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Delyth Jewell, who is the deputy leader of Plaid Cymru, is one of four regional Senedd Members serving the South Wales East region.

We are in the midst of a Westminster election, and much focus is inevitably falling to the promises being made by different parties on the campaign trail. 

One story from the Senedd, though, has cut through all of that, and has (rightly) angered a great many members of the public. 

The story, of course, centres on Wales’ First Minister, Vaughan Gething, who last week lost a vote of no confidence in the Senedd.

Integrity in politics is vitally important. I have been saddened that, in recent weeks, a scandal has emerged surrounding donations accepted by Wales’ First Minister during the recent leadership election. 

I believe that Vaughan Gething was wrong to accept a donation of £200,000 from a convicted environmental polluter, and I believe he should give the money back. It was for this reason that I voted for the motion of no confidence in him last week.

At the time when I’m writing this, Mr Gething has refused to resign from his post, which breaks all precedent and (I’m afraid) shows a level of disrespect for our Senedd. 

The vote cannot be dismissed (as some have suggested) as a mere “gimmick”: it was a vote in our democratically elected Senedd, and all conventions of parliamentary democracy dictate that a leader who loses the confidence of a legislature cannot carry on in post. 

In Scotland, we recently saw the then-First Minister Humza Yousaf resign before such a vote could take place, knowing that he was destined to lose it. I fear for how our Welsh democracy could be undermined were a vote of this magnitude to be ignored by those in power.

It would not be the first time that Wales’ democratic voice had been sidelined. I led a debate last week in the Senedd on HS2, and the ongoing scandal which has seen Wales lose out on £4 billion as a result of that project being wrongly designated by the Treasury as an “England and Wales” project. 

Anyone with access to a map could see how ridiculous this designation is: HS2 does not come into Wales at all, but whilst Scotland and Northern Ireland are receiving consequential funding for this project, Wales is not – leaving us funding a project which makes us poorer. It is a perverse decision, and one which every single party in the Senedd has labelled unjust. 

You read that correctly: every party in the Senedd, including the Conservatives, have argued that Wales should receive these billions of pounds – and yet Westminster ignores us. Neither Labour nor the Conservatives have pledged to right this wrong if they win power in a few weeks’ time. It is maddening to see, time and again, how Wales’ interests are ignored by Westminster.

We owe it to our citizens that the voices of those they elect should be listened to. When the Senedd calls, on a cross-party basis, for money to be returned to us, that should be adhered to. And likewise, when the Senedd states that it has lost confidence in the First Minister, that vote should not be dismissed on a whim. 

Our Senedd is still young, but it carries the weight (and the wishes) of the people of Wales. When it speaks, its words should matter.