Plaid Cymru is a centre-left to left-wing, Welsh nationalist political party in Wales, committed to Welsh independence from the United Kingdom. It campaigns on a platform of social democracy and civic nationalism. The party is a supporter of the European Union and is a member of the European Free Alliance (EFA). The party holds 4 of 32 Welsh seats in the UK Parliament, 12 of 60 seats in the Senedd, and 202 of 1,231 principal local authority councillors. Plaid was formed in 1925 under the name Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru and Gwynfor Evans won the first Westminster seat for the party at the 1966 Carmarthen by-election.
Dafydd Elis Elis-Thomas, Baron Elis-Thomas,, is a Welsh politician who served as the leader of Plaid Cymru from 1984 to 1991 and represented the Dwyfor Meirionnydd constituency in the Senedd from 1999 to 2021.
Mark Allan Isherwood is a Welsh Conservative Party politician, who has served as a Member of the Senedd (MS) for the North Wales region since 2003. He is currently Shadow Counsel General and Shadow Minister for Housing and Planning. Isherwood has held a number of Shadow Ministerial positions for the Welsh Conservatives since he was first elected, at various points holding portfolios for Finance, Social Justice, North Wales, Europe, Housing, Communities and Local Government, among others.
Elin Jones is a Welsh politician who has served as the Llywydd of the Senedd since 2016. A member of Plaid Cymru, Jones has been the Member of the Senedd (MS) for Ceredigion since 1999.
Darren David Millar is a Welsh Conservative politician who has served as the Member of the Senedd (MS) for Clwyd West since 2007.
Andrew Robert Tudor Davies CBE is a Welsh politician who has served as Member of the Senedd for the South Wales Central region since 2007. He is currently serving as Leader of the Welsh Conservatives until a new leader can be appointed, having stood down on 3 December 2024.
Paul Windsor Davies is a British politician who has served as Member of the Senedd (MS) for Preseli Pembrokeshire since 2007. He served as Leader of the Welsh Conservatives and Leader of the Opposition in Wales from June 2018 to January 2021, resigning after possible breaches of Welsh COVID-19 rules. He had previously been Deputy Leader from 2011 to 2018 and Acting Leader in 2011 and 2018.
The Welsh Shadow Cabinet is formed from members of the official opposition in the Senedd, the largest party not part of the Welsh Government, to scrutinise ministers in the Welsh Cabinet. It is led by the Leader of the Opposition, who typically appoints members of the Senedd (MSs) from their party as shadow ministers with portfolios which mirror ministerial posts in the Cabinet who scrutinise ministers and can propose their own alternative policies. Other opposition parties in the Senedd also appoint frontbench teams of spokespeople who perform the same function. These are also sometimes styled as "shadow cabinets" by their parties, though unlike the Shadow Cabinet they have no official recognition. Since 2021, the Shadow Cabinet has been formed from members of the Welsh Conservatives led by Andrew RT Davies, who have alternated with Plaid Cymru as the official opposition in the Senedd since its establishment as the National Assembly for Wales in 1999.
Russell Ian George is a Welsh Conservative Party politician who has been the Montgomeryshire Member of the Senedd (MS) since the 2011 election.
Rhun ap Iorwerth is a Welsh journalist and politician who has served as the Leader of Plaid Cymru since June 2023. He has been the Member of the Senedd (MS) for Ynys Môn since 2013.
The 2016 National Assembly for Wales election was held on Thursday 5 May 2016, to elect members (AMs) of the National Assembly for Wales, now known as the Senedd. It was the fifth election for the National Assembly, the third election taken under the rules of the Government of Wales Act 2006 and the first since the Wales Act 2014.
This is a list of Assembly Memberselected to the fifth National Assembly for Wales at the 2016 election. In May 2020, the representatives were renamed to Members of the Seneddin the fifth Senedd, they would be known as the fifth Senedd for the remainder of their term. From the 2021 election members would be elected under this new title of Senedd. There are a total of 60 members elected, 40 were elected from first past the post constituencies with a further 20 members being returned from five regions, each electing four AMs through mixed member proportional representation. In between elections, members of the legislature may not necessarily be of the same party or the same candidate elected in 2016.
In the Senedd, the Leader of the Opposition is the leader of the Official Opposition, the largest political party that is not in the Welsh Government. The Leader of the Opposition leads and appoints members of the Shadow Cabinet and as such is sometimes styled as the Shadow First Minister of Wales.
Andrew RT Davies became the Leader of the Opposition in Wales on the 24 January 2021 after the resignation of Paul Davies as leader the following day. On 29 March 2021, Nick Ramsay left the Welsh Conservative group, meaning it was no longer the largest party not in government in the Senedd, and therefore no longer the official opposition.
Ieuan Wyn Jones became Leader of the Opposition in Wales after being elected as President of Plaid Cymru, the Official Opposition in the National Assembly for Wales, on 3 August 2000. Jones had previously served in these roles in an acting capacity on the behalf of his predecessor Dafydd Wigley from December 1999 to February 2000. He formed his shadow cabinet on 9 August and, like his predecessor, appointed himself Shadow First Secretary of Wales and Shadow Assembly Secretary for Finance. Members of his shadow cabinet were initially known as shadow assembly secretaries until October 2000. From that month, members were known as shadow ministers, with Jones's titles also changing to Shadow First Minister of Wales and Shadow Minister for Finance, after a similar change was made to the names of ministerial posts in Rhodri Morgan's coalition government between Labour and the Liberal Democrats. Jones's shadow cabinet was dissolved after the formation of a coalition government between Plaid Cymru and Morgan's Labour Party on 19 July 2007.
Ieuan Wyn Jones, the leader of Plaid Cymru, formed his frontbench team of party spokespeople in the National Assembly for Wales on 25 May 2011 after the dissolution of his party's coalition government with Rhodri Morgan and Carwyn Jones' Welsh Labour following the 2011 National Assembly for Wales election. Jones had previously led a shadow cabinet before entering coalition from 2000 to 2007, when his party had served as the Official Opposition since the 1999 National Assembly for Wales election.
Nick Bourne became Leader of the Opposition in Wales after the Welsh Conservatives became the largest party that was not a part of the government in the National Assembly for Wales after the 2007 Assembly Elections. This was because the second largest overall party, Plaid Cymru, had entered into government as part of the One Wales coalition with Welsh Labour.
Andrew RT Davies became Leader of the Opposition in July 2011, after he was elected leader of the Welsh Conservatives, which formed the second largest party bloc in the National Assembly for Wales after the 2011 National Assembly for Wales election.
Leanne Wood became Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly for Wales after Plaid Cymru became the largest party not in government after the 2016 National Assembly for Wales election. 12 Plaid Cymru AMs were elected, as opposed to 11 Welsh Conservative AMs.
