Potential future Tory leaders speak at Welsh Conservative conference

Home secretary Sajid Javid and health secretary Matt Hancock – both tipped as potential runners in the eventual race to succeed Mrs May – both appeared at the event in Llangollen on Saturday.

Mr Javid said key to achieving electoral victory in Wales is to show how the Conservatives had run services in England to convince voters they would do a better job in government than Labour.

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“As a party we must make it a priority to focus on the Welsh Assembly,” he said. “We must transform from an opposition to a political force ready to make (Assembly group leader) Paul Davies first minister.”

Calling Labour’s record on education in Wales “nothing short of a catastrophe”, he said: “Labour’s broken ideology has robbed Welsh children of opportunity and we will not let them get away with it.”

But he did not deny work remained to be done to make this a reality, saying: “We need to earn back the trust of police officers, of teachers, of nurses.

“They are professionals that want the same things we do, and we must earn their trust back.”

Sajid Javid. Picture: Jane Barlow/PA Wire

He added: “There’s nothing Jeremy Corbyn wants more than a General Election, and we can’t sugar-coat it, when it comes – and it could come before 2022 – it’s going to be tough.”

And Mr Hancock said he was concerned polls were showing working-age people were increasingly less likely to vote Conservative.

“Today we’re no longer the party of working age people,” he said. “If you’re under 50 you’re more likely to vote for Jeremy Corbyn than the Conservatives. Think about that. We have an age problem.

“Too many people of working age don’t see the party as we see it.

“It’s not that they don’t believe in these values, it’s that they don’t think we’re on their side.”

Matt Hancock. Picture: Jonathan Brady/PA Wire

He also had some strong words for Jeremy Corbyn, calling him “the most dangerous party leader in 100 years” and “a threat to our security”.

He said: "This is a man who, whenever there's a choice between Britain and her enemies, always makes the wrong choice.

"Hamas, Hezbollah, the IRA, Assange, Assad: he always sides with our opponents. He's happy to meet with anyone for a dialogue as long as that anyone isn't the leader of the free world.

"He's the most dangerous party leader this country has seen in 100 years - he's a threat to our security, to our freedom, to our prosperity, and it is our deep duty to ensure that he never enters Number 10."

Mr Hancock also used his speech to warn against flirting with "hard-right policies".

He said: "I worry that those who flirt with hard-right policies are putting the integrity of our union at risk.

"We in this party stand for our union and we always will, and it is our party's job to keep our country together."

Also on Saturday, shadow health minister Darren Miller unveiled a five-point plan aimed at improving accountability in the Welsh NHS following a damning report into maternity services at the Royal Glamorgan Hospital in Llantrisant and the Prince Charles Hospital in Merthyr Tydfil released earlier this week.

Saying the Welsh Government had been “running the NHS into the ground”, Mr Miller said serious action needed to be taken to address accountability in the Welsh NHS.

Darren Miller speaking at the Welsh Conservative spring conference

Among the five overhauls are for elected health commissioners covering each health board area to be introduced, replacing ministerial appointments to health boards, and to require staff to record and disclose failings.

The healthcare inspectorate and community health councils would also be made independent of the Welsh Government and given far more funding, while the party would also set up a Welsh NHS leadership council, which all senior managers and executives will be required to register with. Anyone found responsible for “serious NHS failings” would be removed from the register and banned from working in the Welsh health service.

“The NHS in Wales is breaking records, but breaking records for all the wrong reasons," he said.

“The hard-working and dedicated staff in our Welsh NHS are being let down by this Welsh Labour Government who, for 20 years, have failed to take accountability and responsibility for our health service. They even cut the NHS in Wales by £800 million, the only government in the UK to do so in modern times."

He added: “Only the Welsh Conservatives will empower patients and empower staff to create a Welsh NHS that the people of Wales deserve and that for so long Welsh Labour have neglected and taken for granted.”

The Royal Glamorgan and Prince Charles hospitals have both been placed into special measures following the report, which found a series of failings, including a lack of midwives and consultants, as well as concerns around how women who had lost babies were supported.

The review was set up following a series of serious incidents over a two-year period at the two hospitals, both run by the Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board - including eight stillbirths and four deaths of newborn babies.

But health minister Vaughan Gething has refused to quit over the revelations.

Other topics of discussion on Saturday included proposals by the Welsh Government to give prisoners the votes, the economy and education – with shadow education minister Suzy Davies saying a Conservative-led Welsh Government would scrap the Welsh baccalaureate.

Monmouth AM Nick Ramsay also spoke in his capacity as shadow finance minister, saying the devolution of greater powers over income tax meant the Welsh Government could no longer blame Westminster for funding problems.

“No longer is the Welsh Government merely a spending authority,” he said. “It is now responsible for raising a big chunk of what it spends as well.”

He added: “If the Welsh Labour Government gets it wrong there is no safety net, there is no bail out from London, there is no calling the Paw Patrol.”

Speaking to the Argus from the conference, the party’s Assembly group leader Paul Davies said work had begun on selecting candidates for the 2021 Assembly Election.

“We will now be going out across Wales talking to stakeholders, talking to them about the matters that are important to them, and making sure then that we develop policies which are fit for the 21st century.”

He added: “The people of Wales are aspirational and we’ve got to give people opportunities, and that’s what I want to do – to make sure that we improve people’s lives and give the people of Wales hope.”

And he urged first minister Mark Drakeford to move ahead with making a decision on the M4 relief road.

“The Welsh Government should have dealt with this issue 15 years ago,” he said.

“They have wasted years and it seems to me they are still kicking the can down the road.

“They used the Newport West by-election as an excuse not to make a decision, it seems they’re perhaps using the European elections now as an excuse not to make a decision.

“We have to make a decision now in order to give people certainty.

“If they turn it down they have to bring forward a solution and we’ll have to wait and see what that alternative is.”

The first minister has said he will make a decision on the long-awaited scheme in the first week of June.