Welsh Labour: A softer, nicer kind of neglect

Cllr Rhys Mills

Welsh Labour’s tenure since devolution resembles a sitcom that, despite initial promise, should have been cancelled after the second season. The early episodes hinted at innovation and progress, but as seasons passed, the plot stagnated, characters became predictable, and the audience’s patience wore thin.

By the second series, the scriptwriters were out of ideas, the main characters were phoning it in, and yet, somehow, the show got renewed for another 20 years. The first season of devolution came with all the usual fanfare, shiny new logo, some feel-good policies, and the promise of a fresh political era.

Welsh Labour scrapped prescription charges (although I’m pretty sure they stole that from Plaid Cymru) , rejected PFI in hospitals, and briefly entertained the idea that Wales could do things differently. But much like a promising pilot episode that quickly descends into lazy writing and recycled jokes, it soon became clear that their vision of devolution was essentially Westminster Lite: same old economic model, just with more red dragons slapped on it.

Blame

Meanwhile, countries like Slovenia were actually doing the work, raising the minimum wage, strengthening workers’ rights, and reducing poverty. Wales, on the other hand, took a different approach: loudly blaming Westminster for every problem while simultaneously refusing to ask for the powers needed to fix them.

As time went on, Welsh Labour settled into its role as a middle-aged sitcom star who knows they’ll never be written out. Under Carwyn Jones, the government perfected the art of looking busy while doing very little. We were assured that Wales was on a different path to England, yet our public services continued to unravel at roughly the same speed.

Education? A shambles. PISA rankings plummeted, teachers burned out, and reforms were rushed in at the last minute like an essay written at 3am. Finland, meanwhile, took a different route, investing in teachers, scrapping standardised testing, and trusting schools to actually educate rather than just produce statistics. Unsurprisingly, their system became one of the best in the world, while we were left with press releases insisting that this time the curriculum changes would definitely work.

Then came housing, a sector so broken it now functions primarily as a way to funnel money from desperate tenants to landlords who own more properties than they have immediate relatives. Berlin introduced rent controls to stop speculative landlords rinsing working people. The Senedd, on the other hand, looked at the crisis and decided, heroically, to do almost nothing. It’s probably just a coincidence that as of 2023, 26 of the 60 Senedd members happen to be landlords themselves.

‘Bold’

Under Mark Drakeford, the plot became even more predictable. The Senedd proudly announced another round of “bold” policies that turned out to be slightly tweaked versions of things Labour should have done ten years ago.

Take child poverty. Wales has one of the highest rates in the UK, yet the government’s response is best described as a mix of well-meaning concern and a shoulder shrug. Poland managed to slash child poverty by directly increasing cash support for families. Wales, meanwhile, continues to tinker around the edges, offering sympathy and the occasional initiative, but nothing that might fundamentally disrupt the status quo.

The economy? Don’t get me started. Other small nations like the Basque Country have built thriving worker cooperatives that keep wealth in local communities. Wales, in contrast, prefers to roll out the red carpet for multinational corporations that promise investment, take tax breaks, and then leave the moment it’s no longer profitable. It’s like repeatedly lending money to a mate who never pays you back, but each time you convince yourself this time will be different.

Speaking of things that will definitely be different this time, let’s talk about Eluned Morgan. The new First Minister, who promises to take Wales in a bold new direction by… carrying on exactly where her predecessors left off. This is the same Eluned Morgan who, during the last Westminster election, proudly posted a photo of herself holding a sign that read Labour will modernise our NHS…which would have been a powerful message, if she hadn’t been the Welsh Health Minister at the time.

In fairness, Plaid Cymru has managed to push through some genuinely positive policies. The co-operation agreement resulted in free school meals for all primary pupils, a policy that actually helps working families and doesn’t just exist to generate good headlines. It’s a rare example of politicians doing something useful rather than just announcing that something useful might happen at some unspecified future date.

Cheap suits

But here’s where it gets serious. If Welsh Labour continues to shuffle along in this semi-conscious state, a political vacuum is inevitable. And nature abhors a vacuum. Especially one that can be filled by angry men in cheap suits ranting about immigrants while selling off the last remaining bits of the state to their mates.

If we don’t start offering people something better, right-wing populism will be more than happy to step in with the political equivalent of a dodgy payday loan. It sounds appealing at first, but the consequences are horrific.

Michael Sheen once said, “We never got to build a country in the first place.” That thought has lingered with me ever since. The promise of devolution was supposed to be our chance to do just that, yet two decades in, we’re still waiting for the foundations to be laid.

And before anyone asks why I haven’t mentioned Vaughan Gething’s leadership, I hadn’t forgotten him, I could easily think of 200,000 reasons not to. And if you’d care to Google it, you’ll notice Labour doesn’t have the best track record with numbers that start with 20…..

So here’s the question for my friends in Plaid: if Welsh Labour finally collapses under the weight of its own mediocrity, are we ready to step up? Are we bold enough to seize the moment, to go beyond competent management and actually offer a vision of Wales that’s exciting, radical, and worth fighting for?

Because if we’re not, we won’t just be handing the future of Wales to someone else, we’ll be giving it away, wrapped in a bow, to those who care more about power than the people they claim to serve.

Rhys Mills is a Plaid Cymru town councillor and mayor of Blackwood.