The UK government should work alongside the one in Cardiff to prevent rural depopulation
During a webinar last year on “the past, present and future of Welsh living standards”, the first minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford, told an anecdote to illustrate a point. Mr Drakeford had publicly floated the idea of using tax devolution powers to persuade people living in, for example, Bristol, to come and live in Wales and become Welsh taxpayers. This idea was frostily received by current Welsh taxpayers, he reported. The gist of the reaction was that “people who live in Wales need to belong to Wales” rather than have their truest and deepest affiliations elsewhere.
The response shows that while Wales shares many economic challenges with English regions such as the West Midlands and the north-east, questions of national identity add an extra layer of sentiment that counts in people’s everyday lives. This was illustrated again last week, when the Welsh government’s economy minister, Vaughan Gething, focused on the number of young people leaving the country. The government’s aim of increasing the number of Welsh speakers to a million by 2050 would be imperilled, he said, if too many youngsters in language heartlands in the west and the north felt obliged to up sticks and head to English cities for high-quality, well-paid jobs. An upbeat campaign has been launched to persuade more to stay closer to home. “It’s about having a more optimistic vision of the future,” Mr Gething suggested. “You don’t have to get out to get on.”
