- Conservative leader casts doubt on party’s support for devolution
- Dog whistle politics follow Farage’s lead
- Welsh Conservative leader tacks hard right
IN THE five weeks since the General Election, the UK’s parties have been feeling their way around a shifted political reality.
After fourteen years in opposition in Westminster, Labour is discovering what it means to be in government.
Following their shattering defeat, the Conservatives are trying to discover a renewed sense of identity and purpose while trying to select a credible, new leader.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats, with an increased number of MPs, are coalescing around issues upon which they can hold the huge Labour majority to account.
Reform UK is less apparent in parliament and on the structural challenges facing the UK than it is on social media, where it is omnipresent, sounding its one-note dog whistle to sow and increase division.
The SNP are broken and reduced to political stunts, while Plaid’s strong showing on July 4 left them with no louder or bigger voice in UK politics than beforehand.
CHANGE IN WALES OR MORE OF THE SAME?
That’s the UK picture.
In Wales, there has also been tumult.
Polls for the Senedd election in 2026, still twenty months away, suggest Labour’s long grip on power is weakening. A First Minister mired in scandal and internal dissent has gone, and a new First Minister crowned in his place.
Plaid Cymru is buoyant and hopes that Rhun ap Iorwerth’s communication skills will enable them to create a genuine breakthrough for the Party of Wales across Wales.
Reform UK is showing well in the polls and will be praying that Labour does not get to grips with immigration policy in Westminster. If that happens, in May 2026 Reform UK will be as relevant as UKIP. However, the polls are currently set fair for Nigel Farage’s limited vehicle. As long as there are chips on its voters’ shoulders and grievances to stoke, Reform will remain an electoral threat.
And the Conservatives?
Ah, the Conservatives!
DAVIES PUTS CLEAR BLUE WATER – BETWEEN THE CONSERVATIVES AND HIMSELF
After a humiliating electoral defeat which saw the party lose all its Welsh MPs, in light of polls showing it desperately trailing Plaid Cymru and barely ahead of Reform, and with a UK leadership election in the offing, you’d imagine a period of reflection was in order.
Some more thoughtful Conservative Party members and MSs are undoubtedly thinking about how to recover from its recent pasting.
Like Murdo Fraser, who is standing for the leadership of the Scottish Conservatives, they are thinking about how to get out from under the idea that they are the UK party’s sock puppet.
Well, the Conservative’s Senedd leader in Wales is having none of it.
Andrew RT Davies has decided where to position the Conservative Party in Wales. Or rather, he’s decided what he wants the Conservative Party in Wales to be.
Mr Davies’s political position has always been buoyed by the Conservatives’ BluKip tendency. His staff and advisors have been former UKIP or Brexit-supporting fringe organisation members or employed by crackpot “thinktanks” like the Taxpayers’ Alliance. His supporters in the wider party are a combination of the post-Brexit new right and the old right, which thinks Wales will be forever England.
And that’s why Andrew RT Davies wants the Welsh Conservatives to be Reform UK.
There is not an anti-immigrant bandwagon Mr Davies won’t hitch himself to or a public issue too sensitive upon which he can resist the temptation to outdo Lee Anderson for offensiveness or Nigel Farage for opportunism.
His Senedd colleagues, to their everlasting regret and shame, have too often failed to hold their leader accountable for his ability to identify an issue and then charge at it like a bull in a china shop.
Conservative MSs articulated well-founded concerns about Vaughan Gething’s poor political judgement and record. A careful observer couldn’t help thinking the former First Minister was a proxy for their frustrations with their leader.
A CLASS APART
When it comes to appalling judgement, Andrew RT Davies is a class apart.
He’s still banging on about the 20mph speed limit, even after data showing the number of serious injuries in road accidents has sharply fallen since its introduction.
Mr Davies confected a row about Halal meat supposedly being served to Welsh schoolchildren without the option to refuse it. The claim upon which he based his pompous outrage was untrue. However, that did not stop him from writing to every Welsh local authority in sulphurous terms demanding an end to a non-existent practice. His concern had less to do with any concern about Halal slaughter than with the practice’s Muslim origins. His conduct was so beyond the pale that one of his shadow cabinet stepped forward and told him to stop peddling untruths. He’s not apologised yet for being a total ass on that topic.
And why would he?
After all, he can jump in and claim he is articulating his constituents’ concerns, well-founded or not. Those who shout the loudest lead him, and, regardless of the facts, he then shouts on their behalf.
Someone needs to tell him that he’s not leading; he’s reacting.
More recently, Mr Davies has sunk his size twelve wellies right into the mire of civil unrest.
Judging from his social media, the Conservative leader is “only saying” that he’s reflecting his constituents’ concerns on the complex causes of the civil unrest in English cities.
His coded language fools nobody. The best that can be said is that it is doubtful Mr Davies is a racist bigot, but he must listen to a large number of people who are.
Mr Davies claims his constituents are much exercised by “two-tier policing”.
Yes, the Cowbridge Riots and the Aberthaw Unrest are horrific. Meanwhile, the Border Force patrolling Barrybados’s sands is overwhelmed by migrants in small boats braving the crossing from North Somerset.
Parroting claims made by fringe political figures, neo-Nazi troublemakers, and their fellow travellers is irresponsible at best and cynical exploitation of an incendiary situation at worst.
The person who shouts “Fire!” in a crowded theatre when there is no fire is as guilty for the deaths and injuries following the ensuing stampede as someone who actually sets a fire. What Mr Davies is doing is worse. He can see a fire endangering life and limb and is pouring petrol on it.
And through most of this, with the exception noted above, his Senedd colleagues have remained publicly silent.
Mistaking their silence for support is a grave error. However, silence is not good enough.
Many voters are concerned about immigration and its perceived and actual effects on social cohesion and public services. Their concerns are not racist, at least not necessarily so. However, there is a more nuanced debate to be had than Mr Davies would have us believe.
DAVIES UNITES SENEDD GROUP AGAINST HIM
This week, Mr Davies found an issue that brought his Senedd colleagues together to condemn his actions.
It’s the Vale of Glamorgan Show. As one of the Vale’s most consequential political figures and the regional MS, Mr Davies attended.
So far, so normal.
Outside his pitch, Mr Davies placed a bucket of balls and invited members of the public to place a ball in one of two buckets marked “Yes” and “No” under a question asking them whether the Senedd should be abolished.
That is not Conservative policy, whether in Wales or at the UK level. The Conservatives, after all, extended the Senedd’s powers when Labour wouldn’t. The Conservative position is that the problem with devolution is not devolution but Labour’s hegemony in Wales’s devolved government.
Doubtless, there are members of the Conservative (and Labour) Party who think the Senedd should go. Equally, there are voters from all parties and none who would happily see the end of devolved government.
However, Andrew RT Davies leads the opposition in the Senedd. He didn’t discuss his stunt with his colleagues, who, one after the other, took to social media to condemn it.
Local MS Paul Davies commented: “The Conservative Party is clear – it is not Party policy to abolish the Senedd. I’m not sure why this question is even being asked.”
Meanwhile, North East Wales MS Gareth Davies said: I’m on the public record in saying that if I wanted to abolish the Senedd, I’d have never bothered standing for it in the first place.”
Tom Giffard MS made a telling point: “Abolishing the Senedd won’t be on the ballot at the next election—but Labour’s awful record on health, the economy and education will, as will our positive plan to turn it around.
“That’s what we’ll be focusing on.”
Andrew RT Davies has handed Labour, which is in all sorts of political trouble in Wales, a lifeline it neither deserves nor expected.
His colleagues should reflect carefully on whether his unchecked rambling and rabble-rousing conduct should continue to define and hamper their electoral efforts to re-establish the Conservative voice in Wales and help redefine Welsh Conservatism.
