Treading Caerphilly: What Does the Future Hold for Wales? with Rhun ap Iorwerth MS | ep. 140

The elections happening for the Welsh Senedd in 2026 are held at the same time as the English local elections and the vote for the Scottish Parliament – but there’s an argument to be made that they’re by far the most important ones happening on May 7th.

Since it was first elected in 1999, Labour have been the story of Wales. They have held a plurality of seats and have formed all Welsh Governments, be that majority, minority or coalition. They’ve never received less than 29.6% of the vote in either the constituency or regional list ballots.

Yet, four months out, opinion polls have them as low as 10%.

In their place stand two diametrically opposed forces: on one side, as in all British politics, stand the right-wing Reform, polling near 30%.

And on the other stands the Party of Wales, Plaid Cymru. They currently lead polls with highs of 33% and took one of their biggest scalps back in October, beating the surging Reform in the Caerphilly by-election for a Westminster MP.

The addition of a completely new voting system for the Senedd adds a wrinkle to proceedings also, as it moves to a closed-list proportional system in 16 constituencies across the country.

With the country on a precipice, we were joined by the Leader of Plaid Cymru, Rhun ap Iorwerth, to discuss what the future of Wales looks like and what Plaid Cymru’s plan is should they be successful in May.

Rhun has been the Leader of Plaid since 2023, before which he was Deputy Leader for five years, and has served as Member of the Senedd for Ynys Môn since 2013. Before this, he worked as a journalist, becoming BBC Wales’s Chief Political Correspondent in 2001, a post he held for five years, before moving into presenting roles.

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