Nationalism has claimed the Valleys South Wales has been abandoned by Labour

The familiar inclement weather returned as I walked along Bailey Street in the Rhondda Valley of South Wales. The street is named after the 19th-century industrialist Crawshay Bailey, the “King of Iron”, who was integral to the coal industry in these parts. As I strolled past a boarded-up old Methodist chapel, my path crossed a young adult of no more than 16 years old. High on some mind-numbing substance, he was low on life. He wore a resigned look, sporting a worn Adidas tracksuit, which suggested he wanted to run, but where to exactly? I couldn’t help thinking that the very idea of university was further away from this young man’s dreams than it was in the early Nineties, when I made my own escape from these abandoned towns.

But something else was troubling me, which wasn’t unrelated. A few months before, a Nazi flag had been hoisted onto an electrical cable at the very intersection where our generational paths collided, and left to fly in the mountain breeze. Many locals were horrified, and a local man was arrested. A swastika was being flown three minutes away from the home where I lived out my teenage years and my parents still dwell, in what was once one of Britain’s strongest bastions of anti-fascism? What would the miners who held these communities together have thought of such disrespect? How did it come to this?

Debates continue to rage about the meaning of flags, as indicators of identity and belonging. But they have never just been about nationalism. Back in 1831, in the Valleys town of Merthyr Tydfil, the red flag of socialism was raised for the first time in direct response to the working conditions at the Cyfarthfa Ironworks that was lorded over by Crawshay Bailey. That flag would become synonymous with this region, giving rise to the Labour Party, birthing the idea of the NHS and also becoming a key battleground in unionism and the fight for working-class rights.

Earlier this year, I co-hosted a two-part BBC radio series called From Despair to Where?. Named after the song from the Manic Street Preachers, it addressed the problem of the Valleys today. The producers wanted to show a balanced picture of the region and, to their credit, managed to find some inspiring local projects. But what I found only reaffirmed the general malaise, decline and dereliction that has come to define this place. The sense of hopelessness felt by a group of young girls I interviewed has stayed with me. As one of them tearily said to me off camera, “there is no hope for the young in these valleys. Is there any wonder that so many are taking their own lives? I sometimes wonder what the point of it all is. I want to believe in something. But it’s hard.”

But something has also changed in the atmosphere. When I was growing up in the Valleys in the Eighties, we felt the sense of ruination and abandonment. This was captured by a BBC reporter who, in 2013, described the place as carrying an “unbearable sadness”. Yet in a political reversal of the stages of grief, that sadness turned to despair and that despair has now turned to anger that is barely contained within the valley. And who can deny these people that anger when the outside world continues to crush them?

The BBC series was inspired by a book I wrote about growing up in poverty. It also situated the history of the Valleys within the broad sweep of political and economic history to bring new attention to its struggles, and how people need to have their voices listened to by those in power but find it often denied. My hope was especially to reach out to disillusioned young people and remind them of the Valleys’ proud past of fighting injustice and inequality.

Miners from South Wales made up the largest contingent of volunteers from Britain in the fight against the fascists during the Spanish Civil War. An encounter with striking Rhondda Valley miners in London inspired the American civil rights activist, Paul Robeson, to establish lifelong links with the region, finding common cause between the exploitation of Welsh labour and racist policies in America. That is not to mention the contribution these communities gave deep underground as their coal extractions literally fuelled both of Britain’s war efforts, which included untold sacrifices against the Nazis.

Yet I have also come to the sobering realisation that such history means absolutely nothing to young people in these towns, who are desperately scrambling to find their place in a world that doesn’t want or need them. The mining communities that once defined the Valleys belong to a different world entirely. It is not theirs. There is nothing remotely comparable, except the poverty and the familiar strips of precariously perched terraced houses, which are home to people who continue to know their lives don’t matter. There is no nostalgia for that past. Everything from that era has been lost or abandoned.

Just as the idea of university has been looked upon with suspicion by many in the Valleys for a number of generations, so the same suspicions apply to politicians, especially those seated in Westminster. Indeed, while there was a moment in history when the peoples of the Valleys did feel some kind of representation, through the voices of politicians such as Aneurin Bevan, the Aberfan disaster of 1966 extinguished whatever faith there may have been in the national political process. Aberfan was also a watershed moment for the Labour Party in South Wales, as the governing party was shown to be removed from the people whom it was meant to represent the most.

What replaced it was apathy. The apathy continued for generations, and the palpable feeling of despondency grew more assured each time the Labour Party came to power. Local people have known the Tories never cared for their plight, but that’s OK. It’s politics and at least you know where you stand. What’s worse is to be continually held down by those who claim to be saving you from drowning.

Keir Starmer’s government has been both a monumental let down and a cataclysmic failure for these people. Cuts to benefits have been acutely felt, especially by pensioners, which has then led to further disbelief as politicians such as Angela Rayner profit from second homes. Her potential replacement as deputy prime minister, Bridget Phillipson, killed off any hopes many poor young children could have of getting into university with her hike in tuition fees. Local people suspect the next Budget, and its inevitable round of cuts, is only going to make things worse.

As I walked back through the village of Ton-Pentre a few days ago, I met an elderly lady who used to work in the local library. That has now been closed down, like most other amenities and public services. An educated woman, she told me of her concerns, and how she marks each passing year by counting more boarded-up shops or the appearance of another vape store, fast-food eatery or tattoo parlour on the high street. Those streets used to be at the heart of local communities, and at least tempered poverty with a sense of belonging. She said she barely leaves her home any more.

We spoke of the flag incident, which she said was outrageous and caused a great deal of harm to the elderly. Then, to my surprise, she told me that as a life-long Labour supporter she would be voting Reform in the next election. It seems she won’t be alone. Polling data continually shows Reform leading in these towns, sometimes with margins greater than the 10-point leads frequently reflected nationally.

While some commentators will be quick to draw immediate connections between the Nazi flag and the rise of Reform, speaking to people here tells a different story. Yes — there is some concern with migration if people are asked. But that concern is really about local economic conditions, and a belief that the more money the Government spends elsewhere, the less there is for any chance of recovery here. And let’s be fair: the Labour government hasn’t presented the argument any other way.

To understand the rise of Reform, then, it is crucial to understand the failures of Westminster and how people are now finding meaning in their message that claims to be working for the working classes. While I don’t like the politics of Reform and have stated on many occasions my suspicions of Nigel Farage, I do understand why local people in places like the Valleys would exercise their democratic right in that way. That does need to be respected, or else we just become another external voice denying poor people theirs.

Reform may be feeding off the anger poor communities like those in South Wales are feeling today, but they didn’t cause it. The Valleys of South Wales have been in a state of economic depression for nearly a century. And the people there have always belonged to a particular class — the disposable of history.

As we look across the political landscape today, we know it has been increasingly marked by intolerance and a simple inability to sit down with people we fundamentally disagree with and have an open and respectful conversation. Should we therefore be surprised to see a swastika in South Wales? We would hope there would be universal revulsion against Nazi regalia, given the horrors that symbol of fascist power undeniably evokes. Those who fly such flags should be condemned. But that doesn’t mean we should turn away from the anger that lies beneath. History teaches us that’s the most foolish and dangerous of all the paths to take.

Beneath the ground of the Valleys of South Wales, there remain many empty tunnels and discarded mining shafts, which are still full of coal, damp, seeping toxic chemicals and even traces of floating gases. But the people there are also sitting on a social and political bomb, which is just waiting for somebody to come along and light a match to prove it was there. If we are to prevent places like the Valleys from exploding, a serious change in attitudes is necessary, starting with those in Westminster.

A good place to start is to listen to local people, especially their struggles and concerns without condescending them. If not, all the current debates about the St George’s Cross may pale in comparison.

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