PLAID Cymru leader Leanne Wood has today told her party’s conference in Caernarfon that her party will use its influence in a hung parliament after May’s election to build a ‘post-austerity Wales.’

She said the time had come to end the austerity agenda which had hurt communities and failed to deliver a sustainable economy. She said post-austerity Wales would see investment in infrastructure and the economy and an additional £1.2 billion a year for the Welsh budget.

Ms Wood said: “Austerity is ideologically-motivated. It’s a policy with the aim of dismantling the state and social protection.

She added it is not rooted in fiscal responsibility or economic sense and that austerity is an "experiment that has failed and Plaid Cymru would end it".

“In building post-austerity Wales, our country must have the tools to deliver not just a new constitutional framework, but to build a new society based on the aspirations of people in Wales.

“By raising the minimum wage to the level of the living wage over the next parliament, £1.5 billion could be saved in in-work benefits that subsidise poor pay.

“A billion pounds could be saved by introducing rent caps that end tenants being ripped off and reduce the need for housing benefit.

“And Plaid Cymru proposes doubling the bankers’ levy to raise £2.8 billion a year because queues at food banks are growing because of the mistakes made by bankers and they must contribute to the creation of post-austerity communities.

“And a permanent rebalancing of the UK’s economy, the building of post-austerity communities, must mean investment infrastructure.

“In building post-austerity Wales, closing the resources gap between Wales and Scotland is crucial.

“The Barnett Formula has entrenched Wales’ disadvantage, every single year since its introduction in 1978.

“The Westminster parties have entrenched the Barnett Formula.

“If they are committed to its retention then they should be able to commit to it meaning the same funding per head for Wales as it does for Scotland.