Carwyn Jones has unwittingly thrown his party a curve ball

I wonder if the Third Rate Minister  Carwyn Jones Knew that he was potentially throwing his party a curved ball when he announced  the result of the first-ever Welsh Labour deputy leadership race before he  revealed he would stand down as First Minister later this year.


Defeated deputy leadership candidate Julie Morgan has said Welsh Labour has to change its "undemocratic" voting system.

The Cardiff North AM won significantly more votes from the party's membership and yet lost the first-ever Welsh Labour deputy leadership race to rival Carolyn Harris MP.

The weighted system has been criticised by opponents, including Mrs Morgan, as giving members less influence, and unions and politicians more.
The electoral college gives the support of all members as a whole the same amount of weight as the votes of MPs and AMs and the decisions made by unions and other affiliates.

It means AMs who are also members of the party and members of an affiliated union can often vote several times.
There has been significant criticism over how some of the biggest unions took the decision to back Carolyn Harris without consulting their membership.
It is understood that Unite Wales' decision was taken by "just three or four people".
Mrs Morgan said her vote as an AM is worth 400 times that of a member.
She won the members vote, but lost the trade unions and parliamentarian vote.
Her team have calculated she had more than 65% of the members vote.

Labour's deputy leadership result

How the votes added up:
Affiliates
Carolyn Harris - 20.14%
Julie Morgan - 13.19%
Members
Carolyn Harris - 11.61%
Julie Morgan - 21.73%
MPs, AMs and MEPs:
Carolyn Harris - 19.75%
Julie Morgan - 13.58%
Total:
Carolyn Harris - 51.5%
Julie Morgan - 48.5%

Mrs Morgan spoke of her frustration she lost out to the same system which saw her late husband Rhodri lose out as leader.
He lost out to Alun Michael to become Wales’ then First Secretary in 1999 despite winning the most members' votes.
She said: 

"It frustrates me and upsets me. It's the thought that he went through all that and was desperate for the job as leader and we're still using the same system now that returns what is clearly not a democratic result."
"I am obviously disappointed not to have won but I am very pleased it was very close and of course the key issue is that I won the members vote.
"I overwhelmingly won that members' vote.
"The Parliamentarians vote was 19.75% to 13.5% and that compensated a little but wasn't enough.
"If two or three Parliamentarians voted for me I would have won because their votes are weighted about 400x more.
"This is what I predicted. We could have just edged it but we knew the odds were stacked against us.

She took the majority of the members votes, with 65.2% of those members who voted selecting Mrs Morgan.

"Members have spoken to me and are disappointed because of the vast number of members who voted for me.
"I want to make it clear that I knew these rules when I stood so I am accepting the result, it's just that the campaign continues on my behalf to try to get one-member-one-vote.
"I think this takes that campaign a step further. I think there's more hope now.
"I don't feel down, I feel like I have won because it's got the case for one-member-one-vote out there and very pleased that we did so well there."

Which leaves Welsh Labour with a dilemma  as one Leadership contest ends and another one starts.

Do they run it under the electoral college rules or under One Member One Vote?

If they do the former, then they risk of a repeat of the debacle of the first Welsh leader elections where the membership voted for Rhodri Morgan only to seee Tony Blair's   choice of Alun Michael winning in the same way Carolyn Harris did Yesterday.

The result was marked by the historically high level of support for Plaid Cymru, who won their highest share of the vote in any Wales-wide election and, as of 2016, their highest number of seats in an Assembly election to date. The party won considerable support in traditionally safe Labour areas such as the South Wales Valleys, winning Rhondda and Islwyn and narrowly failing to win a number of other seats.

However to change the rules now, would completely undermine the recent election of Carolyn Harris and whilst it may be pretty much a non-job, how much authority can she claim?

 Finance Secretary Mark Drakeford, considered by many to be a front-runner for the job of first minister, said he was giving "serious consideration" to putting himself in the running following Mr Jones's announcement. 

I suspect there will be moves to see that Mr Drakeford , remains the only candidate and there is a coronation rather an election,