Friday, October 24, 2025
Reflections on the Caerphilly by-election
In fact, the seat was taken by Plaid Cymru with a majority of 3,848 votes and a 47.4% vote share, in an election where, for the first time in a Senedd contest, turnout actually went up and passed 50%. This was despite, Farage spending the day in the constituency and Reform pouring unprecedented resources into their campaign. So, what went wrong for the so-called insurgents?
Firstly, Plaid Cymru had a well-known, highly-respected and effective local candidate, who has been a councillor in the area, seemingly for ever, and has been leader of the local council twice.
Lindsay Whittle also represented the area as a regional Assembly Member for five years, and had fought the constituency fourteen times prior to this election, while Plaid Cymru have history in this seat, coming within 2000 votes of winning it in a 1968 by-election.
An opinion poll a week before polling day, showed Reform in the lead with Plaid Cymru not far behind them. Once this was made public, it naturally led to progressive forces uniting behind the Welsh nationalist candidate, squeezing an already unpopular Labour Party down to a derisory 11% of the vote. Note that Labour have held this seat at every election since 1918.
An opinion poll a week before polling day, showed Reform in the lead with Plaid Cymru not far behind them. Once this was made public, it naturally led to progressive forces uniting behind the Welsh nationalist candidate, squeezing an already unpopular Labour Party down to a derisory 11% of the vote. Note that Labour have held this seat at every election since 1918.
Other parties were also squeezed, while the bigger turnout indicates that many voters were motivated to go to the polls to stop Reform.
In many ways this seat was a natural one for Reform to take. It has a large working class population, overwhelmingly born and brought up locally, only 2.9% of those living there were born abroad. It's demographcs are very similar to England's red wall seats where Reform are making inroads. However, yesterday's result shows that despite Reform aggressively running an anti immigration line during the campaign, there is a ceiling on the number of people who will respond to that sort of campaign.
The other lesson for those promoting the inevitability of a Nigel Farage premiership in three years time, is that there is an inherent problem for his party in counting on disengaged voters to put them in power. That is that people who are disengaged from the system don't tend to vote, or even to register to vote, preferring to express their discontent on social media instead. Getting these voters to the polling booth in the numbers required to win is more difficult that perhaps Farage and his advisors thought.
As the journalist, Will Hayward has reported several times in his newsletter, Reform in Wales is not a happy ship. He writes that there was a lot of anger among grassroots members at the perceived domineering approach that the group around their candidate, Llyr Powell had taken when it came to dominating local groups:
Within all parties, but especially ones like Reform, success is the great legitimiser. Many people within the party, especially those who have jumped ship from the Tories, are not there because of principle. They support Reform because they see it as the most effective vehicle for their own advancement. As soon as this is no longer the case, division can quickly rise to the surface.
Llyr Powell was Nigel Farage’s picked man in Wales. If he is put at the top of party lists ahead of May’s election after this failure I can imagine many in the party getting very angry.
Finally, what does this election mean for the rest of Wales?
This is, of course, a by-election, with very particular circumstances. Next May there will be 16 separate contests, fought on a closed list d'hondt system, where the sort of two party squeeze that occurred in Caerphilly will not be repeated.
In many ways this seat was a natural one for Reform to take. It has a large working class population, overwhelmingly born and brought up locally, only 2.9% of those living there were born abroad. It's demographcs are very similar to England's red wall seats where Reform are making inroads. However, yesterday's result shows that despite Reform aggressively running an anti immigration line during the campaign, there is a ceiling on the number of people who will respond to that sort of campaign.
The other lesson for those promoting the inevitability of a Nigel Farage premiership in three years time, is that there is an inherent problem for his party in counting on disengaged voters to put them in power. That is that people who are disengaged from the system don't tend to vote, or even to register to vote, preferring to express their discontent on social media instead. Getting these voters to the polling booth in the numbers required to win is more difficult that perhaps Farage and his advisors thought.
As the journalist, Will Hayward has reported several times in his newsletter, Reform in Wales is not a happy ship. He writes that there was a lot of anger among grassroots members at the perceived domineering approach that the group around their candidate, Llyr Powell had taken when it came to dominating local groups:
Within all parties, but especially ones like Reform, success is the great legitimiser. Many people within the party, especially those who have jumped ship from the Tories, are not there because of principle. They support Reform because they see it as the most effective vehicle for their own advancement. As soon as this is no longer the case, division can quickly rise to the surface.
Llyr Powell was Nigel Farage’s picked man in Wales. If he is put at the top of party lists ahead of May’s election after this failure I can imagine many in the party getting very angry.
Finally, what does this election mean for the rest of Wales?
This is, of course, a by-election, with very particular circumstances. Next May there will be 16 separate contests, fought on a closed list d'hondt system, where the sort of two party squeeze that occurred in Caerphilly will not be repeated.
The Caerphilly result will inevitably give a boost to Plaid Cymru and the likelihood is that they will now be the largest party in the 96 seat Senedd, with Reform not far behind them.
Labour is likely to be the third largest party with Tories, Liberal Democrats and Greens also represented, but no one party will have a majority.
Labour is likely to be the third largest party with Tories, Liberal Democrats and Greens also represented, but no one party will have a majority.
The key to the electoral performance of the smaller parties in each of these constituencies will be differential turnout. The threshold that needs to be reached to get elected is 12%, but Reform's difficulty in getting its disengaged supporters out to vote may well be a factor.
Whatever the result, I cannot see Nigel Farage's party getting enough support to form a government, which means that a Plaid Cymru-Labour coalition or a minority Plaid Cymru government is the most likely scenario.
It is worth noting, that a number of influential people in Welsh Labour are opposed to going into government with Plaid. Their reasoning is that Reform should be put into power, where they will make a pigs-ear of the entire thing, lose support across the UK and let Labour win another UK general election. The political term for this view is 'wishful thinking'. It would also be a disaster for Wales.
There is still seven months to go to the Senedd elections, so anything can happen. The one thing that is clear however, is that last night's result was a major blow to Reform and it is going to affect their prospects going forward.
It is worth noting, that a number of influential people in Welsh Labour are opposed to going into government with Plaid. Their reasoning is that Reform should be put into power, where they will make a pigs-ear of the entire thing, lose support across the UK and let Labour win another UK general election. The political term for this view is 'wishful thinking'. It would also be a disaster for Wales.
There is still seven months to go to the Senedd elections, so anything can happen. The one thing that is clear however, is that last night's result was a major blow to Reform and it is going to affect their prospects going forward.
