Welsh Week: gobaith: hope for change after the 7th of May

This is the fourth blog in HEPI’s Welsh Week. It was kindly authored by Deio Owen, Llywydd UCM Cymru (NUS Cymru President).

Read the first blog here, the second blog here, the third blog here and the fifth blog here.

On the 7th of May, Wales, Scotland, and some parts of England will head to the polls. Here in Wales, this election could be described as the most important since devolution. 96 new Members of the Senedd (the Welsh Parliament) will be elected; a significant increase from current 60. Voting will also move from a combination of first Past the Post and Closed Regional Lists using D’Hond to only Closed List D’Hondt system, and the 40 current constituencies and 5 regions will be replaced by 16 new super constituencies. With this comes hope.

Since education was devolved to Wales at the turn of the century, the biggest change we’ve seen has been the recent creation of Medr, the new funding and regulatory body for tertiary education. Although the Diamond reforms shifted funding from upfront tuition fees to a maintenance loans and grants system in 2016, students are still trying to keep their heads above the water financially. The student experience remains a constant struggle to pay our bills, get on with our coursework, and navigate an ever-changing job market as we near graduation. Despite having what’s been referred to as the ‘most generous living cost support in the UK for full-time undergraduates’,  students are still being short-changed. The 2025 HEPI and Technology1 report A Minimum Income Standard for Students calculated that the living costs for first-year students is £20,208 in Wales. There’s no surprise, therefore, that students feel like the £10,685 currently on offer barely touches the edges.

When looking at the Maintenance Loan and Grant currently available for students, it’s no wonder that students are working more. When I was studying, I was working shifts at a nightclub in Cardiff, often working from 7pm until 4am. With that came an impact on not just my social life, but also on my studies. We can’t keep expecting students to make up for the shortfalls of the system by working more hours just to make ends meet. The Welsh Government recently moved away from using the real living wage as a measure of inflation for student loans by choosing instead to use the CPI. If we’re to make loans fairer, one of the first steps must be to link the support to the real inflation students are facing.

When referring to hope, gobaith, I’m not referring to the next government tinkering around the edges, making piecemeal increases here and there to funding. The gobaith I have for the next government is to have a real review, and an honest conversation, about how our education system here in Wales can best provide for Wales. This is about ensuring opportunities to study; secure and consistent funding; and a real vision of a system where a learner’s education pathway isn’t blocked by financial, social or systemic barriers.

It’s no secret that the education sector, especially the higher education sector, is not on a stable footing in Wales or across the UK more widely, with more and more universities posting deficits. Recently, the Welsh Government announced a call for evidence looking at the future of tertiary education in Wales. While to some, this is seen as nothing but a thought exercise, to others it’s the start of an honest conversation about how we can improve the tertiary sector here in Wales, both in terms of the learner’s experience and the sustainability of the sector. The paper released by the Welsh Government is an honest and open document that goes into some detail about the challenges the sector faces and opens the door to a conversation that is long overdue.

As the next Government is elected and gets started on its programme for Government, it’s crucial that the work currently underway by the Welsh Government into the future of tertiary education isn’t forgotten.

It’s also no secret that Wales is a small country geographically, however, we still have eight Universities, and a wide range of provision available throughout Wales. With Medr’s inception in 2024, collaboration has been a key talking point throughout my two years as president of NUS Cymru. But actions often speak louder than words. Coming from rural northwest Wales and moving down to Cardiff to study the course I wanted was something that felt quite natural to me. Butthat’s not the case for everyone. Some people might need to stay closer to home for personal, caring or financial reasons, or might not fancy living in the city. Location should not be putting people off from going to University.

If we’re serious as a country and sector about having a collaborative system, we should be confident in ourselves to work together, share provision, and stop competing for the same students. There is an opportunity through the higher education sector to invest in Wales’s future, and collaboration, less competition and fresh ideas are a part of that opportunity. Higher education can also serve Wales better by fostering connections with the communities they’re based in, and promoting opportunities to study in Wales, to those who are growing up here. That is not to discourage anyone from coming to Wales to study, but rather an investment in those in Wales who want to go to university and to stay here after they’ve graduated.

These are all things the next Government will have to think about. Students are ready to see change, but the system needs to accept that.

These conversations will be tough, but we need to look at how universities can work together. This is more than just memorandums of understanding; we need to look at a transformative approach to who and how higher education is delivered in Wales.

If the next government isn’t ready to address the higher education elephant in the room, I’m worried it will only come back to haunt them. Without real investment and proper reforms, the next generation will feel even more betrayed by the system than we are now, and any gobaith will fade away.

Want to understand more about Wales and higher education?

Read HEPI and London Economics’ recent report on higher education funding in Wales, as well as a blog on Plan 2 student loans in Wales.

In 2024, to mark 25 years since the devolution of powers to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, HEPI and The Education Group London published the collection of essays ‘Evolution of Devolution‘. It provides a comprehensive analysis of how higher education policies in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have evolved over the past quarter of a century.