Wales (Cymru)

A Plaid Cymru general election candidate has criticised his Conservative rival for living more than 100 miles away in Oxfordshire.

Tory Jack Robson, who is standing in the Pontypridd constituency, has declared on his nomination papers that he lives at an address in the Banbury constituency.

But while Banbury, estimated to be 105 miles from Pontypridd, has been held continuously by the Conservatives since 1922, with MP Victoria Prentis securing a majority of nearly 17,000 at the last election in 2019, the situation is very different in Pontypridd, where the seat has been represented by a Labour MP, also since 1922.

In 2019 Labour’s Alex Davies-Jones was elected with a majority of 5,890 over Sam Trask, the Tory candidate. On July 4 Mr Trask was due to stand as the Conservative candidate in Bridgend, but pulled out after it emerged that he had posted lewd messages about women on the myfitnesspal website.

“Use your vote” is emblazoned in huge blue letters on the bridge that flanks the main entrance to the European Parliament building in Brussels.

European elections, much like those to the Senedd, have been typified by poor turnout caused in part by confusion about the decisions at stake.

The campaign slogan for the latest European polls taking place this weekend is though wasted in Brussels. Not because the residents of the capital of Europe are so fanatical about the institutions, but because, in Belgium, voting is a legal duty, not a choice.

It’s a model that former First Minister Mark Drakeford recently suggested Wales should adopt.

“Many countries around the world, Australia and Belgium to take just two random examples, have that system,” he told BBC Radio Wales last month.

Activists raised awareness of the devastating impacts of long Covid at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff Bay, ahead of a performance of the play Nye starring Michael Sheen. They collected signatures for The Care Society, a Senedd petition calling for a comprehensive response to the long Covid crisis in Wales. Its key components include healthcare and research, economic empowerment, and green Covid-safe infrastructure.

Members of various UK and international advocacy organisations were represented, including Long COVID Wales – the devolved Welsh campaigning offshoot of the 60,000-strong patient-led UK group Long COVID Support. Protect the Heart of the Arts, which advocates for Covid safety in the performing arts, was also in attendance.

Plaid Cymru’s candidate in Ynys Môn for the upcoming General Election says any plans to develop a nuclear power site at Wyfla must centre around the needs and interests of local communities.

The UK Government confirmed earlier today (22 May) that the Wylfa site on Ynys Môn is their preferred option for the development of a new large-scale nuclear power station.

This follows the announcement in March that the UK Government had purchased the land previously owned by Hitatchi for £160 million.

Wylfa’s twin reactor Magnox nuclear power station stopped generating power at the end of 2015 and has been decommissioned.

Hitachi pulled the plug on a project to build a nuclear power station on the site three years ago, despite pumping £2 billion into the development.

Welsh Water's pollution incidents shot up last year, despite the company spending hundreds of millions of pounds to "improve services".

The company recorded 107 pollution incidents in 2023-24, up from 89 the year before.

Welsh Water has faced criticism in recent months over its performance on leaks and raw sewage spills.

The Welsh Government has been blasted by nurses’ leaders following the pay settlement agreed with doctors which was announced earlier today (7 June).

Royal College of Nursing Wales (RCN) says it is “incensed” by the offer, which the British Medical Association (BMA) has recommended that junior doctors, specialist doctors and consultants accept.

Under the deals, junior doctors have been offered a 7.4% additional uplift, taking the total to a 12.4% uplift for 2023-24, which will be backdated to April last year.

A revised consultant pay scale has been proposed, providing higher career earnings, increased starting pay, and an additional pay rise of up to 10.1% for some consultant doctors.

Labour and the Conservatives have been urged to commit to reclassifying HS2 as an England-only project to “right a £4bn wrong”.

Delyth Jewell accused Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak of ignoring Wales as the Senedd unanimously reiterated calls for a fair share of funding from the rail project.

Plaid Cymru’s shadow transport secretary said committing to HS2 consequential funding is a litmus test for the UK Labour and Tory leaders – “a test they are failing”.

The party’s deputy leader told the chamber: “This is not just a debate about a railway line; it is about how Westminster disregards the needs and the voice of Wales.

“HS2 is a railway line in another country that we are nonetheless funding – a track that does not break our border but that is costing us billions to run.”

New road collision data published today shows that casualties have reduced on roads since the introduction of the new 20mph speed limits in September last year.

The data, which provides the total number of casualties in police recorded collisions, shows that in the last quarter of 2023 (October – December) road casualties on 20mph and 30mph roads reduced by 218, from 681 in 2022 to 463 in 2023.

The continuing scandals surrounding Vaughan Gething have cut Welsh Labour’s poll lead over Plaid Cymru at a Senedd election to just seven percentage points.

A YouGov poll carried out between May 30 and June 3 put Labour on 30%, with Plaid Cymru on 23% and the Conservatives on 19%.

This showed a significant drop in support for Labour since an equivalent poll undertaken between May 2 and May 4, which showed Labour on 36%, with the Conservatives in second place on 29% and Plaid Cymru on 20%.

The way in which Vaughan Gething secured his victory in the race to become Labour’s leader in Wales – and the nation’s first minister – was bound to store up problems for him and his party. Bad enough was the crude way in which the largest trade unions placed their collective thumb on the scale in his favour. More damaging still was Gething’s decision to fund his leadership campaign through a £200,000 donation from a company controlled by a businessman found guilty of environmental crimes. As a result, the legitimacy of his wafer-thin victory over his rival, Jeremy Miles, was always going to be open to question.

What was in doubt was the extent to which Gething would be able to rebuild the bridges that his leadership campaign had burned, so that he might at least lead his party into the next devolved election due in May 2026. Wednesday’s events in the Senedd suggest that is now unlikely. While Gething and his remaining allies persist in trying to make the frankly absurd case that it matters not if the first minister loses a confidence vote in the Welsh legislature, wiser heads are recognising that his position is becoming untenable.

What a day.

One that will go down in Welsh political history.

Just over 24 hours ago Vaughan Gething said he was confident of winning the vote.

Tonight he has had to clarify that he will not resign.

The debate preceding the vote was passionate and emotional.

An award-winning Welsh artist has accused the National Museums and Galleries of Wales of censorship by not showing one of his works in the lead-up to the UK General Election.

No Cajolery, an artwork by David Garner was meant to feature in a new exhibition at the National Museum in Cardiff called The Valleys. Garner had been commissioned to install a composite work made up of banners featuring political quotations, a large road sign as well as a billboard to be located offsite.

Vaughan Gething, the embattled First Minister, has lost a vote of no confidence tabled by the Welsh Conservatives.

The motion follows the collapse of the co-operation deal between Labour and Plaid Cymru and a series of scandals involving Mr Gething.

The motion is non-binding and will not force Mr Gething to stand aside from his role as First Minister, but the result will be highly embarrassing for him.

Ahead of the vote, Sir Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party, offered his support for the FM, accusing Plaid Cymru and the Conservatives of “game playing”.

A blistering row has broken out between a Liberal Democrat general election candidate and his Labour rival over support for Vaughan Gething.

In recent decades Brecon & Radnorshire has swung between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, but with an expanded seat taking in the upper part of the Swansea Valley, Brecon Radnorshire and Cwm Tawe is seen by Labour as winnable.

In 2019, the unexpanded seat was won by Tory Fay Jones, who is seeking re-election.

The Welsh Labour candidate for the expanded seat, Matthew Dorrance, has now been challenged in an open letter from Lib Dem candidate David Chadwick over his support for Mr Gething, who is embroiled in a series of scandals, notably over his decision to accept donations totalling £200k from a businessman convicted of dumping toxic sludge in the protected Gwent Levels wetland landscape.

17 pro-Palestine protesters have been arrested by South Wales Police following demonstrations in Cardiff.

The bulk of the arrests were made after around 100 people gathered at Cardiff Bay Police Station to demand the release of a disabled protestor.

The man had led a sit down protest earlier in the day at the junction of Park Place and Boulevard de Nantes near Cardiff’s city centre.

Footage posted online by the campaign group Cymru Students for Palestine showed the man being led away by officers after addressing protesters with a megaphone.

Around 60 people then made their way to Cardiff Bay Police station to demonstrate the arrest.

First Minister Vaughan Gething is set to face a vote of no confidence in the Senedd this week – but would his Labour colleagues be likely to break ranks during an election period?

Controversies surrounding the embattled First Minister include a huge donation to his election campaign and a row over the sacking of a junior minister just a few weeks after appointing his Cabinet.

But Mr Gething’s short and problematic tenure as Welsh Labour leader began even before he was elected as First Minister.

Here’s everything you need to know about the story so far…

Mark Drakeford has dramatically criticised the Welsh government's decision to scrap changes to the school holiday.

The Welsh government earlier announced that plans to cut the summer school holiday had been shelved until the next Senedd election.

Visibly angry and addressing his remarks at education secretary Lynne Neagle, he said he regretted the “political damage” the decision would cause to Wales.

In response she told the former first minister: "You cannot have a consultation and then just ignore that consultation."

It comes a day before his successor, Vaughan Gething, will face a crucial no confidence vote in the Senedd.

A Welsh publisher is to release a new translation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic fantasy novel The Hobbit in Welsh.

One of the most popular and most-translated books of the twentieth century and the prelude to The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit was originally published in 1937 and has since been translated into dozens of languages, including other Celtic languages such as Irish and Scottish Gaelic.

Until now, however, the celebrated novel has never before been available in Welsh—perhaps surprisingly, given author J.R.R. Tolkien’s own interest in the Welsh language, upon which he drew for some elements of the fictional languages he invented in his works.

A think tank director who has been parachuted into a Welsh constituency as its Labour candidate has deleted social media posts from 2023 that conflict with the party’s current policies.

Torsten Bell, chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, which specialises in research on social inequality, was imposed on Swansea West last week. Ordinary party members have complained that they were not given the opportunity to vote in the selection, with Labour officials loyal to Keir Starmer ensuring that Mr Bell won the candidacy in the safe seat.

It has emerged that since he was selected for Swansea West, a series of social media posts he made in January 2023 have been deleted. The posts coincided with the publication of a report by the Resolution Foundation that criticised tax breaks given to those who invest in Individual Savings Accounts (ISAs).

A company that bankrolled Vaughan Gething's successful bid to become Wales' first minister was linked to a criminal investigation at the time, the BBC can reveal.

Mr Gething's leadership campaign accepted £200,000 from a firm controlled by millionaire businessman David Neal.

A criminal investigation into suspected environmental offences by one of Mr Neal's firms, Resources Management Limited (RML), is being carried out by Natural Resources Wales, external (NRW).

A spokesman for Welsh Labour told the BBC on Friday the issues had "previously been addressed" by Mr Gething - but later the first minister said he was "not aware of any of the details" of the criminal investigation.

Questions have been asked of the Welsh Government’s director of ethics about the controversial sacking of a junior minister who was accused of leaking information to the media.

First Minister Vaughan Gething axed Minister for Social Partnership Hannah Blythyn in an unprecedented move earlier this month.

He alleged that Ms Blythyn had disclosed messages to Nation.Cymru from a group chat used by ministers during the Covid-19 pandemic.

One previously unseen iMessages appeared to show the then Health Minister’s intention to delete a discussion because it could be subject to freedom of information legislation.

Ms Blythyn staunchly denied the claims saying, “integrity is all in politics and I retain mine.”

Nation.Cymru has never revealed how we obtained the messages.

One of the most prominent left-wing members of Welsh Labour has resigned from the party after 35 years, denouncing the direction it has taken under the leadership of Keir Starmer.

Darren Williams, who heads the PCS union in Wales and co-founded the Welsh Labour Grassroots group, said in a letter to Sir Keir: “After 35 years’ continuous, active Labour membership – including time spent on the National Executive Committee, the Welsh Executive Committee, the National Policy Forum and as a Cardiff councillor – I have cancelled my direct debit today, as I can no longer bear to remain in a party that treats its members, representatives and voters with such contempt.

“I have witnessed some pretty unedifying behaviour by various party leaders over the years but you have outdone them all. Your abandonment of all the pledges on which you originally stood for the leadership was shameless enough but you have proceeded to water down policy commitments on green investment and workers’ rights, among other areas, while failing to take a clear moral stance against the Tories’ inhuman attacks on refugees and migrants or against Israel’s genocidal onslaught in Gaza.

Noraini Binti Husin Jamal (Nora), along with around 1,000 activists from around the world who tried and failed to deliver aid to Gaza, is ready to break the blockade with the Gaza Freedom Flotilla next time.

The flotilla of ships was stranded in Turkey in late April leaving 5,000 tonnes of humanitarian aid undelivered, after the Republic of Guinea Bissau withdrew its flag from the lead ship. Organisers have accused Israel of applying pressure to stall the departure. Nora returned to Wales and has been looking forward to rejoining the mission to the Gaza Strip.

A former Welsh Labour MP has slammed the party for parachuting two candidates with no connection to Wales into safe Labour seats.

Earlier today Nation.Cymru revealed that a think tank boss and a former Starmer aide have been selected as Welsh Labour general election candidates.

Think tank chief and former Labour aide Torsten Bell has been selected as Welsh Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Swansea West, while executive director of legal affairs for the Labour Party, Alex Barros-Curtis, was selected for Cardiff West.

Concerns that First Minister Vaughan Gething may have deleted text messages during the pandemic are being taken “very seriously” by the Covid inquiry, a representative has said.

Earlier this month it emerged that the Welsh Labour leader had told ministers in a group chat in August 2020 that he was deleting messages, saying they could be captured by a Freedom of Information (FOI) request.

He may also have to give further evidence to the Covid inquiry, the representative said.

It comes at a time of heightened pressure on Mr Gething, who will face a vote of no confidence in his leadership in the Senedd next week.