Row as Welsh Labour blocks high flying candidate from standing for the Senedd

Martin Shipton

A huge row has broken out over a decision by Welsh Labour to exclude from a Senedd election shortlist a candidate seen by some influential figures as one of the party’s brightest hopes.

There are allegations that Owain Williams has been kept off the eight-person shortlist for the new super-constituency of Caerdydd Ffynnon Taf by supporters of former First Minister Vaughan Gething.

Mr Williams is said to be close to Jeremy Miles, who was narrowly defeated by Mr Gething in last year’s Welsh Labour leadership election.

A panel convened by the party’s Welsh Executive Committee (WEC) decided to keep Mr Williams off the shortlist and local party members in the two Westminster seats of Cardiff East and Cardiff North will now decide the order in which the candidates will be ranked. Six MSs will be elected from the super-constituency by the closed list system of proportional representation.

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School election

Mr Williams, 38, first stood as a Labour candidate in a school election in 1997, the year that Tony Blair won a landslide general election victory.

Educated at Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Melin Gruffydd and Ysgol Gyfun Gymraeg Glantaf in Cardiff, in 2003 he won a sixth form scholarship to study at Eton College. He played cricket for Wales as a schoolboy.

He is the son of Rhodri Williams, the former chair of the Welsh Language Board and S4C, and his father was criticised at the time for sending him to Eton.

Subsequently he studied at Oxford University and is now a management consultant with ghSMART, which has been described as the world's premier leadership advisory firm. Mr Williams is the firm’s principal leadership specialist, advising clients on their most pressing challenges, including leadership assessment, talent management, culture and organisational change.

His profile picture on X, formerly Twitter, pictures him with former First Minister Mark Drakeford, Cardiff North MP Anna McMorrin and Cardiff North MS Julie Morgan, whom he says he has known since he was 10 years old.

He describes Lord Ellis-Thomas, the National Assembly’s former Presiding Officer who died earlier this year as “Uncle Daf”.

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Unison

In a statement posted on social media Mr Williams, who had been endorsed by Wales’ largest trade union Unison, wrote: “Welsh Labour have decided not to shortlist me as one of their top eight candidates for the Senedd in Caerdydd Ffynnon Taf. I think this is a bad decision.

“Since announcing my candidacy, I’ve made a clear argument: we need to renew the party and the country, with new thinking and nothing that cannot be questioned. So many people, within the party and beyond, were excited by this. I think it’s a grave mistake not to allow the party membership in Caerdydd Ffynnon Taf the chance to vote on this platform.

“I’m grateful to every one of you who has supported my campaign to this point. Many of you took considerable political risk in doing so.

“Your encouragement has left me more convinced than ever that Welsh Labour and, more importantly, Wales needs nothing less than transformation. That work must go on, and I will play my part in every way I can.”

David Llewellyn Davies, who was chief special adviser to Mark Drakeford during the early part of his period as First Minister, posted a message that said: “I am speechless. How can @WelshLabour have decided that one of its most gifted and talented members cannot make the top 8 in a shortlist for his own constituency? Wales denied an MS of Cabinet quality who would have made a positive difference to the lives of Welsh people.”

Professor Daniel Susskind, an economist and writer whose latest book Growth: A Reckoning was chosen by former President Barack Obama as one of his favourite books of 2024, posted: “What a terrible decision by Welsh Labour. I am disappointed for @Owain2026 because he is a good friend. But I am even more disappointed for Wales because Owain is one of the few people in the party with the ideas and vision the country so desperately needs.”

Author, political philosopher and barrister Jamie Susskind posted: “Absolutely staggering that someone as capable and thoughtful as Owain isn’t being championed by Welsh Labour. What on earth has possessed them?”

In 2021 Mr Williams was candidate number four on Labour’s regional list for South Wales Central. None of the candidates on the list were elected because of the party’s success in the first-past-the-post constituencies.

'Dominant'

A Welsh Labour source told Nation.Cymru: “Owain is very close to Jeremy Miles. Vaughan supporters, especially around [Secretary of State for Wales and Cardiff East MP] Jo Stevens’ office have kept him off the shortlist. They haven’t been particularly subtle about it. They are very dominant on the WEC.

“There were rumours that they were going to keep him off the long list over a membership issue relating to whether his membership was registered in Cardiff North or the Vale of Glamorgan, but it didn’t happen. Apparently Jeremy and others kicked up a stink.

“Now they’ve succeeded in keeping him off the shortlist. It’s a classic way of killing the chances of a candidate who those in charge of the party machinery don’t want to see elected.”

The eight candidates who made it to the shortlist are TUC Cymru general secretary Shavanah Taj; Cardiff councillors Sarah Merry, Jennifer Burke, Dan De’Ath, Jackie Jones, Lee Bridgeman and Bernie Bowen-Thomson; and Jo Stevens’ special adviser Matt Hexter.

Before the first election to what is now the Senedd, then Welsh Secretary Ron Davies said his ambition was for the body to comprise Wales’ “brightest and best”.

The increase in the number of MSs from 60 to 96 has been seen by some as an opportunity to improve the calibre of Members.

On Monday August 4 Mr Williams is due to interview First Minister Eluned Morgan on the National
Eisteddfod Maes in Wrexham.