Few places have been as loyal to Britain’s governing Labour Party as the valleys of South Wales. But even in Wales, Labour risks falling behind not just one rival party but two, according to opinion polls that show the right-wing populist Reform U.K. party battling for the top spot with the center-left Plaid Cymru.
“I’ve always been Labour, but this time I’m swaying towards Plaid,” said Nesta Evans, 78, a retired teacher who lives in Tredegar, a former mining and iron-working town.
Labour has dominated in Welsh politics for a century and has led the government in Cardiff, the capital, ever since the forerunner of the Welsh Parliament was created in 1999. To Ms. Evans, that means the party has had enough time to accomplish more than it has, she said.
Unlike Plaid Cymru, Ms. Evans does not support independence for Wales, but she said she was reassured by the party’s pledge that the discussion was not for the present but was “years ahead.”
Taylor Jenkins, 26, a part-time teacher who lives with his parents in Tredegar, said that while his parents had once voted for the Conservative Party, they were now supporting Reform.
Mr. Jenkins said he planned to stick with Labour. “I just think it’s too big a change, and I don’t know if that’s good,” he said. “At least we know what we’ve got at the moment; we don’t want it to get any worse.”
In his campaign office in Caerphilly last week, Llyr Powell, a Reform U.K. candidate for the Welsh Parliament, described Labour as “the most successful party in the Western world here in Wales,” because of the number of lawmakers it has sent to the British Parliament in Westminster.
“We are the insurgents; we are the ones who are growing in the polls; we are the opposition to Labour,” Mr. Powell said.
That contention is hotly disputed by Lindsay Whittle, a candidate for Plaid Cymru for Blaenau Gwent Caerffili Rhymni, the same constituency Mr. Powell is from. Mr. Whittle said he had been in the party since the 1960s and predicted it would defeat Labour on Friday.
“It’s the atomic explosion, the death of the Labour party,” he said.
Anthony Hunt, a Labour candidate in the Sir Fynwy Torfaen region, said that globally the rise of populism was presenting a challenge, especially in places that had once been industrial areas.
“I’m just trying to emphasize that this election is a choice,” he said. “It’s not a referendum on whether you think everything is perfect now. It’s a choice between different visions of the future for Wales and for our communities.”