St David’s Day and Welsh Affairs

Nia Griffith Excerpts

Thursday 26th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dame Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

A very happy St David’s day to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and to everyone here. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West and Islwyn (Ruth Jones) on taking the initiative for this debate. It is a pleasure to have the opportunity in the St David’s day debate to highlight some of the very positive steps that this UK Labour Government are taking to drive economic growth in Wales, create more and better jobs, and help people cope with the cost of living crisis.

Of course, it is our job as politicians to face up to the problems and tackle them, but too often we overlook the success stories—the real drive and determination of factory managers and business owners whose enterprises are doing well in spite of what are often challenging circumstances. Just in the last couple of weeks, I visited three such businesses. It was inspiring to see Shufflebottom Ltd in Cross Hands. Well known locally for its steel-framed agricultural buildings, it is now winning contracts for school buildings, the Ministry of Defence and leisure centres, including the splendid new Pentre Awel building in Llanelli, a Swansea bay city region project financed by both the UK and Welsh Governments.

Then we have Dave Timbrell-Hill, whose Beer Park located at Dafen trade park in Llanelli—

[Tonia Antoniazzi]

Hear, hear!

[Dame Nia Griffith]

I know my hon. Friend knows it well. Beer Park was named last year as the best independent beer and cider retailer in the UK, and it was shortlisted again this year for the prestigious drinks retailing awards.

Then we have DesignYO!, a design company that has gone from being a work-from-home start-up to taking on another full-time employee and opening premises in Llanelli town centre. Those are three very different businesses, but each provides quality goods and contributes to our local economy.

We must be under no illusion that the task we faced after 14 years of Tory austerity, which saw not only swingeing cuts to our public services but wage freezes and benefit freezes, coupled with the Tory cost of living crisis, has made life very, very difficult for my constituents in Llanelli. Time and again, I hear from people across my constituency that the cost of living crisis is their biggest concern, as they work every hour they can and still struggle to make ends meet. Tackling that cost of living crisis is an absolute priority for both the UK and Welsh Labour Governments. That is why it is so important that we have put up the national minimum wage and the national living wage. It is important to ensure that work pays, and workers need and deserve those increases. Moreover, we have made a particular increase to the 18 to 20-year-old rate as a step towards bringing it up to the rate for 21-year-olds.

I am delighted that we are now removing the two-child benefit cap. I had the privilege of working on the child poverty taskforce. We looked at the full range of possible ways of taking children out of poverty, and this is the most effective change we can make. The imposition of the two-child limit by the Conservatives when they were in power has pushed hundreds of thousands of children into poverty, damaging their health, education and life chances. In Llanelli alone, an estimated 2,200 children will benefit from the change, giving them the foundation they need to succeed in school and go on to get secure, well-paid jobs.

We are also uprating the universal credit standard allowance by 6%, the first ever permanent real-terms increase, benefiting some 320,000 households in Wales. We are keeping the triple lock on the state pension, meaning that it will increase by 4.8% this April, raising incomes for 700,000 pensioners in Wales. We are sticking to our pledge of no increases in income tax, employee national insurance contributions or VAT. Furthermore, we have seen many cuts in interest rates, bringing down the cost of mortgages and business loans.

I welcome the decision by this Labour Government to save householders some £150 on their domestic energy bills from April this year. That will be particularly beneficial to those who rely heavily on electricity, such as those whose homes are not on the mains gas network, of whom there are many in the more rural parts of the Llanelli constituency. Let us not forget that the Welsh Government have rolled out the universal free school meal programme for all primary school pupils in Wales, which is a real help to many families.

The UK Labour Government are ending Tory austerity and providing the Welsh Government with the best settlement since devolution—some £22.4 billion on average for each of three years—so that they can plan ahead and begin to rebuild and improve public services, but that will take time. In some instances, additional work can be started immediately but in other areas, such as specialist areas of the health service, more personnel will have to be recruited in order to speed up the process of bringing down waiting lists. I appreciate that we all want to see waiting lists come down more quickly, but it is no mean feat that they are now consistently falling. Whether it is creating more and better paid jobs, filling potholes, bringing down waiting lists or tackling the cost of living crisis, I know that our two Labour Governments, in Westminster and Cardiff, are relentlessly focusing on improving people’s lives.

We must also remove barriers to people’s getting to work, one of which is lack of transport for them to get from where they live to where they work. I welcome the UK Government’s massive investment in rail in Wales, but Welsh Labour and the UK-wide Labour Government are also absolutely committed to investing in our bus services so that people can get to job opportunities. This is not to be anti-car—far from it; we recognise how vital car transport is, particularly in rural and semi-rural areas, and we have frozen fuel duty for two years running and now petrol is the cheapest it has been for five years—but it is to recognise that we need good bus services, too, and to understand that many households do not have access to a car at all or, if they do have a car, that different members of the family need to go in different directions to work or leisure activities.

Our bus services, particularly in semi-rural areas, have been badly eroded over the years. First, we had the Tory privatisation of bus services, which led to companies prioritising only the more profitable routes; then we had Tory austerity, which cut local council budgets, leading councils to cut back on subsidies for less profitable services; and then we had covid, and some services have struggled to pick up since that time. I very much welcome the initiative introduced last year by the Welsh Labour Government to enable 16 to 21-year-olds to pay just a £1 flat-rate bus fare, which is so important to help them get to education, training and job opportunities. If Labour is returned to government in the Senedd elections in May, we are absolutely committed to enabling all adults of working age to pay a flat-rate bus fare of £2.

Hand in hand with that is our election commitment to provide over 100 new bus routes across Wales. The Welsh Government have already passed legislation to bring bus services under public control, and we in south-west Wales will be one of the first areas where that will happen. If Labour is returned to government at the Senedd elections, the public will have an opportunity to be involved in shaping our bus services. I have already talked to First Bus and officers at Carmarthenshire county council about this future model.

I do not want to pre-empt what services the public will want, but I know, for example, that many residents in Tycroes would like a bus service from Ammanford to Llanelli. That could be one of the new routes, but, likewise, the public could have views about timetabling, evening services or frequency. What about Sunday services? Our Sunday bus services seem to reflect a bygone era, when everything was closed and people just walked to chapel, but now shops and hospitality venues are open, sporting events happen, and it is a popular day to get together with family and friends. People need buses to get to work in those places, and to go and enjoy them.

What is important is that Labour is committed to increasing these services and to giving local residents opportunities to shape the services of the future. I thank my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales for securing a good Budget settlement for Wales and allowing the Welsh Government to prepare these sorts of plans. If Labour is in government after May, I very much look forward to the additional bus services.

I will finish on a note about the Pride in Place programme. I very much welcome the funding that has been allocated to Llanelli. At some £20 million over 10 years, it will help us to regenerate Llanelli town centre and the area around it, and to create job opportunities. This is a real chance for Llanelli people to shape the town’s future, because it is Llanelli people who know what is best for Llanelli. We will want to hear from everyone who lives or works in Llanelli, or would like to have more reason to come into the town centre and the surrounding area: local businesses, residents, education establishments, third sector organisations, public sector, private sector, young people, older people. We really want to make the most of this opportunity. Once again, I thank my colleagues in Government for giving us the investment that we have needed so badly in Wales.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Chadwick]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution, and I am coming to that.

Secondly, we need a Government with plans to empower people across Wales. Devolution was intended to bring power closer to people, but the Welsh Government has instead hoarded power in Cardiff. We need a Government in Wales who trust councillors and council officers to make their own decisions, without demanding that the Welsh Government sign off on minor changes to bus routes; a Government who do not try to hide behind a £2 million a year Future Generations Commissioner; and a Government who ensure that health boards are truly accountable to the people they serve. In short, to put things right, Wales needs more than just a change of Government; we need a change in the style of government. Most importantly, people need the truth from us—politics depends on it. What happens to the spirit of democracy when people are not told the truth? It erodes trust, leading to populism.

Last week, the Government sought headlines by saying that they were spending £14 billion on Welsh rail projects. Well, Labour knows, and we know, that they are not doing so. What did that announcement achieve, other than creating further distrust in politicians? This will be their legacy: a Wales that is so tired of broken promises that people have stopped tuning in or turning up.

The Government are not the only ones who have broken their promises. The Brexiteers told Wales that leaving the European Union would save our steel industry, save Welsh farming and boost our international links. Ten years on, our steel industry is on the brink of collapse, Welsh farmers are being undercut by lamb imports from Australia and New Zealand, and Welsh universities are cutting jobs. The Brexiteers cost us the last decade, and Reform cannot be trusted with the next. If this Government wish to see off the threat from Reform and restore some faith in democracy, they must do two things: first, fix our health care system, and secondly, grow the economy. I will start with healthcare.

At the start of this Parliament, we were told that the two Labour Governments would work together. The Government said that they would use spare capacity in England to drive down waiting lists in Wales, and that proposal was welcome. Cross-border healthcare has long been an everyday reality for my constituents. My predecessors, Richard Livsey and Roger Williams, fought to ensure that Powys patients could go to Hereford hospital for treatment. But last summer, faced with a mounting deficit that is now approaching £50 million, Powys teaching health board asked English hospitals to slow down treatment times for Powys patients. Waiting times for some procedures have now doubled.

On Saturday I spoke to Dorothy Griffiths, who has been waiting since June 2024 for a knee replacement, and she is not alone. Patients who could have had hip or knee operations months ago have been left in pain because no one will take responsibility for ending this cruel policy. Nobody waiting for a knee replacement gets better with time, and the financial, physical and emotional costs will only mount. I have pressed the Welsh Office and Welsh Government Ministers for a plan to end the pain, but it is clear that there is no plan. Denying healthcare to people who need it is a moral outrage.

Growing our economy is how we can pay for the NHS that we need. Agriculture, heavy industry and tourism are key sectors of the Welsh economy. The Welsh economy is driven by small family-owned businesses, and I wish to emphasise this point: the best long-term approach to tackling poverty in Wales is to build an economy with good jobs. Businesses are allies in the war on poverty, not foes, yet rather than seeing those sectors as an asset, this Labour Government have all but declared war on them. First, despite the low earnings of Welsh farmers being well known to anyone who knows anything about farming, the Government launched a tax raid on family farms. Secondly, they introduced a jobs tax and rateable value changes for pubs, restaurants and hospitality venues, prompting closures and lost jobs across Wales.

Thirdly, there is the great betrayal of our steel industry. Before the general election, Welsh Labour MPs lined up in front of signs saying that they would “Save Our Steel.” They had a manifesto commitment to spend £2.5 billion on rebuilding our steel industry. Then they let the blast furnaces be turned off and said there was nothing that they could do. Yet months later, when the blast furnaces in Scunthorpe were under the same threat, Labour intervened and nationalised the steelworks. It was one rule for England and another for Wales.

We were told during that debate that a steel strategy was forthcoming. In September last year, I asked the Government where it was. Their answer was that it would be published by the end of the year, but it still has not been published. Why not? How much money has been spent on shoring up the English steel industry in the meantime? Will the Government commit to spending that £2.5 billion in Wales? If they do not, our economy in south Wales will be in danger of withering away, and the anger that will follow will wash Labour Members away. They must fight their colleagues for that funding.

There is huge demand for the skills that exist in south Wales, particularly around Neath Port Talbot. Welders are in big demand and can command six-figure salaries. We need an abundance of welders to build the big infrastructure projects that we need on time and on budget, and therein lies the opportunity to tackle poverty and build the industries of the future. Let us get Welsh children welding.

I support the Government’s aim of building supply chains and providing green jobs, but they must hurry up, because Wales is missing out. The tidal lagoon project in Swansea bay, which the Conservatives cancelled, would have created thousands of jobs, generated tons of green energy and given us an industrial lead. The Liberal Democrats agree with the Government that green industrial leadership is ours for the taking. Take offshore wind: Wales has the coastline, the ports and the industrial skills to lead the renewable transition, but parts of the supply chains have now been built elsewhere, which means that Welsh companies will have to import steel to build the necessary parts. We should not be importing steel into Port Talbot—that defies all logic. The Government have given themselves a deadline of 2035 to get floating offshore wind ready. What are they waiting for? This sluggish attempt at industrial development is costing us jobs.

[Dame Nia Griffith]

Does the hon. Member not recognise that there have been two very successful auctions for offshore floating wind, and the electric arc furnace has already started to be built in Port Talbot? We have the development of the ports in Milford and Port Talbot, plus the defence college and the associated factories that will go with that industry, plus the amazing semi- conductor industry, which I do not pretend to understand. Yes, of course we want welders, but we also want people highly skilled in the many new technologies that we are already bringing to Wales. He just does not seem to be living in the same country as the rest of us.

[David Chadwick]

It will be news to people in Port Talbot that the electric arc furnace is ready, because that is not what they are seeing on the ground. It is not ready. They were told it would be ready in 2027, but now we are hearing that will not happen until possibly 2028. This failure in industrial development is costing us jobs and damaging Welsh communities.

I am glad that the hon. Lady mentioned the Crown Estate, because the Crown Estate should have been forced to prioritise domestic supply chains, as has happened in the Netherlands and Germany, in its offshore leasing rounds. That is why devolution of the Crown Estate matters. It must be held accountable for its actions in Wales, and for its utter failure to build Welsh supply chains using Welsh businesses. I would like to distance myself from my predecessor, who said in this place that

“moving away from steelmaking would not have a direct impact on national security.”—[Official Report, 31 January 2024; Vol. 744, c. 849.]

I disagree, and I think it shows that the Conservatives do not understand Wales and never have done.

Finally, the Welsh Liberal Democrats believe that the green transition must be a Welsh jobs strategy. That means anchoring supply chains here, and investing in steel capacity, heavy plate manufacturing and port infrastructure, so that Welsh communities benefit directly from the energy revolution happening off our shores.