NEWPORT West’s AM Rosemary Butler received a formal complaint from the Liberal Democrats after she told one of their AMs to take her hand off her hip during a Senedd debate.

As Presiding Officer of the National Assembly, Dame Rosemary told Eluned Parrott AM, ‘Take your hand off your hip. Ask the question.”

Ms Parrott said today: “We didn’t feel that it was appropriate. My party leader has written to the Presiding Officer.

“I’m deeply disappointed by what happened and I’m particularly disappointed because I was raising an issue that is incredibly important to my constituents, the issue of funding cuts to music education services and the privatisation of music.

“Facile arguments about how somebody stands don’t really help and as I say I was very disappointed by that particular intervention.

“We haven’t yet had a response from the Presiding Officer.”

She added: “I think in terms of the way we see this Assembly it is not helpful for the focus to be on incidents like this. We need to get beyond this to a situation where we are talking about the things that actually mean something to people. It’s the substance that matters, not the way that substance is delivered.”

A spokesman for the Presiding Officer said at the time: “It is part of the Presiding Officer’s role to maintain order in the chamber, and that is what she was doing.”