Professor John Doyle:

Last month, I gave evidence to the Welsh commission established by the Labour Government to examine the future of Wales. It studies everything, but because politics is dominated by the Labour Party in Wales and by people not in favour of independence. However, the members are looking at constitutional reform and independence is on the table to keep it all party, but it is not really what the commission examines. They are just looking at the options. They are genuinely trying to cast its eyes at least 20 or 25 years - perhaps not 50 - into the future. The problem in that commission, and why they will struggle to write a report, is that, in some ways, they cannot resolve the issue. They could probably describe where they would like to be, apart from the constitutional setup but they are constantly stuck on how to get from A to B. For example, on the constitutional question, the Labour Party will say it is not against independence in principle, but Wales must grow the economy so there is near parity with England, and then it could be examined. Plaid Cymru says there is no prospect of growing the economy because Wales does not have the political levers of a sovereign state to get there. The discussion then just ends up in a binary. It is very hard to park those issues because they constantly come back. It is a really good commission. The members put a lot of hard work in and the commission is getting a lot of expertise in from Wales and abroad but I suspect they will struggle to write a final report because the future and the current tend to be interconnected. Climate and environment is probably the single biggest challenge of our time. It is the hardest one for politicians to deal with because no one will see the benefits before or after an election.