Not even the snow and ice could stop this general election year from announcing its arrival. Within the first few days of the New Year, the campaigning began and already there’s one word which looks set to dominate debate in this most exciting of elections. The word is ‘cuts’ and we had better get used to it.

Britain can’t afford to keep on spending like there’s no tomorrow – Labour has built a mountain of public debt that must be cleared sooner, rather than later. The consequences of allowing that debt to rise could be devastating for the British economy, as its fragile recovery continues.

But, though there will be cuts, we’re talking about cutting a very large cake and there’s an awful lot you can do with what’s left. What matters now, is priorities.

So the question Welsh voters need to ask is, ‘After you have made your cuts, what will you do with what’s left?’ On this question, the difference between the three parties could not be greater. Welsh voters really do have a genuine choice at this election.

I’m proud to say the Liberal Democrats have squared up to the debt we must tackle. Both Nick Clegg and Vince Cable have been clear on the tough choices we would make, choices that some media observers suggested would cause our party members to rise up in protest. In reality, our members have understood and accepted the need to prioritise while money is tight.

The core value defining our priorities is fairness –using what little money is available to tackle inequalities that have grown under Labour and would surge further under a Tory government.

Our fair tax plans represent the only clear hope of addressing the widening gap between rich and poor. In Wales, around half of children living in poverty, live in working households. That’s a damning indictment of a tax system Labour refuses to fix and the Tories would make more unfair still by cutting taxes for the rich.

By introducing a tax on mansions worth more than £2m and closing loopholes for wealthy tax dodgers, Liberal Democrats could afford to lift over 200,000 Welsh workers out of paying tax altogether and save more than 800,000 workers £700 in income tax a year.

Contrast Nick Clegg’s straight-talking approach with the neatly spun speeches of Cameron and Brown and the real election battle lines becomes clear.

In a recent speech, Gordon Brown outlined all the fantastic things Labour would do if re-elected – but said nothing of how they might pay for any of it. Brown paused only to tell the audience that ‘some departments’ would need to be cut. I suspect, we may never find out what, if anything, he had in mind for the chop.

Meanwhile, the Conservatives’ philosophy is ‘cut everything, cut big and cut it now.’ The impact of cutting an estimated 12%, across all budgets, beginning immediately would see crucial services in health and education suffer unnecessarily. Quite simply, this approach reveals a complete lack of priorities – and priorities, as I have outlined, reflect values.

No Welsh voter should be seduced by this brazen Labour and Tory electioneering. When I’m out campaigning, everybody I meet tells me they know tough choices must be made – and change is urgently needed.

Look closely and it’s clear Wales is still reeling from a decade of fantasy finance. There are 126,000 unemployed people in Wales, half of who are under 25. House repossessions in Wales surged to 40,000 in 2008 and UK household debt remains the highest in Europe.

Amazingly, Labour and the Tories still see the City of London as panacea, hoping that a new credit free-for-all can start a new boom, this time, with a happy ending.

We all know this flawed over-reliance on the City has had its day. Talking to business in Wales, it’s clear to me that cheap credit glossed over the structural failings in the economy. For this reason, my focus is on making Wales a strong place to do business and the best place to grow your business.

It’s investment in skills and infrastructure that will achieve these aims, but the Labour-Plaid government in the National Assembly has forced a 5% cut on further and higher education institutions, cuts that threaten to devastate our skills base and research expertise, just as we emerge from recession. We would reverse this using as yet unallocated health funding, in the context of a Welsh NHS whose finance chiefs admit £1billion is not being spent effectively.

And just a few weeks ago, my colleague Jenny Randerson, called for the subsidy of flights between Cardiff and Anglesey to be scrapped so as to improve North-South rail links. Why, we asked, subsidise just over 14,000 flights by £84 a ticket at an annual cost of around £1million?

The Welsh Government could switch tracks and subsidise hundreds of thousands of rail tickets, or improve infrastructure instead. They refuse to act and in doing so, continue to favour the few over the many, folly over fairness. It’s a small example of misplaced priorities creating an unfair Wales. Yes, over the next few months, it’s cuts that will dominate debate, but it’s those priorities that will shape our future.