Why the Senedd election matters beyond Wales

“Wales is about to hold its first Senedd election under a new closed proportional list voting system. At the same time, Labour could lose its long-standing hold in Wales. Lowri Wilkie , Zoe Fisher , Amy Isham and Andrew Kemp look at what this could mean for Wales’ pioneering experiment in wellbeing governance. Enjoying this post? Then sign up to our newsletter and receive a weekly roundup of all our articles. The UK often talks about prevention and long term thinking . Over the past decade, Wales (Cymru) has worked to embed these ambitions in law. Yet short-term political pressures and incentives still shape decisions. On 7 May 2026, Wales will hold its first Senedd election under a new closed proportional list voting system and a larger Senedd. For the first time since devolution in 1999, Welsh Labour’s long-standing dominance looks uncertain, with several parties polling competitively and the electoral landscape far more fragmented. Governments around the world are exploring whether policy can be organised around long-term wellbeing , and Wales offers one of the most ambitious real-world tests. Advances in wellbeing science see wellbeing as shaped by systems , not simply individual choices. For observers outside Wales, this is a live experiment in whether wellbeing governance can endure under real electoral competition. What Wales has already built The centrepiece of Wales’ wellbeing governance is the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 , which places a statutory duty on public bodies to pursue long-term wellbeing. The Act established seven national wellbeing goals and requires organisations to set aligned objectives, applying five “ways of working” that embed long-term and preventative decision-making across government. Oversight is provided by the independent Future Generations Commissioner, who supports implementation. Wales is unusually well positioned to implement a wellbeing economy. As part of a wider prevention-focused policy framework, Wales has also joined the Wellbeing Economy Governments partnership and set out prevention-led health strategies , aimed at shifting the operating system of government around long-term wellbeing. Wales is unusually well positioned to implement a wellbeing economy. It already has the legislative architecture, and its population and institutional landscape are small enough to enable easier coordination across government, health boards and local authorities. Wales retains strong community networks, rich natural environments and traditions of place and mutual support, social assets that can support long-term wellbeing if recognised and strengthened through policy. The Implementation Gap However, a decade after the Well-being of Future Generations Act, the gap between ambition and delivery is widely recognised. The Act has raised the profile of long-term thinking but has not yet driven the system-wide change intended . The Future Generations Commissioner has called for stronger protection of prevention funding, clearer accountability, greater public engagement and a post-legislative review. A March 2026 Institute for Welsh Affairs report similarly calls for stronger scrutiny, greater resources and political leadership to realise the Act’s transformative potential. The stakes here are not abstract. Researchers warn that delaying long-term governance allows systemic risks to accumulate. Climate scientists warn that the “planet’s vital signs are flashing red” due to continued short-termism. Similar concerns on artificial intelligence caution that adoption of AI systems without effective oversight could generate large-scale societal risks. The lesson is broader than Wales. Evidence and legislation alone do not shift systems; long-term goals take hold only when political, fiscal and institutional incentives support them. The fiscal trap Health and Social Care accounts for £12.6 billion, more than 55 per cent of the Welsh Government’s resource budget . An ageing population and high levels of chronic illness continue to increase demand. At the same time, Wales has limited fiscal autonomy. Around four fifths of Welsh Government funding comes from the UK block grant, with only a small share raised through devolved taxes. The result is a fiscal trap. Rising health demand locks spending into crisis response, while limited revenue powers restrict the ability to invest upstream in prevention and long-term priorities. Political incentives Barriers to wellbeing governance are political as well as technical. Elections reward visible responses to immediate problems. Constituency pressures, service failures, and waiting-list headlines shape priorities, while prevention delivers later and often invisibly, making it electorally weak. Institutions reinforce this mismatch. Wellbeing duties exist in law, yet budgeting remains largely annual and siloed. Wales has quietly built one of the world’s most ambitious frameworks for governing around long-term wellbeing. The question now is whether that ambition can survive electoral politics and fiscal constraint. Public politics matters too. When electoral competition becomes more polarised, long-term commitments become easier targets. Multi-decade investments such as prevention or climate adaptation can quickly be reframed as ideological. Despite this, examples from across Wales show how wellbeing approaches can operate in practice when systems create space for them. From policy to practice Our research across Welsh health, community and education settings shows how services and institutions can support connection to self, others and nature in everyday settings. Building a wellbeing system requires action across multiple levels of scale. Health care services must still respond to crisis, but prevention can also be embedded within the care itself. In our work with people living with brain injury in South Wales, services have partnered with community organisations to support recovery in local life. In Swansea this has included partnerships with local sport organisations such as Swansea City AFC, a Science engagement centre , community farms and surfing organisations. These approaches build movement, connection and purpose, factors associated with improved wellbeing and reduced long-term service reliance. Prevention can also operate earlier in the system through community-based approaches. Our research on Local Area Coordination shows how relationship-based support can help people strengthen social networks and engage with community activities before crises emerge. We found that the quality of the relationship between coordinators and community members predicted wellbeing through increased community integration, highlighting the potential for connection to reduce service dependency. We have also incorporated biophilic design principles into a social housing project in South Wales, treating green community space and the built environment as preventive health infrastructure. Delivering the Well-being of Future Generations Act requires more than policy commitments; it depends also on the skills and inner capacities needed to navigate complex challenges. Welsh Government has begun linking these capabilities to the Inner Development Goals framework, which complements the Sustainable Development Goals . Our work in education delivers a curriculum-based wellbeing module that equips university students with skills to manage their wellbeing while strengthening community, and relationships to nature, building capacities needed to navigate crisis. These models show how wellbeing can be built through communities and environments, but moving from pilots to system practice requires sustained investment and leadership. Readers outside Wales should pay close attention to the 2026 Senedd election. Wales has quietly built one of the world’s most ambitious frameworks for governing around long-term wellbeing. The question now is whether that ambition can survive electoral politics and fiscal constraint. If it does, Wales could become one of the clearest global examples of how governments move beyond short-term crisis management toward a wellbeing economy. If it falters, an extraordinary policy experiment risks remaining unfinished. Enjoyed this post? Sign up to our newsletter and receive a weekly roundup of all our articles. All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of LSE British Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science. Image credit: Lachlan1 on Shutterstock The post Why the Senedd election matters beyond Wales first appeared on LSE British Politics .

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