Labour’s Welsh sanctuary: a masterclass in political self-harm

David Taylor

Few things are more dispiriting than watching politicians you broadly support shoot themselves in both feet. Wales’s Nation of Sanctuary initiative has become a case study in how the urge to appear different from England, combined with weak political judgment, can turn a popular policy into a self-inflicted crisis.

Since 2019, the Welsh Government has spent around £55 million under the Nation of Sanctuary banner. The vast majority has gone to supporting Ukrainian refugees who arrived through legal UK government schemes. Helping Ukrainians fleeing Putin’s invasion commands near-universal public support. There was no controversy in the policy itself.

So how did Welsh Labour manage to make a mess of it?

Moral leadership

The problem lies not in what was done, but in how it was presented. Rather than making a straightforward case for supporting Ukraine, ministers tried to turn the programme into a statement of Welsh moral leadership. A practical humanitarian commitment was wrapped in sweeping rhetoric about Wales as a “sanctuary” for all refugees and asylum seekers, implying a compassion that set it apart from Westminster.

This played well with the Cardiff Bay establishment but left the policy wide open to attack. Reform UK and others now portray the programme as an open-door immigration scheme. The claim is false, but it resonates because ministers blurred those boundaries when it suited them. It is hard to rebut misinformation when it rests on your own exaggeration.

With Reform seemingly on course for victory in the Caerphilly by-election, Welsh Labour and Plaid Cymru are now protesting loudly about the public’s supposed misunderstanding of the policy. But the confusion is entirely of their own making. The narrative now being weaponised against them is the same one they promoted when it played in their favour: vague, self-congratulatory language that was never grounded in what the programme actually did.

Broader weakness

This episode exposes a broader weakness in Welsh politics. The problem isn’t that Wales copies Westminster, but that it constantly feels the need to prove it doesn’t. Policy is too often driven by the desire to appear distinct and morally superior rather than by what works. The result is a system that mistakes gesture for governance – guided by vanity, ideology and the reflex to sound kinder than England, whatever the outcome.

For years, this culture went largely unchallenged. With limited scrutiny, a comfortable political class and a weak opposition, the Senedd has become a place where appearance too often outranks achievement. The Nation of Sanctuary was merely the latest example: grand claims masking thin delivery. But that complacency is catching up with them. When every initiative is sold as a moral crusade, even a small misstep becomes a crisis of credibility.

Political crossfire

The real tragedy is that Ukrainian refugees are now caught in the political crossfire. Will the Welsh Government learn from this? Unlikely. The instinct to differentiate for its own sake is too deeply embedded in the political ecosystem, a culture that prizes theatre over results and validation within the bubble over credibility beyond it. Surrounded by the same advisers, lobbyists and commentators who reward moral signalling, ministers and Members alike have come to mistake approval inside their circle for trust outside it.

After a quarter of a century in charge, Wales’s political establishment has run out of excuses. The Nation of Sanctuary was meant to celebrate Welsh compassion; it now stands as proof of something else – that when politics becomes a performance, even good intentions end in failure.

David Taylor is a former Welsh Labour special adviser