Eluned Morgan, Wales’s Labour First Minister, is expected to break ranks over the party’s controversial decision to slash the disability benefits bill in a major speech on Tuesday
Welsh First Minister Eluned Morgan will distance herself from Labour’s benefit cuts and warn the Government that she will stand up against “unfairness”.
In a major speech on Tuesday, the Welsh Labour leader is expected to take aim at the Government’s plans to slash the disability benefits bill, which will disproportionately affect people in Wales.
Ms Morgan, who is a Gavin and Stacey fan, is expected to compare Labour in England and Wales to the beloved sitcom – saying what works in Essex may not work in Barry.
Her intervention comes as Labour gears up for a bitter battle in next year’s Senedd elections, where the party faces being squeezed by Reform on the right and Plaid Cymru on the left.
Tensions are mounting in Labour ranks after Reform made sweeping gains in the English local elections last week, when the party also won a by-election in the Labour stronghold of Runcorn and Helsby by six votes.
READ MORE: NEIL KINNOCK: ‘Labour must be relevant to people’s everyday lives and offer realistic hope’
Cuts to disability benefits – which have been blamed by some Labour MPs for alienating voters – will disproportionately hit people living in Wales and northern England. Recent analysis by Policy in Practice found four out of the 10 local authority areas worst affected by benefit cuts were in Wales.
Ms Morgan will point to successes driving down NHS waiting lists after extra cash from the Budget. But she will draw a line in the sand over benefit cuts, and signal a shift to the left in Cardiff.
Pointing to the UK Government, she is expected to say: “Where we disagree, we’ll say it. Where we see unfairness, we’ll stand up to it. And when Westminster makes decisions we think will harm Welsh communities, we will not stay silent.”
She added: “I will not hesitate to challenge from within [Labour], even when it means shaking things up and disrupting the comfortable.”
The First Minister will also take aim at Reform in the speech, saying: “We walk beside people, we don’t divide them. Our politics isn’t about putting people down, it’s about quiet determination. It’s about care, compassion and graft. It’s about solidarity not spite.”
Former Labour leader Neil Kinnock threw his weight behind her efforts to spell out how the party would stand up for Wales. He said: “There is a lot to learn from the outcomes of the local elections in England, including the seepage of votes to Liberals, Greens and abstentions which – ironically – made the task of Reform much easier.
“And the fight in Wales will be even more intense. To earn sustained support, Labour has to be relevant to people’s everyday lives and offer realistic hope for the future. In Wales, Labour has to embody Welsh values of community, fairness and determination.”
It comes as ex-Cabinet Minister Louise Haigh became the most senior MP yet to say the cuts to welfare and the winter fuel allowance should be ditched. She said Labour faced an “existential” threat from Reform and urged the PM to tear up Labour’s pledge not to raise taxes.
It marks her first major intervention since she quit as Transport Secretary in November after admitting she had pleaded guilty to a fraud offence a decade ago over a mobile phone theft.
On Sunday, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said the Government was impatient to bring about the change voters want but it would take time to fix the mess the Tories left behind.
He told the BBC: “All I’d say to people, we’ve got the message, we’re not daft, we haven’t got our heads in the sand, all I’d ask people for is to give us a bit of time and to give us the benefit of the doubt.
“To recognise the range, the breadth, the depth of the crisis that we walked into, we’re going at those challenges as hard as we can, as fast as we can; we’re as frustrated, impatient about the challenges and the change that’s needed in the country as everyone else.”
Mr Streeting added: “The Chancellor’s been very clear with the Cabinet and with the country that we can’t just kind of keep reaching for a tax lever to solve our problems, we’ve got to do more on the reform side, making sure money’s better spent.
“That’s why, although the Chancellor has invested £26 billion more in the NHS made possible because of those choices, not all of which have been popular, but I would argue as Health Secretary, the right choice to invest in the NHS.”
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