- Parallel lines - 26th January 2026
- Burn bridges… - 26th January 2026
- Poll dancing - 23rd January 2026
During a 42 year journalistic career our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry, has always been struck by incredible historical parallels and how slim, or non-existent, majorities can lead to significant change, and nowhere is this emphasised better than what is today coming out of Donald Trump’s America.
It always pays to take a long view.
Major events happen with politicians who have the slimmest of margins (or none whatsoever), and their long term effect can be far-reaching.
There have also been unbelievable historical parallels throughout history.
Famously Margaret Thatcher, never secured a majority of the votes cast even though she won three successive elections, yet her legacy (not least in Wales) has been profound.
She de-industrialised the UK changing the landscape permanently.
It is unquestioned that devolution in Wales, and the establishment of the Welsh Parliament/Senedd Cymru (WP/SC) in 1999, changed the country permanently (even if it is abolished, which is unlikely, that will always be the case).
But it is often forgotten just how close was the referendum result that established it two years before.
In answer to the question: ‘I agree that there should be a Welsh Assembly’. 50.3 per cent voted yes, while 49.7 per cent voted ‘no’.
I conducted my interview in the Rhondda for broadcast the following day (where the declaration was fairly early), on the basis that the referendum had been lost, and it was only when I arrived back home in Cardiff did I hear that it had in fact been won.
This was arguably, along with votes in Scotland and Northern Ireland, one of the most important constitutional changes ever, yet it had only been won on less than one per cent of the vote.
For me, perhaps bizarrely, this is put in sharp relief by what is happening in America today.
From Donald Trump’s tariff ‘reform’, to shooting up ‘drug courier’ boats there is little doubt that what is happening is very important, yet his share of the vote was just 49.8 per cent.
In other words most people voted for someone else, even though Mr Trump and his gang called it a ‘landslide’.
I am also struck by extraordinary historical parallels, as you witness these major episodes taking place before your eyes.
As we watch what is happening across the pond, it is evident this ‘protectionism’ has a flavour of the ‘isolationism’ of the 1930s which only really ended when Japan’s bombing of Pearl Harbour brought America into the war.
So there are lessons in history – it always pays to take the long view.
I know this more than most…
The memories of Phil’s extraordinary decades long award-winning career in journalism (including his years at the BBC when he covered the devolution referendum) as he was gripped by the rare neurological disabling condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in another major book ‘A Good Story’. Order it now.
Also on The Eye – for him exposing hypocrisy and humbug has always been central, and today this is put centre stage by Labour declaring that the party wanted to “avoid an unnecessary mayoral election, which would use substantial amounts of taxpayers’ money and resources that are better spent tackling the cost-of-living crisis” when everyone knew it was really about blocking Andy Burnham.
Tomorrow – how the launch of a major campaign by a giant insurance company, fronted by a new star instead of disgraced Welshman Wynne Evans, highlights the appalling nature of what he did.
