Labour’s Defeat in Wales Spells Big Trouble for the Union

Labour has won every general election in Wales for a century – the longest winning streak for any party in any country in the western world. This didn’t just have important implications for Wales and for Labour – it was a vital part of the glue holding the union together. 

This relationship between Labourism and unionism isn’t just incidental – it’s part of their mutual fabric. Modern Britain – the idea of the country as a single nation on this archipelago in the north Atlantic, rather than a multinational empire – was created as much by Clement Attlee’s 1945 Labour government as it was by Churchill’s wartime speeches. The affection for it felt particularly among baby boomers is a memory both of its past imperial dominance, but also of its once generous welfare state. 

Wales has always had an important role in this: Welsh Labour politicians – most notably Nye Bevan – were involved in this foundation, ensuring it wasn’t just an English project. As Scotland has swung to the Scottish National Party (SNP) over the last generation (with the exception of the 2024 election), Wales’s continued habit of voting Labour has become even more vital for defending and projecting a certain idea of unionism. 

And so, when Labour lost Caerphilly last night – a seat it had held in every election since 1918, coming a poor third to Plaid Cymru (who won) and Reform (who came second) in a Senedd by-election for the constituency in which it got just 11% – it wasn’t just a significant bump in the normal rollercoaster of electoral politics. 

It was a step into a flume taking Wales – and the UK – in a whole new direction. 

There is an election for the Senedd in May. There have been eight opinion polls so far this year indicating how people might vote. Labour have been ahead in three, Reform in three, and Plaid Cymru in two. But experience from Scotland shows that voters with more than one parliament to elect tend to answer questions from pollsters about the next election by telling them how they voted in the last one, up until the weeks before the vote. 

Polling for the 2011 Holyrood election generally had Labour ahead of the SNP from May 2010 – when Gordon Brown’s party thrashed Alex Salmond’s – until March 2011. In May 2011, the SNP won a majority with a 15% margin. 

Where in the past, most people always voted the same way, now they tend to make up their mind in the week running up to an election. Particularly voters who feel there is more than one party which sometimes represents their values. Until last night’s vote, it wasn’t totally clear which way Welsh voters were likely to actually go when they thought closely about the question in those final days before an actual vote – although many of us already suspected Labour wouldn’t come off well. 

Now, Starmer’s success seems even less likely: Caerphilly indicates that last minute hyperfocus is likely to be disastrous for Labour. 

Compounding this is the fact that this was probably the last ever first past the post election for a Senedd seat – Wales is switching to a more-proportional-than-before system, with just multi-member constituencies. 

Neither Labour nor Plaid will be able to (honestly) make the ‘it’s either us or Reform’ argument in a specific place. But both parties will also have Polanski’s insurgency to compete with: the last poll had the Welsh Greens up on 9%, as they offer another suddenly-more-plausible home for former Labour voters in South Wales put off by what some see as Plaid’s nationalism. 

Winning at least one Senedd seat in May is one of Zack Polanski’s top priorities, and with a membership surge bringing vast new resources, it’s very likely he’ll get his way. And, like Plaid Cymru – as Zack said to me earlier this month – Greens are in favour of independence.

The implications of Labour dramatically losing Wales to Plaid Cymru or a Plaid/Green partnership are profound. Because, if Labourism is dead in Wales – as seems likely – then the union is in significant trouble. With Labour likely to suffer significant losses in the Scottish parliament election in May too, the idea that it is a pan-UK party will recede. For voters in both Scotland and Wales who spent 14 years of Tory rule torn between wanting independence or a Labour government, the former will look increasingly tempting. 

Even without a Plaid Cymru government advocating for it – or without any Green Senedd members to campaign for a more radical version of it – support for independence in Wales has soared to about 40% (once undecideds are excluded). A large majority of younger voters are now in favour. 

On the other side, Reform is eating the British nationalist/unionist vote. In 2021, the Abolish the Welsh Assembly party got 1,119 votes in Caerphilly, the Tories, 5,013, both of which were hoovered up by Team Farage this time. 

The next Welsh election is likely to create a clear dialectic: insurgent Plaid Cymru and Greens in favour of independence with the support of younger and left-leaning voters on one side; and Reform leading the charge for the union on behalf of older, more rightwing voters on the other. 

This dynamic will be a radical departure from the stodgy, centrist unionism of Wales’s Labour, Tories and Lib Dems. And while it will be a rocky ride, there’s always something important to remember about generational political splits: time only runs in one direction.