Wales

‘From this evening, I must give the British people a very simple instruction — you must stay at home,’ Boris Johnson declared on 23 March. At the beginning of the pandemic, when infection levels first began to rise, the country was all in it together. The prescription was a national one, and the Prime Minister could speak to the nation as one. Though infection levels have begun to surge again, the restrictions are now specific and local. The PM can no longer address the country as a whole, and this poses a problem for him. Last time, at least, there could be no claims that the Tories were favouring one

On 12 May, the government stopped publishing international comparisons of its Covid-19 death toll in the daily press briefings. The argument was that the data wasn’t helpful, and perhaps even misleading: the way calculations were carried out varied country-by-country, with each nation on a different timescale when experiencing the peak of infections and death. There would be a time for international comparisons, but that time wasn’t now. Today, the ONS picks up where the press briefings left off, comparing excess mortality rates throughout Europe. The data is not specifically calculating Covid-19 deaths, but rather all causes of mortality on a five-year average. This is the metric the UK’s chief medical officer

Elections in Wales are supposed to be boringly predictable. Until the 2019 European election, Labour had come first in 38 of the last 39 Wales-wide election contests, including all 26 of the last general elections, in a run that began in 1922. But all good – or bad – things tend to come to an end eventually. To describe what happened in the European election as an electoral earthquake in Wales seems almost to understate the magnitude of what happened. The Brexit Party, who did not even exist until six weeks ago, got more than double the Labour vote share, and came first in 19 of the 22 local authority

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