The Electoral Commission report on May 2022’s local elections in Wales, published yesterday, highlights that the extension of the franchise is only the first step in ensuring the participation of new groups of voters in Welsh elections.

The Senedd and Elections (Wales) Act 2020 was hailed as an important step in increasing democracy through the extension of the right to vote to 16 & 17 year olds as well as qualifying foreign nationals in all devolved elections. But as the report shows, extending the franchise alone is not enough.

Only an estimated 1 in 5 (12,338) newly enfranchised 16 & 17 year olds registered to vote ahead of the local elections in Wales. While 81 per cent of voters in general were satisfied with the process of registering to vote, the satisfaction levels dropped to 70 per cent for this age group. There is a clear deficit in turnout between those under 35 years old compared to older age groups.

The feedback from young people, along with those who work with them, was that they still lack the knowledge on how to participate in democratic processes. This lack of knowledge, combined with a lack of information on parties and candidates results in less motivation to get involved in elections.

These deficits in knowledge were echoed by parents, 77% of whom think that it is important for children to learn the basics of democracy, politics and voting at school. But only 22% think that the information their children currently get is sufficient.

Combined, these data informed the first recommendation of the report:

Report Recommendation 1

Welsh Government should consider continuing to provide an additional resource to local authorities to increase registration rates and support participation amongst newly enfranchised and under-registered groups, building upon the work carried out by the Electoral Registration Support Officers.

ERS Cymru has long called for better political education in Wales to bridge this knowledge gap and ensure that all newly enfranchised voters have the tools they need to participate and make informed decisions when it comes to voting.

Our work over the last two years building and convening Democracy Group Cymru, a network of over 60 organisations working with newly enfranchised voters in Wales, has shown that longer lasting, more innovative engagement is needed to increase democratic participation.

We echo the Electoral Commission’s call for the Welsh Government to continue providing additional resources to help increase registration rates through activities that promote engagement and impart information. There is all too often a rush ahead of any given election to engage those less likely to vote. We advocate for a longer term approach that sees democratic engagement and political education activities supported outside of election periods. The New Curriculum for Wales provides one opportunity for this under its aim to support learners to become ‘ethical, informed citizens who understand and exercise their human and democratic responsibilities and rights.’ The report states that this provides:

“…an opportunity for democratic awareness to be woven consistently through education,
rather than being a standalone topic during an election.”

This requires that teachers themselves have both the knowledge and the confidence to teach political literacy, a concern that was highlighted by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Political Literacy’s report The Missing Link. They found that only 1 per cent of teachers in England felt ‘fully prepared’ to develop young people’s political literacy. This is a concern that we’ve heard more anecdotally in Wales too, making it vital that teachers get the support they need to confidently weave democratic awareness into their lessons.

The deficit in engagement from younger would-be voters is set against the backdrop of an overall local election turnout that was 4 percent lower than in 2017 (38% in 2022, 42% in 2017). This varied across the country from a high of 56.5% in Monmouthshire County Council to a low of 31.3% in Torfaen County Borough Council, and even more so by ward with 70.5% turnout in Rogerstone North Ward, Newport City contrasted with just 9.6% turnout in Llanwern Ward also in Newport City. The overall picture is that once again we see a devolved election that has failed to engage the majority of the electorate. So, as well as engaging newly enfranchised voters in democracy, we still have work to do in engaging those over 18 missing from the register or who don’t head to the ballot box.

The top five reasons given in the EC report for not voting in the local elections were:

• lack of time/too busy (18%)
• not interested/fed up with politics (12%)
• vote wouldn’t have made a difference to the outcome/ doesn’t count (11%)
• medical/health reasons not related to COVID-19 (9%)
• didn’t like the candidates/parties/they didn’t represent my views (8%)

If we combine those with a sense of apathy towards the system with those with a sense of apathy towards the political parties/candidates then nearly 1/3 of respondents (31%) didn’t vote for reasons of democratic disengagement.

The reasons given by 16-24 year olds for not voting were largely the same as the respondents overall. Two places where their response differed were a higher percentage (23 per cent) cited lack of time/too busy as their reason and 16 per cent said they forgot about voting (compared to 7 per cent across the whole sample). This suggests that voting may be seen as less important to this age group, perhaps in part due to the timing issues of exams, alongside the more widespread sentiments of democratic engagement.

It is therefore crucial that we work together to understand and fight this apathy on all fronts. Designing for greater accessibility may help improve engagement, but ultimately we also need people both young and old to care about their vote and be confident in its ability to affect change.

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It’s hard to think of a more troubling year in living memory. But the public health crisis has, perhaps counter-intuitively, put issues of democracy at the forefront.

The election may feel like a distant memory, but its ramifications are being keenly felt. Single party majorities are used to command and control, pushing buttons and pulling levers. But during a health emergency, it is countries with more cooperative forms of government which appear to have performed best.

Going back to last December, the government secured an 80 seat majority – with just over a one percent increase in vote share. That election saw a surge in tactical voting and all the usual flaws of winner-takes-all politics. But really it was a crisis of representation.

Over 70 percent of people’s votes did not contribute to the result, ERS research showed. That’s a shocking indictment of Westminster’s warped voting system. It’s no wonder trust in politics is at rock bottom and people feel fundamentally locked out of decision-making.

The winner-takes-all mentality has been precisely the wrong mindset for trying to lay out policy and conduct communications with the whole country in a crisis.

I’m proud of our work this year shining a light on the failings of this zero-sum political system.

Early on in the crisis, we realised it was important to continue to campaign for political reform, but be sensitive to what was going on. We played a constructive role. Amid fears voters could be effectively silenced without their MPs being able to contribute, we led the calls for virtual proceedings.

We noted that emergency legislation vested huge powers in ministers – at a time when there appeared to be less parliamentary activity. Our warnings of a vacuum in scrutiny led to real change, with the UK’s virtual proceedings offering an excellent example to the world.

It was a sign that, when pushed, parliament can move reluctantly into the 21st century. 

But we know that we need lasting change to open up government decision-making. To ensure ministers have to listen to all voters – not just those in swing seats. That requires
a shift to proportional representation
across parliament.

For the unelected House of Lords, this was the year that for most people their patience totally ran out.

We know that through our polling work, and the media work we did, with the ERS’ calls for a fully and fairly elected second chamber chiming with the way many voters were thinking.

It is a point of near-consensus now that the ‘private members’ club’ style of politics has got to go. This year saw the PM pack the second chamber with yet more donors and party cronies, and ERS concerns dominated the headlines on this. But 2020 also highlighted that the nations and regions were simply being ignored in our patchwork constitutional set-up. That’s why our calls for a PR-elected Senate of the Nations and Regions are more vital than ever.

We’ve seen real success across Britain. In Wales, ERS Cymru’s campaigning has been instrumental in ensuring that councils will soon be able to use the Single Transferable Vote. Automatic voter registration could soon be a reality there, and we are leading coalitions to secure visible wins on a range of vital democratic issues. Fairer elections – and a different way of doing democracy involving citizens directly – are firmly on the agenda. In Scotland, the ERS has been closely involved in the government-backed Citizens’ Assembly, as well as pressing ministers on the need for stronger lobbying rules.

All this is a living example of ERS strategy in action: pushing for real democracy at all levels. I’m proud of how the ERS has moved quickly to respond to the pressing issues this year – and to raise the voice of voters in the debate.

I’d like to say a huge thanks to the new ERS Council for their support in the governance of the organisation, and a heartfelt thank you to the staff of the ERS who have soldiered on through a difficult year – while continuing to produce excellent work. And to the members who are making this all possible. Together we are leading the fight for the democratic change the UK so desperately needs.

Read this year’s annual report

ERS Cymru has advocated for the use of deliberative democracy and citizens’ assemblies for many years. But it’s an idea that has renewed importance when it comes to the Covid pandemic.

Our manifesto published ahead of the 2021 Senedd Elections specifically calls for the use of citizens’ assemblies and participatory budgeting to create a society where ownership of political decisions is shared – with the public directly involved in finding ways forward. 

As Wales eases its way out of lockdown, now is the perfect time for commitment to a collaborative future. Deliberative practices result in a more engaged and democratic society. 

This is vitally important in rebuilding trust with politicians in a system where people largely don’t see their votes as counting, and where power too often feels distant. The complex nature of the challenges faced by countries across the world in the 21st century – from climate change to economic pressures – needs input from the wider public to ensure policies are produced that work for everyone. 

This input can’t be distilled down into simple referendum questions, but must encompass full and open discussions of the issues along with their potential solutions. What better place to start that deliberation in Wales than with a citizens’ assembly focused on our post-lockdown economic recovery?

The pandemic has fundamentally altered the way we’ve been living and interacting over the past three months. It has highlighted many things, including: the fragility of our consumerist economy, the need for strong local food networks and the importance of our key workers in society, to name just a few. A citizens’ assembly on Covid recovery planning could help us rebuild in a way that is more resilient and able to respond to these realisations. 

Learning from experience

Citizens’ assemblies are formed using a cross-section of society, a ‘mini-public’, that is selected to encompass the demographics across a whole population (gender, age, ethnicity, socio-economic background). For the recent ‘Climate Assembly UK’, members were also balanced to take into account ‘level of concern over climate change’, to ensure fair representation across this spectrum too. 

Over a given timeframe the assembly meets to engage in open, respectful and informed discussion and debate with their peers on an issue before providing recommendations. 

Their structure uses three phases: learning, consultation and deliberation/discussion, which gives the participants the time and resources to move beyond newspaper headlines and political slogans on an issue. Time to dig much deeper allows appreciation of the complexities of an issue, often altering personal opinions in the process. This empathy is vital for democracy to work.

Citizens’ assemblies are already in use in response to pressing contemporary issues. In France the French Citizens’ Convention on Climate was set up in the wake of the Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vests) protests, sparked due to rising fuel tax and social inequalities. It offered a way to ‘co-produce’ policies around climate change with the French public. It is in these thorny moments that citizen’s assemblies shine. Their deliberative approach is particularly suited to complex problems and can be used as a uniting tool in polarised societies.

The Republic of Ireland’s use of citizens’ assemblies allowed it to discuss controversial topics, such as abortion, in a measured way. The resulting call for a referendum on the issue and eventual legalisation change is an example of how even those with opposing views can come to a shared and more nuanced conclusion through the process.

We’ve seen the continuation of some of these citizens’ assemblies despite lockdown restrictions, with a move to online platforms. The French Citizens’ Convention on Climate produced their 50 priorities to tackle economic recovery and greenhouse gas emissions while improving health and well-being in early April via Zoom. Similarly Climate Assembly UK recently published its interim briefing on post-lockdown steps to aid economic recovery, with nearly 80% of assembly members agreeing that these steps should be designed to help achieve net zero.    

A Welsh Citizens’ Assembly

Wales is a diverse nation with a similarly diverse set of needs. A citizens’ assembly will help ensure that post-Covid economic recovery works for the whole of Wales, whether that be rural areas with poor broadband speeds or the urban South-East with its congestion issues.

Many feel cut off from Cardiff and disengaged with the Senedd, so there is a direct need for these practices to build communities and provide more effective links between the people and decision-makers.

Deepening our democratic processes could be crucial to rebuilding in an inclusive and participatory way. The type of recovery a citizen might want to see could be influenced by one of more demographics including their location in the country or age. We need to lean into these differences, learn from them, deliberate on them and collectively construct solutions for all. Citizens’ assemblies provide the perfect tool for this.

Let’s move away from the centralised approach we’ve seen in Westminster, and find a way forward together.

Civil society groups led by ERS Cymru have launched their ‘democracy asks’ for the 2021 Welsh Senedd elections, throwing down the gauntlet for Welsh parties to back real democracy for voters.

The ‘Manifesto for Democracy’ – spearheaded by Electoral Reform Society Cymru and backed by Colleges Wales, Oxfam Cymru, WEN Wales, IWA and Chwarae Teg – calls for:

1. A stronger Senedd: A size that reflects the powers and challenges of a Parliament, with proper scrutiny through 90 members, elected by STV with an ‘equality floor’ to ensure diversity
2. Fair representation for all: STV for all local elections – ‘permissive’ PR risks leaving out councils that need reform the most.  At a local level, we want to see the sector collecting and publishing diversity data, and a far-reaching Access to Elected Office Fund introduced
3. Democracy beyond the ballot box: Adoption of deliberative democracy tools into standard policy making processes, with tools such as participatory budgeting and citizens’ assemblies regularly used
4. Young citizens: A commitment to statutory political education within schools to tackle the democratic deficit and foster civic engagement

The Democracy Manifesto is being sent to political parties in Wales. ERS Cymru were instrumental in campaigning for votes at 16/17, but there’s much more to do when it comes to democracy in Wales.

The Society wants to see full implementation of the Expert Panel on Assembly Electoral Reform’s recommendations – to increase the number of Members of the Senedd to around 90, alongside implementation of the Single Transferable Vote (STV) with an integrated gender quota. The Society also wants to see proportional representation guaranteed for local elections.

While there’s been some good progress over the past few years, trust in politics remains low and we need a democratic renewal, to put real power in the hands of voters.

Campaigners want to see a greater role for participatory democracy. With the Senedd having real powers over political reform, Wales can lead the way in building a Parliament fit for the 21st century.

The ERS are urging parties to lead on this and get behind bold innovations that can empower the public, and create a new contract with the people of Wales for the next Parliament.

A spokesperson for ColegauCymru said: “We are pleased to support ERS Cymru’s asks ahead of next year’s Senedd elections. We particularly welcome the vision of working towards a stronger and more diverse Senedd, and the recognition of the importance of improving the political education of young people in Wales – particularly in light of new laws which lower the voting age for the 2021 Senedd Elections.”

Read the Manifesto for Democracy here.

In 2018, I was asked by colleagues in Electoral Reform Society Scotland to chair a panel at a conference called Democracy 21. It was built around a pretty simple premise: people should have the collective power to make good things happen for themselves and their communities and also use that power to stop bad things happening. 

Nearly 500 people attended, including academics and legislators. But primarily it represented the strength of Scotland’s civil society. It was packed with community groups, activists, community organisers, artists and creators who were there to discuss the challenges that democracy was up against.

It obviously made me think about civil society in Wales. Our impact, our involvement, and could we compare? 

Historically there may have already been a reasonably coherent civil society in Scotland, as they had stronger institutions even before their Parliament was reconvened in 1999. Of course, in Wales we have also had a civil society. If you look at active community groups in the post-war years up until the eighties, it was a very strong one. But would we really be able to call it a distinctly Welsh civil society?

Devolution for both nations have developed their respective civil societies further. Say what you like, but our institutions are not only closer to the people they seek to represent in distance, but in our opportunity to influence them. 

One of the issues is that many of the groups that are involved in civil society don’t actually know they are part of it. It is easy for a community group – quietly working tirelessly to change the lives of people in their square-mile – to think of their work in isolation, but they are part of the community we know as civil society. How do we let them know? How do we involve them and what is expected of them when they do?

What about our functioning civil society that has developed alongside the fledgling political institutions of Wales? Where next for them…us? And how do we give Welsh civil society the boost it needs to start emulating Scotland’s distinct and strong civil voice? 

ERS Cymru, alongside the Bevan Foundation, asked those very questions at the end of last year in an event held in the Pierhead in Cardiff Bay. We looked at where we are now but the main object was to draft recommendations for what needed to happen next.

We asked our 50 or so delegates to work in groups and come up with specific recommendations on how to improve civil society.

The room as a whole then voted to back (or not) each group’s recommendations and that left us with a list of 11 recommendations, including participatory budgeting, annual leave/time off for democratic engagement, a new civil society code, and a review into the health of civil society in Wales.

The challenge we have is getting beyond that room. 50 people in Cardiff Bay should not be solely responsible for coming up with ideas of how to strengthen civil society across the whole of Wales. That’s why we need you to take a look, add your comments and own ideas and share this among your networks so they can do the same. 

If we are going to ever address some of the fundamental challenges facing Welsh civil society then we need a wide conversation about how to do that within but crucially beyond Cardiff Bay. 

Everybody has had to step up recently. As the pandemic hit, our communities and Welsh civil society were part of the enormous effort to make sure people who needed help, received it. From national charities to small village organising committees, civil society has reacted to this disaster the only way they can: by mobilising, by being inventive and resourceful and by meeting any threat head-on.

When this is all over, we need those charities, organisations and groups – large and small – to step up once again. Those connections must endure and make sure their voices and the people they represent are heard in decision making on every level – from local councils to their Parliaments in Cardiff and London.

A gathering of 450 people to talk about Welsh democracy and community empowerment seems a very long way off, but we can be taking steps to bridge the gap and strengthen our civil society for the benefit of all of the people it represents and supports. 

A version of this piece was first published by the Institute of Welsh Affairs in 2019, with changes made w/b 6th April 2020.

Another wild month in politics – from crucial Brexit votes to the apparent disintegration of Britain’s party structures. Throughout, we’ve been pointing at the elephant in the room: the crumbling state of Britain’s democracy and how it can be repaired.

We were proud to launch our new report, Reining in the Wild West: Campaign Rules for the 21st Century, on the 15^th anniversary of Facebook’s launch (I’m not sure they liked the gift). We drew in academics, regulators, politicians and campaigners alike to say it is time we brought Britain’s broken political campaign rules up to date. It was featured in the Sunday Times.

We led a wide coalition of campaigners to directly call on the PM to rein in the online ‘wild west’. The Guardian and the tech press also joined the debate, while we had op eds published on ConservativeHome, LabourList, OpenDemocracy and Democratic Audit. Read the full series.

Our research on cross-community voting in Northern Ireland was cited in the Times.

Before the party split, the Sunday Times carried an article arguing it was “High time we voted out first-past-the-post electoral system”. He argued: “Brexit is testing the two big UK parties to destruction, but first past the post requires factions banding together into monoliths to keep hurdling the high barriers to entry that it imposes.” When eight Labour MPs left the party just a day later, it was a reflection that parties have not been their true “shape” for a long time — they have been bolted together by a broken electoral system. We wrote a letter in response.

Darren Hughes spoke to Wired magazine about the Independent Group split, arguing: “The last few years have demonstrated that these issues run much deeper than a blue team and a red team. Society has fundamentally changed and Brexit has drawn back the curtains…

“Both major parties are essentially coalitions, but the voters have no control over which faction is going to be in charge of the party,” he told Wired.

Also responding to the party breakup, Times columnist Hugo Rifkind wrote with passion about the need for proportional representation. He cited our research that 68% of votes do not go towards electing an MP, noting Theresa May could have won an absolute majority in the 2017 election with just 533 extra votes in the nine most marginal constituencies.

“Statistics like this should open your eyes to the power that targeted and often covert political advertising could have in a system where seats can be comfortably won on less than half the vote. First-past-the-post is ripe for being manipulated,” he wrote.

We responded, with our letter in the Times securing the top spot. The debate on fair votes is opening up again.

But while Brexit and the Independent Group have dominated the headlines, the government have been trying to evade transparency. We raised the alarm after ministers failed to meet their obligations as part of the Open Government Network. They are meant to say how they will make government more transparent – but they’ve missed the deadline by months.

Finally, the government’s voter ID scheme continues to fall apart, with councils dropping out following our campaigning. As we said in the Independent, “local councils are under huge budget and staffing pressures – the last thing they need is their election clerks to become glorified bouncers.”

Here is just a highlight of the coverage our campaigns have received in the press this month.

MPs call for end to ‘political gender gap’ at Westminster

We coordinated the media for the Centenary Action Group’s campaign to make the government implement S106 of the Equality Act 2010. Already part of the law, this section would make political parties reveal their candidate ‘gender gaps’. The campaign was picked up by the Daily Mail and Financial Times, and the Guardian published our letter.

Electoral Reform Society says pupils want democracy lessons

ERS Cymru has been travelling around Wales talking to pupils about what they want to see in citizenship education classes. The launch of the Our Voices Heard report with Kirsty William AM was covered by BBC Wales.

Make Debates Happen petition hits parliamentary target with 100,000 signatures

Following our Debating the TV Debates research, we gave our support to Sky News’ Make Debates Happen petition. They’ve now hit 100,000 so it should get a debate in parliament.

Fury as Tories refuse to reveal cost of ‘unnecessary’ voter fraud crackdown

We continued our campaign to reveal the true cost of the government’s voter ID trials. The Mirror and the Local Government Chronical both covered the exorbitant cost. The first trial cost £1.7million, but Cabinet Office minister Chloe Smith has refused to say how much next May’s pilot will cost.

The democratic disaster of 90 seats reserved for men in Parliament

The Scotsman published a piece by our Chief Executive Darren Hughes on the ludicrous practice of hereditary peer by-elections, while the Daily Mail investigated some of the House of Lord’s less active members.

The UK’s democracy is in danger of backsliding – but current policy proposals are not the right fix

Our work on designing campaign regulations fit for the digital age was covered in the Guardian and Director of Research Jess Garland responded to Democratic Audit’s recent report The UK’s Changing Democracy,

Has there ever been such a time of change in Welsh politics? By the end of this year there is a chance that none of the parties in the Assembly will have the same leader as at the beginning of the year.

This period of flux is very interesting for the political nerds (myself included) but it is also one where we have an unprecedented opportunity to deliver some game-changers in the policy world.

As well as the ‘who’, we now need to see the candidates making strong commitments to the ‘what’ – and chief among these should be what they intend to do to tackle issues around diversity and inequality.

In July, ERS Cymru released a report, New Voices: How Welsh politics can begin to reflect Wales, which explored the issues around diversity in Welsh politics. It revealed a pretty depressing picture of how progress is being held back in Wales: councils with consistently slow progress on female councillors (including two in Wales with no women at all on their cabinets,) an Assembly that has gone backwards on equality, and one party never having a Welsh female MP in Westminster.

On top of this were the shocking reports of abuse and harassment, including razor blades and excrement being sent to Welsh politicians. 266 of them took part in a survey for the report and over 45% said they had suffered abuse or harassment. When this came to women alone it rose to 54%.

Wales needs action on diversity – our political system is fundamentally not representative of the country it serves.

Unless the next leaders of the main political parties in Wales take this seriously we cannot move forward.

That’s why we’ve written to the candidates for leadership of each of the three main political parties in Wales urging them to make strong commitments on equality.

These include committing to:

• Fielding at least 45% female candidates in Assembly elections
• The introduction of measures to encourage a broader range of candidates from ethnic minorities, a wider age spread and those with disabilities, as well as monitoring processes to ensure progress
  Delivering the recommendations of the Expert Panel on Assembly Reform on gender parity
• Signing up for a joint code of conduct on intimidating behaviour along with other parties in the Assembly
• Delivering better political education in Welsh schools to engage a wider proportion of the population in politics in Wales.

The next leaders of the political parties in Wales have a chance here to show what leadership really means. This is a chance for Wales to set about boosting the diversity of our political institutions and to address a fundamental issue with our democracy. If politics in Wales doesn’t reflect our communities then how can it properly represent them?

The commitments we are asking the candidates to make are ones that would make a substantial difference to the way Welsh politics works and the kinds of people that would feel politics is something worth engaging with.

That the three main parties all have a leadership contest now is significant – this is a chance to get all of these parties to make the same commitments and put them all on the same page on this issue.

Those Assembly Members that are now official candidates, or who are trying to get the sufficient nominations to stand in their respective elections should take our recommendations seriously, and stand on a platform of a Welsh politics that is diverse and which properly reflects the people of Wales.

It’s a time of change, and a time for change.

Read the New Voices Report

We got a sense of the shocking scale of abuse in Westminster last year. But there has been relatively little heard about the issues surrounding harassment and diverse representation in Wales.

It turns out the situation is toxic.

We had a pretty strong idea about the lack of diversity – which groups are under-represented and put off politics. But until now, we didn’t have a clear idea what the main causes were.

ERS Cymru set about pulling together a report on the representativeness of politics in Wales and exploring what the barriers are.

The results are striking. Of 266 elected representatives who were surveyed as part of the work, 121 said they had been abused or harassed either in office or while campaigning. That’s 45.5% of total respondents.

Of 266 elected representatives who were surveyed as part of @erscymru's work, 121 said they had been abused or harassed Click To Tweet

Alarmingly, a majority – 54% – of female respondents say they have faced this kind of behaviour.

Some of the abuse went beyond what we expected to hear: one person said they had excrement delivered through the post in a Valentine’s card. Another reported inappropriate sexual advances by constituents, during advice surgeries and door-to-door canvassing sessions.

Is it any wonder, given these reports, that people are put off from standing for public office?

ERS Cymru has sought to listen and to learn from what politicians – and those who were put off trying to get involved – have told us as part of gathering the information for our new report.

But mostly we want to ensure that action is taken. It is why we have published 16 recommendations to help diversify Welsh politics.

These range from a 45% quota for women for each party at local government elections, a joint code of conduct on abuse among political parties, better training and guidance on harassment, and looking to improve funding for candidates from under-represented groups.

Others include each political party introducing an action plan on diversity to select candidates for vacant target seats at a Westminster level.

We also think that better political and civic education should be delivered in Welsh schools to begin to try and tackle the negative culture that is currently leading to a lot of the abuse we are seeing.

We need better political and civic education in Welsh schools to tackle the negative culture that is leading to a lot of abuse Click To Tweet

Politicians in Wales told us that they struggle to maintain a healthy family life, and that they worry about finances.

The abuse they face is one clear example of the barriers to a truly representative politics in Wales.

The Welsh Government and others should read these shocking stories – and act on the need for change.

The report, titled ‘New Voices: How Welsh politics can begin to reflect Wales’, is being launched at the Welsh Assembly on Thursday 12th July.

Read the report

Jess Blair reflects on the results of Wales’ largest ever in-depth survey on how people feel about politics in Wales.

‘What does politics mean to you?”

It’s a tough question, and even more difficult to answer in ten words or less. But it’s precisely this question (among many others) that over 800 people across Wales answered as part of our ‘Missing Voices’ project which reports back today.

Missing Voices has been an attempt to understand what people across Wales feel about politics beyond the ballot box. To do this we ran a series of focus groups, spanning across Wales, and a wide-scale survey.

Our focus groups deliberately tried to reach those who wouldn’t normally take part in this type of project, and saw us visiting 20 different places, from a Zumba group in Hirwaun to talking to amateur actors auditioning for the local panto in Criccieth. In total over 850 people directly inputted into the project – and we spoke to many more.

What we found was a real mixed bag – but one which may uncomfortable reading for our political institutions and representatives.

Our report, which is out today (and available here in English and here in Welsh), has identified three key themes from what people have told us: confusion, frustration, and hope.

And while these themes will not necessarily be news to a lot of people, we now have a much deeper understanding of what exactly has led to these feelings.

Confusion and a lack of understanding and engagement with Welsh politics was a significant issue throughout the project. People spanning different generations told us about their uncertainty around what they were voting for and policy and politics at a Welsh level in particular. When asked “What does politics mean to you?” many of the responses summed up this issue:

“I’m not as passionate as I should be and I believe that is down to my lack of knowledge”

“I’m unsure & confused, therefore uninterested sadly.”

The political climate has played a role in many feeling distrustful and frustrated with politics, with responses to the survey and focus groups referencing the expenses scandal, tax evasion and recent allegations of sexual harassment in politics.

A perceived divide between politics and people also emerged, with many not feeling represented by their elected politicians.

“I don’t do politics, I hate it.”

“Politicians promise the world and deliver nothing. Very little change.”

But it’s not all bad news. Across Wales we also found a lot of hope, particularly following a General Election where turnout increased, especially among young people.

“Politics is life, its effects my life and those around me. You can’t turn a blind eye and ignore it, issues need to be addressed, voices need to be heard. There’s a real shift in the way ‘young’ people like me see ‘politics’ and it’s good. There is a revolution coming,”

said one person responding to our survey.

And there’s a high degree of confidence in the ‘nuts and bolts’ of democracy in Wales – even if that doesn’t feed through to engagement or understanding. 89% are confident our polling stations are well-run. But when it comes to having a voice, 38% are not confident they ‘can really change the way things are run.’

What the participants in this project have shown us is that there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic about the future, there are serious issues that need to be addressed before we can have a fully functioning and healthy democracy.

It is clear that political education, at a school level and beyond, is not providing the electorate with all the information they need. And for many, there is a huge chasm between real life and politics – and a lack of effective communication from different levels of government is perpetuating this.

Our next steps at ERS Cymru are to take what people have told us and shape it into a strategy that can bring politics and people together. We’ll be starting in January with a project looking at improving political education across Wales and tackling the information deficit that seems to be affecting so many people.

‘Missing Voices’ has given us one of the most in depth insights to date into what people think and we should not overlook that. Now our institutions and representatives must adapt to make sure these voices are properly heard.