Congratulations

4/ The work of Richard and other Welsh Liberals would contribute to the introduction of the secret ballot in 1872.

Writing in the 1880s, Stuart Rendel (Lib MP, Montgomeryshire) argued that it was not until the Ballot Act that the Welsh electorate was truly represented in elections at Westminster.

3/ In 1869, Henry Richard (Liberal MP Merthyr Boroughs) delivered his maiden speech before the Commons where he claimed to raise the first Welsh question at Westminster "in the memory of man". The contents of the question included the issue of landlord interference at the 1868 election in Wales.

2/ The issue of political landlordism formed an important part of the early catalogue of Welsh questions in the House of Commons.

WCML would be much quicker. The XC franchise is capped at Crewe on WCML and not sure if there's scope for an Open Access operator. Route capacity may be the sticking point for any WCML offering.

Both ECML. I read that the GC proposal has 11 stops, and XC has 22. Also, more daily services under the GC plan.

Perhaps a little too cynical? XC announced plans for this route a year ago (before GC), and the GC/XC plans are different in terms of frequency of services, route map, stops, on board offering etc, so not necessarily direct competition. Still a case for a separate Open Access route.