Steffan Lewis became the youngest AM in Wales when he was elected on the Plaid Cymru regional list for South Wales East last May. Ian Craig met him at his office in Cardiff Bay to talk about his role and what he wants to achieve.

AS ONE of the newest faces in the Senedd and the youngest AM in Wales at 32-years-old, Plaid Cymru’s Steffan Lewis has had a lot to learn in the first nine months of what he called his “political apprenticeship”.

But the South East Wales AM, already appointed the party’s Brexit spokesman, has jumped in with both feet.

Growing up in Crosskeys and Tredegar, he’s never moved far from his roots in the Welsh Valleys, today living in Blackwood.

Like so many in Wales, and particularly the Valleys, Mr Lewis said the decline of Wales’ industry was his first awareness of the real impact of politics on people’s lives.

“I can still remember the coal wagons going down Gladstone Street in Crosskeys and the windows being filthy with the soot from the coal,” he said.

“And I remember the coal man coming and delivering coal to our house and that changing quite quickly, or it felt quite quickly, as I was growing up.

“At that time I began to wonder about industry and jobs and particularly about it being part of Wales’ makeup.”

Joining Plaid Cymru at 11-years-old, he said studying a degree in history, specialising in industrial history, at the University of Glamorgan, now part of the University of South Wales, cemented this interest further.

“I’ve often wondered why a country so rich in natural resources ended up being a country that was so poor in terms of how that was benefiting local communities,” he said.

He added: “I come from a family where politics was discussed a lot.

“It was always there, but it was never something which felt like it was a natural, expected thing to do.”

Now elevated to a position of power, Mr Lewis said his main goal for his term in the Assembly was to ensure Gwent benefited as much as possible from the Cardiff Capital Region City Deal, a collaboration between 10 local authorities in the area, including Newport, Monmouthshire, Torfaen, Blaenau Gwent and Caerphilly, aimed at increasing investment into the area, as well as the planned South Wales Metro.

“My biggest fear is that it will be a missed opportunity for Gwent, and particularly the Gwent Valleys,” he said.

“I feel the government’s plan is just to make it a bit easier and a bit more convenient for people to be able to leave the Gwent Valleys to go and work in Cardiff.

“That wouldn’t be good enough for the people of south east Wales, and Gwent in particular.

“So I want to make sure through every stage of the development of the City Region project and the Metro that it is spreading job opportunities across the whole of south east Wales.

“In order to do that I think the government has to come up with a coherent plan about what Gwent is going to contribute to the economy and what is going to be our raison d’être economically.”

He said an idea he would like to pursue would be to designate areas in Gwent as ‘growth poles’ for specific types of employment or economic activity, singling out the cyber security centre at the University of South Wales’ Newport campus as an example.

“If we wanted we could make Newport a global leader in cyber security,” he said.

“We all know that’s going to be a very relevant field for decades to come, if not longer.

“So let’s have a government that’s dedicated not just to being satisfied with where we are now, even though it’s a good place, but to see how we can take that further.

“At the heart of it has to be industry.

“Wales is an industrial country and we are at our best when were an industrial country, so we have to look at new industries which can provide our people with well paid, highly skilled jobs.

“That isn’t going to come from poorly-paid service sector work.”

Mr Lewis added developing a niche for Newport and Gwent within the capital region

“What is Newport’s place in Wales going to look like? And what about the Gwent Valleys and the Heads of the Valleys communities? What is it now in the 21st century we are going to be known for throughout Wales but also throughout the UK and hopefully the world as well?

“These are going to be increasingly important questions in Wales.”

He added he was also campaigning to set up a perinatal mental health unit for women immediately before and after birth as well as lobbying for former mineworkers to have a fairer deal on pensions.

As a regional AM elected under the additional member system, Mr Lewis’ constituency covers a massive geographical area with a population of more than one million people.

Although he conceded this was a challenge, he added it also afforded the opportunity to have a wider view of issues such as transport links.

“There is an opportunity to work across constituency boundaries because in communities in Gwent there are flows of people and goods and services across boundaries,” he said.

“We have Newport as the historic capital of the county of Gwent so it’s still important to people who live up in the Valleys.

“So yes, it’s a big area to try and cover and there’s a lot of communities, but when you look at it from a policy perspective it’s quite useful to have a regional view.”

But, although it was the system through which he got into office, he said he did not believe having constituency AMs elected through a first past the post method while regional members elected differently was a good way forward.

“It’s a shambles of a system really to have two-tier AMs elected in different ways to the same Parliament,” he said.

“Once we are here we are all equal, but the way we get here is different. I think it’s a nonsense and I think it’s a big mistake the Labour Party made when they introduced this system of top-up seats.

“I’d prefer to have slightly larger, multi-member constituencies elected proportionally.”

Throughout the first nine months of what he referred to as his “political apprenticeship”, the father-of-one said what had struck him most was how willing people of all political persuasions had proven to engage with him.

“There’s been a really poisonous debate on social media with the Brexit stuff,” he said.

“But the vast majority of people are really reasonable.

“Even if they don’t agree with a single thing you say they will go ‘fair enough, I respect you but disagree with you entirely’ and that’s what you don’t get on social media, there’s no room for that.

“When I’ve gone round and had my street surgeries and people have said ‘no, no, not interested’ they’re still very decent and tidy.

“I think what people are sick of is politicians trying to be something they’re not, people can sense that a mile off and become very cynical, and politicians not answering questions and not saying what they really think.

“I couldn’t do that, I wouldn’t get away with it.

“I speak my mind, it’s fine to disagree in a democracy, it’s fine to have really robust debate but I think in a healthy democracy it should be under the pretence of respect for different views and each other.”