth.

In particular, cybersecurity and data strategy will mean nothing unless they are consistent everywhere.

It is necessary for the government to build the architecture and infrastructure of a fundamental platform that will serve as digital public goods for the private sector to utilize to proceed with the digitalization of the whole society.

Sanjay Anandaram of iSPIRT, a nonprofit organization which has been developing the digital platform India Stack in India, likened digital platforms to roads.

End users use the services that have been built atop (the governments) digital platforms by private businesses and public entities, Sanjay said in an interview with G20 Japan Digital. Businesses can design and innovate new services for their customers and partners using these platforms.

In a sense, the platform is like roads. The state will construct them and anyone can design and deploy any vehicle to run on them following rules, he said. The users, the public, can use these vehicles (such services) and go where they want to go.

In order to strengthen the nations cyber power as a pillar of its growth strategy, it is necessary for the government to clearly aim at digitalizing the whole society in a blanket manner and construct strong roads.

Secondly, to realize such goals, the digital agency should be positioned above other ministries.

The National Security Secretariat, established in the Cabinet Secretariat by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2014, is probably the latest example of a government entity succeeding in breaking down silos and securing effective coordination and planning authorities.

The secretariat has influence over other ministries as it is dedicated to the planning and coordination of basic direction and important matters of foreign and defense policies concerning Japans national security and because of its close relations with the government leadership, directly providing information to the prime minister and the chief Cabinet secretary.

But how can this be realized by a government agency?

Various new agencies were established following the restructuring and streamlining of government ministries and agencies conducted in the 1990s under Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimotos administration.

For instance, the Consumer Affairs Agency was created in 2009 as an organ affiliated with the Cabinet Office in order to focus on consumer issues which could not have been dealt with appropriately because they involved a number of ministries, such as choking accidents caused by mini-cup konjac jelly and food poisoning cases caused by frozen dumplings shipped from China.

The agency was regarded as a sweeping reform that would go down in history, launched by transferring related authorities and personnel from eight ministries and a commission the Cabinet Office, the Fair Trade Commission, the National Police Agency, the Financial Services Agency, the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry, the Justice Ministry, the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, and the Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry.

The Japan Tourism Agency, set up in 2008, also has as one of its goals the abolition of vertically-divided administrative functions to strengthen the governments tourism-boosting efforts under the leadership of the commissioner.

These agencies are positioned as affiliated organs of ministries.

Japans administrative system is structured in a way that ministries are positioned under the Cabinet Office, with agencies such as the Financial Services Agency, the Japan Sports Agency and the Japan Tourism Agency coming under different ministries.

However, there is one exception. The Reconstruction Agency is ranked as being the same as a ministry.

This is because the agency was not created as an affiliated organ of a ministry, but as a body under the direct control of the Cabinet on the basis of a law to establish such an agency, having an authority to plan and coordinate policies from a position above ministries.

The digital agency should be in a similar position. It could start small and grow big, but there is a danger of the agency remaining too compact.

In 2007, when the Defense Agency, which had been a subordinate body under the Cabinet Office, was given a ministry status, the government explained that the agency had already been working in the same way as government ministries, with its tasks expanding from management of the Self-Defense Forces to getting involved in policy planning for a variety of issues.

The digital agency should be engaged not only in the management of administrative systems but also in policy making, and should be positioned to demonstrate leadership over ministries from the beginning, with the potential to become a ministry in the future.

It is of course important where the digital agency will be positioned in the government, but more important is the people who will breathe life into the agency.

How should the agency be organized so that it can gather talented people from the private sector who will put their heart into digitalizing the nation for the coming era?

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga (left) and digital reform minister Takuya Hirai launched an office established by the Cabinet Office and tasked with creating a digital agency, on Sept. 30. | POOL / VIA KYODO

Making the agency a special zone for civil servants so that people from the private sector can work there free from bureaucratic restraints is one idea.

In Japan, around 70% of the people working for the information technology industry are hired by IT vendors and the rest employed by IT user firms.

While roughly 60% of such people in Western countries including the United States and Germany are working for user companies, human resources in Japan are concentrated in companies that are entrusted with developing systems.

The number of university students specializing in data science is also relatively small in Japan, meaning the nation lacks a sufficient environment to nurture globally competitive specialists who can create added value on their own initiative.

When I conducted an interview survey on the IT industry in Japan for a year up to August, many pointed out that the seniority system of companies is resulting in few people experiencing project management when they are young.

At this moment, there are very few people in Japan who can design world-class IT architecture.

The digital agency should invite such people and provide them with an environment in which they can work to achieve their goals without feeling constrained to follow the rules and practices of bureaucrats.

The government should take the establishment of the agency as a golden opportunity to broaden the base of human resources in the IT industry and give such people the chance to work on the nations biggest project by utilizing cutting-edge technology in a free development environment.

By having a team of people who can develop and operate systems within the agency and eventually being able to send out talented people to the private sector, the digital agency can create a growth factor for the nation and for human resources development in the long term.

The digital agency should not be pie in the sky. Now is the time to establish an effective digital control tower with clear objectives, think of how to organize it and who to hire without compromising, so that Japan wont lose again in the global competition in an era of cyberpower.

Jun Mukoyama is a fellow at API. API Geoeconomic Briefing, provided by the Asia Pacific Initiative, an independent think tank based in Tokyo, is a series that looks into geopolitical and economic trends in the post-COVID-19 world, with a particular focus on technology and innovation, global supply chains, international rule-making and climate change.

In a time of both misinformation and too much information, quality journalism is more crucial than ever.By subscribing, you can help us get the story right.

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The need to digitalize Japanese society as a whole - The Japan Times

Political Report

A new law will stop the suspension of drivers licenses when New Yorkers fail to pay fines, though the governor weakened the legislation before signing it.

On New Years Eve, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed into law a bill that will end the suspension of drivers licenses over a failure to pay a traffic ticket, a major win for economic and racial justice advocates who have long decried the practice. The law will also reinstate the licenses of hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers, many of whom have lost driving privileges because they cannot afford to pay their fines.

Suspending drivers licenses entrenches and punishes poverty by preventing people from driving to work, taking kids to school, or visiting their doctor during the COVID-19 pandemic. People who are stopped for driving on a suspended license face misdemeanor or felony charges, and arrests of people who cant afford to pay fines and fees inflate jail populations across the country.

This win is a significant step toward scaling back economic and racial inequality in New York, Katie Adamides, New York state director at the Fines and Fees Justice Center, said in a press statement about the new law. (Note: Jonathan Ben-Menachem, the author, was employed by the Fines and Fees Justice Center until July of 2020.) The law was sponsored by Assemblymember Pamela Hunter and Senator Timothy Kennedy.

Advocates are also warning, though, that New York needs to take many other steps if it aims to fight the criminalization of poverty, especially because Cuomo cut out an important part of the legislation before signing it.

After the 2008 recession and the wave of austerity that followed it, local tax revenues dropped and tax increases became less politically viable. As a result, jurisdictions increased the amounts of fines and fees, and they imposed them on more people in order to fund government services. Since fines and fees are not adjusted according to wealth, theyre an inherently regressive form of taxation, and cities with larger Black populations tend to rely more on fines to fund government.

When the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, led to a Department of Justice investigation that exposed the towns racist and extractive policing practices, efforts to reform fines and fees accelerated nationwide. In recent years, advocates have targeted drivers license suspensions.

With its new law, New York joins 10 states that have stopped suspending licenses for failure to pay court debt, according to the Fines and Fees Justice Center. Hawaii, Oregon, and Virginia adopted similar laws last year, and others have restricted license suspensions more narrowly as well. (New York, unlike other states, already did not suspend licenses over fines and fees related to criminal convictions as opposed to traffic violations.) Advocates are hoping to get other states such as Texas to join.

Studies undertaken in New York show that drivers license suspensions for unpaid fines and fees disproportionately target Black and low-income communities, as is true nationally.

According to data released by Driven By Justice, an advocacy coalition that supported the new law, New York ZIP codes with lower average incomes and fewer white residents tend to see dramatically more suspensions. In New York City, where driving on a suspended license is one of the most-charged crimes, 80 percent of all those who are arrested for this offense are Black or Latinx.

The inequitable impact traces back to the fact that Black and Latinx drivers are pulled over and ticketed at higher rates, making them more likely to accrue debt and have their license suspended. New York courts are among the most aggressive in the country when it comes to traffic tickets. In Buffalo, for example, police issue seven times as many tickets for tinted windows as they do for speeding; drivers even told the Investigative Post in 2019 that they had received a separate ticket for each tinted window. Those multi-ticket stops are most common in Black neighborhoods.

The new law does not eliminate all drivers license suspensions related to traffic tickets, however.

The bill that had initially passed the legislature would have also ended suspensions for a failure to appear in court for traffic hearings. But in late December, the governors office requested a chapter amendment, which the legislature agreed to, removing this provision.

In a memorandum explaining the carve-out, the governor wrote: Allowing drivers to simply ignore their tickets will inevitably allow for scofflaws to remain on the roads, and present a health and safety hazard to the public.

But a failure to appear in court is connected to poverty as well. People who cant pay a traffic ticket may also not be able to take time off work to go to court, or may be unable to arrange child care. Those who can afford it can pay off their fines without the need to show up in traffic court.

Drivers license suspensions for failure to appear only punish poor New Yorkers who cant afford to take time off of work to appear in court, Scott Levy, chief policy counsel at Bronx Defenders, told the Political Report. The state is shooting itself in the foot by not ending these suspensions for failure to appear. It means that thousands of people across New York will not get the benefit of being able to drive to work without the fear of being arrested.

Under the new law, people who miss their court appearance will be afforded a 90-day grace period before their license is suspended, and two notifications will be sent by mail or digital communication. The new law also imposes a moratorium on all criminal charges for driving on a suspended license (when the suspension stems from failure to pay or appear) between Jan. 1 and July 1, when the state will implement a new system to offer payment plans to people who cannot afford their traffic tickets.

The cumulative effect of drivers license suspensions in New York has been enormous. Between January 2016 and April 2018 alone, there were almost 1.7 million drivers license suspensions in New York for both nonpayment of traffic fines and non-appearance at traffic hearings.

The new law also still allows suspensions for nonpayment of fines and fees for drivers who violate vehicle height or weight restrictions. These account for less than 1 percent of tickets statewide and mainly impact drivers of large trucks and construction vehicles.

Beyond tickets and drivers license suspensions, advocates have pointed to a broad array of potential fines and fees reforms in New York. The No Price on Justice coalition is calling for the abolition of all state-imposed court fees, commissary garnishment for court debt, arrests and incarceration for nonpayment of fines, and mandatory minimum fines.

State lawmakers have introduced legislation to address several of the coalitions policy goals. In the last session, one bill would have abolished a wide range of court fees, including the mandatory surcharge attached to criminal convictions. It would have ended commissary garnishment and debtors prison practices, too. Another bill would have required all state prisons to provide free phone calls for incarcerated people for a minimum of 90 minutes per day; currently, incarcerated people must pay exorbitant sums that they often cannot afford in order to get in touch with their families. Its likely that these bills will be reintroduced in the 2021 session.

Democrats made legislative gains in New York in 2020, including securing a newly veto-proof majority, which may ease passage for progressive legislation in the upcoming session.

Some advocates hope that this new landscape will encourage politicians to take up even more ambitious transformations of the states fiscal policy.

For example, the state property tax capa policy long pursued by Governor Cuomoprohibits local governments other than New York City from raising property taxes by more than 2 percent each year. Municipalities that have few ways to raise revenue may then end up resorting to fines and fees. Abolishing the property tax cap would give municipalities another option.

While recent reforms like ending drivers license suspensions for unpaid traffic tickets are steps in the right direction, New York is long overdue for much broader fines and fees reform, Adamides, of the Fines and Fees Justice Center, told the Political Report. Until the state ends its reliance on fines and fees for revenue, we will continue to see the extreme harm that these regressive taxes cause to those least able to afford them.

This story has been updated to reflect the authors past employment with the Fines and Fees Justice Center.

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New York Ends a Punishment That Traps People in Poverty - The Appeal

The curtain is closing on the Trump years, and America is grappling with what comes next. From families separated at the border to a pandemic raging out of control to a macabre federal execution spree, the U.S. arguably has become less that "shining city on a hill" and more like a house of horrors.

Photo of Liane Jackson by Callie Lipkin/ABA Journal.

In too many cases, collateral damage has been deemed inevitable and acceptable, in the service of expediency and political capital. Guilt or innocence have been less important than a message of tough intolerance. In the past four years, political ideology has grown dangerously aligned with totalitarian regimes where the rule of law is not just an afterthought, its an oxymoron.

A tough law and order approach to justice has been the hallmark of this administration, often with alacrity and vengeance prioritized over constitutional rights. President Donald Trump has encouraged a more aggressive police force, unleashed law enforcement on peaceful civilian protesters, praised violent white supremacists, denigrated science, and in 2020, instigated the bloodiest sweep of death row in more than a century.

But Trumps revival of the federal death penalty after years of dormancy isnt just about criminal justice, its a reflection of his administrations Old Testament throughline that has impacted every aspect of his national response.

While nearly every nation in Europe and Latin America has abandoned capital punishment, and with public support in the U.S. at an all-time low, the Trump administration nonetheless reinstated federal executions for the first time in 17 years and wasted no time playing catch up.

In 2020, the Federal Bureau of Prisons executed 10 inmates in six months, more than all the states combined. The pandemic has imperiled those working to implement the executions, has compromised defense teams ability to effectively represent their clients, and even prevented witnesses presence at executions. Nonetheless, the Department of Justice has pressed forward with its draconian agenda, planning executions within days of President-elect Joe Bidens inauguration.

As could be expected, carrying out executions during a pandemic has created a reckless domino effect, adding strain to a system already ill-equipped to deal with disease. The governments rush to kill has caused senseless risk for incarcerated people, prison staff, and everyone who lives in Terre Haute, Indiana, the ACLU wrote in an analysis of data from the Bureau of Prisons showing federal executions likely caused a COVID-19 spike.

In November, ABA President Patricia Lee Refo wrote Trump, urging him to offer reprieves: At a time of national crisis such as this, the public interest is not served by rushing forward with executions at the expense of due process, fundamental fairness and individual health and safety.

But its all in pursuit of a barbaric sense of justice that disregards public sentiment. To expedite the killings, Attorney General William Barr bypassed laws regarding the acquisition of lethal injection drugs and fast-tracked a rule to expand execution methods to include death by firing squad and electrocution.

Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row and the first to face execution in nearly 70 years, is scheduled to die Jan. 12. Montgomery is mentally ill, takes antipsychotic medications and her competency to be executed is regularly monitored.

A federal court granted a temporary stay in her case in November after both of her attorneys became ill with COVID-19 and were unable to file a clemency petition on her behalf. Cory Johnson, who attorneys have argued is intellectually disabled, is set for lethal injection Jan. 14, and Dustin John Higgs is scheduled to be put to death on Jan. 15. Both Johnson and Higgs have tested positive for COVID-19, and their attorneys are petitioning for stays of execution.

The likelihood any death row inmate would get a pardon from Trump is lowso far clemency from the president has been largely reserved for war criminals, corrupt political allies and friends. Its also unlikely the conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court would grant any last-minute reprieve, as the justices have been busy rejecting habeas petitions and reversing stays of execution.

While Catholic Justices Brett M. Kavanaugh, John G. Roberts Jr., Clarence Thomas, Amy Coney Barrett and Samuel A. Alito Jr. have mostly co-signed President Trumps death penalty agenda, this fall, the Roman Catholic Church unequivocally stated that the death penalty is universally unacceptable and that it would work toward its abolition, a position President-elect Biden, a practicing Catholic, supports. Pope Francis has declared opposition to capital punishment based not just on mercy, but in opposition to the idea of revenge and viewing punishment in a vindictive and even cruel way.

According to a recent Gallup poll, the percentage of Americans who consider the death penalty morally acceptable has fallen to a record low, with 60% percent preferring life without the possibility of parole to execution. State executions and new death sentences imposed are at their lowest levels in decades, continuing a sharp decline that began in 1999.

But Trump has made no secret of his philosophy, telling Larry King in 1989: Maybe hate is what we need if were gonna get something done, a statement he made pushing for executions in the notorious Central Park Five case, where five Black and Latino teens were wrongfully convicted of murdering a jogger.

They should be forced to suffer and, when they kill, they should be executed for their crimes. They must serve as examples for their crimes, Trump wrote in the $85,000 full-page ads he took out in four New York papers after the teens were arrested.

The Central Park Five were exonerated in 2002 after a convicted murderer confessed to the crime and DNA evidence proved their innocence. Despite this fact, Trump doubled down and never apologized.

Research shows the death penalty is racist, flawed and costly, inhumane and unjust, arbitrary and capricious, with no deterrent effect on public safety. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, about 42% of inmates on death row are Black, despite representing 13 percent of the population. Of the five people to be scheduled for execution between November 2020 and January 2021, four were Black.

And there are innocent people on death row. Since 1973, at least 172 people sentenced to death were later found to be innocent of the crime charged and more than half of the wrongfully convicted were Black.

If all the currently scheduled executions proceed, Trump will have put to death more people in a single year than any other administration since 1896. And no outgoing president in modern history has overseen an execution.

Trumps lame duck death chambers are the first since Grover Cleveland presided over an execution in 1889. Biden has said he will work to end federal executions, but theres nothing he can do about the administrations race to kill before Inauguration Day.

After Jan. 20, the country will turn the page on the controversy and carnage that was a hallmark of the last four years. But in these final, waning days, as the flow of devastating losses and deaths continues unabated, the loss of humanity should be no surprise.

Intersection is a column that explores issues of race, gender and law across Americas criminal and social justice landscape.

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There will be blood: Coronavirus, conflict and capital punishment - ABA Journal

Be it a passion they are born with or one they learn through circumstance, this year's Young Australian of the Year finalists all share the same drive to better the world for others.

But with a variety of backgrounds behind their drive, including poverty, disability, misfortune or a foundation in humanitarianism, any award will be a footnote on what is already a long list of achievements.

When AFLW footballer Tayla Harris was taken, aged 12, by her father to a boxing gym to learn a "combat sport for self defence", the coaches unearthed a fighting spirit.

At 23, the Victorian Young Australian of the Year remains undefeated in eight professional fights and holds the Australian super welterweight title.

"I loved the sport and learning about all the skills, discipline and hard work that it takes to become a fighter," Harris said.

But it is was her prowess on the football field that brought Harris to the attention of the wider Australian public, becoming Carlton Football Club's (CFC) leading goalkicker in 2019 and the AFLW Mark of the Year winner for two years running.

In 2019, a brilliantly captured image of Harris hovering above the field in full extension after kicking a football was tweeted by the AFL broadcaster.

Social media trolls swamped the feed with abusive, sexualised commentary, prompting the Seven Network to remove the image in an ill-fated response that drew widespread condemnation.

"I have always been taught by my parents to stand up for others in need and, of course, stand up for myself when I believed it was right," Harris said.

She went on to become an advocate for respectful relationships, visiting schools and workplaces through a CFC initiative to promote gender equality, and became an ambassador for Our Watch, an organisation aiming to prevent violence against women.

Harris has also co-authored a book entitled More Than a Kick, which provides young people with advice about social media and dealing with online bullying.

Modern slavery could be as close as the imported seafood and chocolate products we buy from the local supermarket, according to Western Australia's Young Australian of the Year Grace Forrest.

The 27-year-old founding director of international abolition organisation, Walk Free, said Australia imports an estimated $12 billion worth of products derived from modern slavery annually.

"Modern slavery could also have touched the clothes on your back, the toys you buy your children or the device you are reading this on," Ms Forrest said.

Ms Forrest said she first came face-to-face with modern slavery at 15 when she met children as young as three who had been rescued from human trafficking an experience that "fundamentally" shifted her perspective of the world.

"Globally, there is still an enduring belief that slavery has been abolished, that it's a dark legacy of our past relegated to history books," she said.

Ms Forrest's all-female Walk Free team in 2018 successfully campaigned for the implementation of the Australian Modern Slavery Act, which requires businesses turning over more than $100 million annually to report their supply chain details along with any risks of exploitation.

Walk Free's Global Slavery Index [GSI] estimates there are more than 40 million people living in slave conditions worldwide.

"Modern slavery is also an innately gendered issue; 70 per cent of victims are women and girls," Ms Forrest said.

Ms Forrest speaks regularly on the topic and has presented several times for the United Nations, most recently to its Security Council on Walk Free's new report, Stacked Odds.

She has also presented at the World Economic Forum Sustainable Development Impact Summit, the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings Women's Forum, and has been appointed the UN Association of Australia's youngest ever Goodwill Ambassador for Anti-Slavery.

Drawn to flying from a young age, Nathan Parker was captured by its demand to focus on the moment and leave everything else in the hangar.

That was until a military bus accident left him without his left hand and stole his dream to become a fighter pilot just days away from climbing into the cockpit.

But rather than wallow in self-pity, Mr Parker returned to civilian flying in three months and resumed military and university duties within seven months.

"I think I'm far more passionate about flying now, especially due to the countless times I thought I would never fly again following the bus accident," the NSW Young Australian of the Year said.

At 25, Mr Parker is a commercial pilot and senior Recreational Aviation Australia flying instructor in Lismore, pursuing a dream to fly aerobatics and provide joy flights for sick children.

He is also a motivational speaker and mentor who seeks to "assist, encourage and inspire as many people as possible to transform their toughest times into their greatest opportunities".

While overcoming his own "loss", Mr Parker represented Australia in the 2017 and 2018 Invictus Games where he won three golds, four silvers and two bronze, and found an affinity for indoor rowing.

"Not only was the atmosphere at the indoor rowing events electrifying, but throughout my recovery, indoor rowing provided me a means to see continual improvement," Mr Parker said.

His original love for flying, of course, knows no bounds.

"I have a number of big goals, including pursuing competition aerobatics and aspiring to win an Australian Aerobatic Championship," he said.

Ask 19-year-old climate action and youth empowerment advocate Toby Thorpe what he wants to be doing in 10 years and last on his list is fighting for change.

"I want to not have to worry and second-guess life decisions due to the impact of climate change," he said.

"I want to be able to look back on my life and say, 'I was on the right side of history'."

Mr Thorpe founded Tasmania's first state-wide climate leaders' conference across three cities when he was 14, attracting more than 350 students and professionals and encouraging them to lead sustainability projects for the environment and their communities.

He was later team leader of 14 Huonville High School students who were congratulated by world leaders in 2017 after designing a range of sustainable energy solutions for their school.

In recent years, the 2021 Tasmanian Young Australian of the Year led the island state's Youth Delegation for two United Nations Climate Change Conferences.

He says his passion is driven by opportunities to "revolutionise our systems toward being fairer and more equal" but he is under no illusions about the complexities involved in making change.

"I try and leave frustration out of the equation when advocating for action on climate change because I believe that it is an issue that should not require debate and should not be about politics," Mr Thorpe said.

"No one should drop out of school, cease employment or disengage from society simply because of their period," says South Australia's Young Australian of the Year Isobel Marshall.

But for millions of young women across the globe, period poverty is a reality and one that the 22-year-old wants to end.

After crowdfunding $56,000 in 2018, Ms Marshall and fellow South Australian Eloise Hall launched TABOO, a brand of ethically sourced organic pads and tampons.

All TABOO's net profits are sent to its charity partner (One Girls) in Sierra Leone and Uganda, where they are used to fight period poverty.

Pads are also donated to Australian women, including those who have escaped domestic violence, girls "sent to school with no products", those living in rural Australia with limited access, and women requiring emergency accommodation.

Ms Marshall said they travelled to Kenya and India in 2018 where they shadowed organisations working in areas including menstrual health care.

"We met girls who walk three hours everyday to get to school with nothing but dirty rags to soak up the blood and dealing with period cramps but nothing to help the pain," she said.

"We met girls who had dropped out of school at 13 because of their gender and biology.

"The trip was confronting but we left with a deep sense of conviction that we were right where we needed to be."

Ms Marshall is also studying for a Bachelor of Surgery and a Bachelor of Medicine.

"The more I learn about the human body, the more I am convinced that its incredible abilities, including menstruation and reproduction, should be celebrated and respected, not shamed," she said.

For a young Daniel Clarke, watching the late Steve Irwin sit in a tree as an orangutan handed him her baby was a "magical" sight he will never forget.

"That was the first time I saw how an orangutan can show such emotion towards a human," Daniel said.

Daniel has cerebral palsy and, when he was approached as a child by the Starlight Foundation charity to make a wish, he did not request anything for himself but instead wanted to "save the orangutans in Borneo".

Fast forward 14 years and Daniel, 24, and his brother, William, 22, have raised more than $900,000 to protect critically endangered orangutans in Sumatra and Borneo, sponsoring more than 50,000 hectares of habitat and adopting more than 100 animals.

The brothers have subsequently been named Queensland's Young Australians of the Year.

William said they had both always shared a love of wildlife and nature but when he witnessed Daniel's determination to save the orangutan, he saw "an amazing opportunity" to help his brother.

"Since working together we have both grown more passionate in wanting to make a a difference and are so proud of what we have been able to achieve, so far, as brothers," he said.

Their literary work on orangutan conservation has been incorporated into the NSW Department of Education Curriculum and, to date, they have spoken in about 80 Australian schools.

Their efforts have been recognised by former US president Barack Obama, famed primatologist Dr Jane Goodall, and former prime minister John Howard, who arranged a $500,000 grant over four years towards orangutan protection after meeting Daniel.

With a goal of $1,000,000, the brothers said they wanted the animals to be safe with no threat from palm oil plantations and illegal logging, pointing out that if the orangutans can be saved from extinction, other animals in the same habitat could be saved as well.

Aboriginal health practitioner Stuart McGrath knows all about poverty.

He had a nomadic upbringing in remote Northern Territory Indigenous communities where he described his own poverty as a "dark tunnel".

"It took me roughly 15 years to get out of that cycle," Mr McGrath said.

But the NT's Young Australian of the Year also recognised at an early age that education was the "key to a good life".

"That's what separated me among my peers and my childhood friends I figured out if I go to school every day it may be the way out," Mr McGrath said.

He moved to Galiwin'ku, a Yolngu community on Elcho Island north-east of Darwin, where his education progressed, before he schooling in Canberra and later studying in Darwin.

"Anyone can break that cycle," Mr McGrath said.

"Whether you're Caucasian, or black, or an immigrant or refugee, everyone has that one thing in common we're all chasing the Australian dream."

When he graduates, Mr McGrath will become the first Yolngu registered nurse, a task he has undertaken while working full-time and bringing up two young girls.

The 29-year-old has also helped produce the Ask the Specialist podcast with the Menzies School of Health Research, and is committed to addressing preventable diseases in Indigenous communities.

"There are a lot of poor health outcomes where I'm from that aren't even necessary because they are modifiable diseases, like rheumatic heart disease, diabetes, cardio diseases," Mr McGrath said.

"They [community members] can make informed decisions and take ownership and responsibility on the information I can relay in my native tongue."

He also has his eyes on postgraduate health studies with a focus on Aboriginal affairs policy making.

"That's where the real impacts can be made," Mr McGrath said.

The drive to help people can be "born inside you", says Salvation Army youth worker Tara McClelland.

At 24, the ACT Young Australian of the Year puts her efforts into assisting 16-to-24-year-olds at risk of or experiencing homelessness, and increasing their skills while in crisis accommodation.

"[Young people] are so resilient," Ms McClelland said.

"They can be dealt the toughest cards but they still manage to have a smile on their face and get going and make positive steps."

Ms McClelland also volunteers for the Headspace Canberra Young Reference Group, applying for funding and organising events to support mental health, including school information sessions.

She is on the Canberra Youth Theatre's Youth Artists Advisory Panel and has contributed to the Commissioner for Children and Young People's work to reduce family violence.

"Sometimes young people are afraid to ask for help because they are afraid of judgement, but you don't know what someone's gone through, or what's just under the surface," Ms McClelland said.

"Being able to help them by providing the simple things, like living skills for young people who don't know how to budget, or don't know how to cook, or access services ... to walk beside them and help is something that I'm just so proud to be a part of."

Ms McClelland has been recognised with a 2019 Annual Yogie Award commendation and a nomination for 2020 Young Canberra Citizen of the Year.

"I want to be using this platform to reach as many young people as possible," she said.

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Young Australian of the Year 2021: Standing up to help those in need - ABC News

By Oliver Bayliss 2021-01-07T07:00:00

Britains exit from the exchange programme has needlessly destroyed something of enormous value, writes Oliver Bayliss

As we enter a new year we do so outside of the European Union. During the final throes of the tit-for-tat negotiations between government and EU chiefs when fishing quotas and level playing fields grabbed the limelight it was the abolition of the Erasmus+ scheme that stands out as one of the more depressing acts of self-sabotage. The scheme enabled participants seeking higher education, work placements and training exchanges to spend up to a year in other member states universities; providing an opportunity to expand horizons, learn languages and experience different cultures. In 2019 alone nearly 55,000 young people benefited from the scheme, funded by grants totalling 144.7m.

Now, after 33 years and hundreds of thousands of UK participants, that door is closed.

I was one of those students. In 2005 I spent a year in Barcelona at the polytechnic school of architecture. It was daunting at first; studying in another language (Catalan mostly rather than Castilian Spanish which I learned the bones of before going). What struck me was the emphasis on the technical aspects of architectural education. Afternoons were spent calculating the size of radiators. Exams resembled A-levels; rows of desks, a scale ruler and pencil, 90 minutes to draw a stack of window details.

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Scrapping Erasmus is a tragedy for the next generation of architects - Building Design

After a year of uncertainty, fear, and suffering on a global scale, many of us found ourselves counting down the months to 2021 with some hope that the new calendar year would bring an end to the unprecedented times weve been suffering through since March. But the end of 2020 didnt erase the pandemic, restore the global economy, or settle any nations political turmoil. Fortunately, we know that saints are forged in times of unrest, perhaps even more readily than in times of stability. As we seek to become saints in a tumultuous world, lets look to those whove gone before, who found holiness even as their worlds seemed to be crumbling around them.

Bl. Jacques Jules Bonnaud(1741-1792) was born in Haiti but sent to France as a child in order to avoid the difficulties his dark skin brought him as a biracial boy in the Americas. In France, he was educated by Jesuits and soon entered the Society of Jesus. When he was still in formation, the Jesuit order was dissolved in France and Bonnaud was forced to find another way to pursue his vocation in a diocesan seminary. Once ordained, Fr. Bonnaud lived according to the Jesuit rule as best he could while serving as a priest in the Archdiocese of Paris; later he became vicar general of Lyon for several years, as the French Revolution rocked the country. He was eventually martyred for refusing to swear allegiance to the state.

Bl. Catherine Jarrige (1754-1836) was a French peasant who tried to subdue her mischievous spirit after becoming a lay Dominican. When the Revolution broke out, though, she discovered that God had made her spirited on purpose. She spent the time of crisis smuggling priests from one place to another, ensuring that no baby went unbaptized and nobody died without the Sacraments. She teased and tricked the revolutionaries, using sarcasm and improvisational acting to save lives. After the Revolution, she went back to a quieter life of begging for the poor, but retained her reputation as the hero of local Catholics.

Ven. Felix Varela y Morales (1788-1853) was a Cuban priest and statesman, a seminary professor whose intellectual contributions to Cuba were so significant that hes often called, the one who taught us how to think. When he was sent as a representative to the Spanish Parliament, Varela took that opportunity to speak out in favor of the abolition of slavery and the freedom of Spanish colonies. He received a death sentence for his trouble, but escaped to New York. There he spent the rest of his life in exile, serving immigrant communities (particularly the Irish) and working to form the Catholic Church in America to lead the way in support of immigrants.

St. Zygmunt Szcesny Felinski (1822-1895) was born to a proudly Polish family at a time when there was no independent Poland. His father died when he was 11; when he was 18, his mother was exiled to Siberia for her pro-Polish sentiment. Zygmunt himself was involved in a failed revolution before becoming a diocesan priest. He was made archbishop of Warsaw while the city was besieged by the Russians, but served in Warsaw for only 16 months before being exiled to Siberia for 20 years. Archbishop Felinski spent the rest of his life in semi-exile in modern Ukraine.

St. Rafael Guzar y Valencia (1878-1938) had no idea the upheaval that awaited him when he was ordained a priest in Mexico at 23. During the Mexican Revolution, he was forced into hiding, living as an undercover priest before fleeing to the United States, Guatemala, and Cuba. After years of exile, he was named bishop of Veracruz and returned to Mexico. Even then, he wasnt safe, spending half of his 18-year episcopacy in exile or in hiding.

Bl. Natalia Tulasiewicz (1906-1945) was a poet, a violinist, a middle-aged high school teacher with tuberculosis and dreams of a Ph.D. But when the Germans invaded Poland, Natalia became a member of the resistance, secretly teaching Polish culture before sneaking off to a German factory to bring faith and hope to the Polish women forced to work there. The Nazis eventually caught wind of the prayer circles and retreats Natalia was running and sent her to a concentration camp, where she continued to serve as a beacon of hope and an apostle to Ravensbrck until she was killed in a gas chamber.

Ven. Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan (1928-2002) was consecrated archbishop of Saigon at age 47a week before the fall of Saigon to communist forces. A few months later, he was arrested and placed in a communist internment camp for 13 years, nine of which he spent in solitary confinement. During that time, Archbishop Van Thuan evangelized his guards, celebrated Mass with his hand as a chalice, and smuggled messages of hope to his people. He was finally freed but sent into exile for his last 11 years.

Servant of God Ragheed Aziz Ganni (1972-2007) was a popular young priest who played soccer and gave talks at youth rallies. He spent his priesthood rallying his people in the face of incessant terrorist attacks on Christians in his hometown of Mosul. Fr. Gannis parish was attacked at least 10 times, but he refused to live in fear, saying, Without the Sunday Eucharist we cannot live. He was killed by terrorists for refusing to keep his church closed after they threatened him.

Read more:Pope Francis to Coptic Patriarch: We are united in the blood of our martyrs

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Saints who lived in times of great unrest - Aleteia EN

Hull and East Riding has turned to South Yorkshire for a new chairman of the emerging Local Enterprise Partnership.

James Newman OBE, founding chair of the Sheffield City Region LEP has been appointed ahead of the April 1 launch.

He oversaw it from new entity in 2010, under David Camerons Conservative-Lib Dem coalition abolition of regional development agencies, to the signing of one of the first city devolution deals in October 2015.

An East Riding resident, he is currently chair of Finance Yorkshire and the South Yorkshire Community Foundation and has a number of other business and charitable roles, nationally and in Yorkshire.

Mr Newman said: I am delighted to have been given this opportunity to take this role. The creation of this LEP marks the beginning of a new era for the region and I look forward to working with both the leaders, their councils, the business community and voluntary sector to create a successful partnership, which will bring more funding to the region, allowing our strategically important industries and all our businesses to drive economic growth, which will benefit the region and all its employees and communities.

It will also be important to make sure we continue the excellent work of the current Humber LEP and work closely with our colleagues across the Humber Estuary, where our combined assets and expertise are of national importance.

Our first task will be to recruit a new board for the LEP, alongside other advisory boards and committees, so as to ensure the new LEP is ready to start its important role as soon as possible.

It has come to being after the government ruled local authorities could not sit in two LEP areas. Previously North and North East Lincolnshire councils, had been in the Humber LEP with Hull and East Yorkshire. The South Bank pairing was also part of Greater Lincolnshire LEP, with whom their allegiance was pledged when the Westminster directive emerged.

Thomas Martin, chair of the Hull and East Riding Business Engagement Board and chair of the recruitment panel, said: I am delighted that such a thorough recruitment process has secured our region the expertise, and an external perspective, that we will draw on heavily as we continue our devolution journey. A devolution deal for the region is vital to our future success together.

The leaders of both councils, supported by the business community, are clearly aligned on this journey, and I very much hope that James, as the new chair, will draw extensively on the knowledge that has made the existing Humber LEP so productive.

There are new boundaries, new rules and new relationships to be forged and these must drive additional opportunities throughout our combined coastal, rural, urban and estuary communities. The leaders have shown the way and we all now need to align around James to ensure the region continues to punch above its weight throughout the national Levelling Up debate.

Much of Mr Newmans full-time career was spent as group finance director of several FTSE-listed companies, across manufacturing and service industries, including Kelda Group Plc - the holding company for Yorkshire Water, where he was also deputy chief executive - print giant Watmoughs and cable engineer Bridon.

Outside of the corporate boardroom he was governor and deputy chairman of Sheffield Hallam University and was awarded an honorary doctorate in 2012 for services to business, enterprise and education in Yorkshire.

He is on the Court at the University of York. He is a Fellow of both the Institute of Chartered Accountants and of the Association of Corporate Treasurers and completed a year as Master Cutler of the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire in 2009/10 and is a Freeman of the City of London and of the Worshipful Company of Ironmongers.

His OBE was awarded in 2017 for services to business, the economy and charity in Yorkshire.

Councillor Stephen Brady, leader of Hull City Council, said, I am delighted that James has been appointed as the chair of the Hull and East Yorkshire Local Enterprise Partnership. James has a fantastic and very successful track record in business and also has extensive experience of working with both local and national government to bring them together and really focus on driving forward local economies and make a positive difference to businesses and residents alike.

The Hull and East Yorkshire LEP is business led and will bring together partners from the private, public and third sectors, along with collaborating with a wide-range of local partners, to act as a powerful, informed and independent voice for Hull and East Yorkshire, and James will play a vital role in shaping, developing and leading this partnership. I am very much looking forward to working with him in his new role in what, I am sure, will be a very successful partnership.

Lord Haskins of Skidby led the Humber LEP for the best part of its decade of being, with Stephen Parnaby, former leader of East Riding, controversially taking the interim role following his decision to step down in April 2020, despite a selection process having begun.

Councillor Richard Burton, current leader of East Riding Council, said: I very much welcome the appointment of James Newman, who is a well-respected businessman and a resident of the East Riding. James has an excellent track record of running major businesses across Yorkshire and led the formation of the Sheffield City Region LEP as its first chair. I am delighted that he will be able to bring his vast experience to this new role as Chair of our new LEP. On behalf of the Council, I look forward very much to working with James and to the role that the new organisation will play in the future of Hull and East Yorkshire.

What do you think of the LEP situation? Share your views in the comments section below.

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Chairman appointed to lead new Hull and East Yorkshire LEP - Business Live

The Senedd. Picture by Senedd Cymru.

A Tory website has published an article calling for the abolition of the Senedd because the party cant win elections in Wales.

Michael Evans argues in Prydain Review that devosceptism is the inescapable future for his party because the idea that a Conservative Welsh Government is possible is a shallow lie.

He said that the Conservatives cannot win enough constituency seats to get an outright majority and that a deal between the party and Plaid Cymru was not possible.

Mr Evans also claimed that any Tory who tells you otherwise is disrespecting you and insulting your intelligence.

The Welsh Conservatives currently have 11 seats out of 60 in the Senedd, and would need to win 31 for an outright majority, which is an increase of 20.

Devosceptic

Mr Evans said: When faced with devosceptic opinions, there is a stock answer given by the leadership. It goes like this: Yes, devolution hasnt worked for 20 years, but thats Labours fault. We can make it work with a Welsh Conservative Government.

As Henry Hill has pointed out, this is a distinction without a practical difference. But it is also a dishonest position that diminishes those who trot it out.

Devolution is not just the Welsh Government, but the Senedd. And the Senedds electoral system is semi-proportional. Even Labour has never won an outright majority. A Tory who tells you that the Welsh Conservatives can win outright is lying to you, disrespecting you and insulting your intelligence.

The Additional Member System incorporates first past the post constituency results with the Dhondt method for allocating the 20 regional seats. In English, this means that the more constituencies you win, the fewer regional members you get.

The Conservative vote is fairly evenly spread across the five Senedd regions, meaning that their road to a majority has to be based on constituencies only.

This would be extremely tough even if it was just a first past the post election with the 40 constituency seats; in that scenario the Senedd Conservatives would need to improve on the successful 2019 Westminster tally. But with the Additional Member System it is impossible.

To win an outright majority, the Welsh Conservatives would need to increase their number of constituency wins from 6 to 31. This means that to get to a majority of just one, their must win seats would include Llanelli, Torfaen, Caerphilly, Neath, Ceredigion, Newport East, Ogmore and Islwyn.

When theyve never even won the Vale of Glamorgan at an Assembly election, one can see that the suggestion of winning all those seats is beyond absurd.

No coalition

He added: And there will be no coalition, not that the suggestion of one would assuage devosceptic concerns about devolution in any case. Plaid Cymru has ruled out a coalition with the Welsh Conservatives.

There is no scenario, other than being the larger partner in a coalition, that would be more preferable to Plaid than holding the Senedd balance and forcing a Labour minority government to dance to its tune.

There will be no Tory majority, and there will be no Tory-Plaid deal. There is a dawning realisation across the Party that the Welsh Conservatives cannot win. That devolved politics is a cul-de-sac for the Party.

The implication of this for the devolution debate in the Conservative Party is simple. Conservative MSs point to every problem with the Welsh Government, but have no viable solution. They cant win. They cant change anything. So solutions will be sought elsewhere.

Difficult questions are coming, and nobody is going to be fobbed off with the shallow lie that a Welsh Conservative government is possible.

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'Abolish the Senedd because we can't win Welsh elections' says Tory website - Nation.Cymru