{"id":971314,"date":"2026-05-19T15:50:25","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T15:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/971314\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T15:50:25","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T15:50:25","slug":"six-things-we-learned-as-rhun-ap-iorwerth-set-out-his-top-priorities-as-first-minister","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/971314\/","title":{"rendered":"Six things we learned as Rhun ap Iorwerth set out his top priorities as First Minister"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rhun ap Iorwerth has had his first chance to stand in front of the Senedd<\/a> and make his maiden pitch to the people who elected him.<\/p>\n

After last week’s vote to make him First Minister, and the announcement of the cabinet<\/a> that will serve him, on Tuesday the Senedd was back in action to hear Wales’ new First Minister announce his priorities.<\/p>\n

He listed his “core missions” as being “cutting waiting lists, raising standards in our schools, creating jobs, supporting businesses, tackling child poverty, helping households with the cost-of-living crisis, and standing up for Wales”.<\/p>\n

In his speech he said he would “honour the promises that I have made to the people of Wales”.<\/p>\n

“I know that I am speaking on behalf of the whole government when I say that,” he said.<\/p>\n

“The path will not always be smooth and without obstruction but we will face the challenges together with the aim of saying that we have always done our best for Wales.”<\/p>\n

When his speech concluded he then took statements, and faced questions from the leader of the opposition, Dan Thomas of Reform UK, for the first time and also heard from each party represented in the Senedd.<\/p>\n

These things were among the top issues that came to the fore.<\/p>\n

1. Independence looms large<\/p>\n

Throughout the election campaign Mr ap Iorwerth made clear his plan was not to put any independence referendum in front of Welsh voters in this four-year term \u2013 but the topic came up almost immediately once opposition politicians got to speak.<\/p>\n

In his response to the Plaid Cymru<\/a> leader Reform UK’s Dan Thomas brought up the fact the First Minister had mentioned independence during a phone call with the Prime Minister when the pair spoke for the first time. Mr Thomas said he was “disappointed” the topic was brought up.<\/p>\n

He told Mr ap Iorwerth: “While the constitutional debates may excite politicians and commentators most people in Wales are asking far more basic questions: ‘Can I get a GP appointment? Will my child receive a decent education? Can I afford my bills? Will my family have opportunities in Wales in four years’ time?’<\/p>\n

“These are the issues that matter and, while your statement today implies that these are your priorities, raising independence with the UK Government suggests that you are distracted by constitutional issues.”<\/p>\n

To that the Plaid leader repeated that he wants to use the next four years to show people what his party can do and no independence referendum is looming.<\/p>\n

“I said to the Prime Minister, as I have said throughout my time in politics and will continue to do so, we deal with the issues that we deal with now and we set a journey that the people of Wales will ultimately have to decide on the trajectory and the pace of.<\/p>\n

“I will offer leadership, I will do so here, within the Senedd, in partnership and seeking co-operation with Members across this Senedd, but always with the interests of the people of Wales at heart.”<\/p>\n

2. Hope for more powers for Wales<\/p>\n

Mr ap Iorwerth said he wanted to make “early progress” on further powers being devolved to Wales putting justice and policing, the Crown Estate, and developing a fair funding formula top of his list. On a day HS2 was back in the headlines<\/a> he said he wanted to “tackle the injustice of HS2” too. For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation, sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

3. Overground, underground…<\/p>\n

Across swathes of Wales plans to build pylons are causing huge concern and for many Plaid supporters \u2013 and their politicians \u2013 they want cables to have to go underground rather than overground.<\/p>\n

The manifesto pledge on this read: “Immediately prohibit the use of large steel lattice pylons for new 11-132 kV lines in Wales with a clear presumption in favour of undergrounding and overhead alternatives permitted only where installation is via low wooden poles or equivalent, less intrusive infrastructure.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The Welsh Government\u2019s new cabinet met for the first time on Monday, May 18(Image: Welsh Government)<\/p>\n

On Tuesday he was asked explicitly by Reform UK’s James Evans about that. “A number of your candidates, some who are sat in here, and mMinisters of your own government, have called these proposals out and said that those need to be stopped. So, can you take the opportunity today to say that your government will refuse planning applications that currently sit with Planning and Environment Decisions Wales?”<\/p>\n

The First Minister’s answer was more nuanced \u2013 much to the dismay of the Reform UK front bench who were shaking their heads. “On the development of renewables projects, people suggest moratoria or blanket refusals on planning and so on. I don’t think that’s the right approach, because you deal with them case by case.<\/p>\n

“But also there are principles at the heart of what I think is an important approach to the development of energy schemes and that is, as I mentioned earlier, putting the community at the heart of decisions”.<\/p>\n

4. Labour’s maths problem<\/p>\n

Labour’s interim leader Ken Skates opened his speech saying “asking awkward questions” would be part of his role as a backbencher.<\/p>\n

He went on: “You have to go back almost a decade to find the last time a First Minister appointed a government where the majority of members were men and yet here we are again.<\/p>\n

“Now as politicians we are often, and rightly, reminded that what matters is deeds, not words. This government certainly does not reflect the diversity of our modern nation,” he told the Senedd.<\/p>\n

There was just one problem, though, which the new First Minister was happy to point out. “We have a 50-50 ministerial split between men and women in this government,” said Mr ap Iorwerth.<\/p>\n

5. Mobile phone limit for schools<\/p>\n

Conservative Darren Millar heads up the seven-strong group of Conservative politicians. He used part of his speech to ask about a proposal in Plaid’s 100 days document saying it was an area where they had common ground.<\/p>\n

“In your 100 days document you refer to restricting the use of mobile phones in schools. Now that’s something that our party’s been calling for for quite some time. We stand ready to support you on the delivery of that ambition. Can you tell us: are you prepared to deliver it?”<\/p>\n

The First Minister replied: “That is something that, absolutely, we will want to pursue in government.”<\/p>\n

6. No quick answer on M4 relief road<\/p>\n

During the election campaign Mr ap Iorweth said during the WalesOnline leaders debate<\/a> he thought something had to be done to ease congestion on the M4<\/a>. On Tuesday he was asked what that would mean.<\/p>\n

The Tories had pledged a toll-free M4 relief road, and Natasha Asghar, their Casnewydd Islwyn MS, asked if he would back that. His answer was non-committal.<\/p>\n

The First Minister said: “We have two ministers working together on the connectivity agenda.<\/p>\n

“We are determined that we look in its entirety at how we deliver that connectivity on rail, on bus, on road, to make sure that our economy and our communities are well served by this government.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rhun ap Iorwerth has had his first chance to stand in front of the Senedd and make his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":971315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5010],"tags":[748,4884,127448,285,252190,33595,16,15,1764,14794],"class_list":["post-971314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wales","tag-britain","tag-great-britain","tag-plaid-cymru","tag-politics","tag-rhun-ap-iorwerth","tag-senedd","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-wales","tag-welsh-government"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116602040251633612","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/971314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=971314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/971314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/971315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=971314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=971314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=971314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}