She said: "Since I became an Assembly Member I have been amazed by the number of
quangos and review commissions that the (Welsh) Government set up.
A study by the think-tank has revealed an astonishing 132
quango officials are paid more than a Cabinet secretary, and 686 received more than an MSP.
Ministers may have talked about a bonfire of the
quangos, but the Government has been far too timid in following through with its promises.
Not because of the abolition of most of the
quangos, which were not technology-related.
His Whitehall department said the Government was now more than halfway through the first wave of its
quango reform programme with closures made so far set to save at least pounds 1.
In the run-up to the Election, both Fine Gael and Labour promised to get rid of up to 150
quangos.
The Local Government Secretary, Eric Pickles, who abolished the
quangos earlier this year, said: "Labour maxed out the nation's credit card, and it turns out that their
quangos were at it too.
Sustainability-related
quangos that are being abolished or reconstituted as "expert committees" include: Cycling England, the Renewables Advisory Board and the Commission for Integrated Transport.
The Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition said 192
quangos would disappear, a further 118 bodies would be merged and another 171 "substantially" reformed.
People have been fed up with the old way of doing business, where the people they voted for could often avoid taking responsibility for difficult and tough decisions by creating or hiding behind one of these
quangos.
Business Secretary Vince Cable said the work of the
quangos would be taken over by Government departments, making them more accountable and reducing administrative costs.
He said there could be more than 1,000
quangos operating in Britain today: "This growth in the number of
quangos, and in the scope of their influence, raises important questions for our democracy and politics - questions of accountability, now vital in the light of the damaged trust in our political system, questions about public spending control, now vital in the light of the debt crisis; and questions relating to the effectiveness of politics in addressing the key social problems that give people such great concern.
