Minister Mick Antoniw sorry for ‘offensive’ tweet about Tories

On 16 September last year Mr Antoniw posted on his X account: “Tories so happy to see people and particularly children killed and injured on our roads. Wholly irresponsible but not surprising.”

He was responding to a post by the leader of the Welsh Conservatives in the Senedd, Andrew R T Davies, which included a picture of a newspaper front page calling the 20mph default speed limit on most restricted roads “insane”.

Mr Davies’ Tory colleague, Natasha Asghar MS, complained to the Standards of Conduct Committee that the tweet was “wholly inappropriate,… deeply offensive and completely unnecessary” and in breach of Senedd members’ Code of Conduct.

In his report, Standards Commissioner Douglas Bain says that “offensive comments of that kind about a large section of the electorate are not only offensive but could bring the Senedd into disrepute”.

“In making them the member, who is a senior politician, set a very poor example, and demonstrated a lack of judgement and leadership…”

The standards committee “agreed with the commissioner’s characterisation of the comments and their ramifications”.