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Mike Drakeford? ‘Sloppy’ Sky News gets First Minister’s name wrong

29 Apr 2020 2 minute read
Mike Drakeford – or is it? Picture by Andrew RT Davies on Twitter.

Sky News has been described as “sloppy” and “insulting to Wales” after they got Mark Drakeford’s name wrong this morning.

Wales’ First Minister appeared on Sky News in order to congratulate Boris Johnson and his partner Carrie Symonds on the birth of a baby boy, but was billed as ‘Mike Drakeford’.

“We’ve got a new First Minister!” former Welsh Conservative leader, Assembly Member Andrew RT Davies said, posting a picture of the blooper.

Samuel Kurtz said it was “funny, but also shows Wales is often an afterthought”.

“It’s not done on purpose, but it does show an air of flippancy, a shoulder shrug, towards what we do in Wales,” he said. “I’m no fan of ‘Mike’, but at least get the guy’s name right!”

 

‘Progress’

Emily Durrant said: “No matter what your political views, that is truly sloppy and frankly insulting to Wales. I can’t imagine the same happening to our PM.”

Hooray! “Mike” Drakeford (aka the First Minister) makes it onto national news (albeit only for a ‘non-story’ at a time of national crisis,” Tim Price said. “It’s progress guys, soon people will be looking for Wales on a map. Occasionally.”

“A first minister so well respected and regarded, one of the UK’s leading news organisations doesn’t actually know his name,” Clwyd South Conservatives commented.


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Plain citizen
Plain citizen
4 years ago

The way for Wales to be pre eminent in the UK is for it to be the commercial, financial and industrial powerhouse of the UK. Something which ‘Mike’ and his colleagues of the Cardiff elite show absolutely no signs of achieving. Perhaps his party hasn’t been in power long enough?
If you look at the progress and achievements of the small Baltic states since they got from under the control of the Russian centrally planned monolith you can see what can be done.

j humphrys
j humphrys
4 years ago
Reply to  Plain citizen

Estonia out from under Russia (USSR) and into the EU. Wales out from under England (UK) and …………….?

John Evans
John Evans
4 years ago
Reply to  Plain citizen

I don’t care if Wales is ‘pre eminent’ or a ‘powerhouse’ while it is still a part of the misnomer that is the UK. I want Wales to be preeminent and a powerhouse for itself thanks.

Wrexhamian
Wrexhamian
4 years ago

That mistake, though harmless in itself, tells you everything you need to know about the English media’s attitude towards this country.

Jase
Jase
4 years ago

Most people in wales don’t know who he is never mind the rest of the country

Ceri
Ceri
4 years ago
Reply to  Jase

That’s a great excuse for a news org isn’t it?! Duw mowr, this must’ve been tough for you to decide how to respond to this one – ‘on the one hand, these guys are offended that yet another careless slip up about Cymru has happened but, then again, most of them don’t really support old Mike Drakeingham’…how’s your head? This conundrum is way beyond the cognitive ability of a troll. Paracetamol?

Jase
Jase
4 years ago
Reply to  Ceri

More people watch it in wales than S4C is welsh mush

Ceri
Ceri
4 years ago
Reply to  Jase

Even The Internet Research Institute’s bots would sound more convincing than that.

Wrexhamian
Wrexhamian
4 years ago
Reply to  Ceri

Anwybyddu fo, Ceri. He’ll keep this up all evening until the Special Brew kicks in. There’s a deep-seated resentment of the Cymri there somewhere. He’s a serial pseudonym-changer, to give the misleading immpression that there’s more than one of him.

Poor old Drakeford’s probably going to be saddled with his own new monicker for a while. I now call him Mikey D.

Ceri
Ceri
4 years ago
Reply to  Wrexhamian

The more he and his ilk speaks, the more unionism as a whole gets tinged. The commenting community on Nation and the movement as a whole is improving, it reflects well. The best way to slay a troll is to not take it seriously. But don’t ignore it! In the dark, they multiply!

Eifion
Eifion
4 years ago
Reply to  Jase

Rest of the country ? Pa wlad Jase?

Jonathan Gammond
Jonathan Gammond
4 years ago

At least it was described as Breaking News!!!

Cymro
Cymro
4 years ago

Through out this crisis all we have heard from the media and politicians is England England England plus Scotland Scotland not once have I heard from the London based media and Parliament anything concerning the crisis is Cymru ….. Mark Drakford needs to get his act together and look North on how to do this to the benifit of our Nation

Rhosddu
Rhosddu
4 years ago
Reply to  Cymro

Cue Gordon Brown, Man of Destiny…

John Ellis
John Ellis
4 years ago

The hard fact is that very few in England have even heard of Mr Drakeford. Indeed. I’d guess that most English folk are blissfully completely unaware that Wales has a government and a First Minister. Even worse, I’d hazard a guess that a fair number of folk living in Wales are almost equally as unaware, which is one of the problems facing Welsh devolution. In the aftermath of the Covid 19 crisis I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the Westminster Tories, on the back of their 80 seat majority and their electoral successes in Wales last December, didn’t take… Read more »

j Humphrys
j Humphrys
4 years ago
Reply to  John Ellis

John, notice the Clwyd South Conservative’s comment? I detect some movement.

Ceri
Ceri
4 years ago
Reply to  j Humphrys

j Humphys – link to the quote?

j Humphrys
j Humphrys
4 years ago
Reply to  Ceri

Oh, I was ref. to last sentence in article.

Ceri
Ceri
4 years ago
Reply to  j Humphrys

Ha! I must have skimmed over the attribution, I thought it was Tim Price c**t’d. There we go.

John Ellis
John Ellis
4 years ago
Reply to  j Humphrys

I do agree that there has been some movement, though I suspect that a fair amount of it derives from the fact that after over two decades of devolution there are now senior Welsh Tories with a vested interest in the continuance of the Senedd – career turkeys being instinctively disinclined to vote for Christmas! I notice that even Janet Finch-Saunders, who in ideology and type strikes me as fairly typical of the post-Thatcher strain of Conservativism, regularly takes opportunity via the media to affirm her wholehearted support for devolution. But somehow I’m always left doubting whether that support at… Read more »

j Humphrys
j Humphrys
4 years ago
Reply to  John Ellis

I wonder how many bods would know the name of new Labour leader, etc?

John Ellis
John Ellis
4 years ago
Reply to  j Humphrys

You have a point there! 😉

Mike Jenkins
Mike Jenkins
4 years ago

This is surely not the major point. The main point is that Gething and Drakeford have abandoned targets for testing in Cymru and refused to carry out testing in Care Homes. People will die as a result of these erroneous responses. It’s sheer madness!

John Ellis
John Ellis
4 years ago
Reply to  Mike Jenkins

I can in part see the First Minister’s point: there is actually little to be gained from testing residents who are asymptomatic in care homes which have had no incidences of Covid-19 infection: all it can reveal is a person’s infectivity or otherwise at the moment that the test was carried out. In no way does the test prevent that person from becoming infected at some later point. And there’s a further issue upon which Mr Drakeford didn’t touch: the impact on residents of having their throats and noses swabbed. That would inevitably create fear and consternation among the frail… Read more »

Mike Deem
Mike Deem
4 years ago

Jeremy Vine described him as “the guy from Wales.”

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