Scrap Senedd, net zero and political correctness, says Heritage Party
BBCThe only smaller party which has election candidates in every Welsh seat is promising to scrap the Senedd, end "net zero" carbon reduction targets and "abolish political correctness".
The Heritage Party is standing candidates in all of Wales' 16 constituencies, and says it wants to promote "traditional family values".
Led by the man who founded it in 2020, former UKIP London Assembly Member David Kurten, the party describes itself as socially conservative and influenced by Christian cultural values.
The party's manifesto calls for a moratorium on expanding the 5G network "until proven safe" and says it will end what it calls the "sexualisation of school children".
Heritage Party spokesperson Jason Barker said he and his fellow candidates in Wales are standing to promote "traditional family values".
"We're all just concerned citizens who've had enough of the way things are being done and what the big parties are up to," he said.
"We stand against the net zero agenda, against the sexualisation of children through sexual education in schools.
"All of the big parties pretty much say the same thing. There's no difference between them.
"We don't have corporate funders with agendas. We're just standing as real people, trying to do something for the betterment of the country."
Among the party's key pledges is their plan to eradicate net zero targets. They also want to open new coal mines, lift CO2 restrictions and stop building wind turbines.
"We're not anti-renewable, we're anti net zero because it's a catch all policy that makes no sense," said Barker.
"What we're against is very large-scale industrialised projects across Wales.
"There are much better ways of spending that money and much better ways of making this a better place to live."
The party is also promising to cut NHS waiting times and open new community police stations, as well as eliminating the Welsh government budget deficit.
Barker said this could be achieved without spending cuts or increases in tax.
"What it means is a look at efficiency," he said.
"There is a tremendous amount of waste.
"There was apparently £3m spent on gender neutral tree planting in Uganda by the Senedd.
"I don't really know what that means, but on the face of it, it sounds ridiculous. And yet we can't fill potholes in.
"In the long term we want to abolish the Senedd, because we believe that's an extra layer of bureaucracy and cost that is not necessary and not helping the Welsh people."
The party advocates that marriage is only acceptable between a man and a woman. Its manifesto also states that only husband and wife couples should be allowed to adopt children.
The party is calling for surrogacy to be banned, as well as for the prohibition of what they call "LGBTQQIAAAPP+ propaganda" to children.
Barker said it was "not fair at all" to suggest the party had a problem with gay people, but said they were concerned by what he called "degenerate behaviour" in society.
"That's a twisting of it," he said.
"It is a Christian party. I'm not a churchgoing Christian myself but most of the people in the party are.
"Traditional family values are what we're trying to support.
"There's an awful lot of degenerate behaviour, as we see it, going on at the moment that makes no sense at all, but we've got absolutely no problem with any particular group of people. Certainly not."
