Much has changed since our last time together just two weeks ago. The world order continues to be dismantled at a rate of knots by Donald Trump and his extremist regime, which has torn up the established geopolitical rule book and decimated the US federal government. A fortnight ago you might still be scoffed at for suggesting Trump was appeasing Vladimir Putin. Now we’re three days on from Kremlin spokesman Dimitry Peskov welcoming Trump’s “alignment” with Russia’s vision of the world.
Why do I mention Trump’s fascist regime in a column about Welsh politics? Because his right-hand man – no, not Elon Musk, the other one – Vice President JD Vance has disrespected Welsh servicemen and women in his latest attack on the UK. More on that later.
Dodds to the rescue
As regular readers know, the Welsh Government budget has been a talking point for months – especially after the collapse of the Labour–Plaid Cooperation Agreement. The government doesn’t have a majority in the Senedd, so it required the support or abstention of one opposition MS to drag its budget through.
A deal between the Welsh Government and Welsh Liberal Democrats had been speculated upon for some time. Rumours suggested that Jane Dodds, Welsh Lib Dem leader and the party’s only MS, was the most likely saviour for Labour. And a deal was indeed struck – straight after the last instalment of Wales on Wednesday was published. Typical).
Dodds’s price was that an extra £100mn to be allocated to Lib Dem priority areas. This sum happened to be the exact amount Mark Drakeford was rumoured to have kept in reserve for so-called ‘wiggle room’. On Tuesday, with Dodds’s support, the £26bn budget passed in the Senedd.
The Labour UK Government repeatedly threatened that failure to pass the budget would result in withdrawal of £4bn funding in the next financial year. It’s a stick Welsh Labour used in attempts to attack Plaid Cymru over its stance on the issue. Coercive behaviour you shouldn’t really expect in a “union of equals”, but there we are. The point is now moot anyway after the Lib Dem deal.
Thanks to them there’ll be an extra £30mn for childcare support under the Flying Start programme for all under-twos, a £30mn boost to social care to target delayed hospital discharges, a £20mn uplift for county councils, £15mn in subsidised bus travel for under-21s, and a £5mn boost to tackle river and sea pollution.
In good faith
Lib Dems can certainly say they’ve made an impact on their priority areas and improved the budget via their deal. The only debate is around the scale of impact and whether it will create or expand their political capital. Any Liberal Democrat comms strategy for the next year must relentlessly focus on these areas and the uplifts under the deal, extolling them as Lib Dem victories.
So far the main thing I’ve seen from the Lib Dems was a rather ham-fisted attack on Plaid in an opinion piece published in Nation.Cymru. Franck Banza, the Lib Dem candidate for Gower in the 2024 UK general election, lauded Dodds’s approach. He claimed his party was the only one to engage with the Welsh Government in good faith and had “saved” Wales from economic and political crises.
To be clear, Plaid Cymru also engaged with the Welsh Government. Rhun ap Iorwerth’s party laid out what it would take for them to support Labour’s budget. Demands included devolution of the Welsh Crown Estate and resolution of the HS2 funding scandal. Plaid was firmly told to do one, and that no official talks would be entertained on the basis of those demands. Labour slamming Plaid about matters that – until it got into Downing Street – were key Labour policies really isn’t a good look.
Banza is right to shout about Lib Dems making a difference. However, I think it’s a bit much to broadside Plaid with suggestions they’ve acted in bad faith and played “political games”. The Liberal Democrats played a political game too. It’s just that their support was bought at a significantly cheaper price than Plaid was asking.
JD Vance insults Welsh soldiers
Fresh from a disgraceful ambush of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the White House, and an ill-informed conspiracy-filled rant at the Munich Security Conference, JD Vance has stepped up his campaign to insult long-term allies of the United States.
When asked for his thoughts on a potential European peacekeeping force being deployed to Ukraine in the future, Vice-President Vance scoffed and casually batted away the prospect, claiming that a deal which would see the US exploit Ukraine’s natural resources is a better security guarantee “than 20,000 troops from some random country that hasn’t fought a war in 30 or 40 years”.
The only two countries that have confirmed a willingness to put troops on the ground are the UK and France. Both came to the aid of the US, rightly or wrongly, and fought alongside Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan. Vance’s comments caused outrage across the UK, including among usually Trump-sympathetic media and ‘commentators’.
Vance has insulted and casually dismissed the sacrifices of 46 Welsh war-dead and the dozens of others who sustained injuries and live daily with the mental scars of those American-led conflicts. Whatever your thoughts on the legality or justification for either war, park it for a moment and consider what just happened. JD Vance, the second-in-command (third?) of the USA, has derided their sacrifice.
He has since backtracked and claimed he didn’t mention the UK or France, so criticism isn’t justified. C’mon man … how could you not be referring to the only two countries that signalled their willingness to take part in a peacekeeping force? But of course, his cabal has said even more odious things.
What is the Llywydd thinking?
I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read that the Llywydd – the Speaker of the Senedd – had rejected an urgent question on what steps will be taken to prevent Russian interference in next year’s Senedd election. It’s an election in which many in Washington and Moscow will be hoping a certain party does particularly well, to provide a stronger foothold and resources for that party to be primed for the next UK general election.
The question was posed by the Conservative Tom Giffard: “What steps is the Government taking to prevent Russian interference in Welsh elections?” I’m baffled as to why Elin Jones would reject such a topical question, especially given the global situation at this time. The official reply to comment on why the question was rejected reads rather curtly too. “The process and criteria for considering topical questions is set out in guidance to members.”
If it’s a technical beef about procedure or admin, it seems a rather tin-eared approach to such an important question. The optics regarding the rejection of this question couldn’t be much worse, in my view. It’s very relevant to next year’s Senedd election, and I for one would like to see it debated there.
That’s it for this latest instalment of Wales on Wednesday. See you in a fortnight, when we aim for normal service to be resumed. Wales On Wednesday But On Thursday doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.
