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TRADE UNIONISTS besieged the Senedd today as three protest demonstrations were held to influence the Welsh Labour government’s draft budget as it was debated.
A UCU Cymru rally lobbied the Welsh government after last week’s shock announcement of 400 job cuts and course closures at Cardiff University.
UCU members were joined by hundreds of trade unionists urging the Welsh government to intervene to save higher education (HE).
UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: “The job cuts and course closures at Cardiff are ripping the heart out of universities in Wales.”
Ms Grady said the Welsh government must not “ignore a crisis occurring on its watch” and called on it to fund the sector properly.
TUC Cymru general secretary Shavanah Taj told the protest that politicians from all parties have been at the rally but said that we have to hold them to account when they go back into the Senedd and agree on a budget for Wales.
Ms Taj said that the crisis provoked by the Cardiff University cuts meant that an urgent meeting of the country’s social partnership council must be held and TUC Cymru had written to ministers demanding a meeting.
NAHT Cymru members joined the education rally to demand transparency on where the money from the UK government’s budget settlement in England intended for schools in Wales had gone.
The head teachers’ union said it had made multiple Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to obtain details of what extra consequential funding Welsh schools will get after increased education spending in England.
But neither the Welsh government nor the UK Treasury were able to provide the data.
NAHT Cymru’s Laura Doel said the lack of transparency was concerning, adding: “Schools in Wales lack the money they need just to do the basics, let alone meet education reform demands.
“Schools are contemplating deficit budgets, cutting pupil spending, and making staff redundant and sticking plaster solutions are no longer enough.”
Unite Wales also held a rally demanding the Welsh government does more to help those pensioners hit hardest by the cuts to winter fuel payments.
Unite Wales’s Peter Hughes slammed the Senedd for taking decisions in warm offices while pensioners froze and warned MSs that trade unionists and pensioners would be voting in next year’s election.
“The Welsh government must do more as Scotland and Northern Ireland are giving £100 to every pensioner who has lost the winter fuel payment,” Mr Hughes said.
Senedd members were voting on the draft budget as the Star was going to press, but it was expected to be passed as Welsh Tory leader Darren Miller and fellow party MS Russell George were absent at a prayer meeting with US President Donald Trump.
Their absence means Welsh Labour had a majority to pass its budget in principle, but formal adoption of the final budget for 2025/26 will take place in a month, meaning the lobbying will continue.