Wales' new First Minister

Should we be excited about Eluned Morgan taking the top job?

Hello!

I write this newsletter as we prepare to welcome our third First Minister of the year. We are going to take a look at Eluned Morgan and explore what her premiership might mean for Wales (spoiler, don’t get excited).

But first some good news. As I write this I still have the slight headache and sense of vague fear that I associate with my mornings waking up in the Cathays area of Cardiff as a student. 

This is because on Tuesday I was in London for the Publisher Newsletter Awards. Incredibly, this newsletter was named “Best Politics Newsletter”. 

It is no exaggeration to say I was stunned by this given who we were up against. The resources behind some of the other 11 newsletters is huge so to win is very humbling. I therefore wanted to thank all those at WalesOnline who give me the time and platform to put this together. 

Most of all I want to thank all of you who are reading this. We are very close to 2,000 subscribers now and from the day that this newsletter launched I have been overwhelmed by how supportive you have all been. I genuinely believe that without a population more informed on how they are governed we are doomed to continue with the unambitious ineptitude we have been subjected to by multiple parties for decades. 

Right, on with the newsletter!

When Wales does things differently

Before we come on to Eluned Morgan I want to address something that came up in the newsletter comments last week - the idea that the Welsh Government hasn’t improved the lives of people in Wales. One comment on last weeks issue was “I cannot think of any act by the devolved government to make people's lives in Wales any better over the entire time of its existence”.

When I am back from my time away I want to do an assessment of how the Welsh Government has managed public services in Wales since 1999. I have started this, but it is a pretty sizeable task so it will need to wait until I am back at work in September. However in the meantime we can have a look at some of the times that Wales has diverged from England to see if it is fair to say that the Welsh Gov hasn’t ever made lives better for the people of Wales.

These are some of the times that Wales has diverged (or at least led the way):

• Free prescriptions. Introduced in Wales back in 2007, I think it is hard to argue that this wasn’t a bit of welcome policy making. By contrast, in England, it is £9.65 for each medicine dispensed. Of course there are weaknesses in the policy such as the state paying over the odds for medicines that people can get pretty cheaply at a supermarket. 

  However, taking away much of the financial burden of treating long-term conditions is, in my view, a self evident good. This is reflected in the consistently high public support for the policy. 

• Carrier bag charges. In the autumn of 2011 Wales became the first UK country to introduce a charge for single-use carrier bags. Bringing in the 5p charge had an instant impact and by 2015 the number of single-use carrier bags handed out by shops in Wales had fallen by 71%. 

  England made the introduction in 2015 and since then usage at the main retailers has dropped by a staggering 97%. It is a really good piece of policy making and, credit to the WG, it was brought in before David Attenborough’s documentaries had put plastic pollution high up on the public's radar. 

• Opt out organ donation. In my view this policy was a no brainer (pun intended). On December 1, 2015 the Human Transplantation (Wales) Act 2013 came into full effect, making Wales the first country in the UK to introduce an opt-out system for organ and tissue donation.

  This meant that unless people specifically opted out, it would be assumed that they were happy for their organs to be donated after their death. 

There are plenty of other areas we can discuss like votes for 16 and 17-year-olds, smoking bans, Covid etc. But when it comes down to it, all the good policies in the world can’t offset the fact that the fundamental services the Welsh Government is responsible for are in a torrid state. 

It is all very well that the process of organ donation has been streamlined, but when tens of thousands of people are waiting over two years for an operation it is easy to see why the people of Cymru don’t feel that their Government is serving them well. 

I would also like to add that I really do appreciate people commenting and discussing issues in the newsletter comment section. It was nice to see that, in the main, it was civil and constructive. Given that I often have to read the WalesOnline comment section which can be a black hole of unending misery (and people calling me a “Labour loving cockwomble”) I really value the polite dialogue. 

Eluned More-gan of the same?

I do understand if you wish to unsubscribe after that pun, but before you do take a look at the following chart:

This shows waiting lists within the Welsh NHS. What you will notice is that all of the lines are now going up. One-year waits (both for first appointments and follow ups) have been increasing for a year. Two-year waits, which had been falling with glacial slowness, have now seen an increase for two months in a row. 

What makes this worse is that this isn’t during the middle of winter when pressures are high, it is late spring. For context, the figure for two-year waits in England is almost zero. Now the WG will argue that England and Wales measure the stats differently and this is correct to an extent, but it is nowhere near different enough to account for the discrepancies in waiting lists. 

These figures are made all the worse because last year I demonstrated through a series of FOIs that some of the falls in these lists is because people were actually dying before they could be treated. 

The person who, until yesterday, was responsible for the Welsh NHS post Covid was…drumroll… now former health minister Eluned Morgan. Since 2021 she has been responsible for our health service and the record is pretty dismal.

Given both Mark Drakeford and Vaughan Gething had the health brief before her it seems that failing at managing the Welsh NHS is a prerequisite for getting Wales’ top job.

What will Eluned Morgan’s premiership be like? 

The above is a really hard question to answer because there has been no leadership contest. This is, in my view, a real problem.

While I totally understand the Welsh Labour desire to bring the party together and pretend that everything is fine, the lack of a real contest (and the accompanying debate about the future) sets the stage for more of the unambitious muddling along we have become accustomed to. 

Welsh Labour have been in power in Wales for 25 years. They have been the largest party for over 100. For the entirety of devolution they haven’t had to offer much to the electorate in Wales beyond wearing red in order to be assured of victory. But times are changing. 

People in Wales are now far more aware of who is responsible for their public services. Add to that the growing distrust of “establishment” parties and Welsh Labour have a real problem on their hands. They simply can’t stumble on, believing that what worked before will work in the future. In 2026 they have to be able to look the Welsh people in the eye and say “we have made your lives better”. 

But they are going to have to do this with little additional money from Westminster. They have the ability to raise more money here in Wales (though admittedly not a lot) and need to be bold in how they reform public services if they are going to have any chance of not being punished in two years. 

I have serious doubts that Eluned Morgan (or indeed anyone in the Welsh Labour Party) could push ahead with the decisive actions that are needed. The boldest thing the WG has done recently has been the 20mph limit. The early signs are that it has made a large improvement to road safety in Wales but under Vaughan Gething they attempted to row back on it and seemed almost embarrassed by their own actions. I would suggest that is not a group committed to the stresses, strains and energy needed to bring forward truly meaningful change. This is not surprising, 25 years is a very long time and stagnation is likely inevitable.

Perhaps I am being too harsh on our new FM. On a personal level I find Baroness Morgan very likeable. Despite her spending almost her entire adult life as a politician there is something relatable about her. On that note here is a video of her saying “we are all f***ed”. 

She has strengths when it comes to the role. Being a Welsh speaker is helpful. She is a decent speaker. Her experience in a variety of roles will be very valuable. 

But it is hard to escape the feeling that this is simply more of the same. Will Wales be much improved after two years of Eluned Morgan? I hope my doubts are wrong.

Take care and thanks again for all of the support

Will