Welsh independence

Wales
This article is part of a series on the
politics and government of
Wales

Welsh independence (Welsh: Annibyniaeth i Gymru) is a political ideal advocated by some political parties, advocacy groups, and people in Wales that would see Wales secede from the United Kingdom and become an independent sovereign state. This ideology is promoted mainly by the Welsh nationalist party, Plaid Cymru.[1]

History

Location of Wales in the United Kingdom

Wales became distinct culturally and politically from other Brythonic groups during the Early Middle Ages.[2][3] Following the Norman conquest of England in 1066, the Normans penetrated into Wales and gradually established control over parts of the country.[3] The death of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd in 1282 led to the conquest of the last independent Welsh kingdom by Edward I of England. The Welsh revolted against English rule several times over the next years, with the last significant attempt being the Glyndŵr Rising of 1400–15. In the 16th century Henry VIII, himself of Welsh extraction, passed the Laws in Wales Acts aiming to incorporate Wales fully into the Kingdom of England. For centuries, the union was considered to be an advantage to Wales, and it offered new opportunities to the Welsh gentry who could now become justices of the peace and members of Parliament at Westminster.[4]

According to the Encyclopaedia of Wales, the belief that Wales should form an independent nation state originated in the mid 19th century (the first recorded use of the Welsh word for nationalism, cenedlaetholdeb, is from 1858).[5] The Sunday Closing Act of 1881 was the first legislation to acknowledge that Wales had a separate politico-legal character from the rest of the English state. In 1886 Joseph Chamberlain proposed "Home Rule All Round" the United Kingdom, and in the same year the Cymru Fydd (Young Wales) movement was founded to further the cause.[5] However, the goal they envisaged was a devolved assembly rather than a fully independent state, and the movement collapsed in 1896 amid personal rivalries and rifts between representatives from the North and South, East and West Wales.[5]

There was little mainstream political interest in Home Rule following the First World War. The focus of Welsh nationalist politics moved to the newly founded Plaid Cymru from 1925,[5] although it took until the late 1960s for Plaid to make its first electoral breakthroughs. In 1956 a 250,000-name petition calling for a parliament for Wales produced few results, but the declaration of Cardiff as the capital of Wales in 1955,[6] Labour's 1959 commitment to appoint a Secretary of State for Wales, the creation of the Welsh Office in 1965,[7] and the repeal of the Wales and Berwick Act 1746 two years later seemed to demonstrate a growing nationalist impetus.[5] However, the heavy defeat for a proposed Welsh Assembly offered by Labour in the 1979 devolution referendum "suggested that the vast majority of the inhabitants of Wales had no desire to see their country having a national future".[5]

In the 1980s, economic restructuring and Thatcherite market reforms brought social dislocation to parts of Wales, which had formerly been described as having "the largest public sector west of the Iron Curtain".[8] A succession of non-Welsh Conservative Secretaries of State after 1987 was portrayed by opponents as 'colonial' and indicative of a 'democratic deficit'.[8] In the early 1990s the Labour Party became committed to devolution to both Scotland and Wales, and in 1997 it was elected with a manifesto commitment to hold referendums on a Scottish Parliament and a Welsh Assembly.[8]

The proposed assembly won a narrow majority in the 1997 referendum. The political climate was very different from that of 1979, with a new generation of Welsh MPs in Westminster and a broad consensus on the previously divisive issue of the Welsh language.[8] However, political commentator Denis Balsom notes public sentiment that devolution may have been "unnecessary" following the election of a 'progressive' Labour Government.[8] These conflicting sentiments were reflected in the relatively low turnout at the referendum and the narrowness of the victory for devolution campaigners. Since 1997, there is evidence of increased support for, and trust in, the Assembly and greater support for it to receive enhanced powers,[9] as evidenced by the 63.49% "Yes" vote in the 2011 referendum.

Support

Surveys regarding support for independence have yielded different results, though they often find that between 10 and 15% of Welsh desire independence from the United Kingdom.[10] A 2001 survey for the Institute of Welsh Affairs found that 11% of people polled favoured independence.[11] A 2007 survey by the Institute of Welsh Politics at the University of Wales found that 12% of those questioned supported independence, down slightly from 14% in 1997.[12] A poll taken by BBC Wales Newsnight in 2007 found that 20% of Welsh questioned favoured independence.[10] A 2006 poll taken by Wales on Sunday found the number to be as high as 52%, although the poll mostly interviewed people in North Wales where support for independence is strongest.[13]

A Yougov/ITV Wales Poll in February 2012, showed that only 10% of Welsh voters would support independence even if Scotland became independent of the British state,[14] with three constituent countries, the same level of support as polls have shown with the British state composing four constituent countries. However, a Yougov/ITV Wales Poll in September 2014, showed a marked increase in support for Welsh independence having risen to 17%.[15]

In February 2014, an ICM poll for BBC Wales found that 5% of people wanted to see an independent Wales.[16] Following the referendum on Scottish independence, a September 2014 poll conducted by the same company found that support for Welsh independence had remained relatively unchanged from the previous poll in February, recorded as being at 3%. The same poll found that there had been a significant increase in support for more powers for the Welsh Government.[17]

It had been suggested before the UK's referendum on EU membership that Wales might vote by a majority for Remain while the UK as a whole voted for Leave, which would increase support for independence. However, while Scotland, Northern Ireland and London voted for Remain, Wales as a whole voted by a majority for Leave, with majorities for Leave in all but five of its council areas, the Remain majorities being in Cardiff, Monmouthshire, Vale of Glamorgan and the two Welsh-speaking heartlands, Gwynedd and Ceredigion. A poll cited on this page does however show increased support for independence, by some counts, after the referendum as a means of remaining in the EU.

Opinion polling

Date Support Independence (%) Support more powers for the National Assembly (%) Support Status Quo (%) Support fewer powers for the National Assembly (%) Support abolition of the National Assembly and oppose independence(%) Indifferent/Did not reply/Other (%)
2014[18] 5 37 28 3 23 5
2014[19] 3 49 26 2 12 6
Date(s) conducted In Favour of Independence Opposed to Independence Indifferent/No Reply Sample Held by Notes
March 2013 10% 62% 28% Unknown ITV Wales/ YouGov Even if Scotland left.
April 2014 16% 62% 22% 1000 You Gov
8-11 September 2014 17% 70% 13% Over 1000 ITV Wales/Cardiff University
July 2016 15% 65% 20% 1010ITV Wales/ YouGov
July 2016 19% 61% 21% 1010ITV Wales/ YouGov Even if Scotland left.
July 2016 28% 53% 20% 1010ITV Wales/ YouGov Independent Wales within the EU.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ "Aims//Our History". Plaid Cymru. Retrieved 2016-03-22.
  2. ↑ Koch, pp. 291–92.
  3. 1 2 Koch, p. 551.
  4. ↑ "Wales under the Tudors". History. UK: BBC. 2010-10-15. Retrieved 2010-12-29.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 The Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales, Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2008
  6. ↑ "Cardiff as Capital of Wales: Formal Recognition by Government", The Times, 1955-12-21
  7. ↑ "NDAD | Welsh Office". UK: The National Archives. Retrieved 2010-12-29.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 Balsom, D. "Political Developments in Wales 1979–1997" in Balsom and Barry Jones, eds (2000) The Road to the National Assembly for Wales. Cardiff: University of Wales Press.
  9. ↑ Welsh Assembly Government | Governance
  10. 1 2 "Welsh firmly back Britain's Union". BBC News. 16 January 2007. Retrieved 15 July 2009.
  11. ↑ Cole, Alistair; J. Barry Jones; Alan Storer (September 2001). "Consensus Growing for Stronger Assembly" (PDF). Institute of Welsh Affairs. Retrieved 16 July 2009.
  12. ↑ Livingstone, Tomos (17 September 2007). "Parliament for Wales says poll". Wales Online. Retrieved 16 July 2009.
  13. ↑ Withers, Matt (30 July 2006). "Please, sir, can we have some more?". Wales Online. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
  14. ↑ "Voters would say "No" to an independent Wales: Poll". Wales Online. 2012-02-02. Retrieved 2014-02-03.
  15. ↑ "Voters would say "No" to an independent Wales: Poll". Wales Online. 2014-09-15. Retrieved 2014-09-19.
  16. ↑ BBC News (28 February 2014), 'BBC Cymru Wales poll: Few in Wales back Scottish independence' http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-26378274
  17. ↑ BBC News (24 September 2014), 'Record low' back Welsh independence - BBC/ICM poll' http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-29331475
  18. ↑ "BBC Cymru Wales poll: Few in Wales back Scottish independence". BBC News. Retrieved 6 April 2014.
  19. ↑ "'Record low' back Welsh independence - BBC/ICM poll". Wales Online. 2014-09-15. Retrieved 2014-09-19.

References

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/9/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.