Drakeford’s Home Rule plan ‘would not solve problem of Tory governments’ says Adam Price

Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price has accused the First Minister of “looking backwards not forward” on the topic of Wales’ constitutional future as he was urged to back independence for Wales.

Challenging Mark Drakeford during today’s FMQs, the Plaid Cymru Leader said that it was independence – not Home Rule – that would solve Wales’s “democratic deficit”.

Last Friday, Mark Drakeford called for “home rule” for Wales within the United Kingdom.

But Adam Price said that would not solve the problem that Wales never voted Conservative but had a Conservative Government in Westminster “for two thirds of the time”.

He pointed to comments by Labour for Indy Wales head Bob Lloyd who said that “for the last 100 years Wales has voted for a socialist party in domestic elections yet hasn’t got what it’s asked for.”

Plaid Cymru Leader Adam Price MS said there was no reason to think Wales’ circumstances would changed soon without independence.

“The First Minister describes independence as a nineteenth century response to a 21st century problem, going on to propose home rule instead, itself an idea from the 1880s,” he said.

“The problem is that Home rule will never solve the Welsh democratic deficit – only independence can do that.

“Westminster has never seen itself as Wales’ partner in constitutional terms. Independence will ensure all decisions affecting Wales are made in Wales and to enable Wales to become a better, fairer and more equal nation.”

‘Radical redrawing’

Earlier, Mark Drakeford had described the break-up on the UK as a “real and present danger and a solution is urgently needed”.

“A sustainable, modern UK is one where our prosperity and life chances are raised up by the practice of solidarity, not reduced by division and attempts to recreate a union where its component nations are expected to take orders from the centre,” he told the National.

“Independence is a 19th Century response to a 21st Century problem – it is a slogan not a solution. It asks the people of Wales to start with a conclusion without the evidence, risking the welfare of those our party exists to support.

“Wales’ future is best secured through a radical redrawing of the United Kingdom’s constitution to recognise that it is a voluntary association of four nations.

“An association where power is dispersed, not centralised, where as much as possible, decisions which affect people’s daily lives are made as close to the people as they can be taken, but where there are fiscal and financial mechanisms to pool resources and to share rewards.”