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Welsh nationalists demand Labour put principles before party
Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth launches his party's General Election manifesto in Marble Hall, at The Temple of Peace in Cardiff, Wales, June 13, 2024

WELSH nationalists accused the Labour Party today of turning its back on Wales and using opinion polls, not principles, to determine its actions.

Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said Labour’s promise that having two governments of the same party working together would be good for Wales was nothing more than cynical spin.

“Labour voted against calls to scrap the two-child benefit cap, they’ve cancelled the only in-person consultation in Wales on the cruel cuts to disability benefits and Wales misses out on further rail funding,” he said.

Mr ap Iorwerth said that each time his party called out these damaging policies, First Minister Eluned Morgan mocked calls to lift the two-child benefit cap and proposals to nationalise Tata Steel’s Port Talbot plant.

The Plaid leader and Welsh Conservative Party head Darren Millar both raised the money lost to Wales through the rise in National Insurance contributions in the public sector.

Ms Morgan derided both party leaders for voting against the increase of billions of pounds in the recent Welsh budget.

“We have had the biggest uplift in the history of devolution and you voted, along with Plaid Cymru, to block that money coming to Wales,” she said.

Mr ap Iorwerth also brought up the Oxford to Cambridge rail project, whose classification as an England and Wales matter denies the latter country a share of the funding.

The First Minister said the Plaid leader needed a lesson on how the Welsh devolution settlement works and offered to have her civil servants explain it to him.

“Rail infrastructure is not devolved to Wales. Are we getting our fair share? Absolutely not,” Ms Morgan said.
 

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