Rhys ab Owen was found to have shown “no remorse”, the Senedd’s standards committee found
By David Deans
BBC Wales political reporter
A politician is to be banned from the Senedd for six weeks after an investigation found he inappropriately touched and swore at two women while drunk on a night out.
The Senedd’s standards committee said Rhys ab Owen had shown “no remorse” for the events in Cardiff on 30 June 2021.
In one instance he was found to have inappropriately touched a complainant by squeezing her thigh in a taxi.
Mr ab Owen denied improper conduct towards the women, the report said.
In a statement issued after the publication of the report he apologised “to those who were affected by my behaviour”.
However the committee said Mr ab Owen had denied inappropriately touching the women throughout the process.
It also said the two women raised the matter within Plaid Cymru very soon after the event.
Mr ab Owen was not suspended from the party group until more than a year later, in November 2022. He was suspended as a party member shortly after publication of the report.
One of the women’s phone numbers was given to the politician to apologise.
The 42-day ban will need to be passed by the Senedd next week, and will mean that he will be stripped of his salary. It will not include recess.
It is the biggest sanction against a Member of the Senedd (MS) that has ever been implemented.
But because of the rules of the Welsh Parliament, and unlike Westminster, Mr ab Owen does not face a recall petition.
Mr ab Owen was elected as a Plaid Cymru Senedd member for South Wales Central in 2021. He was suspended from the party group in November 2022.
The call by the standards committee for Mr ab Owen to be banned from the Senedd follows an investigation by the standards commissioner and behaviour watchdog, Douglas Bain, into a complaint by one of the women.
Plaid Cymru has suspended Rhys ab Owen in the wake of the report
According to the standards committee report, on 30 June 2021 Mr ab Owen and a number of other Senedd members went to Cardiff Bay’s Wetherspoons where they met up with Plaid Cymru staff.
While there, Mr ab Owen drunk “a quantity of wine”. He was said to be more drunk than others present.
The woman who made a complaint to the commissioner about the politician said that Mr ab Owen swore at her twice in a street near the pub.
The report said Mr ab Owen touched her inappropriately by putting his arm around her waist and pulling her body close to his.
Later, in a taxi, Mr ab Owen was said to have squeezed her upper thigh “hard with his hand”.
Another woman, known in the report as “witness A”, was sworn at when she called out Mr ab Owen’s behaviour.
Mr ab Owen was found to have inappropriately touched witness A on the waist in the pub itself.
The report said he also made inappropriate comments to witness A in Boom Battle Bar in Cardiff city centre.
The MS was said by the complainant to have apologised on several occasions for his misconduct.
In a statement, Mr ab Owen said it was “not up to the standard the public expects of a member of the Senedd, and for that I apologise unreservedly”.
He added: “Whatever challenge I might have with the particulars of the complaint, or how it was subsequently investigated, is a separate matter on which I am considering my next steps.”
When did Plaid know?
The report said the complainant and Witness A raised the matter within Plaid Cymru on 1 July. It was reported to their line managers, and it was escalated to the then-chief whip Sian Gwenllian, who spoke with them and the member.
Mr ab Owen was given the complainant’s phone number and called her to apologise. According to the report, he repeatedly said he was sorry.
The committee said that was not appropriate.
Paperwork showed there was insufficient support provided for those involved, the report said.
The committee found the party’s processes were inadequate and ineffective, and the commissioner has written to all party leaders asking them to satisfy themselves appropriate processes are in place.
Plaid Cymru itself did not take part in the cross-party committee’s deliberations, because its member Peredur Owen-Griffiths was named in the report and because all of its members took part in a decision to suspend Mr ab Owen from the group.
What has Rhun ap Iorwerth said?
Previous Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price resigned last year after a report alleged a culture of of harassment, bullying and misogyny.
Speaking to BBC Wales, his replacement, Rhun ap Iorwerth, said the report’s findings “are very serious”.
“There is a level of behaviour and conduct that is expected of us as parliamentarians and the member himself has admitted that his behaviour fell short of that”, he added.
“For us as a party now, we have taken the immediate step of suspending his membership, whilst an internal process is instigated immediately and the Senedd of course prepares to vote on the findings of the report itself next Wednesday.
“The report does touch on the way that the party did respond and our response at the time fell short of what we would wish it to be.
“There are questions asked in the report of all parties. What’s important to us is that we have already been through a process before the commissioner’s investigation of looking at our party culture and I know that we have and are putting all those measures in place to make sure that we are a party that is safe and that is welcoming.”
Human rights claims
A written complaint was made in August 2022. BBC Wales understands much of the committee’s time has been taken with dealing with legal issues raised by Mr ab Owen.
The report details many issues Mr ab Owen raised about the process, including that Mr ab Owen had claimed Mr Bain was biased against him and argued he had a right to a private life under Human Rights legislation, which extend to being “boisterous, argumentative or rowdy”.
Both claims were rejected by the committee, which said the circumstances of the evening in question were closely connected with the member’s position as an MS.
Mr ab Owen asked for Mr Bain, who is from Northern Ireland, to recuse himself from the investigation because he does not speak Welsh. The request was denied and translation was offered.
The standards committee found Mr ab Owen’s behaviour were “serious breaches” of the Senedd’s code of conduct, including that politicians must not bully, harass or discriminate, or subject anyone to personal attack.
A Senedd spokesperson said: “The Senedd’s Standards of Conduct Committee has taken time and a great deal of care to reach its conclusions on this complex and sensitive case.
“It is now up to Members of the Senedd to consider the Committee’s findings ahead of the debate on 13 March.”
