Former Plaid Cymru leader says party “haven’t convinced” voters

On the day that Plaid Cymru launch their manifesto, their former leader Daffyd Elis-Thomas has said that he has “no issue” with Wales voting for Labour. Elis-Thomas, now a Plaid peer, said he did not think the Welsh people had been “convinced” by his party, and that they were yet to have a clear message.

Speaking earlier today, he said that he felt it was Plaid’s “responsibility” to do better than it currently is.

He told the BBC:

“I have no issue with the decision of the Welsh people to vote for the Labour Party, because they clearly haven’t been convinced that we are a better alternative. In Scotland the SNP have convinced them, it seems to me from the polls, and therefore that’s our responsibility, we have to have a better election than we’ve ever had before.”

Lord Ellis-Thomas, who was President of the Welsh nationalist group from 1984 to 1991, was also asked if the party’s message was clear, to which he replied: “I don’t think it is at this stage.”

Alan Pugh, Labour’s candidate in Arfon, described it as a “damning attack on Leanne Wood’s leadership” and said it showed that even her own party were not sold on her vision. He said:

“To have a former Plaid leader saying that he has ‘no issue’ with people across Wales voting for Labour because Plaid have failed to convince that they are a better alternative is hugely embarrassing and lays bare Plaid’s absurd claims that they are the ‘voice of Wales’.”

Plaid Cymru’s leader Leanne Wood is probably the leader appearing in Thursday’s seven-way with least name recognition – and she has been placed next to Ed Miliband in the line up. She may have been feeling bullish about her chances, but an intervention like this is bound to have dented her confidence.