Wales

Theresa May is making a last ditch attempt this morning to convince MPs to back her Brexit deal when it’s finally put to a vote tomorrow evening. To do this, the Prime Minister will cite the 1997 referendum on creating the Welsh assembly. In that vote, Yes won by 0.3 percent, on a turnout of just over 50 percent – yet it was still enacted: ‘That result was accepted by both sides, and the popular legitimacy of that institution has never seriously been questioned.’ Alas, Mr S suspects it’s not the best example for May to go on. After that vote, the Tories argued against the creation of the assembly and

Politicians in Wales sometimes complain, at least in private, about the lack of media and public attention they receive. But Andrew RT Davies’ resignation as leader of the Conservatives in the Welsh Assembly, means that Welsh politics is back in the spotlight. With the prospect of simultaneous leadership elections running over the summer for all four Assembly parties, this looks set to continue. The announcement in April that First Minister Carwyn Jones would stand down as Welsh Labour leader by the end of the year was followed last week by Ukip in Wales declaring that they would ballot their membership over who should lead their fractious National Assembly group. There

Twenty years ago Wales (barely) said Yes to devolution. Despite a Welsh Assembly being supported by the wildly popular new Prime Minister Blair and opposed by the very unpopular Conservatives, the public gave the most grudging endorsement to partial self-rule. A lot of water has flowed under many Welsh bridges since then. Public opposition to devolution fell away surprisingly quickly after 1997; the latest evidence, which I will be presenting in Cardiff on Monday, confirms that a clear majority in Wales now support devolution. There is little political opposition either. The Conservatives swiftly accepted the referendum result; since returning to power at Westminster they have overseen two Wales Acts transferring

Never underestimate the resilience of the Welsh Labour party. Up until now, this year’s general election had looked like it was going to be an historic one in Wales, where the Conservatives have not won since the 1850s, and Labour have come first in both votes and seats every time since 1922. Both Welsh polls conducted since the election was called had given the Tories a clear lead, and put them on all-time high levels of support. But the latest Welsh poll, published today, puts a very different light on things. Labour are now, it appears, back in a clear lead: up nine percentage points in the last two weeks,

Once upon a time the Welsh didn’t much care for the Kippers. In successive European elections (1999, 2004 and 2009), Scotland always produced Ukip’s worst result and Wales was the second or third worst. It was a similar story in Welsh Assembly elections: in 2003, 2007 and 2011, Ukip talked up their chances of winning seats on the regional list, only to fall well short in the end. Wales seemed barren territory for what looked like a very English party. Then things started to change. In the 2014 European election, Ukip came within a whisker of actually topping the poll in Wales. This was followed in the 2015 general election by the

The recent Welsh poll showing a ten-point Conservative lead in voting intentions for the forthcoming general election (and also, though much less reported, the first ever Conservative lead in devolved voting intentions in Wales), came as a shock to many. The next Welsh poll, out next week, will tell us whether this first one was just an outlier or the more solid harbinger of an historic realignment in Welsh politics. But why should it be such a surprise that the governing party of the UK, with around a twenty-point opinion poll lead across Britain, should have a lead half that size in one particular part of Britain? The astonishment is

The latest polling marmalade dropper comes from Wales. Labour have won a majority of Welsh seats in every general election for the past eighty-odd years. But the latest Welsh Political Barometer, the most respected poll there, has the Tories on 40 per cent and on course to win 21 seats to Labour’s 15. This poll combined with the fact that Labour is now down to one MP in Scotland shows how difficult it will be for the party to win a UK-wide majority again. They will have to do it without the inbuilt advantage that their Celtic strength used to provide them with. If May can succeed in realigning British

Goodness, Wales is gorgeous to look at. The landscape is sublime. I woke in Abergavenny to snow on the Black Mountains, interspersed with emerald green valleys — all that rain is not for nothing. The natural beauty only heightens a troubling question. Wales voted for Brexit, but every road, university and waterfront improvement scheme — and they are everywhere — is EU-funded. Excuse me? What were all those warmly welcoming people I met thinking of exactly? This is an extract from Joanna Trollope’s diary, which appears in this week’s Spectator

Industry will shrivel. Exports will dry up. The few remaining steel works will be closed down. And rugby will be banned. Okay, I made that last one up. But in a report today, the leaders of Welsh Labour and Plaid Cymru have laid out the case for keeping the principality in the single market – and warned that the economy will be virtually destroyed if they come out. ‘Severing ties with the single market to control our borders would be an act of catastrophic self-harm,’ according to the Welsh First Minister, Carwyn Jones. Like a kind of mini-me Nicola Sturgeon, it is possible to see what Jones, or certainly the Plaid

On Monday 25 July we climbed Cader Idris. No particular reason except a free Monday and a memory of what a fine mountain it looked when, many years ago and heading for the north Wales coast, I skirted this massive ridged hunk of green and black rising from oak forests. Some hills have a strong sense of their own identity and Cader Idris impresses itself on all who see it. It’s a walk, really, not a climb, but at just under 3,000 feet a big, steep walk, taking four or five hours up and down. So we set out from Derbyshire at seven and were there in three-and-a-half hours. In