Sioned Williams' Speech to the Plaid Cymru Conference

Read Sioned Williams MS's speech to the Plaid Cymru Autumn Conference in Cardiff in full 


Good afternoon Conference!


Well it's great to feel the energy at our conference this weekend. The desire to make a difference, the passion for ensuring change - real change - for Wales can be felt, can't it! It's an exciting feeling. And it fills me with hope.


Because I sit there, in the Chamber in the Senedd, week after week, listening to minister after minister - it's hard to keep track to tell the truth! - Although it's the same old faces that have been rotating and rotating for decades - I'm sitting there, listening to Labour in Wales promising that they will deliver for our nation. But they don't.

And there is even a delivery minister now, mind you, as even Eluned Morgan saw that someone was needed to remind the government that their ministers needed to deliver! - it's pathetic really. Pathetic and a cause for concern, and above all a source of frustration for those of us who know that Devolution can deliver so much more for the people of Wales. And that independence could deliver so much more again.

Because I'm sitting there, listening to the warm words, the hot air, the promises to deliver on what is essential to ensure prosperity and fairness for the people of Wales - empty promises, the same promises for twenty-five years!

I sit there listening to promises about improving standards in our schools, while schools are facing cuts and targets to recruit teachers are being missed year after year.

I'm sitting there listening to Eluned Morgan listing all the spending that goes on tackling child poverty, while she and her government refuse to pressure Keir Starmer or Rachel Reeves to take the step that could take tens of thousands of Welsh children out of poverty by scrapping the cap on benefits and the two child limit.

And when I asked Eluned Morgan if she would stand up for the children of Wales, she said that was not her job, and if I didn't like what the Starmer Labour government was doing, I should write to my Member of Parliament!

Poverty is not something we should accept as an inevitable part of Welsh life - food banks should not be a normal part of our communities. The main obstacle to making progress on tackling child poverty in Wales is the decisions of the politicians in London and Westminster and Cardiff who hold the reins of power. The Welsh Government has decided not to set statutory child poverty targets, has decided not to call on the Westminster Labour Government to remove the two-child cap and the cap on benefits, has decided not to prioritize feeding all children from low-income families in our secondary schools, have decided not to ensure that the poorest children are fed during the school holidays.

And Health and Social Care - well where do I start? The political hits are sadly easy for us when we face the Welsh Givernment across the benches in the Senedd, but the consequences are hitting people so hard. And it's unacceptable.  

I sit there listening to nostalgic paeans to Aneirin Bevan and claims that the NHS is secure - while our Health Boards  are millions of pounds in deficit, and Plaid Cymru’s call for over a decade that the doctors and nurses we need be trained, and given the tools to give the level of care they want to,  have been ignored, and a destabilising recruitment and retention crisis is the result! 

Because there was no change in July whatever the slogans and placards said. The only real change we have felt in Wales since that election was that the people of Ynys Mon now have a true champion for them in Westminster in the inspirational Llinos Medi and the people of Caerfyrddin have a true force of nature at their side in Ann Davies.  It raises one's spirit to see those twp excellent women working sode by side with Ben and Liz in Westminster, doesn't it!

No,  the air in Wales is full of nothing but broken promises from Labour.  

Broken promises that the days of chronic underfunding for our councils and public services would be over.  

Broken promises to the thousands of people in Port Talbot and its surrounding communities that their jobs would be saved, that they would not be thrown on the scrapheap.  That a fair transition to greener steel was possible. 

And broken promises to the children who are growing up in poverty that the cruel austerity measures which punishes them for the size of their familiy, would be history along with the Tories.  

And this winter will be even colder than the last one for the half a million Welsh pensioners who will lose the Winter Fuel Payment, putting their health at risk.  

Yes the self-serving Tories stripped our public services to the bone, trashed the economy, undermined devolution, stirred up division and hatred in our communities, turned their backs those who needed the most support.   

But now we have a Labour government who appoints a Downing Street cast off as an envoy - an envoy!-  to Wales, who refuse to reverse Tory cuts and impose some of their own, who are still starving Wales of the funding it's entitled to.    

She's being a bit hard on Labour, I've heard some say.  

We live at a time when the Right is ascendant, the xenophobic, anti-immigrant, anti-European right at that. So the parties of the centre and the left need to work together.  

I accept that principle and we have, of course in the best interest of the people of Wales.  

Indeed, where Labour do have have something to shout about – free school meals for all primary children  for instance, - well it was us, Plaid Cymru who delivered that against continual Labour resistance , who achieved it through co-operation and through campaigning.  

But imagine what we could do if we were in power.  

Because that's what I do. When I'm sitting there. in that Siambr, in the Senedd. When I see a Labour Government out of steam, out of ideas and out of time.   

Rolling back - on progressive policies such as making council tax fairer,  

Rolling over -  when Starmer says no to giving us the powers we need on policing, justice, gender equality,  - I could go on and on.  

But let's instead think about what real change means. What it looks like.  

There is another election upon us, and we have to be out on the streets making our case, making our voices heard for real change. For change that will bring hope, to the communities all over Wales from Pontardawe to Penygraig, from Rhosllannerchrugog to Rhymni, from Caerdydd to Cwmbran.  

We know what we’ll get from Reform, - immigration, immigration, immigration. A politics that appeals to people’s basest instincts. A politics that divides. Historians of the future will be astonished by the extent to which the Conservative party has followed the far right’s rhetoric and the way Keir Starmer, while distancing Labour from  the right's methods and rhetoric around immigration won't challenge their underlying position.  

Politics is about making the case, persuading people of looking at things in another way. 

And that, Conference, is the strength we have in Plaid Cymru. We know that there is an alternative and we won’t let them divide us. Ours is a politics of bringing people together and sharing a vision.  

Well, we can do that with Labour - some will say. 

I don’t think so. I think so even less having sat in the Senedd recently. 

Because in the face of the proven unfairness of the way we’re funded, in the face of the obvious injustice of HS2, in face of thousands of job losses in our steelworks, and in the face of an anti-European Right that run roughshod over our history and interests as a people, I’m tired of having to listen to a Welsh government that is too embarrassed, too weak  to make the case for Wales.  

I’m tired of the easy lazy slogans that all the Unionist parties throw at anyone who believes in an independent future for our nation:  

"Welsh independence means economic disaster, means separation, means closing our doors to the world” 

And instead of standing up and saying, "Well, excuse me, you British centralist, elitist, anti-devolution, anti-democratic, anti-Welsh language, pro-status quo, longing-for-a-Britain-that-no-longer-exists xenophobe!” we have a government that cowers in the corner and says "Please. Don’t. Hurt. Me!"

“We’ll behave!” “We won't make a fuss!” 

Those days, frodyr a chwiorydd, are surely over. 

Let’s have a real discussion, a real choice. 

(And some of you who love a certain American political drama will know where the inspiration for those last lines came from! ) 

We have another vision for Wales’ future. its bold. It's clear.

We will invest in our children and young people - to prevent them from being scarred by poverty, to ensure they get the best start in life by creating a high quality, affordable childcare system, by ensuring their schools and their colleges have the resources to support them in creating a prosperous future for themselves and to contribute to a prosperous future for our nation.

We will ensure fairness - so that all of our valleys and rural communities are served by regular and affordable public transport, so we have thriving and vibrant town centres, where local businesses are supported,  and our communities benefit fully from the renewable clean energy that is created in them.

We will ensure the right to basic services, the right to an affordable home, the right to economic justice - not just keep fixing holes in the safety net.

I'm tired of watching a tired government.

It's time to create the change we all need and want to see. By proposing policies that have the interests of the people of Wales, the needs of our communities in every part of Wales, the welfare of our children, and fairness for our nation at their heart.

This starts with you

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