The Tories 'not irrelevant because it's not more left-wing politics Wales needs, it's centre-right politics...'

The Conservative Party insists 'we're not irrelevant' in Wales after last month's Senedd by-election thumping. The party says not only did they lose votes to Nigel Farage's Reform UK, but an unexpected other party, as Political Editor Ruth Mosalski reports

- Ruth Mosalski

IT SEEMS strange - coming just days after what can only be described as an utter thumping in an election - that a prominent Conservative tries to argue his party isn’t irrelevant.

And yet former group leader in Wales Andrew RT Davies uses just that word, and he’s not the only one.

In 2021, the Conservative Senedd candidate in the Caerphilly Senedd constituency got 17.3% of the vote, with 5,013 voting for him.

At the next electoral test in the constituency, just a few weeks ago in a by-election, just 690 people marked a box for the Conservative candidate Gareth Potter.

With a turnout of over 50%, Mr Potter was handed just 2% of the votes and lost his £500 depositthe ultimate electoral badge of shame.

There can be no doubt, the party lost out because of the boom of Reform UK.

While it was Plaid Cymru who were ultimately successful in Caerphilly, Reform’s vote share jumped by 35%.

But the Conservative Party say they didn’t just lose votes to Reform, they also - almost unfathomably - lost votes to Plaid Cymru.

Such is the dividing nature of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK that while some Tories jumped ship to the incomers, others were so determined to stop them they voted for the party in Welsh politics at the furthest end of the political spectrum to them, and opted to support Plaid’s Lindsay Whittle.

It is not inconceivable to suggest that what was left - that 2% - is what remains of a core Tory vote in the seat which, while never a bedrock of activists, has previously backed them in decent numbers.

Some believe it has spelt out - starkly - what they already fear: The writing is on the wall for 2026 and the Conservatives' day as the official opposition will end spectacularly, although some are still hoping that things will turn around ahead of the next Westminster election.