Last week, Gair Rhydd was given the chance to interview Cefin Campbell, the Plaid Cymru Minister for Skills and Tertiary Education. Campbell was drawn to Plaid at the young age of 14. Despite being born in one of the most Labour-voting parts of the United Kingdom, it was a visit by Gwynfor Evans to his local chapel while campaigning for parliament that drew him to the movement.
The belief in a right of self-determination for Wales, instilled in him during Evans’ speech, would be the defining feature of the rest of his political career. On universities and student media, the minister started out by sharply criticising the previous Labour government for allowing universities to ‘wither on the vine’.
However, when pressed about immediate government commitments to avoid further redundancies and address issues caused by the university sector facing a financial breaking point, he repeatedly pointed towards Plaid’s review into higher education sustainability, which is due to be published in late 2027, more than a year away.
‘Promising to look into it’ can leave students feeling a lack of urgency from the government, and makes the largest party in the Senedd vulnerable to other groups offering more radical, immediate alternatives to young people.
This is particularly risky for Plaid, given that at the last election many student voters chose them over the Greens as the party of progressive action and change.
Just a couple of days after the interview, I spoke to a politics student friend of mine, and she complained about the government in Wales. When I asked her to elaborate, she said she felt the government hadn’t done anything for her since coming into government.
This may seem harsh, but in a world increasingly dominated by populism and the attention economy, repeatedly pointing to a review whose findings are not due to be published for more than a year risks leaving students feeling like the government is delegating hard decisions to a third party and not acting assertively enough when needed.
When asked about the declining state of student media across the country, with Gair Rhydd now being the last in-print student publication in the whole of Wales, the minister offered praise for student journalism while admitting no one had ever asked him about how it should be supported.
He highlighted the importance of greater access to ministers, to allow them to be scrutinised and present their case to young people, but didn’t offer any further concrete commitments to supporting the threatened enterprise.
Hearing that no one had ever brought up student media to the tertiary education secretary was disheartening, and although greater access to ministers is a welcome offer, it is disheartening to know that nothing else is being discussed in the Welsh government on how to save our now dwindling student media ecosystem.
When discussing the Welsh language, the minister referred to Wales as an increasingly bilingual nation. While this is true in terms of legislation, it is not true in terms of the total number of speakers or the percentage of the population who speak Welsh, which declined by 23,700 speakers and 1.2% respectively between 2011 and 2021.
The minister is undoubtedly one of the people who have done the most to protect and uplift Cymraeg, but it is important to recognise the challenges facing Britain's oldest living language if we are to achieve the government's target of one million Welsh speakers by 2050.
It often feels like Welsh is an afterthought in universities, and I felt I didn't hear the concrete commitment to change that is necessary given the scale of the problem.
On campus safety and the Time to Act campaign, the minister’s tone noticeably shifted. He spoke of how close the issue was to him personally, having three daughters who have faced a range of inappropriate behaviour directed towards them. He explicitly recognised the severity of the crisis within universities, but stopped short of committing to Time to Act’s calls for a statutory duty to prevent.
The minister argued that given the immediate severity of the crisis, legislation may be too slow to be the correct tool to combat the issue. He instead spoke of the need for greater non-legislative measures through Medr, including bystander training, information sharing, and faster investigations into accusations of inappropriate behaviour, while stating he was open to legislation in the future if it was deemed necessary.
Finally, the minister discussed Plaid’s message to young people. When listening to him it’s hard not to appreciate his love for Wales and Cardiff. The minister has dedicated his life to Welsh language and culture and it comes off in his warmth for the city and its people.
However, this is in contrast to the real issues facing the city, students and language, and what some have called a lack of boldness on the government's part.
So, with Plaid Cymru entering its fourth month in government, do you feel satisfied with the party's offering to students?