What Wales Could Do Next

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Plaid Cymru’s first 100 days: ten economic tests for a government that wants to change Wales

For the next Welsh Government, its first 100 days will matter far more than the usual choreography of ministerial visits, symbolic announcements and statements of intent. It will be the moment when Plaid Cymru, a party that has long argued that Wales needs a different economic model, will have to demonstrate that it can begin to build one.

Its manifesto contains many of the right ingredients: a National Development Agency, a stronger focus on Welsh-owned firms, public and business rates reform, childcare, skills, housing, energy, transport, universities, and fairer funding. It also makes an explicit commitment to begin realigning Welsh Government spending with its priorities within the first 100 days, which matters because the central question for Plaid will not be whether it has ideas, but whether it can turn them into an operating programme for government.

This is critical because Wales has too often lacked the ability to focus political energy, institutional capacity and public money on a small number of priorities that can genuinely change the country’s economic trajectory. As Plaid Cymru enters government, these are the ten economic and business issues that should define its first 100 days.

1. Turn the National Development Agency into the central economic delivery vehicle

The proposed National Development Agency FOR Wales is likely the most significant economic commitment in the manifesto, but it must not become another arm’s-length body with a logo, a board and a vague remit. Its purpose should be clear: to grow Welsh-owned businesses, increase productivity, improve export performance, attract investment that strengthens local supply chains, and ensure that more of the profits generated in Wales remain in Wales.

Within the first 100 days, Plaid should publish the agency’s mission, governance model, first-year budget, regional footprint and measurable targets. It should also decide what functions move out of Welsh Government, what remains inside government, and how the new agency relates to the Development Bank of Wales, Business Wales, and the existing regional growth structures, as Wales has had too many economic bodies with overlapping responsibilities and insufficient authority.

Certainly, the review of the Development Bank promised by Plaid Cymru will show how serious it is about change to Wales’s economic infrastructure.

And, let’s finally be honest and admit that business support in Wales has been a failure for over two decades and has done little to make any real difference to most Welsh businesses except those in receipt of Welsh Government funding to deliver these services.

2. Make Welsh ownership a serious economic objective

For too long, Welsh economic policy has been too relaxed about ownership. We rightly celebrate jobs created by inward investment, but we have paid too little attention to who owns the businesses, where strategic decisions are made, where profits go, and whether supply chains become embedded in Welsh communities.

A stronger Welsh economy will require more indigenous firms with the ambition and capacity to scale. It will also require more entrepreneurs starting businesses and more medium-sized businesses rooted in Wales. For the former, it will need proper funding mechanisms and supporting infrastructure; for the latter, it will require succession finance, management buyouts, employee ownership, patient capital, and a willingness to intervene before successful Welsh firms are sold too early or lost to external ownership.

Some have argued that this is not important, but I disagree. If more businesses are created, owned, and led in Wales, more decisions will be made here, more profits will be recycled here, and more supply chains are likely to be anchored here.

In the first 100 days, Plaid should commission a comprehensive Welsh ownership audit to identify key medium-sized firms that could be supported to grow, succession risks, acquisition threats, employee ownership opportunities, and businesses with potential to scale.

3. Use procurement as an economic development tool

The manifesto’s ambition to increase the share of Welsh public procurement awarded to Wales-based suppliers from around 55 per cent to at least 70 per cent could be one of the most powerful economic levers available to a devolved government. Public procurement is not a marginal administrative process and is one of the largest tools available to Wales.

But this will only work if it is done intelligently, and it cannot mean simply adding a vague “local” clause to tenders. It means breaking contracts into accessible lots, building supplier capacity before contracts are issued, training procurement officers, measuring where money actually lands, and ensuring that Welsh SMEs can collaborate to bid for larger contracts.

In the first 100 days, Plaid should identify the high-spend areas where Welsh supplier capacity can be expanded quickly, such as food, construction, retrofit, digital services, social care, professional services, creative services, transport, facilities management and public sector technology.

Most importantly, the aim should not be protectionism and a closed shop, but building real capability, because if Welsh firms are to win more public contracts, they must be helped to meet the standards, scale, quality and consistency that public bodies require.

4. Reform business rates before more high streets are hollowed out

Business rates remain one of the great unresolved problems in Welsh economic policy, and the current system too often penalises visible, place-based businesses while failing to reflect the rise of online commerce, logistics parks and out-of-town retail. If we are serious about reviving the high street in towns across Wales, the tax system must stop working against the very businesses that give those places life.

Plaid’s commitment to rebalance business rates in favour of high-street hospitality, leisure and retail is right, but the first 100 days should be used to move from principle to design. Ministers should publish an options paper setting out how relief will be targeted, how out-of-town retail will contribute more fairly, how empty properties will be treated, and how the system can support town-centre living, independent retail and evening economies.

The high street cannot be revived by nostalgia and looking to the past, as it needs a new economic function. That means more homes above shops, more flexible planning, more independent businesses, better transport links, more cultural activity, access to banking, and a tax system that recognises the social and economic value of town-centre businesses.

5. Treat childcare as labour market infrastructure

One of the more contentious debates during the election campaign was how Plaid Cymru could afford its childcare policies. That seemed to conveniently ignore the fact that childcare should not be seen only as a social policy, as it allows parents, especially mothers, to return to work, increase their hours, retrain, start businesses and progress in their careers. It also gives children a better start and supports household incomes at a time when many families are under severe pressure.

The manifesto’s offer of 20 hours a week for children aged 9 months to 4 years, delivered over 48 weeks, should sit at the heart of the government’s economic strategy, not at the margins of education policy. But the biggest risk is delivery, and Wales will need more childcare workers, more rural provision, more flexible provision and a sustainable funding rate for providers. Without that, a generous entitlement on paper could become another postcode lottery in practice.

This means that in the first 100 days, Plaid should publish the rollout timetable, workforce plan, provider funding model and capital requirements. The promise is significant, but implementation will determine whether it becomes transformational or frustrating.

6. Build a skills system around real economic demand

Wales has spent years talking about skills, yet employers continue to report gaps, young people struggle to navigate options, and too many programmes are shaped by institutional supply rather than economic demand. Plaid’s proposal for a national skills audit is sensible, but it must be swift, practical and directly linked to funding decisions. In the first 100 days, the government should identify the first wave of priority sectors: renewable energy, housing retrofit, construction, digital and AI, semiconductors, health and social care, food and drink, advanced manufacturing, tourism and the creative industries.

The real test is whether colleges, universities, schools, training providers and employers are brought into a coherent system, as Wales needs more visible routes into good work, with every young person understanding the academic, technical and vocational pathways available to them. Every region should know which sectors it is backing, and every major public investment should have a skills plan attached to it.

7. Put energy wealth at the centre of Wales’s economic future

Wales has wind, water, land, ports, industrial sites and communities that could benefit from the green transition, but the lesson of previous economic eras is clear: owning resources is not enough. The question is who captures the value.

That is why the proposals on the Crown Estate, a Wales Wealth Fund, community ownership, Trydan Gwyrdd Cymru and renewable energy benefits are central to the economic future of Wales. The first 100 days should be used to set out a National Energy Strategy that maps generation, grid constraints, port opportunities, supply chain gaps, skills needs and community benefit mechanisms.

This should not be framed simply as climate policy, but rather as an industrial policy for the nation’s economic future. If floating offshore wind, hydrogen, grid infrastructure, retrofit, heat networks and community energy are treated as separate initiatives, Wales will miss the moment. If they are brought together as part of a single national mission, they could become a foundation of a more prosperous Welsh economy.

8. Treat housing as economic infrastructure

Housing is not only a social issue; it also affects labour mobility, household spending, health outcomes, construction capacity, town-centre regeneration, and whether young people can remain in their communities.

Plaid’s target of at least 20,000 new social homes by 2030, alongside the proposed body to enable social housing delivery, should be treated as part of an economic programme as well as a housing programme. The first 100 days should focus on land assembly, planning barriers, funding models, Welsh supply chains, modern methods of construction, and the role of pension fund investment.

The same applies to retrofit. A serious area-based retrofit programme could reduce fuel poverty, improve health, cut emissions, and create skilled local jobs, but only if it is designed with delivery capacity in mind. Wales cannot announce a retrofit revolution and then discover it lacks enough assessors, installers, electricians, plumbers, project managers, or trusted local firms to do the work.

9. Create a credible plan for transport and digital connectivity

An economy cannot function properly if people cannot get to work, goods cannot move efficiently, rural communities are isolated, and businesses lack reliable digital infrastructure.

Plaid is right to focus on rail funding, bus integration, fairer fares, active travel, EV charging, and broadband gaps, but the first 100 days should avoid producing another long wish list. The priority should be sequencing, i.e., what can be done immediately, what depends on Westminster, what requires capital, what requires planning reform, what Transport for Wales can deliver, and what must local authorities deliver.

Regarding digital infrastructure, those parts of Wales that still lack reliable broadband should be treated as an economic inclusion issue. A business in rural Wales without reliable broadband is not operating on a level playing field; a student without connectivity is disadvantaged; and a household unable to access digital public services is excluded from the modern state.

In other words, connectivity concerns whether people and businesses can participate fully in the economy wherever they live.

10. Put universities back at the heart of economic renewal

Wales’s universities are not simply educational providers; they are major employers, regional anchors, research institutions, talent magnets, and one of the few parts of Welsh civic life with genuine international reach. That is why the decision to appoint a Deputy Minister for skills and tertiary education is so important as there will a focus, quite rightly, on this critical area over the next for years.

Plaid’s manifesto rightly proposes an independent review of higher education funding, but this should not become another slow institutional exercise. In the first 100 days, the new government should make clear that universities are central to Wales’s economic future. This means asking how they can help retain more young talent in Wales, support Welsh-owned businesses, attract research investment, commercialise ideas, strengthen innovation, and work more closely with colleges and employers. It also means recognising that a financially weakened university sector will damage towns and cities across Wales if it is allowed to decline further.

The review should therefore be framed not only by funding but also by purpose. What kind of university system does Wales need over the next twenty years? How can it support productivity, skills, start-ups, public services and regional growth? And how can more of the money spent on higher education in Wales remain in Wales?

What can be done within the existing budget?

The question is not whether Plaid can deliver everything in its manifesto within the existing Welsh budget, because it plainly cannot. The more serious question is whether it can use its first 100 days to distinguish what can be done immediately, what must be phased through reprioritisation, and what depends on winning new powers or resources from Westminster.

A surprising amount of the first 100 days’ agenda can begin within the existing budget. The mission and structure of the National Development Agency, a Welsh ownership audit, a higher education review, a national skills audit, a business rates review, a procurement pipeline, an energy mapping exercise, and a clearer economic delivery plan are largely matters of political direction, institutional design, and administrative focus. They require capacity and discipline more than large amounts of new money.

A second group of commitments can begin within the existing budget but will require serious reprioritisation. Childcare, retrofit, social housing, transport improvements, university renewal and business support all fall into this category. Plaid can start, phase and design them in the first 100 days, but it cannot pretend they are cost-free. The manifesto’s commitment to realign spending with its priorities is therefore not a technical detail. It is where the hard choices begin. A third group cannot be delivered properly without powers or money from elsewhere, and rail funding, HS2 consequential, the Crown Estate, wider borrowing powers, tax reform and full control over natural resource revenues all require negotiation with Westminster. Plaid can make these central demands from day one, but it cannot bank them as guaranteed income.

That distinction is critical, as the early test of a Plaid government will not be whether it can spend money it does not have, but whether it can stop spreading existing money too thinly, end programmes that no longer deliver, redirect resources towards priorities that matter, and be honest about what requires a wider fiscal or constitutional settlement.

Where could other parties support Plaid?

The political arithmetic may be difficult, but the economic agenda need not be wholly partisan. If we take the manifestos at face value, there should be potential cross-party support for several elements of this programme, including business rates reform, procurement reform, support for small businesses, town-centre regeneration, skills and apprenticeships, broadband, housing delivery, university sustainability, and better use of public money.

Even parties that disagree strongly on constitutional questions may find common ground on practical economic delivery. Conservatives are likely to support elements of business rates reform, small-business support and procurement access, whilst Labour may be open to childcare, housing and public-service reform, especially where these build on existing policy directions. Liberal Democrats would likely be constructive on education, childcare, local government, and housing, and the Greens would be natural allies on energy, retrofitting, active travel, and community wealth.

The sharper dividing lines will come on taxation, borrowing, roads, net zero, the Crown Estate, independence-related structures, and the scale of state intervention in the economy. As a result, perhaps Plaid will not get everything through easily. That means the first 100 days should be politically astute as well as economically ambitious, and the new Welsh Government should avoid bundling practical economic reforms with measures that make agreement harder than necessary. It should separate what can command broad support from what will inevitably become a constitutional fight, building alliances around delivery while making the wider argument for powers and funding in parallel.

The discipline of Welsh Government

Yet none of these ten priorities will matter unless Plaid also changes the way the Welsh Government works, and the central challenge for a first Plaid government will not be the absence of ideas but focus, and in the past, Wales too often lacked disciplined execution. More importantly, many have suggested that the Welsh civil service has essentially become an extension of the Labour Party over the last two and a half decades and that maintaining the status quo has been the overriding priority within Cathays Park.

So rather than procrastination, ministers need to ensure that the first 100 days conclude with a clear economic delivery plan that outlines what will be done in year one, who is responsible, how it will be funded, and how progress will be measured. Some commitments will require legislation, some will require negotiation with Westminster, and some will require new institutions. Others will simply require existing funds to be spent more effectively.

The test of Plaid in government will be whether it can move beyond ambition to delivery. If it tries to do everything at once, it risks disappointing quickly but if it concentrates on a small number of economic missions, it has a chance to show that Wales can be governed differently.

The first 100 days should therefore be about discipline as much as about direction - not another statement of national ambition, but the beginning of a government that knows what it is trying to achieve, measures whether it is achieving it, and is willing to stop doing things that no longer work.

If the new Welsh Government wants to prove that Wales can be governed differently, this is where it starts - not with slogans about change, but with the disciplined, practical work of building the institutions, incentives and investment pipelines that can transform the Welsh economy over the next decade.