In other countries, it would be remarkable, said Fraser Nelson in The Spectator: last week, Vaughan Gething won the election to become the new First Minister of Wales – which will make him the first black leader of any European government.
But here, “having a non-white leader” is no longer remarkable, thanks to Rishi Sunak in London and Humza Yousaf in Edinburgh having already achieved historic firsts.
‘How much can change in a lifetime’
In a week in which MP Diane Abbott was denied the chance to speak in Parliament during a debate about racism against her, it can hardly be said that the struggle for inclusion is over, said Sunder Katwala in The Guardian; but Gething’s win shows “how much can change in a lifetime”. When he arrived in the UK aged two, in 1976, having been born in Zambia to a Welsh father and a Zambian mother, there wasn’t a single non-white MP in the House of Commons.
From that point of view, his win is a “cause for celebration”, said Richard Wyn Jones in the same paper; but his victory in the Labour race to replace Mark Drakeford has caused deep unease in his party. He beat his rival Jeremy Miles with just 51.7% of the vote, which was secured via a combination of “Old Labour-style backroom machinations” – to ensure him the support of all the most powerful unions – and a “New Labour-style willingness” to accept a campaign donation that many consider badly tainted. Gething was given £200,000 (a vast sum set against total spending) by a firm run by a man who has been convicted of illegal waste dumping, and on whose behalf he had earlier been accused of lobbying.
‘Gething’s election will prove a turning point’
Of course, he has no wider mandate, said Jawad Iqbal in The Spectator: only 100,000 people were eligible to vote in the contest; turnout was just 16.1%. He shares that with Sunak and Yousaf, and like them, he takes over at a time of growing public dissatisfaction with those in power, and at the “fag end of a long period of government by their respective parties”.
Labour has run Wales since 1999, and its recent record is one of economic decline and failing public services. NHS waiting lists are longer in Wales than in England; Welsh schools’ results in Pisa tests recently fell to their lowest-ever level. As a long-serving minister, Gething is implicated in this, and has no credible plans for changing it. Soon, he won’t even be able to blame the Tory Government in London for Wales’s problems, said Henry Hill on UnHerd; nor is he likely to pick fights with a Labour one, as he is widely seen as Keir Starmer’s man. Labour’s grip on Wales is tight; but, just possibly, Gething’s election will prove a turning point.