Calum Davies is a Conservative councillor in Cardiff and former Senedd candidate.
Calum’s pamphlet The Failed Experiment can be read here and is linked in the text
When it comes to Scottish independence, Brexit, and second referendums we usually get an answer – even from opponents of another poll – that we must respect the result for a generation before voting again.
Next year marks 30 years since the vote to create a Welsh Assembly. This was actually on the second time of asking because less than two decades earlier, the people of Wales voted against devolution by a margin of four-to-one.
Since, there have been seven elections to the body and its successor, the Senedd. It is now time, a generation on, for the people of Wales to have the chance to judge for themselves whether it has been a worthwhile endeavour.
Regular readers will know that I regard devolution a failure. It was promised that it would deliver on three key lines: that it would improve public services and the standard of living, it would kill nationalism stone-dead, and it would bring power closer to us meaningfully, not just physically.
Three decades on, public services have fallen far behind other parts of the UK, the separatists are in government, and powers are hoarded by an elite in Cardiff Bay rather than distributed to communities. Given this, what purpose does it serve the people of Wales?
This provides a clear case to abolish. Indeed, despite there being no elected representation of the view, support for abolition stands at around 30% – more popular than Welsh independence. Most Conservative and Reform UK voters want to scrap the Senedd.
For too long, abolitionists have been quiet or reduced to posting views on social media while proponents of devolution enjoy all the trappings and support of the regime. My columns on this website probably constitute a large proportion of works on the topic. It is time that changed.
That is why, today, I am releasing The Failed ExperimentThe Case for the Abolition of National Devolution in Wales.
This hundred-page political pamphlet sets out the reasons devolution has failed, is destined to continue producing poor outcomes for Welsh people, and why it would be advantageous for certain parties to adopt the cause. It is likely the most substantial, critical evaluation of devolution published, and I thank Conservative Home for hosting it here.
The paper is written from an unashamedly Unionist perspective and does not refrain from disclosing hard truths for pro-Union parties. Arguments made in the document include:
The case against national devolution in Wales is so rich, layered, and wide-ranging that single columns like this cannot do it justice. Any summary of the prosecution compromises its strengths. That is precisely why I chose to write this pamphlet, why you should read it, and why everyone who holds the Union dear to their hearts should use it to make the case themselves.
Following its introduction, the pamphlet opens the case with a look at the past and national identity, explaining how ahistorical, nationalist narratives are projected onto Welsh history to justify the national basis for devolution before moving onto demonstrating how the powers of the Senedd have grown and grown, yet accountability through a weak and coopted media has withered away.
It also examines devolution in practice, not just by looking at the myriad of failures across health, education, economic development, and a whole host of other policy areas, but at how those in Cardiff Bay operate as a self-interested regime. Transparency and reform take a back seat while politicians are dealt a free hand to pursue a separatist and dogmatic agenda.
It closes with a chapter on why it would be so obviously advantageous to the Conservatives and Reform UK to become the abolish party, and a conclusion that looks at a post-abolition Wales and what real devolution that empowers local areas can look like.
The fundamental case at the heart of this is that being anti-devolution is pro-Wales. To scrap the Senedd is to abolish an institution that has provably failed on all the key promises that were used to justify its introduction. A third of the Welsh people, myself among them, want to save Wales from a system that is hurting us.
Abolition does not solve all the problems we have, but the repatriation of powers to the sovereign Parliament in Westminster with others going down to local authorities – of existing and future forms – will go a long way in removing several obstacles to our prosperity and the illusion (or delusion) that devolution can make things better.
I am putting my country first. I do not believe in devolution, but I do believe in Wales.
The case for doing away with devolution and the opportunity of being the party that advocate it are separate. The former is a moral crusade; the latter is politics. Doubters may call this an exercise in tilting at windmills, but other small acorns have grown into mighty oaks. They dared to dream the impossible dream, so why shouldn’t we?
My Welshness is strong enough to survive without an unnecessary layer of government. My Welshness is not so fragile that it needs a failed legislature to uphold it. My Welshness is defined by my culture and my community. Wales was here before devolution, and it will be here after it.