How is Wales governed? | Wales.com

While Wales has its own government and parliament today, from the early 1700s until the late 1990s. Wales was ruled in law by the government of the United Kingdom (UK). Both the UK Government and Parliament are based in Westminster in London, England.

There was a public vote held in Wales in 1997 to determine whether we should have more control over our own laws and government policies.

As a result of that vote, a National Assembly for Wales was created and certain powers started to be moved (“devolved”) from Westminster to Wales.

This process continued throughout the 21st century, with further powers to make laws and collect taxes moving to Wales recently.

Today, Wales has a legislature - Senedd Cymru (the Welsh Parliament in Welsh) that is responsible for making, scrutinising and passing laws, and an executive - the Welsh Government - responsible for making most of the day-to-day decisions that affect people who live in Wales.

Today, this means that Wales has two governments - the Welsh Government and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, each one with power and responsibility over different things.

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