Will new Welsh leader change UK relations?

Members of Welsh Labour have been voting for their party's next leader – and the country's next first minister – following Mark Drakeford's decision to step down. 

Either Jeremy Miles, the minister for education and Welsh language, or Vaughan Gething, the minister for the economy, will be announced on Saturday as the winner of the contest.

Drakeford announced his resignation as first minister in December 2023 "after a rollercoaster half-decade in power", said MailOnline. His popularity surged as he led Wales through the Covid crisis, but his approval rating later tanked amid an NHS crisis in Wales and the introduction of 20mph speed limits on Welsh roads.

The successful candidate will become the fifth leader of Wales since the country's National Assembly – now called the Senedd – was established in 1999.

What did the commentators say?

Labour "is riding a 101-year winning streak" in Wales, a country of three million people, said Politico's Dan Bloom. And Westminster has been watching closely as Welsh Labour chooses its new leader. 

Whoever replaces Drakeford, who has served as first minister since December 2018, will face a "tricky in-tray" as the head of the devolved nation. "Near the top" of their to-do list will be deciding how closely to follow Labour leader Keir Starmer, who polls predict will win this year's general election. 

Throughout his tenure, Drakeford has "tacked more to the left" than Starmer. Tthe controversial introduction of 20mph speed limits on Welsh roads "unsettled some Labour MPs and opened up a fierce line of Conservative attack". With education and health policy devolved, Wales has been "an early test of Labour's relationship with the regions and nations to which it has promised more power".

The new leader of Welsh Labour will also inherit "a weary party" that "will no longer be able to blame its problems on the Tories in Westminster" if Starmer wins the next general election, said The Guardian.

Gething or Miles "will have a very different operating climate, less excuses if and when Keir Starmer is prime minister, but facing a similarly tight public expenditure climate", Laura McAllister, professor of public policy at Cardiff University, told the paper.

"You probably only have to tune into a few minutes of plenary any week to hear Labour blaming the Tories in Westminster," said WalesOnline's political editor Ruth Mosalski. But it remains "highly unlikely" that things will get better for Wales with Labour in power at Westminster. "It boils down to money", and there isn't "a secret pot of millions" that Starmer is "suddenly going to unleash down the M4".

In any case, Gething and Miles are both cabinet ministers in the same government and so – other than some differences on policies such as dog licences and river pollution – "we should not expect a stark contrast between them or for either to take Wales in a radically new direction", said David Deans and Daniel Davies on the BBC.

Yet either candidate will represent at least one "first", said the Institute for Government. Gething would be the first Black first minister, and Miles the first openly gay first minister.

What next?

The new Welsh Labour leader will be announced in Cardiff on Saturday. Drakeford's final First Minister's Questions will then take place on Tuesday, after which he will formally resign. On Wednesday, nominations for the new first minister will take place – where the Senedd is expected to nominate the new leader of Welsh Labour as Drakeford's replacement – and the fifth leader of the country since devolution will be installed.