First Minister to lobby Chancellor over lack of funding for railways in Wales
Wales has been “short-changed” when it comes to funding for railways, the First Minister said, as she pledged to beat a path to the Chancellor’s door.
Eluned Morgan said she had discussed consequential funding for the HS2 project with Rachel Reeves during the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, adding that the Chancellor was in “listening mode”.
The HS2 project has caused tensions in Wales since it was first announced, largely due to the fact it was designated an England and Wales project despite the scheme not including any Welsh territory.
Plaid Cymru has called for Wales to receive £4 billion in consequential funding, in line with the proportional funding that both Scotland and Northern Ireland received as a result of the project.
Conversation
Ms Morgan told the PA news agency: “Well it’s definitely an issue that we haven’t given up on, an issue that I raised with the Chancellor.
“I think it is important for there to be recognition that when it comes to rail infrastructure we do feel that Wales has been short-changed, and it’ll be interesting to see how that conversation develops.
“But already the UK Government has made massive commitments to better infrastructure, rail developments in particular, in North Wales. So again, that’s UK Labour helping out directly, in a way that didn’t happen under the Tories.”
Asked whether the Chancellor was receptive to boosting funding for rail infrastructure in Wales, Ms Morgan replied: “I think we’re all in talking and listening mode at the moment.
“She’s got some tough decisions to make, she has to balance the books at a time where she has been left with a £22 billion black hole.
“So there’s lots of people beating a path to her door, and I as First Minister will do that as well.”
Earlier this month, Plaid Cymru’s leader Rhun ap Iorwerth called on the First Minister to ask Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to introduce a new model to calculate funding to replace the Barnett formula.
Fair funding
Ms Morgan said she is “having conversations” on how Wales is funded, adding that “a fair funding system” is essential and the ability to borrow money would be “helpful” to the Welsh Government.
With Senedd elections set to take place in 2026, Ms Morgan was asked whether she was concerned about Reform UK’s popularity in Wales.
She said: “We are going to take the next Senedd elections very seriously, we’re already starting to prepare for that, it’s going to be a very different election because it’s going to be based on a proportional representation system, which does shift the way that people will be elected and yes, we’re concerned not just with Reform but all the other parties.”
She added: “I’ve been on a listening exercise throughout the summer, across the whole of Wales, listening to the people – raw, unfiltered – to hear what are the things that matter to them.
“I brought that back into the centre of Government and set up four priorities that we’re going to focus on, the people’s priorities, which means that we are entirely in line with what they want and I hope that will help us to win the trust and retain the trust of people in Wales.”
Ms Morgan, who was appointed Wales’s leader last month, said the schemes Labour has successfully introduced are often “taken for granted”.
She said: “We give free medicines to people in Wales, and free car parking when people go to hospitals, free bus passes for the over-60s.
“All of these things, people take for granted but it’s really important we remind people what a difference Labour makes to their lives.”
On the Welsh Government’s plans to reach one million Welsh language speakers by 2050, Ms Morgan said being “non-judgmental about the quality and standard of someone’s Welsh is really, really important”.
Ms Morgan, who grew up in Ely, Cardiff, said that “almost everyone” she knows who went to a Welsh language school feels that “unless you mutate correctly, speak in a very appropriate way” it is not good enough.
“I think we need to make sure that we are giving licence to people to just have a go, and any kind of attempt is a good attempt, and to back and support that,” she added.
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I’ll make a prediction … Reeves and Morgan will announce some funding way short of the billions we are owed and proclaim it as a great Labour victory.
Ar y iaith, mae rhaid rhoi stop i’r naratif twp hyn. Ry’n ni’n creu rhyw mytholeg ffug am heddlu iaith sy’n troi Cymry mewn i lanast o nerfau. Mae’n rwtsh pur. Mae’n wir bod diffyg hyder ac wrth gwrs mae angen cefnogi pobl … ond stop creu’r argraff bod na rhyw ddosbarth o Gymry’n mynd o gwmpas yn beirniadu iaith siaradwyr eraill. Mae’n gwneud drwg i ni.
It’s good to see that the Prif Weinidog has seen that Cymru has been short changed in terms of railway funding, and hopefully something substantial will come from that. But, as you say, it’s more than likely we’ll get fobbed off with crumbs yet again… A more suitable means of funding than the Barnett Formula has been needed ever since the Barnett Formula, which was only ever a back of a fag packet, short term solution, was implemented in 1978… Supposedly to be looked at again after devolution, much like the county structure post 1972 Local Government Act was to… Read more »
Spot on Padi. Labour like to bang on about the UK as an example of solidarity and redistributionism. Sheesh! I’d like to get hold of whatever they’re taking! Can’t see it myself unless they mean solidarity with and redistribution to the City and the wealthy 🤷🏻 If the UK is to be what they claim it is, they’d start investing in the Welsh economy and get us up to the same standards as the UK average at least. But of course, they never do. Typical Labour. Why do something useful when a bunch of fine rhetoric allows you to display… Read more »
As an example of how soft Reeves and Starmer are likely to turn out in their dealings with non doms and other super rich coves, the F.T has run a disclosure, probably based on a leak. Such leaks are used to offer comfort to those fat cats ducking and diving out of various jurisdictions as part of their self enrichment plans. The article hides behind a paywall although it may slip into general access within days. I would have paid up but I’ve re-tuned my budgets since losing the WFA !
Wales will get nothing, Reeves will turn her listening ears off and bring to the first ministers attention that there is a 22 billion black hole to fill thank you very much for your support, and goodbye.
Morgan could get a flogging from Reeves and she would still describe it as “a fine example of collaborative working between our two great regimes”. It’s getting more like 1960’s and 70’s Eastern Europe with each passing week.
That could be a possibility.
Ms Morgan would have to prove that she can stand up to the UK bureaucracy.
Yes, it does look like the one party central bureaucracy in Wales.
We must work towards breaking away from this UK bureaucracy.
Remember, those USSR regimes didn’t last much more than ten years,
the UK must collapse even sooner.
Our only future will be with a Plaid Cymru government after 2026.
That 22 billion black hole was caused by the Tory unfunded tax cuts which you could reverse without much pain should you desire to take that option. Instead, you hold the tax threshold at £12,500/annum drawing many low paid into taxation for the 1st time; this is due to inflation. The Welsh government needs to use the carrot and the stick approach in negotiations. With 90 Senedd members we could build the institutions, leave the UK to it, and run our own country independently. We could be free to join EFTA, EEA and EU and protect industry, business and jobs… Read more »
Don’t get taken in by the “£22bn black hole” fib. It’s a construct to suit Reeves and Co.’s play to the super rich gallery. Bleed the public dry with taxation, cuts to services, austerity, the whole mix of assaults on our ability to live reasonably well. Done to enable the uber-wealthy elites to carry on untroubled by any “socialist” tax grab on their assets and incomes, which are already sheltered by all sorts of mitigation and evasion schemes..
Good job not many of the Labour Party have any grasp of astrophysics, they’d realise that the black hole theory is wrong.
Actually a financial black hole would be more like an enormous mountain of money distorting the economic space-time around it.
It would seem that the very existence of the ‘black hole’ is somewhat overstated, and certainly not the surprise Starmer & Co claim that it is: https://fullfact.org/live/2024/sep/labour-22bn-black-hole/
Interesting, like having a magic lamp you could rub and out would pop an 18 million quid penthouse…
Quote: “lack of funding for railways in Wales”. Eluned, I don’t know whether you have noticed but there is a lack of funding for everything in Wales not just railways.
Good luck with that YOU WILL NOT GET ANYTHING just like with the tories the common denomanator is both Tory and Labour are unionist Party and will do nothing and give nothing to Wales
What about the unfair decision were Scotland and Ireland get to keep the money from the crown estates but Wales doesn’t get any of that money why???
FM Eluned Morgan is deluding herself if she thinks UK Labour will reverse the Conservative decision that stole billions from Wales in HS2 consequential.
This is a party she supports as First Minister of Wales. A party that’s become so anti-Welsh and anti-devolution, who although power for literally weeks are embroiled in corruption, who are reneging on manifesto pledges daily. They are untrustworthy and unfit to govern.
Either you and Welsh Labour serve us the Welsh people or are you merely obedient lapdogs tethered to your London master Keir Starmer’s leash. Remember, country over party. Which is it Eluned?
The bill that made HS2 an England & Wales project was voted through with the support of Welsh Labour MP’s. Those total boneheads wouldn’t know what was good for Wales if it kicked them in the tail bone.
King Canute had a better chance of stopping the Sea.