News and Blog

On 4 July It was reported on the Welsh news website Nation-Cymru, that Anas Sarwar, the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland, and a member of the Scottish Parliament, has called for a new Senate of the Nations and Regions to replace the House of Lords. Speaking to the Fabian Society at Westminster, Anas…

The Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit together highlighted many of the challenges facing rural Wales, from poor accessibility to services and youth out-migration to the over-concentration of tourism and reliance on European export markets. At the same time, as Wales navigates the post-pandemic recovery and designs post-Brexit policies and programmes, there are opportunities to approach problems…

I joined a team of researchers from Bangor University, Cardiff Metropolitan University, Public Health Wales and the University of Kentucky to investigate attitudes towards Covid-19 vaccines in coal mining communities in Wales and the US. Our findings are published in a new report for the British Academy, Covid and the coalfield: Vaccine hesitance in Wales…

Today (25th May), the Department of Business Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) released its latest figures for trade union membership. The long-term downward trend in union membership in the UK is well known.  Based on union records, trade union membership within the UK peaked in 1979 at approximately 13.2 million. Since then, there has been…

As part of the project Trust, human rights and civil society within mixed economies of welfare in WISERD’s civil society research programme, I’ve been analysing the human rights situation of LGBT+ people in Caribbean Community countries – alternatively known as CARICOM. Founded in 1973, it is an organisation of fifteen states and dependencies designed to…

The presence of special education needs (SEN) and variations in school-level provision can cause disruptions in a pupil’s educational journey, especially when that child’s needs change as they progress through key stages. This may especially be the case when pupils have multiple needs, including mental health and communication difficulties. Furthermore, gaps between the time of…

This latest blog post in WISERD’S series on the Ukraine crisis examines the response of the European Union. Specifically, it explores the legal and social policy response and the role of civil society. The Russian invasion of Ukraine that began on 24th February has created one of the most serious humanitarian crises in Europe’s post-war…

Public transport was severely impacted during COVID-19 as people’s daily mobility patterns changed. This led to a substantial drop in demand as many workers were instructed to work from home and social distancing measures were introduced on existing services. Department for Transport statistics show a decline from 91 to 26 million passenger journeys on local…

I remember Mariupol. I visited the Russian-speaking port of around 500,000 people in the summer of 1983. It was then Zhdanov, a city of the Soviet Union on the Sea of Azov, adjacent to the Black Sea. Named, as were many Soviet cities and towns, after a prominent Communist: Andrei Zhdanov, a close associate of…

This latest blog post in WISERD’s series on the impact of the war in Ukraine examines what we know so far about public policy and the third sector response to the refugee crisis in Scotland and Northern Ireland. In Scotland there has been cross-party support for assisting Ukrainian refugees. The first minister said, “To those…