A Plaid Cymru politician accused the Welsh Government of kicking “long-overdue” council tax reforms into the long grass.

Peredur Owen Griffiths said pausing reforms until 2028 at the earliest typifies a tendency to prioritise the political survival of the first minister over the interests of the people of Wales.

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The shadow local government secretary criticised the Welsh Government’s “unilateral” decision to abandon a joint commitment to make council tax fairer by 2026.

Plaid Cymru pulled out of the co-operation agreement two days after Vaughan Gething’s new administration postponed plans to redesign council tax.

During local government questions on June 12, Mr Owen Griffiths told the Senedd: “This is one of several reasons why we had no option but to withdraw from the agreement.”

Calling for reforms sooner rather than later, he said the regressive nature of council tax places a disproportionate burden on lower-income households.

Mr Owen Griffiths pointed out that Plaid Cymru has tabled an amendment to the local government finance bill to bring council tax reforms forward to April 2025.

Julie James accepted that council tax is not fit for purpose but she cautioned that councils are currently wrestling with lots of challenges.

Suggesting Labour will vote down the amendment, the local government secretary said: “I'm pretty sure that we actually physically can't do it by that date, even if we wanted to.

“We took the view, I think, with a bit of a heavy heart, that it was just a step too far for local government given the set of things that they were currently dealing with.”