Welsh First Minister Eluned Morgan Loses Her Seat As Labour’s Nightmare Continues

The first minister of Wales Eluned Morgan has just lost her seat as Labour’s day of historic losses continues.

Morgan has led the Welsh devolved government since 2024, while Labour has been in control of the Senedd since devolution in 1999.

Plaid Cymru’s Elin Jones won the seat with 35.8% of the vote, while Labour came in fourth on just 7.3%.

Reform UK came in second, on 25.8%, and the Conservatives came in third on 16.6%.

The Greens were hot on Labour’s heels in fifth place on 7.1% and the Lib Dems on 5.2%.

Morgan said today’s results have been “catastrophic” and urged the party to take a long hard look at itself.

She confirmed she would be stepping down as leader and took full responsibility for the decline in support.

The loss of Labour’s most senior representative in Wales comes on top of an already gruelling day for the party.

It has already taken major losses in the local elections in England amid Reform UK’s surge, while Plaid Cymru has eaten into Labour strongholds in Wales.

Morgan, who is also in the House of Lords, refused to back Starmer as Labour leader beyond “this point in time” earlier this week.

While the full results for the 96 seats in the Senedd are yet to be announced Labour warned after counting began that it expects to take just 10 seats – out of 96.

Forty-nine seats are required for a majority.

Labour held 29 seats out of 60 before the Senedd expanded ahead of this current election.

The party has also been a dominant political force in the country for more than a century but major dissatisfaction with Keir Starmer’s government meant forecasters had predicted a bloodbath for Labour support in Wales.

Labour’s deputy first minister Huw Irranca-Davies, who has kept his seat in Afan Ogwr Rhondda, predicted it was going to be an “exceptionally tough day” early on Friday.

He said he would take defeat personally, adding: “All of us come into politics to do things and change the country, our community, the nation, to be better, to improve people’s lives, and to be rejected in that way is hard to take.

“But I think that is part of politics as well.”

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