Gareth Lewis: Is it too little too late?

First Minister Eluned Morgan gives a speech at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, September 28, 2025

"Is it too little too late?"

This was the musing of a senior Welsh Labour figure reflecting on a punchy display from their party at its Liverpool conference.

An equally senior colleague suggests that Labour in Wales is desperate for new ideas to cut through to woo voters, and that the party has got to start thinking in those terms.

Another concedes that even though immigration policy is controlled at Westminster, it is having a bearing on next year's Senedd election.

And perhaps ominously for the party, two sources suggest that the mood feels like the Brexit vote in 2016, which resulted in an era-defining political change.

"It is a bit like Brexit," says one.

"People feel like the UK is in a pickle and that they need to press a reset button.

"When you ask those people if Brexit has gone well and they say no, and you then point out that senior figures in Reform were at the forefront of the Brexit campaign, those people then blame the Conservatives for messing it up."

That taps in to a problem Labour is facing - that some people have made up their minds already that they just want change, be that Plaid Cymru or Reform.

On Reform, another senior figure put it like this: "There is a well of people out there who haven't voted before, just as there was in Brexit. It is a protest vote against the status quo."

They went on to say: "There is a vote against the Senedd as an institution too and Reform are capitalising on that with their 'if it doesn't work we might look at it' idea", as floated by their only current MS Laura Anne Jones.

Days later Nigel Farage, Reform's leader, distanced himself from those comments.

How potent the Reform vote will be is one of the big questions. Will they get their vote out?

Gareth Lewis says there are optimists who think that, rather than damage limitation, Labour should come out swinging just like the US Ryder Cup team did at the weekend

Labour figures are also clinging on to the hope that Plaid Cymru might struggle to do as well in the south Wales valleys as the polls are suggesting.

Labour has certainly taken the fight to Reform and Plaid Cymru at conference, labelling them "nationalist bedfellows" who would bring chaos if they run the Welsh government after next year's Senedd election.

The party, which has "won" every Senedd and Westminster election in Wales for more than a century, is on the ropes with polls suggesting it is a distant third behind Plaid Cymru and Reform.

Talking a lot about your opponents is in itself a risk as you're giving them free publicity, but it also highlights that talking about Labour's own record after 26 years in power in Wales is not impressing voters.

But there appears to be a general consensus that punchy language and going after the opposition is the right thing to do.

Partly it gives a sense of purpose and unity after weeks of tensions behind the scenes.

It might also counter what one source calls the "self-fulfilling prophecy" of the media talking up the prospect of a Labour defeat, which then feels like a formality to the public.

And it partly deals with an unspoken fear - that if Labour loses next May it will at least go down fighting.

Whilst the Senedd doesn't control immigration policy it is nonetheless coming up on the doorsteps in the Caerphilly by-election according to the first minister.

A south Wales valleys Labour MP concurs.

"Immigration is a huge issue," they say.

"We are an island nation but we have porous borders and people just can't understand that.

"People are right to think that the border should be controlled. It is a reasonable reaction. It is not racist or knee jerk and people are scratching their heads and asking what the government is doing about it."

On Monday, the home secretary outlined tougher criteria for migrants who want to stay in the UK after the prime minister labelled Reform's even tougher proposals "racist".

There has been pragmatism as well as punch from Eluned Morgan this week, with her acknowledgement that her party faces "one hell of a fight".

She's put pressure back on Keir Starmer to deliver, calling for extra investment ahead of next year's election.

Her opponents will no doubt say that the uncertainty over whether she'll get anything new makes a mockery of what Labour calls the "partnership in power".

There are optimists here who think that, rather than damage limitation, Labour should come out swinging just as the US Ryder Cup team did at the weekend.

Despite their valiant efforts, the Americans lost.

Oh, and in answer to whether it is too little too late, another insider talks up Sunday's fiery speech from the first minister – pauses - asks themselves if it will make a difference, smiles ruefully, and says: "no".