Reform UK stands alone by failing to endorse action on UN convention in Wales, ahead of Senedd elections

All but one of the largest parties fighting for seats in Senedd elections next month have pledged to incorporate the UN disability convention into Welsh law, with just Reform UK refusing to back the major step forward for disability rights in Wales.

Labour has led the Welsh government since devolution in 1999, although it has never had an overall majority of seats in the Welsh parliament.

But it has never used that power to incorporate the rights outlined in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) into Welsh law.

And when it published its much-anticipated disability rights plan for Wales in December, there was no promise to act on the UN convention, and no pledge to introduce a right to independent living.

The Welsh government included a pledge to incorporate UNCRPD into Welsh law in its programme for government in 2021, but the national disabled people’s organisation Disability Wales (DW) said in December that no progress had been made towards that goal.

Although Welsh Labour has now pledged to do so, along with four other parties, following prompting from Disability Wales, its backing for the policy is more half-hearted and less clear than that of Plaid Cymru, the Welsh Liberal Democrats, the Wales Green party and the Welsh Conservatives.

Of the six parties, only Reform UK has distanced itself from incorporating the convention into Welsh law.

At a hustings event organised by Disability Wales on Tuesday, Natalie Jarvis, its policy and research officer, stressed the importance of incorporating the convention into Welsh law, the first of five “calls for change” contained in an election pack published by her organisation last month.

Welsh Labour, Plaid Cymru, the Welsh Liberal Democrats, the Welsh Conservatives, and the Wales Green Party have all committed to the policy in response to the five calls for change, while Reform UK has yet to respond to DW.

But Welsh Labour Senedd candidate Ruba Sivagnanam appeared to suggest on Tuesday that her party’s commitment to incorporating the convention in Wales was not comprehensive.

She said the next decade should be “a period of implementation, accountability, and measurable change, and not more strategy”, and that Welsh Labour was “committed to strengthening the UN convention in Welsh law”, but “doing it in a way that is enforceable and meaningful and not tokenistic”.

She did not make any reference to incorporating the convention into Welsh law, despite the commitment made earlier to DW.

In contrast, Plaid Cymru’s Sioned Williams, who has chaired the Senedd’s cross-party group on human rights, and speaks for her party on social justice, said that rights had for too long been “treated as aspirations rather than enforceable protections”.

She said a Plaid Cymru government would “change that by putting those rights into law, by incorporating key international treaties, including the UN convention on the rights of disabled people, directly into Welsh legislation”, and that this would be a “priority”.

She said this would mean disabled people would have “clear enforceable rights and the government has clear legal duties”, a promise that “wasn’t delivered by the last Labour government”.

She said: “We have made this a priority because we believe rights without remedy aren’t rights at all, and we see parties on the right, for instance, freely denouncing human rights.”

Brendan Roberts, from the Welsh Liberal Democrats, one of four disabled Senedd candidates on the panel, said his party wanted to incorporate the convention into Welsh law and “make sure that is sacrosanct, it’s in Welsh legislation, because rights shouldn’t just be something governments agree with in principle.

“They should shape what actually happens, they should shape how decisions are made, how services are designed, and how people are treated when they interact with the system.”

But Dr Gareth Thomas, from Reform UK, another disabled candidate standing for the Senedd, made it clear that his party would not incorporate the convention into Welsh law.

He said his party’s approach to disability rights in Wales was “focused on embedding a disabled people’s rights plan and where possible aligning rights with Welsh law”.

But he added: “However, we would like to break free from global influence on social policy, while still borrowing measures from the UNCRPD.”

James Bennett, from the Wales Green Party, another disabled candidate standing at next month’s Senedd elections, said his party would incorporate the UN convention into Welsh law if it won power next month.

There was also a similar UNCRPD pledge at Tuesday’s meeting from the Welsh Conservatives, despite years of resistance from Conservative-led UK governments in Westminster (see separate story).

Toby Jones, a candidate for the Welsh Conservatives at next month’s election, said the pledge was in his party’s manifesto.

He said such a policy would “raise the profile of these rights across every department of Welsh government” and would require ministers “to consider disabled people’s rights in every piece of legislation they bring forward”.

He added: “Most importantly, it would establish a strategic accountability framework to ensure consistency.

“We need a legal floor that prevents these rights from being eroded by shifting political priorities.”

His comments represent a sharp contrast to the policy of successive Conservative-led UK governments.

A spokesperson for the UK Conservative party said this morning (Thursday): “I am happy to clarify this is not UK policy and is only the policy of the Welsh Conservatives.”

Picture: (From left to right) Gareth Thomas, Ruba Sivagnanam, Toby Jones, and Sioned Williams