Vaughan Gething was the first member of the Senedd (MS) to confirm his intentions to become the next first minister of Wales. Notably, Gething announced his bid to replace Mark Drakeford without mentioning the words “first minister” in his eight-paragraph-long statement. Instead, he outlined his hope of becoming the next leader of the Welsh Labour party.
The two jobs of course go together, but Gething’s choice of words confirmed his passion for Welsh Labour, which rings true for the 10 MPs and eight MSs who have already thrown their weight behind him.
Gething has been politically active in Welsh Labour since he was a 17-year-old campaigning for the 1992 general election. After qualifying as a solicitor, Gething decided to represent workers, the majority of whom were women, who had suffered maltreatment from exploitative employers as a trade union lawyer. His cases included allegations of bullying and discrimination. This legal experience propelled him to become the trade union representative in his workplace before eventually becoming the youngest president of the Wales TUC.
Despite being closely aligned with Keir Starmer’s centrist political position, Gething still holds dear to his trade union roots, which gave him a route into politics. The economy minister strongly believes the depth of Wales’ socialist grassroots are still important to the party’s success in having a healthy internal culture, and also in government.
“We are still a broad church,” Gething told the Guardian in October, reflecting on the lack of factionalism in Welsh Labour. While he rejects suggestions that Starmer’s Labour has been more ruthless than previous Labour leaders, Gething has boasted of Welsh Labour’s success in government because it has been able to “hold on to unity and not get drawn into deep factional arguments leaving some people seen as proper, and others seen as interlopers who don’t belong in the party”.
He has maintained strong relationships with trade unions as an MS and as a minister, which his supporters believe will enable him to deliver a plush policy programme as first minister.
Gething believes Welsh Labour can only continue to win if it is “a united, modern diverse movement which reflects this nation’s ambitions of the future”. If successful, he will become the first black leader in a European country, which would be huge for a Labour party that has long been struggling to prove to its members, MPs and MSs for decades that it does not have a problem with selecting black people for positions of power.
The 49-year-old is the first black Welsh minister of the devolved administrations and the only black member of the Senedd. No other black person has represented a Welsh constituency in either the Welsh or UK parliaments in more than a decade. Before this he was the first black president of NUS Wales.
While Gething strives to help shape a diverse Labour party across the nations that reflects Britain’s population, he believes people should not be put in power solely to boost diversity numbers. “You want to see people being judged on their character and the qualities they bring and the values they offer, if their policy platform is one people can support, as opposed to people saying, ‘I don’t want anyone who looks like you turning up on my doorstep trying to persuade me that you can try to run the country.’ It’s a good challenge for the Labour party.”
Gething’s resilience has been tested since he was a child. His parents – David, a white Welsh vet from Glamorgan, and Beritha, from Zambia – met in the southern African nation where Gething was born. But they faced racism when David accepted a job as a vet in Abergavenny, a town in Monmouthshire, only to see the offer withdrawn because he had arrived in the town with a black family in 1976.
At school, Gething developed the kidney disease nephrotic syndrome. Gething had become so weak that even holding a pencil was challenging. But his life turned around after an NHS trial drug stabilised his condition. An ally has said the ordeal hugely shaped his determination to keep the NHS thriving, as the health service is the difference between life and death for so many people as it was for him.
As a first minister, Gething seeks to deliver an optimistic vision. After 13 years of a Conservative UK government, there is the prospect of Starmer’s Labour winning the keys to No 10 and the chance to develop an ambitious future for Wales. His close links with the UK national parliamentary Labour party will enable him to work closely with Starmer’s leadership, just as Drakeford had the support of Corbyn.
Gething’s pitch will be centred on his hope to give people the opportunity Wales gave to his family, the Guardian understands. He wants people to be able to build successful careers in Wales close to their homes within the sectors that Wales needs to prioritise for a stable future.
But he will warn voters that after “13 years of austerity and culture wars, the Conservatives have not made Britain a fairer or more prosperous nation, so an incoming Labour government will have huge challenges to deal with. No one should expect a tap to be turned on with oceans of money for anything an everything. You can’t fill the bath up in one fell swoop,” he said.
The other contenders
The education and Welsh language minister, Jeremy Miles, is expected to provide the fiercest challenge to Gething’s bid to become Welsh Labour leader and first minister.
His supporters are portraying him as the “grown-up” candidate who will be able to work well with all wings of the Welsh party and also forge close relationships with UK Labour and with opposition parties.
The latter point is key; Mark Drakeford worked closely with Plaid Cymru to get policies such as tackling the second homes crisis in strong Welsh-speaking areas though the Senedd.
Miles, who studied law at Oxford, has received the backing of the likes of Welsh Labour grandee Peter Hain and Andrew Morgan, the leader of the Welsh Local Government Association.
If he did become leader, Miles would be the first openly gay leader of Wales. He has spoken of how he struggled to find his place in the world as a gay young person, in an era when “someone like me” did not exist as far as the school curriculum was concerned.
In recent weeks he has had to defend the Welsh government’s record on education after poor Pisa scores put Wales at the bottom of the four nations results table.
No woman has ever been first minister. Eluned Morgan, the current health minister, stood last time and came third behind Drakeford and Gething. She was expected to stand again, but has ruled herself out.
Some on the left have touted Hannah Blythyn, the deputy minister for social partnership, for the top job. She is a former co-chair of LGBT Labour and was active in the campaign for equal marriage. If she was to win, she would be the first North Walian to become first minister.
