How a pragmatic Plaid Cymru can win power
Ifan Morgan Jones
The last few months have felt like something of a boom time for the Welsh national movement – at least, within our own social media bubble.
Several new groups have sprung up or built up a head of steam, such as Yes Cymru and Labour4IndyWales.
It’s a sign of a healthy national movement that such groups exist. But I also wonder whether the sprouting of so many of them within such a short time is a coincidence.
The cross-party Yes Cymru campaign, and the more pragmatic Labour4IndyWales, may well be less a show of strength and more a symptom of Plaid Cymru’s inability to put its finger where the electorate is.
Plaid Cymru has now had a long run of disappointing electoral performances, going back to the early days of devolution.
So what is Plaid Cymru’s problem? Why is the party failing to break through?
In my opinion, there are two fundamental issues:
- Plaid Cymru are trying to communicate a whole set of arguments at once which, due to the lack of a strong Welsh media, they simply don’t have the bandwidth to do. They have very, very limited opportunities to get their message across. Which means that their message needs to be focused, consistent and very straightforward.
- In many ways, the party’s core is fundamentally misaligned politically and culturally with the nation they want to speak for. So even when they do get their arguments across, many do not appeal to the electorate.
Although I disagree with the plan to set up a new party, I think Royston Jones, in his article here, elaborates on a great deal of the second problem.
Plaid Cymru are seen as having lost touch with the ‘left behind’ in society, i.e. the working class in post-industrial communities or rural communities that are dying on their feet.
Fundamentally, it’s because Plaid Cymru are a ‘front’ row party in a ‘back row’ country.
| Plaid Cymru core | The average Welshman |
| Socially very liberal | Socially mildly conservative |
| University degree | High school education |
| Mainly Welsh-speaking | English-speaking |
| Primarily north and west based | South-east based |
| Mainly middle-class | Working class |
This misalignment means that Plaid Cymru appeals to a niche within a niche. The core vote of left-wing Welsh speaking voters make up around 10-15% of the voting population, which is essentially what they got in the General Election.
But, I hear the middle-class Plaid Cymru intellectual cry, aren’t we all for helping those in the left column? It’s us that are anti-austerity, anti-bedroom tax, pro lifting the cap on public spending, etc.
Isn’t it just a matter of convincing people that immigration is good for the economy? That Wales did well out of the EU? That they’re being taken by a ride by a cabal of globalists?
Can’t they see that we know better?
Austerity
This is the wrong approach, because:
- Again, Plaid Cymru just doesn’t have the bandwidth to change people’s minds on allof these issues.
- Disagreeing with the electorate on a myriad of issues just emphasises the divide between the party and those whose votes they’re chasing.
The voters in the right-hand column aren’t necessarily wrong; they just disagree, for their own perfectly valid reasons.
Let’s take public spending as an example. If it wasn’t already obvious then Brexit should have made it so: There is a lot of antipathy to the way money public is spent.
This is hard for the middle-classes to understand. Isn’t our generosity what is keeping struggling people just above the bread line? Without that, people would be destitute. We have their best interests at heart.
But think about what people see. What they see is the country’s administrative class doing very well out of public spending.
While they’re gorging on a feast, the ‘left behind’ are thrown a fish a day to keep them from starving. And the message is that they should be happy with their one fish.
People are fed up of living on a fish a day – they want someone to give them a fishing lesson, and buy them a damned rod.
Having to depend on that one fish is embarrassing. What people want is an opportunity, and work.
When you tell them ‘but Wales got £200m from the EU’, what they hear is ‘you should be thankful to these foreigners for showing pity on you’.
People don’t want pity. They want independence. Personal and national. They want to stand on their own feet.
It gobsmacks me that farmers would risk 80% of their income, which comes from EU farming subsidies, to support Brexit.
But it shows the depths to which people loathe dependency. It’s degrading and it offers no hope of improvement, no way out. Any change is better.
This doesn’t mean not spending money. But it means building a nation where hard work is seen to pay off rather than on keeping people just about ticking over from day to day.
Anti-austerity isn’t enough – people want to see a difference in how money is spent.
This is a fundamental difference in worldview and telling people they’re wrong to think the way they do, that we know better, just won’t cut it.
The core message
The Plaid Cymru leadership can overcome these two core problems if they focus their message on the one issue that cuts across these boundaries.
They do have a core message that does this. Essentially, it is: ‘Wales is being neglected and treated unfairly by Westminster (Tory and Labour) – only a vote for Plaid Cymru can change that’.
It is an anti-establishment message that resonates. It also has the advantage of being true, and there is a daily stream of evidence to show that it is true.
And the message hits home whether you’re:
- Young or old
- Welsh speaking or not
- Live in north or south Wales
- Middle class or working class
- Left wing or right wing
Plaid Cymru have never lacked for good ideas. Welsh nationalism has always been an intellectual pursuit.
However, they need to appreciate that a) most of the electorate will never hear about these ideas, and b) they won’t necessarily appeal to the worldview of the majority of the Welsh population.
So, every time anyone within Plaid Cymru has an idea, they should consider:
- Does this advance the cause of our central message about Westminster’s mistreatment of Wales?
- Do most people in Wales actually agree with our approach, or are we just appealing to well-educated, liberal intellectuals like ourselves?
Plaid Cymru don’t have the resources to fight every battle. And for a national party, anything beyond the central message is superfluous.
Pragmatism
Modern Welsh nationalism has its roots in the religious nationalism of the 19th century, and I think this still shows.
There is a strong moral code at its heart, but in the cut-throat world of politics, such a code is also very restrictive. Sometimes you have to be pragmatic.
The short-term dopamine hit of being right is too often favoured over the long-term strategy that will do the greater good in the long term.
There are a whole host of policy areas where Plaid Cymru are right, but to no avail, as they’re not in power.
Votes for 16-year-olds? Is it right? Yes. Does it advance the central argument? No. Does it divide Welsh voters? Yes. Throw it overboard.
Getting rid of the Royal Family? Is it right? Yes. Does it advance the central argument? No. Does it divide Welsh voters? Yes. Don’t mention it.
Freedom of movement? Is it right? Yes. Does it advance the central argument? No. Does it divide Welsh voters? Many are against it. Acknowledge their opinions.
Working with the Labour party? Is it right? Sometimes. Does it advance the central argument? No, it undermines it. Does it divide Welsh voters? Yes. Don’t do it.
‘Strip the barnacles off the boat’ as Lynton Crosby is apparently fond of saying.
Following this approach may mean that Plaid Cymru lose opportunities to do good in the meantime.
But it’s arguable that spending time, resources and political capital dealing with symptoms of Wales’ predicament are less important than focusing on the root cause.
Which has been the most successful nationalist party of the last two decades? No, it’s not the SNP, but UKIP.
UKIP are, and have long been, something of a joke as a political party. They had no coherent policies, apart from one: Leaving the EU.
They repeated this argument every opportunity they got, ad nauseam. But when they were saying it for the 500th time someone was hearing it for the first time.
As their arguments gained traction and became more mainstream, the press gave them aplatform, and they continued repeating it again and again until they got what they wanted.
If UKIP had a whole host of well-developed but divisive policies that would have split their base into smaller segments, they wouldn’t have been half as successful.
Their very ambiguity on anything beyond their one, central policy was eventually their greatest strength.
Contrast this with Plaid Cymru. When you decide to support the party, you are asked not only to support the central argument that Westminster is menglecting Wales, but a whole left-wing, intellectual way of seeing the world: high public spending, republican, pro-immigration, and socially liberal.
A national party by defeneition needs to be a bigger tent.
Building bridges
The middle-class intelligentsia worry a lot about the growing political divide in the West, but they think less about what they themselves could do to bridge it.
The onus is put on others to see the error of their ways – to stop being stupid. Again, I’m as guilty of this as anyone else.
But what are national movements for? Ultimately, they’re about finding common ground between the competing cultural, economic and demographic interests within a nation.
They’re always driven by the middle classes because that’s the group that has the leisure time, and education, to think about and articulate these issues.
However, to take that step from being an intellectual pursuit to a mass movement they need to appeal to a broad swathe of society. That means meeting the electorate halfway.
It means sometimes being pragmatic, and agreeing to disagree, even when you’re bursting wanting to say that something isn’t right.
If Plaid Cymru is to succeed, it needs to become a much more streamlined operation. It needs to push one issue and, on all others, find the electoral middle ground.
This isn’t populism – it’s democracy. It’s listening to the people and responding to them.
If we don’t meet people’s concerns halfway, if we talk down at them, we will see the rise of a different kind of nationalism – Trump and other neo-fascists.
Because, ultimately, people would really rather a dangerous authoritarian who understands them than a lovely person with a social conscience who doesn’t.
If Plaid Cymru can become a pragmatic party willing to compromise on its point of view for the greatest eventual good, it can win over the voters and get to grips with what’s really ailing Wales.
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Bravo! Or should I just say ..brave!
Good article Ifan. I am for independence NOW. Compare Eire’s GDP per capita on accession to the EEC in 1973 to Wales’ GDP per capita in 1973 and they were at 80% of our level. Today Ireland’s GDP per capita is more than double Wales’. This disparity arose while both countries were in the EEC/EC/EU. On this measure the EU – alongside Westminster and our “membership”of the U.K. – has done very little for Wales. We need to be truly independent. However the huge stumbling block for Plaid is not that 22% of Welsh people were born in England. It… Read more »
I agree with most of what is written here by Ifan, I don’t agree that you can effectively compare Plaid with UKIP the reason they got traction is in large part to the big money backers they had, but I take the point that they were very focussed on one issue and their collatoral messages were filtered through that core issue. I don’t think the comments about English migration are as important as all that, let the new ultra nationalist party wet their pants about that, many English people are members of PC. Issues of identity need to be downplayed… Read more »
Well Plaid has around 8000 members. I’ve been a member for half of my life, been to many conferences, hundreds of meetings and I know for a fact that their are far fewer English-born members of Plaid, proportionately, than English-born residents of Wales. The people in the Valleys (1 millions of them) fear their identity and communities being eroded by non-UK immigration rather than English immigration. Their fears about immigration are entirely different to those of Fro Gymraeg. English people in Wales (and England) will inevitably see, in many individual cases, a desire for Welsh independence as being anti-English. And… Read more »
I think you’ve pretty much encompassed Plaid Cymru’s problems here – although I’m sure you’d concede you’re not the first to do so, many people have for many years and the party has chose to do nothing but sail on. There is one glaring omission above, even if it’s not something that can be readily rectified – their politicians. The Assembly group are pathetic – they’re constantly fighting one another, involved in grudges; those with intellect lack political intuition and those with political intuition are intellectually lacking. One minute they’re practically in coalition and the next they go into full… Read more »
What could you do about it? You could stand to be elected as a Plaid Cymru politician, Jason, as I am sure you would transform the calibre of the group.
And if it’s a ‘no thank you’, then create your own movement, or if not, stop moaning.
Ha, yes, “Why don’t YOU put yourself in the firing line then?” said the person who won’t even use their real name in the comments section of a website! I’m sure if I’d talked the same way about another party it wouldn’t elicit the same response, no? There is absolutely **nothing** wrong or hypocritical with someone expecting their elected representatives to perform well without wanting to stand for an election themselves: to say otherwise is ridiculous. If I hired a plumber and he flooded the kitchen then surely I could criticise his performance without wanting to be a plumber myself?… Read more »
The difference is that unless you trained to become a plumber, you would have no idea how to fix your flooded kitchen yourself. With all the pontificating and the criticising that you do, surely you’d be an excellent politician?
If that’s the criteria, then YES!
But in all seriousness, anonymous person, I still don’t think the “you don’t want to do it so stop moaning” holds; unless of course you apply that to the 99% of the population that complains about politicians without any desire to be one also.
The thing is, you never seem to moan about other parties or politicians that don’t seem to hold your views. You obviously feel a great deal of affinity to Welsh nationalism, and dare I say, Plaid Cymru, so much so you have a blog and talk about it all the tme. What baffles me is that you would rather channel your frustrations in that way, which has no real effect, than to actually get involved and change things, which, of course, is the harder way. All the best.
Have you ever tried to get a full time politician to actually listen and absorb your message ? Unless it chimes closely with his/her predisposition ( or in some cases a short cut to a media soundbite or photo op ) you might as well talk to a wall. I still remain to figure out how that party went so bad but it’s got a serious credibility deficit out with us people on the ground. It’s getting to a point where Cymdeithas have a more realistic grip on issues in Wales, and they were branded extremists by the establishment !
Beth am sefydlu grwpiau o fewn Plaid Cymru er mwyn ehangu’r babell yn lle creu grwpiau newydd a all hollti’r bleidlais?
Capitalists for Plaid, Working Class Southeast for Plaid, Anarchists for Plaid, Supporters of HRH the Prince of Wales for Plaid, Inner-City for Plaid, English-border Towns for Plaid, Former Labour Anonymous Help Group for Plaid, Toff Landlords for Plaid, Liberals for Plaid (I’ll join this one), conservatives for Plaid, Brexiteers for Plaid, Mormons for Plaid.
Good analysis of the situation Ifan. But, your solution: more pragmatism, and an unwavering focus on Wales being badly treated by Westminster is just anodyne. Hasn’t that been the tactic for donkey’s years anyway?? How is saying that more loudly going to change anything? For me, Plaid have stagnated and stagnated for years. But, the Welsh Euro vote last year could well prove to be the straw to break the camel’s back- having been caught short by the Welsh public’s response. The problem is now that they are tarnished with having put all their eggs in the Remain camp, when… Read more »
Really interesting perspective. But for every UKIP that was successful with a one-policy strategy lacking political ideology, there is an SNP which was equally successful with a detailed manifesto based on an ideology not traditionally associated with its electorate. I think the only real trend is that in both cases voters have been able to connect the dots and see how they could potentially benefit more from a party’s programme than that of others. Labour’s record in Scotland was objectively uninspiring, and though Europe was a non-issue UKIP were able nonetheless to convince voters that it was, and that it… Read more »
Hi Rhydian. I accept your point, but I think the difference between the SNP and Plaid Cymru is that Scotland had and still has a relatively vibrant media, so the SNP had less trouble getting a more detailed message cross. ‘The 2016 manifesto was an excellent programme for government (e.g. it received commendation from Friends of the Earth for its environmental policies which were “greener than the Green Party”), but Plaid threw it all away by not going 1 step further doing these 2 basic things.’ I think you’ve sort of made my point for me, there. How many votes… Read more »
Very true re the media, but cannot underestimate the SNP’s ground campaign in both the 2007 and 2011 elections. SNP has one of the best on-the-ground operations in the UK. For the Greens – the vote in Scotland for the Greens in 2007 was almost identical to the vote for the Greens in Wales in 2016, and yet the SNP still championed environmentalism, so I think my point is still valid. What the SNP did that Plaid didn’t was actually sell their policies and not just have them written down, although granted that relates to the first point about having… Read more »
As endorced by Friends of the Earth!!. What’s next plaudits from Greenpeace, the Dalai Lama and the National Trust. Just how high does this focus on all things lovely and green rank in the eyes of the voters? I voted Plaid at the last election despite their lack of a cutting edge or lack of general charismatic appeal. I can’t see the connection between Plaid and the people in the area I live – no-one ever talks about the environment or fair pay and lots of other issues that obsess politicians. Focus on things that people obsess about every day,… Read more »
“it received commendation from Friends of the Earth for its environmental policies which were ‘greener than the Green Party'” Yes, and Plaid’s opposition to FGM was another big vote winner. Are you a caricature?
You must have realised by now that FGM is a major issue in any attempt to clearly define our inclusive credentials. After all, this new religious zeal for issues is essential if we are to replace that which we lost with the decline in attendance at Methodist and Baptist chapels. Mind you there remains a confusion as to which of the Jews, Zionists, Islamists, Sunnis or Shias et al, et al are the bigger threat especially as we appear unable to come head on and tell all these “cultures” to shape up or ship out. The more welcoming your posture… Read more »
Thank you, Dafis, I was forgetting transgender toilets, for they talk of naught else in Morriston.
The toilet issue was easy to solve – just desegregate them ! Of course that wasn’t enough for the right on progressives, they went and picked a fight over the colour schemes and the gender specific graffiti that appeared on the walls, doors ceilings etc. This ishoo will rumble on for ages until it transitions into the next fad.
In this piece we are presented with a thesis that politics seems to fall into two approaches.The first posits “here are my beliefs and values and this is how I translate them into political action- gather to me” .The second posits “I can not do anything if not elected and therefore I will say the things that get me elected” . If I am correct in my reading Ifan’s post, he believes that PC are in the former camp and he would like a nationalist party closer to the to other camp with a lot simpler and possibly simplistic message.… Read more »
‘.The second posits “I can not do anything if not elected and therefore I will say the things that get me elected” .’ That’s not quite right – Plaid Cymru have a MASSIVE job to change the public’s mind on one issue – that Wales would be better off as a nation in and of itself. What I’m saying is that this in and of itself is a large enough goal for Plaid given its limited coverage in the media, and that it should focus on that rather than trying to also trying to save the world at the same… Read more »
A very good article. But do you honestly see the majority of their current crop of AM’s being able to curb their virtue signalling on every liberal ishoo which is fashionable for one moment? I do though think that McEvoy is a slightly different breed. But we all know how he was treated.
What are the exact ‘ishoos’ should they drop? I can’t work out what this means alot of the time.
I’m not exactly sure that anyone is arguing for any particular issue to be dropped, but rather pointing out the need to focus on the day to day plight of ordinary people. As Dafis said “The toilet issue was easy to solve – just desegregate them !” End of story. Most of these ‘ishoos’ are things that can be dealt with very easily with no fuss, and basically perhaps a libertarian approach could be taken that if something doesn’t cause any harm, then it’s basically not an issue. And if someone, let’s say a transgender person is subject to say,… Read more »
Sibrydion mawr You have grasped my drift precisely. Thank you for articulating it so well. Diolch.
Neil McEvoy is an interesting one. I think he ‘gets’ all of the above. Unfortunately he seems to rub everyone up the wrong way. I haven’t had experience of this myself but plenty of people have told me that he’s very difficult to work with. If he could temper his abrasive style somewhat (when dealing with fellow Plaid) I think he could do a lot of good within the party. It’s a shame. – Ifan
“Although I disagree with the plan to set up a new party,” As you know a fair few of the people in that movement are ex-Plaid members who’ve been saying much of what you’re saying here for years… decades even. Plaid shows no sign of changing. Maybe a new party will shake them up? Maybe the challenge will stop them taking the nationalist vote for granted? You may disagree with it but it is needed. At this juncture its too late to spend the time trying to change Plaid… because there’ll be resistance and people just not listening because if… Read more »
Interesting you mention Glyndwr banners. It’s not actually been that long that it’s been common to see Glyndwr’s flag at events in large numbers. Glyndwr is perhaps an ideal historical figure for us to use symbolically as part of the national myth, far more so than Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, who tends to appeal more to the political right, and in any case was just another chancer who was out to carve out a feudal fiefdom, just like his Anglo- Norman contemporaries. Ordinary Welsh people would have been just as oppressed by him as by any English overlord. No doubt Glyndwr… Read more »
I think its more of a case that part of the colonisation of Wales means the breaking of our identity. You’ve got to ask yourself why focus was put on Owain? Why was he important? More specifically who was he important too. Lets put a bit of context on him first… his flag: whats on it? Its not just Mathrafal, its Dinefwr as well. It was not enough that he be Mathrafal. His mothers claim as being Dinefwr meant everything. Not only to Owain but his maternal cousins the Tudors of Penmynydd – this would be specifically of use to… Read more »
” I wonder what could be missing…” May I suggest that it’s a matter of Identity which of itself is a bit of a shapeshifter depending on who you are and how you see yourself. I am of “native” stock insofar as I can look back to my great grandparents and find that they were all Welsh speaking, country folk through each successive generation down to me. So part 1 of Identity was easy for me. The missing bit included being passed through an education system that was delivered entirely through the medium of English from 7 to 18, with… Read more »
Oh I didn’t mean for it to sound out like “natives” and ethnicity kind of thing. I don’t believe there is a Welsh ethnicity. What I mean is that the idea of modern Welsh nationalism surfacing in the last 200 years is part and parcel of effects on Welsh identity stemming from the Blue Books and mass immigration from England due to industrialisation. Wales essentially could not facilitate integration in those times – so a half-nationalism (Lets call it Anglo-Welsh – something I include myself in to an extent) evolved from the partial assimilation and some what reinforced by the… Read more »
SNP stuck to their principles through thick and thin, worked hard on establishing a grass roots movement and were not tempted to become a populist movement. I’m probably one of the Welsh speaking middle class North Western members of Plaid. I don’t feel that I can influence on any of their policies. There is a shortage of brain power within politics in Wales. There is nothing inspiring in any of their messages. Whilst I accept the media bandwidth argument, if you don’t have the national press then at least work on the local level. I fear that we don’ have… Read more »
Greenham common and the demise of Plaid!
Some people will understand the cryptics I’m sure. Some very well meaning people were simply tocic
We need a return to beliefs – the things that drove Gwynfor to think of things like celtic leagues and all the test of the romantacisms that are really important and cannot be underestimated.
Here is why Plaid has not developed “Mormons for Plaid” etc. And here is the problem issue (ishoo). The Constitution of Plaid Cymru states all the aims you would expect. BUT there is one condition. 2.2 Sicrhau llewyrch economaidd, cyfiawnder cymdeithasol a lles yr amgylchedd naturiol, yn seiliedig ar sosialaeth ddatganolaidd. Whatever Plaid aims for has to be “based on decentralised socialism”. The problems are obvious. We have no widely understood definition of “decentralised socialism” To restrict Plaid socialism to decentralised socialism cuts it down to a microcosm. Month Python skewered this sort of politics decades ago – “People’s Liberation… Read more »
Those are good points Jonathan – I hadn’t realised this was written into the constitution. But nothing is written in stone. The solution to that is to form a group within Plaid Cymru that would campaign for a constitutional amendment! – Ifan
Insightful piece and I agree with central message that Plaid needs a more focused message with a wider appeal but several points that don’t ring true The fact that Plaid support won’t get above 15% or so if it only appeals to people meeting more or less all the criteria in your left hand column is obviously true. But, without having data to prove it, I suspect that your “average Welshman” meeting more or less all the criteria on the right is quite far from a majority as well. What about e.g. urban middle classes in Cardiff and Swansea (and… Read more »
An excellent piece. I am fed up of having no option to vote for independence other than choosing the Labour-Lite or Labour-fun-sized option. You do not need to be a socialist to want independence, I want independence so that Wales can prosper and grow and in my opinion that largely precludes setting off on a path to a socialist economy. I know others have equally valid (but probably wrong 😉 views, but Independence comes first and all the other stuff comes second. While Plaid campaigns on a manifesto, that Momentum could be happy with, then people will be happy to… Read more »
Ifan You have made the point that 20 organised people could change Plaid from within. Yes they could. I have tried to work out why YesCymru and the New Party don’t do this. I think there are two reasons. 1. “Give me a fulcrum and I can move the world” Archimedes. Sometimes it takes a lawyer to point out the fulcrum, the key point. Yes – just change the aims of Plaid. Ok, you have the target. What happens if you shoot for the now clear and obvious target – widen Plaid to all the Welsh? 2. You get an… Read more »
Sorry to say this Ifan but almost seems as if you’re suggesting plaid should become a welsh version of ukip and the welsh electorate will come flocking to the plaid banner? So it’s worth asking how many constituencies did the kippers win in the last uk general election? zero i believe, meanwhile the disastrously progressive plaid equaled its best ever performance in a uk general election. Regarding plaid’s position on brexit well its very revealing i think that since the brexit vote plaid is the only party challenging unionists at westminster from using brexit to roll back welsh devolution –… Read more »
Left, Right, Left, Right! The sound of an individual indentured to the British political system.
Once again, a thought provoking price. Plaid lacks a core central message, as identified. At the 20:20 Vision fringe at Conference, I spoke about this. Sovereignty should be at the heart of everything we do. That’s the glue which should glue a much needed movement together.
Leigh Richards wrote: “…….meanwhile the disastrously progressive plaid equaled its best ever performance in a uk general election”
Once you made that claim, I knew that it wasn’t really worth reading the rest of your comment. Unfortunately, I did. Two wasted minutes of my life I’ll never get back. But fair play, you did make me laugh. 😉
Do you honestly believe what you wrote in the above sentence?
Shame on Nation.Cymru for repeating the insidious anti-McEvoy whispering from the leadership, excusing their hostility with ‘very difficult to work with’ when on the ground we find the opposite. “Neil McEvoy is an interesting one. I think he ‘gets’ all of the above. Unfortunately he seems to rub everyone up the wrong way. I haven’t had experience of this myself but plenty of people have told me that he’s very difficult to work with. ” “rub everyone up the wrong way” ?? McEvoy’s fringe meeting at the September Plaid Conference was packed out and showed the greatest ferment of the… Read more »
Hi Max. This has nothing to do with the Plaid Cymru leadership. I’ve never met Neil McEvoy personally, but I keep being told, by a lot of people who have and are not part of the PC leadership, and independently of each other, that he’s difficult to work with. They give me examples of specific instances where he has said or done things that rubbed them up the wrong way. I know these people well and have no reason to believe that they’re all part of a plot against Neil McEvoy. As I said, this is a shame as I… Read more »
You shouldn’t be making assertions like that. Some blokes down the pub who I know very well and who have worked with him said he was great to work with. I don’t think I have a reason to believe these people are in anyway part of a plot to see him elevated. So that cancels out the nonsense you said.
McEvoy is a sound political practitioner with an eye and ear cocked to respond to his constituents. Not given to engaging in the spurious empty promotion of himself or fashionable causes. Lots of those prancing poseurs from his own and other parties would do well to learn from him.