Plaid - a ship in need of a captain
The dust hasn’t yet settled on Adam Price’s resignation and it it doesn’t look as it will for a while yet. Should he have stayed? That was his preferred option but his authority was completely eroded long before he made a statement on the internal investigation that was publicised a couple of weeks ago.
It’s difficult to know what his alternatives were given that accusations of misogony, bullying and sexual harrasment all happened on his watch. His claim that he was the man to restore order seemed as hollow as Tory claims that they are the right people to repair the economy. Like the current situation has nothing to do with their stewardship of the nation for the last 13 years.
In the end he might have been able to tough it out but he lacked the support base to fight back. Adam was struggling to manage the Plaid broad church, the right didn’t like him for being a bit of a leftie and getting into bed with Labour, others on the left blamed him for pushing Leanne Woods out. He was seen as being slow to act on disciplinary matters and giving preferential treatment to mates and allies who had been found guilty of the party’s code of contact.
It’s a pity because Adam was a politician of many talents. He’d shone in his time in Parliament. His campaign against Tony Blair and the decision to go to war in Iraq one him many admirers across the political board and his speeches to The House during that period are the highlights to his career to date. He came to the leadership after what basically withdrawing support for one of this best friends and closest political allies. What he found is that managing a political movement, especially a broad church one such as Plaid, requires much more subtle skills than that of a firebrand back bench MP.
Is Plaid manageable by anyone now? The early indications are that after a flirtation with leaders from the left and from the Valleys, the party is heading back into bunker, reconnecting with their DNA in heartlands of the North and West with interim leader Llyr Gruffydd and probably Rhun Ap Iorwerth being the favoured candidate (if he gives up on his Westminster ambitions).
It’s doubtful whether the whole furore is having a massive impact on the Welsh Electorate, but these things do matter. It’s rumoured that Plaid is losing membership at a rate that will have implications for their ability to campaign effectively against a Welsh Labour machine that is gaining in confidence. Wales needs effective opposition to hold the Labour led administration in Wales to account. It’s not coming from the Tories who seem to have given up the ghost. Their leader, Andrew RT Davies seems more concerned with his Twitter account than leading a political party.
“Wither Plaid then?”, the question that’s probably not on everyone’s lips outside The Cardiff Bay bubble. A slip back into the comfort zone probably and a period where they consolidate in the heartland and surrender the rest of Wales to Labour? A drift to the right as they try to position themselves against Labour in the run up to the next general elections? The big question remains, how do they break through and challenge Labour in their heartlands?