From the Cefn Saeson by election onwards to the Senedd elections of 2021.

From the Cefn Saeson by election onwards to the Senedd elections of 2021...There begins a long cycle now of the electoral processes within the Labour Party, through its branches, Brecon and Radnor CLP, the party leadership and onto a certain Town Council by election on Thursday in the Cimla area of Neath. You may be surprised to consider the relevance of this Thursday"s by election to the future of the Labour Party in general yet it may be that it is merely an omen for the shape of things to come if Labour moves to the right. The Cefn Saeson by election pits the Green Party in a contest with Labour. This may well become a pattern under a Starmer or Nandy led Centrist or right wing Labour Party. As the Left within Labour battle for the party's future we may yet find that any centrist nudge may find Labour losing up to one million of it's December votes to the Green Party and other smaller parties. The defection of Sonia Klein to Plaid may well be another warning to those calling for centrism. As the clarion calls of Tony Blair call for an arrangement between Labour and the Liberal Democrats we see the trajectory of the Labour right and centre.
After the European elections and General Election of December we saw a remain alliance between Plaid the Greens and the Liberal Democrats..Labour must steer clear of such a development. The sight of Greens in alliance with austerity supporting Liberal Democrats was the ultimate in a lack of principle and ambition. Yet it will not prevent social democracy losing millions of young people switched on to politics by Jeremy Corbyn to the Greens and others.
For Plaid too must realise and understand that devolution for Wales only became possible because of the conversion of Labour to it's cause. It took Labour a long time to exorcise the ghosts of George Thomas and yet the ultimate irony may be yet to come where in the end Welsh independence becomes possible because of the conversion of Welsh Labour to it's cause. It would be a strange irony and a Weberian unforseen consequence of some surprise.

For myself I see no possibility of a mass party of ecosocialism outside of Labour. I see the present leadership election within Labour as a Hegelian moment of struggle that will be fought in leadership and General Elections to come. It may be that the left will triumph on April 4th or it may come in 10 years or more. Of course climate change and other unforseen events may well demolish the seemingly monolithic Tory dominance giving the Left power very quickly.

The Senedd election of 2021 will reveal much in Wales of political trends. The Tory victory in December makes it impossible for Plaid to ally within Wales with the Tories . Had Labour won in December Plaid could well have surged in future elections . There is a Welsh political axiom that suggest a Plaid only does well when Labour is in power at Westminster. At best Labour will win the elections for the Senedd in 2021 or otherwise come to a similar arrangement of the one Wales government of 15 years ago with Plaid. The sheer ignorance of Lisa Nandy over Catalonia and Scottish self determinism offers some attraction to certain elements within Welsh Labour yet offers us nothing more than a narrow cup de sac haunted by the ghost of George Thomas. The British state is cracking apart and the Labour Party must understand just what is happening.
The Cefn Saeson by election may be a warning to the devotees of a centrist Welsh Labour future particularly with the history of by elections in recent years in Neath Port Talbot.
As for myself it's odd how my victory in the delegate election for Disability Labour has an echo of both karma and schadenfreude that perhaps only Neil Wagstaff and Lisa Phillips would understand over certain events after the Uplands by election of 2014 in another party and universe. We move on tonight to the AGM of Ystradgynlais Labour Party and then in March to Brecon and Radnor CLPs AGM in March. The battle with the right and centre moves onto other times and other places for the soul of the Labour Party...the only way that eco socialism can be made manifest is through a socialist Labour Party...