ON TUESDAY, December 3, Andrew RT Davies won a vote of confidence in his leadership. Shortly after the result was announced, he resigned as leader of the Welsh Conservatives.
The outcome of the vote among Senedd members, nine votes to seven, and the subsequent refusal of MSs to serve in his Shadow Cabinet made Mr Davies’s departure inevitable.
As we wrote in our weekend article that detailed the inside story of the putsch, the absolute worst-case scenario was for Mr Davies to win the confidence vote narrowly and stay on as leader, hopelessly wounded and with his authority in bits. By stepping down, Mr Davies has given his Party the chance to regroup and refocus.
A BATTLE OVER THE FUTURE
Mr Davies’s supporters suggest the fallen leader is a victim of his own Party’s MSs briefing against him. To them, he represented the authentic voice of grassroots members: politically incorrect, loud, brash, and prepared to bash the Labour Welsh Government aggressively. Mr Davies certainly has a strong appeal to Party members.
The attempt to brief against Conservative Senedd Group Chair Sam Kurtz as being behind Mr Davies’s ousting and the drip-drip-drip of briefings to the Welsh media is a mile wide of the mark. Mr Davies’s allies would be better off looking closer to home. Describing those who did not back Mr Davies as wet liberals or over-friendly with “Welsh Nationalists” is demonstrably untrue. Mr Davies’s probable replacement, Darren Millar, is scarcely on the left of the Conservative Party, let alone the Senedd Group.
Paul Davies MS said: “A big thank you to Andrew RT Davies, who has been a fantastic leader. His are big shoes to fill. I’m now backing Darren to chart a course for the next Senedd Election.”
Mr Davies’s supporters are hardly blameless themselves. They have been increasingly vituperative and caustic in their briefings against Conservative MSs who worry that Andrew RT Davies’s brand of tub-thumping, bull-in-a-china-shop approach to hot-button issues opens him and them to ridicule.
The Herald understands that even MSs who backed Mr Davies expressed concerns at the way the Group’s officers and communications staff were briefing against elected members and other Conservative members. As Charlie Evans, the Chair of Mid and West Wales Conservatives, writes elsewhere, a house divided against itself cannot stand.
STRATEGY THE KEY
The core issue is the lack of an electoral strategy. In a recent report on the state of Welsh Conservative communications, the Herald wrote that there is a limit to how often 20mph and 36 extra MSs can be shoehorned into every topic.
The Welsh Conservative leader and staff’s main role is to increase Conservative representation in the Welsh Parliament after 2026. Flirting with “Abolish the Assembly” (sic) and chasing Reform UK’s coattails, Andrew RT Davies managed to propel the Welsh Conservatives’ poll position to a dismal fourth. His critics point out, with some justification, that Andrew RT Davies had banged those drums for eighteen months and watched his Party’s ratings nosedive. Nevertheless, Mr Davies continued ploughing the sands.
While the fall in poll ratings is part of the UK Conservatives’ wider unpopularity with voters, it is worth bearing in mind that the Conservative vote fell less in Wales than across the UK on July 4 and that Labour’s vote share fell sharply. Moreover, as even one of Mr Davies’s backers told us: “Reform are just a vibe. They’ve not got any real organisation in Wales. We are fighting a potential threat instead of hitting Labour.”
It is at least arguable that Reform’s appeal to the socially conservative Labour base is more dangerous to an unpopular and failing Welsh Government than it is to the Conservatives. How Reform manages to keep that momentum when its economic policies are pie in the sky remains to be seen. As socially conservative as Welsh voters are, they are also – overwhelmingly in the seats that matter – economically liberal. In that regard, the Conservatives’ failure to formulate a distinctive and distinctively Welsh offering is a drag on their fortunes.
Mr Davies and his backroom team’s effort to take on Reform has failed to capitalise on Labour’s weakness. Eluned Morgan is not a popular First Minister. Her government shows every sign of being run by Westminster and the Welsh Office. Finally, after 25 years in uninterrupted power, Labour in Wales is in the same position as the last Conservative government; there’s nobody left to blame but themselves.
ANGER AMID CALLS FOR UNITY
The Herald spoke to a number of Conservative politicians from across the Party.
They were unanimous in their sharp criticism of the lack of strategy and policy and the failure to lead the communications war instead of reacting to news headlines and Welsh Government announcements.
Charlie Evans told us: “I’m personally gutted about Andrew resigning today, but given the arithmetic of those voting against him, it is understandable.
“He’s one of politics’ good blokes. He’s well-liked by party members partly because of his brand of politics but mainly because he values them and listens to them. He should hold his head up high.
“We Welsh Conservatives find ourselves at a crossroads. If we don’t get the next few weeks and months right, the Senedd Election could be an extinction-level event for our Party.”
Pembrokeshire County Councillor Aled Thomas, Chair of the Conservative Rural Forum in Wales, said: “I would urge all Senedd members to come together following the vote, so our Party can focus on holding this disastrous Welsh Labour Government – which is failing our Health Service, local authorities and young people so badly – to account rather than having public blue on blue infighting, which only serves as a distraction.”
Those who spoke to us on condition of anonymity were scathing.
One prominent Conservative politician told us: “The Senedd Conservative Group is organisationally shambolic. Too comfortable in opposition. No vision. Bitterly divided. The new leader has a massive job on their hands, to make sure we don’t get replaced by Reform and Plaid Cymru.”
Another said: “I wish they’d get on with talking about Labour’s failure and what policies we will enact if we form a government in 2026 rather than just complaining all the time and falling out. We lost badly on July 4 because of this type of division. And here we are, not 6 months later, doing the exact same thing.
“The MSs and backroom staff need to shape up and pull together for the sake of the Party’s future in Wales.”
There were also less apocalyptic voices: “There is a chance to get things right,” said one MS.
“I like Andrew; he’s a nice guy, but it was obvious he could not continue. He must look at the people who advised him. They’re the main reason he’s had to go. Nobody can work with people who hold them in contempt. That reflected badly on Andrew.
“We need to get off the back foot and push Labour hard where they are weakest. The NHS is in a permanent crisis. Local government is on the rack. Public services are shocking. We must explain to voters that we will do things better and show them how. All Labour has to offer is planting more trees, closing Welsh farms and putting Welsh workers on the unemployment register by closing down the industries in which they work.”
