Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

Off to "Ask Rhodri" last night to listen to others putting the First Minister on the spot. It was Jones Public's turn to ask the questions, ten years to the day since Rhodri Morgan was first elected an Assembly Member.

It seems they had something else on.

With minutes to go there were no more than a dozen people waiting outside the Techniquest theatre. If you don't happen to live in Cardiff or haven't been dragged there by your children during the school holidays, I'd better explain that it's the kind of intimate, raked arena where Victorian surgeons used to dissect bodies. You half expected Dr Gunther von Hagens to appear at the door.

By 7 o'clock there was no sign of Dr von Hagens in his fedora but then neither was there much sign of public interest in the event. I counted 17 people who'd turned up who weren't journalists, press officers or in one case, an extremely loyal AM.

Had you come you would have heard the First Minister proving once again that he's best when he's at ease, when the cameras aren't running and when he doesn't have to stick to a slot of two minutes thirty seconds.

He took on David Starkey's view that Wales is "a feeble little nation". The questioner had introduced Dr Starkey as a distinguished historian. "Being the younger brother of one myself" said Professor Prys Morgan's little bro, "I think I can recognise a distinguished historian". Dr Starkey, he suggested, was a television personality and Wales was a country that, thanks to the Act of Union, wasn't even meant to be here but a country that survives centuries later and is a better country thanks to devolution.

You would have heard him saying that England should have had the guts to do away with A levels but hadn't had the courage to do so. Not getting rid of them has partly stymied Welsh plans to develop the Welsh Baccalaureate.

You'd have heard him suggesting there ought to be a campaign to teach the city's taxi drivers ten significant things about Cardiff with which to impress their passengers. Top of the list? That the National Museum has an important collection of Impressionist paintings and that Cardiff University has two Nobel prize winners on its staff. I invite you to come forward with suggestions for the next eight.

You'd have heard him telling the audience he got hooked on politics as a 'freako' twelve year old. He'd dragged his mother along to a meeting and watched as Hooray Henrys from his home village howled down a weaping Alderman Dorothy Rees. Perhaps his admission is part of a plan to inject a new spirit into First Minister's Questions?

And you'd have heard Rhodri Morgan give one piece of advice to his successor: stay close to the people. You could never accuse this First Minister of having failed to do that.

The problem last night seems to be that familiarity - agos-atrwydd as you'd call it in Welsh - has bred, not contempt nor contentment either but a discomforting number of empty seats.

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