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Voters deserve change after being let down over the escalating cost of living, housing pressures and NHS waiting lists, according to Lauren James, the Green Party’s lead candidate for the Casnewydd Islwyn constituency.

The Greens hope their progressive policies will drive them towards a successful election result this month and return their first-ever Senedd Members.

Ms James believes her party can challenge the next Welsh Government to tackle the rising cost of living, rather than “apologise” for previous decisions taken in Cardiff Bay or Westminster.

She said people have been let down over housing and the NHS – and called health “the biggest sticking point” for voters in the constituency.

“There’s a general sense everything’s getting worse, and life is so much harder, and no one’s taken responsibility for it,” she said.

“There is frustration on the doorstep that oftentimes the Welsh Government just seems to blame everybody else.

“When it was the Conservatives in Westminster, it was ‘the Tories are starving us of money’ – and even now they’re saying it’s everyone else’s fault. I think people are sick to the back teeth of hearing it, and they are ready for change.”

The Greens have pledged to end hospital corridor care, build 60,000 social homes and introduce tighter rent controls.

“At the moment you might struggle to find a three or four bed house – I’ve got kids so I would need a house that size – for less than a grand a month now,” said Ms James.

“Paying four figures to effectively pay someone else’s mortgage while they sit on the assets is obscene.”

The party also wants to scrap “unfair” council tax and replace it with a land value tax that means “those with deeper pockets are paying more”, and would eventually want to lower tuition fees in the nation’s universities.

These proposals are ambitious but would be expensive to implement, and Ms James accepts the Greens’ manifesto is not fully costed – “although our key priorities have been”.

“Our manifesto is about setting priorities and direction,” she explained, adding the Greens would use it as a starting point in talks after the election.

“Other parties that may need support to form a government need to see what’s going to be on the negotiating table, and what we’re going to expect to see for Welsh people.

“Housing, the NHS, the cost-of-living crisis, those are those key issues – so that’s going to be what we’re going to be pushing for.”

Recent polling indicates the Greens could challenge for the third-highest vote share in the election, putting them in a strong position to support or work alongside others on the political left.

Ms James said Plaid Cymru, one of the pollsters’ frontrunners, had started “to be a bit more cautious” and the Greens would “hold their feet to the fire and make sure they are delivering for the people of Wales”.

The Greens’ momentum is in no small part down to their UK leader Zack Polanski’s ability to “engage the media on the issues facing both England and Wales”, she said, adding that before him there “probably wasn’t a strong enough voice on the left pushing those issues”.

But she said the party’s growth in recent years was also because of “hard-working people getting out there and engaging with voters”.

If elected, Ms James said her priorities for Casnewydd Islwyn would include more social housing, to tackle long waiting lists in the constituency’s two council areas.

“House prices in Newport in particular – but actually across the constituency – are so much higher than they’ve ever been before, and we need to bring that down,” she said. “There’s a huge waiting list in Newport for social housing, and I don’t think the waiting lists are much better in Caerphilly.

“Newport is the fastest growing city in Wales – we need more housing and we need to make sure people can afford to rent homes as well.”

Another issue close to her heart is improving the condition of “crumbling” local schools – several in Newport have partially or completely closed in recent years due to structural issues.

“Our schools are very old, and it’s wonderful that we’ve still got these great, lovely historical buildings,” said Ms James. “We’ve really got to keep up maintaining our schools and making sure that our kids have the best education that they can. It would be a shame to lose all that history.”

Lauren James’ pitch to the voters of Casnewydd Islwyn

“We’ve seen over the last few years, a government elected on a promise of change – then they came for our pensioners, they came for our disabled people, they kept children in poverty when they didn’t need to. The Labour government in Cardiff Bay has largely apologised for that – they haven’t been standing up for us, and what I’m hearing on the doorstep is that people are ready for change. But who do you want leading that change? If you want fairer rents, an end to the cost-of-living crisis, our NHS to be fixed, our schools to do well and our environment to be given the protection it deserves, then it’s got to be Green.”

Full list of candidates in Casnewydd Islwyn

Welsh Conservatives (six candidates)

• 1. Natasha Asghar
• 2. Toby Jones
• 3. Jake Enea
• 4. Georgie Webb
• 5. Adam Morris
• 6. Rebecca Mamhende

Green Party (six candidates)

• 1. Lauren James
• 2. Philip Davies
• 3. Zaynab Greengrass
• 4. Kerry Vosper
• 5. David Mayer
• 6. Andrew Were

Heritage Party (one candidate)

• 1. Mike Ford

Open Party (two candidates)

• 1. Justna Muhith
• 2. John Horan

Plaid Cymru (six candidates)

• 1. Peredur Owen Griffiths
• 2. Lyn Ackerman
• 3. Rhys Mills
• 4. Joshua Rawcliffe
• 5. Jonathan Clark
• 6. Sarah Henton

Reform UK (six candidates)

• 1. Dan Thomas
• 2. Art Wright
• 3. Marie-Claire Lea
• 4. Nick Jones
• 5. Rebecca Senior
• 6. Tomos Llewelyn

Welsh Labour (seven candidates)

• 1. Jayne Bryant
• 2. Rhianon Passmore
• 3. Chris Carter
• 4. Rhian Howells
• 5. Julie Sangani
• 6. Stephen Marshall
• 7. David Chinnick

Welsh Liberal Democrats (six candidates)

• 1. Mike Hamilton
• 2. John Miller
• 3. Nurul Islam
• 4. Harun Rashid
• 5. Mary Lloyd
• 6. Jeff Evans

Individual candidates (one)

• Taran Clayton