Jack Welsh: Millar’s war on the Welsh Tories’ devosceptic base will doom the party here

Jack Welsh works as a policy and communication professional in Cardiff Bay where he provides support to those holding the Welsh Government to account. ‘Jack Welsh’ is a pseudonym.

On a difficult day for the Conservative Party in England, with challenging local election results expected, the Welsh Conservatives didn’t want to be left out of the misery.

That’s how it seemed when Darren Millar chose, via an interview on a Welsh language website, to declare war on the Party’s base. He declared that devosceptic Welsh Conservatives are prohibited from standing as candidates for the party next year, a departure from the uneasy toleration which prevailed ahead of previous devolved elections.

Prior to this, there were rumours that Cardiff councillor Joel Williams had been removed from the approved list for his view that Wales would be better off without a Senedd – a belief shared by 66 per cent of Conservative voters in Wales, according to a 2024 YouGov poll. Dark whispers also abounded that a new candidates’ commitment which required signatories to “subscribe to party policy” was a euphemism for mandatory support for devolution.

Millar’s apparent confirmation that both were indeed the case sparked outrage among grassroots Tories, with calls for his resignation including Oliver Batt, until recently CCHQ’s Voluntary Party Manager for Wales.

To understand the Welsh Conservatives, one must remember that its members join to participate in British politics. The vast majority are opposed to devolution and see the party’s involvement in devolved politics as an unwelcome sideshow; two thirds of its voters, and nearly the same proportion of the Reform voters it needs to woo, want devolution abolished.

The distance between the base and the Conservative Group in the Senedd, which has bought into the devolved project, was already great. Andrew RT Davies was able to take the role as a sort of de-facto regional leader of the Welsh party through strength of personality and his embrace of avant-garde rightism.

Millar is neither de-facto nor official leader of the Conservatives in Wales. He is leader of the Senedd group, and an aloof figure of the Cardiff Bay bubble. His diktat is therefore incendiary, an act of aggression against those whose support he needs ahead of the 2026 elections. It is nothing short of a declaration of war.

But this wasn’t the only provocation from Millar in that interview. He also reaffirmed in stark terms his intention to collaborate with the separatists, Plaid Cymru, after the election. A view from a Tory member was put to him by Golwg 360:

“Unlike Labour, Plaid Cymru’s purpose is to destroy the United Kingdom. There is absolutely no justification for supporting them. It would be seen (by the membership) as betraying Britain for the sake of a ministerial car.”

Millar’s response was that “getting rid of Labour is for the good of Wales” and that he “wants to do what is necessary” to achieve that. The warped priorities this reveals has unionists worried; his keenness to work with Plaid sends a message that separatism is acceptable to the Conservative and Unionist Party.

This is dangerous for Britain. It was the Scottish Conservatives’ deal with the SNP prior to 2007 which took the scares off them for a large swathe of voters and raised their electoral ceiling. The Scottish Tories have learned the lesson and ruled out working with them. Millar, though, seems content to gamble with Britain’s future for a shot at a ministerial brief.

Our stance on Plaid Cymru, whose leader attended the Welsh independence march (feat. Kneecap) over the weekend, is a test of whether or not we are a unionist party. It is my view that Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the Conservative Party in Wales as much as in England, must intervene and rule out a deal with the devil.

In the aftermath of the local elections, eyes will turn to Wales as the next battleground between us and Reform. We are behind on only 15 per cent, with further room to slide. We stand to lose MSs – despite the expansion of the Senedd from 60 to 96 seats.

Basic electoral strategy dictates that in a second-order, low-turnout, PR election, the priority is expanding the base and motivating it to vote. Our stance on the Senedd should therefore align with the devosceptic values of our base. Instead, they have been alienated further, and made to worry that a Conservative vote enables Plaid.

This approach is doomed. It cannot be allowed to continue. For the sake of the United Kingdom, and the Conservative Party in Wales: Millar must go.