Interview by Hugo Keenan and Ruaidhrí Gillen Lynch

So my first question would be I moved to Cardiff from London, and I know a lot of my peers have done the same from all over the UK now considering that students make up a large portion of this constituency and many might be seeing the name Plaid for the first time to help people better understand the party. What does Plaid mean to you? 

Okay, that’s a good question. I think for me when I was getting involved with the party when I was trying to decide what my political opinions were. It was about social justice to me. 

So I grew up on council estate, and I was quite aware of the difference between myself and my peers and that level of wealth inequality. And then when I went to study in London, I was very aware of the difference between Swansea and London. And Wales and London, and that level of wealth inequality. 

I guess for me, the like ethos I applied was trying to correct some of that economic injustice or that social injustice. I guess there is an element of making sure that like people in Wales aren’t an afterthought, There’s a lot about fairness and justice within the party I think ultimately. 

I’ve read you talk about left behind communities and obviously societal injustice that you were talking about. But it does beg the question from me, why Cardiff? If you mentioned how politically formative it was growing up in Swansea, why not stand for a seat close to home and represent constituents in an area that kick-started your own political journey?

I think its part of a wider problem that we have in Wales, brain drain as you call it or demographic change. We have a lot of areas that don’t have many opportunities, let’s say Swansea is one of them. I’ve got many friends who’ve had to leave to Cardiff Bristol or London. Ultimately, I wanted to work in politics and the capital of Welsh politics is here in Cardiff . And then, since then, I’ve had a baby, I’ve met my boyfriend., I bought a home and this is now where I’ve placed my roots. 

It is a problem that people have to leave Swansea at one point I did think about standing for the council in Swansea when I was living there, but ultimately there’s not much opportunity in Swansea. I think Swansea is generally a bit left behind. 

So [you want to] kind of lead the change from Cardiff, and then hopefully bring up.. 

I think it’s really important to me that people stand where they live. I wouldn’t want to have left  Swansea to go to London and then live in Cardiff and then come back and be like “I know what’s good for you now I’ve left”, whereas I’m quite rooted in my community here in Cardiff now, and I’d like to represent what I know, even though Swansea does play a massive part of what I believe in, of course. 

To build on that, addressing inequality is something that you champion, considering the homelessness and housing allocations bill that was passed earlier on this year.  It seemed to me like the gap is being bridged. In Wales to an extent. We seem to even be leading the rest of the UK in terms of progressive social policy. Do you think that this is the case, or is there work still to be done? 

There is work still to be done, I think. The direction of politics in Wales is what I believe to be right compared to what’s happening elsewhere in the UK. And we’re more socially left and progressive, but I don’t think that that is having enough fundamental change to people’s lives. Recently I was speaking to a woman who was homeless in Cardiff at the other day, she was telling me the state of Adamsdown temporary accommodation where she lives. There’s like cockroaches and stuff there as well, and you see homeless people all over Cardiff. 

We did hear that Labour were going to get rid of homelessness by some sort of date. And that’s not happened. So, while the rhetoric’s right, the actual implementation of something isn’t working, and hopefully a new government coming in can have that different strategy and that different set of ideas to do that. 

When we were at the politics societies hustings with some of the candidates the only candidate on stage who was seen to be unsure about the extent to which students have been taken advantage of in housing was The Labour Party person. What do you think might have to be done on the student side of things and is it co-productive or are these two separate problems? 

When I first moved to Cardiff if I was renting in Cathays. So, my next door neighbours were students, and I was in a shared property essentially. So, I think our landlord was probably previously a student landlord, and I think rent is so extortionate, which is why we’ve got rent controls or rent fair. 

Rents is in the manifesto, but I do think generally one thing we want to bring in is that right to adequate housing. And I think that applies to people across-the-board, whether they’re suffering from homelessness, whether they’re students, whether that’s young families actually just giving having that as a principle and then building housing policy off that should help anyone who’s perhaps a bit more vulnerable. But I do think students are being exploited by landlords, essentially and by people who just charge extortion amounts for horrific housing quite often. 

What do you think are the big problems that need to be challenged? You talk about large-scale housing bills that need to be had, and you will have experience of that issue. But what would you say are the big problems that need to be tackled, specifically for students? 

I think rent is one. I think bringing down the cost of living is another one as well.

I was speaking to nus the other day. 

About which one, the rent? 

Rent control ideally. I think there’s something about actually whether we look at the role of private landlords and whether the students’ unions or so on could actually have accommodation for people that’s outside halls. There’s something there to be explored? 

Speaking to NUS about cost-of-living food and transport is a huge one transport. We’ve committed to maintaining the under 21s reduced transport fares. I’ve been advocating in my party for a young person’s rail young person’s bus pass, which I have not managed to get there yet, but still working on it. So I think that’s an important one generally with bills, as well. 

We want to try and bring down energy bills, but also things like trying to bring in ownership of The Crown Estate to Wales that we can reinvest that profit in energy. We want to create national energy company and also a national energy strategy to sort of tackle this greed that we’re seeing with people just hiking energy bills. 

But I think there’s a lot in the manifesto that is trying to tackle this idea of cost of living generally, I think this is very much like a cost-of-living manifesto. 

I think you’ve definitely hit one of the big wins from a student experience. Another aspect of student life which has come to greater attention has been crime and sexual violence. Do you feel that by tackling problems  like cost of living, other issues will tackle themselves, or does that require a different approach? 

I’d see this sort of separate problems. Especially the thing you talk about women’s safety and generally public safety. I guess it ties into transport policy in some ways we’ve been looking at how we can make sort of bust up safer, active travel safer lighting. 

For example, I have to walk through Bute park in winter, and sometimes if they’re doing the fairs or they had gigs on they shut the actual path that’s lit up, you have to walk through the dark. There are really simple things there that aren’t necessarily cost of living measures that lighting makes people feel safer. I think women’s safety is like a wider issue. 

Generally about how we teach, like consent. And so on in schools and relationships and also much wider issues about reform to the justice system. I’d love to see that devolve so that we could actually tackle issues with women’s safety. 

I think when we’re talking about issues to do with the rats and general sort of pride in the community, and we’re talking about rubbish on streets, it’s not just in Cathays I go to Riverside, I go to Grangetown or Splott. There are huge issues with people with litter and people not feeling like their community is looked after. 

I think this is actually an inequality thing. I think you know, you go into Canton, you go into Pontcanna, if there was like broken glass in the parks, there wouldn’t be accepted, the council will come do something about it. 

I do think that when communities are either less politically engaged, or perhaps less knowledgeable about how to contact the council about these things. Or what their rights are when there’s loads of litter on their streets and are less likely to report it, the council doesn’t do anything about it. So, for me, that’s an issue of political engagement, empowering people to have their rights and letting students know that they don’t have to have like bin bags of rubbish ripped down their street. 

Actually, you can go on the Cardiff Council app and they have to do it within a certain amount of time, but I don’t know if people are informed about that. 

Will Plaid push for more devolution, and would this risk sidelining some of the more successful social programs like Child Payment and the Homelessness Bill, if the Senedd was caught up with other matters?

It’s interesting with the child payment one. Because welfare isn’t devolved to Wales. So when we roll out this pilot, which is going to be trailed in 3 areas, which is the direct temp payment to the families who need it. 

It is actually going to be a tricky one for us to be allowed to do because welfare’s not devolved, but we want to use it as a case for welfare, to be devolved. So like, “look, we can do this”, and we’re going to measure sort of the impact of that and press for devolution. 

And actually, rather than just, you know, there’s loads of things we want to be devolved that we don’t think are working right. But we’re trying something new, where let’s show them  we can do it and show them that it makes a difference and then demand it. And also, this is something that’s very aligned with Plaid policy. 

So I think that’s where the child payment comes from. I think the devolution settlement for me isn’t working as it is, I think is very complex for people to understand and engage with whether that’s first-time voters or people who’ve seen the Senedd system change. Many people don’t know where responsibilities lie and I’d like to see that power given to the Welsh government. I think it makes it a lot simpler for people, and I believe in this idea of localism and that people closer to home know what is best for them.

I just want to talk about the manifesto for a minute. There’s consistent messaging of 26 years of mismanagement and empty promises, but there’s not much consideration about Plaid’s input. IT could be argued that you propped them up for 3 years and you helped pass the same budget that’s responsible in large part for the insufficiencies of the NHS today considering this can your NHS plan fully be trusted by voters?

I think the way the Senedd works is that it makes it very hard for any party to have a majority. And when it was designed, it was to sort of foster cooperative and consensus, politics, and I think people do want to see an adult style politics where people do work together where there’s agreement, rather than what we see in Westminster, where this like back-and-forth this very theatrical thing that’s going on. 

So I’m quite proud that when we have worked with labour we’ve managed to pull them further on things that are progressive and things that are left-wing, you know, like free school meals. I think is just a typical example of that. And we also have then called them out when we don’t agree with them. And when we don’t see eye to eye, but I do think we’re seeing such polarized politics at the minute, and I do think like, I’m proud that we have worked with other parties. 

We’ve worked at The Greens council level in Cardiff, we’ve worked with Liberal Democrats a long time ago at council level in Cardiff, as well, and to me, that’s a good thing that there’s less tribalism, there’s less hostility.  I wouldn’t want our party to work with Reform or the Conservatives, but I do think where we have common ground, we should be adult about it and see what we can do to make things better for people 

It’s interesting, because my next question would be how Plaid will cooperate with other parties. For example, the likes of The Greens they’re polling quite well in South Wales to provide the best for the wealth people. 

Yeah, so I think what Rhun has said on this so far is that he would rather run, depending on the scale of how far we are away from having the majority, as minority government. But for me, the Greens would be preferred to Labour. 

I do think people you know, despite the fact we’ve done good things with labour I think people are fed up of seeing labour in power. They want something different and for me, The Greens would be preferable to that. And I think it would be good to sort of see what that would look like and how we could think about things differently. 

It’s just good to be open-minded about things, isn’t it? But I want to see as many Plaid members as possible, because what I am worried about is if Reform are the largest party, but still say us and The Greens could still form a government together. I’m just worried about them throwing their toys out the pram, essentially like in Gorton and Denton and they said, oh there was family voting or something, you know, and as we’ve seen with Trump, they like to question democracy on the far right. I don’t want our Senedd, which is such a young democracy to be at threat. 

So I would like Plaid as the largest party and then to see what comes out of that afterwards. 

Since graduating in 2021, an important year in world politics, how would you say that you’ve grown throughout your political journey, from a student to a perspective member of the Senedd, what was it like and what did you learn along the way? 

That’s such a good question. There are so many different phases. 

I’m going to go like backwards in time order if that’s okay because I’ve had a weird week this week. I’ve been like piled on social media by Reform, essentially Zia Yusuf and Nadine Dores re-tweeted me. And it’s given me like I like a load of like, self-doubt recently that I didn’t have before. 

But when I stood in the general election, I felt like incredibly confident in my belief that I was bringing about some sort of change. 

And I felt like I grew so much as a person in my own self-confidence, and that was quite like fundamental. And then this campaign has been different for me personally due to the level of scrutiny. I guess maybe it’s that previous elections have been between us and Labour and this is between us and Reform. 

And that hostility is something that has made me have some self-doubt. When I left university, I was Incredibly opinionated, and I think maybe I’ve become a bit more able to reach consensus with people or a bit more pragmatic. I guess my confidence level has come in waves throughout that whole time. 

I think I left Uni very confident, then I joined Plaid, and I was like, “oh my God, I don’t know anything”, because I was around people who knew their stuff. 

The general election gave me a bit of a high again and now I think the reality of last week. I went to hustings where people who young people who’d left care, and then the day before I went to a coffee morning, with the Welsh Refugee Council, and I met asylum seekers from Ukraine and Pakistan and the scale of the problem was really emphasized to me last week and how s***, things are, for people, across Wales.

Then this like Reform pile on and then you know, there is a chance there’s quite a good chance I am going to get elected, and it’s like that’s a lot I’m only like 28 and I’m like dealing with all this and I’ve just had a baby. 

So its been a rollercoaster for me personally and it’s also very isolating because I’m really going for it now. So, I’ve had such a weird week. 

Its isolating because it’s a weird position to be in like there’s not many people, my age or my friend group or people I know who could relate when I try to talk about these issues. 

And to a lot of people, they perhaps wouldn’t have much empathy for politicians either, which is in some cases, fair enough. So yeah, it’s been a learning curve. 

And I still adapting to it, and I think I will continue to, I’m sure there’ll be further highs and lows to it of course.

You know, you’re being quite a long person to be on second on the party list and obviously standing in a constituency where there are loads of students for whom you  could be a role model role. What do you make of that?

I’d hope I would be, and I would hope that people would have faith in themselves and their beliefs. That was what led me into politics, seeing Leanne wood, being such an outspoken woman in politics. And then Bethan Seyed come into my college and she was going on about how she didn’t agree with the monarchy which was something I agreed with. I thought that was amazing.

And then I think Zach Polanski is a really good example of this as well. He was on some sort of chat show. And he just says what he thinks and it makes people think “I’m okay to have my beliefs and even if I get jumped on”. 

I’ve been piled on and I just I think it’s nice to see other people actually sticking out what they believe in. And I keep telling myself to let anything else get to me. So I hope that other people do like feel that they can stick up for what they believe in and get involved in politics too. 

People will be reading this and may be nervous of Reform coming in. Of all the other options why should they vote Plaid. Why is it that you running the seat? 

I think there’s several reasons why and I’ll try to keep it brief, I think I am a younger representative. So, if people want to have someone that perhaps has more understanding of what’s going on for them, make sure that I get my seat and you’re going to see young people represented in the Senedd. Then, there’s like an element of representation there. That’s why I’ve gone into politics as well. The average age of a senate member is 55 at the minute. These are the people making decisions about tuition fees who’ve never paid tuition fees. 

I don’t think people can fully grasp the issues that others are facing when there’s such a gap between them, I do think that we’re standing on a radical manifesto that is going to change the outlook of or is going to change people’s lives in Wales for the better, but it’s not going to happen overnight. 

There are things in there that I truly believe in. One of them being the universal child care offer, this wealth child payment. I hope we could roll that out across-the-board, I just I think we’ve got ways to get money back into people’s pockets. I think that is the number one issue facing people now and.

We are the best option to stop Reform being the largest party and, I know the tactical message isn’t the most fun thing for people to hear. But with that, and then all the other things I’d mentioned before are manifesto, and we have, you know, an interesting set of candidates, I hope that people don’t find the tactical vote message so dry. 

There is a really stark choice in front of us, what Plaid is offering progressive and is radical. I just think what the future looks like with Reform is just scary to me and what that looks like for our services

A lot of party members in Plaid seem to put the measure forward about the election being a binary choice, but ultimately with the new pr system. It isn’t a binary choice. And especially not in the student seats where there is not really a large threshold of the form being elected and multiple different parties quite likely to be elected. So is it not a slight bit of a misleading statement? 

I don’t think it’s misleading, because when we’re talking about these seats later down the list. So in the seat, The Greens are very likely to get one, we’re likely to get 2, maybe 3, The Greens could get one.

They might get 2, but there are things we don’t know in these seats at the bottom of the list, it could be a matter of a 100 votes between them. 

What we’re doing is we’re electing representatives who then go on to form a government. So, it’s hard when we’re talking about “Oh that sixth seat could be between these 2 parties or It could be between these 2 parties.”

Actually, the wider issue is we need as many Plaid members is as possible to go and form the government, and I think that you can’t tactical vote on those lower list seats, as we don’t know what people are going to vote. You can’t guess to that extent. All the polls are saying different things.

For those lower seats, the polls are only saying one thing for the formation of the government and I think that’s a tactical vote message. 

Yes, it’s PR and you know, I would encourage people to vote with their heart. But we’re so aligned with the Greens that I hope it wasn’t a big step for people to take, that they’d be really betraying some sort of moral compass and they have to come to us because there’s so much similarity there. 

Kiera Marshall thank you