Radical Independence for Wales
“The Welsh make and remake Wales day by day and year after year. If they want to. ” – Gwyn Alf Williams Where stands socialism in turbulent present-day Wales? A timely question on the threshold of elections to the Senedd. Are there still politicians who are unrepentant socialists? If so, what kind of platform do …
Continue reading “”THE RHONDDA’S NEXT STEP” by Leanne Wood – a review”
On Saturday, November 21st, three ‘Wales is not for Sale’ rallies were held by Cymdeithas yr Iaith addressing the issue of holiday homes – in Llanberis, Aberaeron and Carmarthen. We were soaked through and Lake Padarn was bleak and grey. Llanberis in the rain is quite different from Llanberis in summer. As the tourists cannot …
For the last two years, Undod has been building up its membership and expanding its activities. As we have said previously, our guiding principle is that the work needed to build a fair, just and humane society must start now: it cannot wait until Wales has achieved independence from the British state. In that spirit, …
Dan Newman and Roxanna Dehaghani The criminal justice system of England and Wales is broken, according to the best-selling Secret Barrister. Decades of underfunding, exacerbated by the UK government’s austerity programme from 2010, have gutted the system posing great threat to access to justice. To date, the debate on the problems of criminal justice have …
Undod stands in solidarity with Gypsy Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities, and with the protestors in Bristol who have this past week been brutalised by police whilst resisting the Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. If passed, this legislation will take away the right to trespass, with devastating effect on the lives of nomadic Gypsy Roma …
Continue reading “Undod stands in solidarity with Gypsy Roma and Traveller communities”
How is someone meant to feel when a local authority decides to postpone a consultation on the future of a Welsh school? That is the step taken recently by Carmarthenshire County Council in the case of both Ysgol Blaenau, and Ysgol Mynydd y Garreg. Is it relief that there appears to be an element of …
Continue reading “The civil disobedience of local authorities”
The following are speeches made at the vigil for Sarah Everard and Wenjing Lin, two young women killed as a result of male violence in the last month alone. People gathered on the steps of the Senedd, looking out to a blustery, mostly clear blue and pink sunset over Cardiff Bay, as women stood and …
On the 3rd of March there will be a debate in the Senedd on the demand for an independent inquiry into the site for a Velindre Cancer Centre. Here Tessa Marshall, a campaigner with Save the Northern Meadows, provides a detailed account of the recent history around the development, highlighting the need for such an …
Continue reading “The Fight for the Northern Meadows: A Salutary Tale for Today’s Wales”
Radical independence forces made significant gains in last week’s parliamentary elections in Catalonia, as the pro-independence vote shifted measurably to the left. Turnout declined because of the Covid-19 pandemic, but reached 51%. A majority of voters opted for pro-independence parties for the first time, and those parties increased their majority by 4 seats. Leftist gains …
Continue reading “Radical independence cause makes gains in Catalonia”
An article that first appeared in Welsh on the Cymdeithas y Cymod website in January 2021 to note that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has come into force, and that there was a day of campaigning against the War in Yemen. Militarism. A crucial subject, but one that is barely discussed in …
If ever there was a time when childcare, and care work more generally, has been thrown into the spotlight then the current pandemic is definitely it. In addition to unexpected and last-minute school closures due to COVID-19, many working families have had the difficult task of caring for their unwell or isolating children sent home …
After averting near-disaster this week with their plans to decimate the National Library, here the group Reclaim Cardiff examine Welsh Labour’s lemming-like behaviour with respect to another potty plan – plonking a Military Medicine Museum on the Senedd’s front lawn. Just when you thought Cardiff Council could achieve no more, prior to Christmas they outdid …
For those who grew up in Aberystwyth and the surrounding area, the National Library is a building and institution that is integral to the landscape and the memory it shaped. As a school child this is a place you visited in awe and hushed silence, to take a look at William Morgan’s Bible, the embodiment …
Undod and Prisoner Solidarity Network are campaigning together to stop the persecution of Welsh language speakers at HMP Berwyn. Prisoner Solidarity Network has been made aware of the ongoing harassment and separation of first language Welsh speakers by staff at HMP Berwyn in North Wales. We’re demanding that the threats, separation and sanctions of Welsh-speaking …
Continue reading “Stop the persecution of Welsh language speakers at HMP Berwyn”
Tomorrow, Cardiff Council’s Planning Committee will consider an application to demolish the Paddle Steamer, a historic establishment in Butetown, for social housing. Campaigners have made a simple ask to engage with them to find a way to keep space for the cafe on the site as part of the development. We’re calling on Council Leader …
Continue reading “Save the Paddle Steamer – letter to the press”
Prospect Trade Union, National Library of Wales Thirty years ago, in the days of Margaret Thatcher, the Welsh Office conducted a review of the National Library of Wales and concluded that the Library required additional funding. A Whitehall-based Civil Servant quipped at the time to a member of management ‘You do like your National Library …
Continue reading “Back to Thatcher for the National Library: Shredding our Heritage”
Angharad Dafis Cymru’s rural communities are under siege. Holiday dwellings on the one hand, and the annhiliation of social hubs of all kinds on the other, are having a detrimental effect on the viability of Cymraeg, let alone the quality of life and standard of living of the inhabitants of these communities. But the official …
Continue reading “Summer dwellings and village schools: the ambivalence of the national movement”
With the Senedd discussing the names of homes on Wednesday, this is an article by Elin Hywel first published on the Llafar Bro Blog. When walking familiar ground, I often consider how different each time was when I travelled this way; what thought consumed me then? I’m sure I remember standing in this same spot …
Our society has many problems. The police aren’t the institution to solve them. In fact, they’re just another problem. We should abolish the police, overhaul our justice system, and use the money and resources we free up to pursue actual, evidence-based solutions – writes Harry Waveney. **** Regarding police violence, many of us over here …
Continue reading “Abolish and replace South Wales Police – and every other police force”
On the first of June last year, Undod issued the first version of this statement in solidarity with those demanding justice for George Floyd, and all those who fight against racism and state violence everywhere. As we noted at that time, the violent suppression of protests across the US, from casual brutality to rubber bullets …
Staging a post-pandemic ‘recovery narrative’ in Wales – by way of a celebratory event born of a ‘culture war’ – is a contradiction in terms, argues Frances Williams. Instead of international cooperation, 2020 was a year which saw the pandemic prompt aggressive nationalist narratives. Projections of the virus as foreign body gave rise to a …
There’s been a big focus on membership numbers in the Welsh independence movement as of late. YesCymru have been diligently tracking their swelling ranks on social media recently, and it makes for incredible reading: membership has risen from around 2,500 at the start of this year to over 16,000, which by most metrics makes it …
The expanding industry If you want to understand modern Wales – how it is governed, its political culture, the level of respect for basic human rights – begin with the facts about imprisonment. By every measure, the Welsh prison complex is expanding. There are now five prisons in Wales: Usk (and Prescoed), Cardiff, Parc, Swansea, …
We do not know when Jesus of Nazareth was born. The earliest Christians mention days in March, April, May and November. December 25th was adopted in the fourth century as part of the process of making Christianity the official religion of the Empire. Up until the reign of Constantine in the early fourth century, being …
On 16 December, Cardiff’s Planning Committee approved the building of a Museum of Military Medicine on Britannia Park in Cardiff Bay, despite local and wider opposition. The Museum was created in 1952 to tell “the story of army medicine and healthcare, human and animal, from the English Civil War to the current day”. It is …
Continue reading “The fight against the Military Medicine Museum goes on”
People will have their own view about the extent to which the Covid-19 pandemic will continue to existentially threaten our economic order, lifestyles, aspirations and opportunities, but one thing that has attempted to hasten our sense that ‘normality’ is returning has been the ‘Let’s get back to work’ mantra. It’s a sign of how central …
Covid-19 has both exposed the extent of poverty in Wales and deepened it. Even before the pandemic, 700,000 people, more than one in five people already lived in poverty. With a quarter of Welsh households seeing their incomes fall since March, and with living costs rising, many of our poorest families are struggling to keep their …
Continue reading “Why the time is right for universal free school meals”
Over the last few weeks, as Wales has become the only part of the UK where COVID-19 cases continue to rise, there seems to have been a conscious decision made by the Welsh Government to attempt to shift the blame away from themselves and onto the general public. On Tuesday, Vaughan Gething appeared on various …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci78Hy83bLc This discussion was recorded on Wednesday 18th November 2020. (Please note that this is a verbatim recording which does not contain the evening’s simultaneous translation audio track of contributions in Welsh into English. Technical lessons have been learned for next time!) Here’s the original blurb for the event: From small rural communities to densely …
Continue reading “Holiday homes and homelessness: Wales’ housing crisis (video)”
These are difficult times in Wales. The never ending economic misery continues, our environment is suffering from climate change and biodiversity loss, young people can’t find affordable housing in their communities, inward migration and second homes have pushed up prices and is threatening our language in the north and west. People are feeling disillusioned, isolated …
