HOW socialists should navigate the uncharted waters of a Plaid Cymru government and Reform opposition were the themes of the Morning Star’s TUC Cymru fringe meeting on Wednesday night.

Incoming Wales TUC president Laura Doel of the NAHT said people living in the Valleys felt “left behind — felt a lack of investment in public services, that when they look out their front doors they see disillusionment, children and young people who don’t have the drive they want them to have.”

Unions would work with the new Welsh government to try to secure core union goals like public ownership of social care.

Unison Cymru/Wales secretary Jess Turner detailed the union’s approach to the Senedd election.

It had formed a campaign committee a year ahead of the elections to gauge union members’ main demands, which became campaign themes.

It was able to agree a Unison manifesto that parties’ manifestos could be measured against, so in meetings with public service workers and phone banking it was easy to demonstrate Reform offered them nothing.

Morning Star Wales reporter David Nicholson warned that Reform was refusing to speak to media it doesn’t like — including the Morning Star — exacerbating the democratic deficit left by most media ignoring Wales. The Morning Star was once again the only outlet covering TUC Cymru at all, he pointed out.

Editor Ben Chacko discussed the need for unions to use political and industrial action to force governments in Wales and Britain to meet their demands, with a failure to deliver increasing the risk of a Reform government. The paper’s readers’ and supporters’ groups provided good local platforms to bring together activists from different unions and campaigns, he argued.