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Stopping snap elections could help to support more women into politics, according to one former MS.

Bethan Sayed, who stepped down at the last Senedd elections to spend time with her newborn son, said women could be better supported by their parties if general election dates were set in advance.

Rishi Sunak's general election announcement last month caught many, including some in his own party, by surprise.

Some of the biggest names on the Welsh language music scene including Cowbois Rhos Botwnnog, HMS Morris and Mari Mathias will be among those playing at Cymdeithas yr Iaith’s gigs in Pontypridd during the week of the National Eisteddfod this year.

Dylan Jenkins, organiser of this year’s Cymdeithas yr Iaith gigs, announced some of the artists who will be playing at the organisation’s gigs this year on Huw Stephens’ programme on Radio Cymru last night (20 June).

A major TV investigation has revealed that the controversial businessman whose company donated £200k to Vaughan Gething is under suspicion for potential tax evasion.

It has been alleged that another of David Neal’s firms has been wrongly characterising the kind of waste it has been dumping at a Pembrokeshire landfill site.

If that proves to be the case, it would mean that Mr Gething was in effect able to win the Welsh Labour leadership election thanks to money that should have been paid to the Welsh Government in landfill disposals tax.

About 1,500 Tata Steel workers will begin an indefinite strike next month over the company’s plans to cut thousands of jobs, the trade union Unite has said.

The move is the first time in more than 40 years that steel workers in the UK have taken strike action, the union added.

About 2,800 Tata Steel workers will lose their jobs when the company closes both blast furnaces in Port Talbot by the end of September.

The company said if the strike affected the safety or stability of its operations it would be "forced" to accelerate closure plans.

The strike will begin on 8 July at Port Talbot and Tata's Llanwern site in Newport.

For many people going about their business on a pleasantly warm Woodfield Street, Morriston, politics and the general election didn’t fire up enthusiasm. Several said they didn’t vote, while others shrugged and said all politicians were the same.

Rosalind Willis, though, wasn’t buying that argument. “I can’t understand when people say they’re all the same,” said the 70-year-old. “Where have you been?” But start mentioning cost of living pressures, the economy, health service, or public transport, and the spark of interest was ignited.

NHS waiting times in Wales are now the highest on record, according to the latest performance data.

The Welsh Government says the “disappointing” figures for April and May show there is a “long way to go” to reduce waits built up during the pandemic.

In April the number of overall patient pathways increased from just under 768,900 to just over 775,000 – the highest on record.

The government argued that the latest figures could have been affected by a “reduction in activity” during the Easter holiday period.

Plaid Cymru says Wales’ new First Minister, Vaughan Gething, had put waiting times “front and centre” of his leadership campaign – but had so failed to deliver.

First Minister Vaughan Gething has been grilled in the Senedd over a stinking landfill site which is owned by the convicted polluter who donated a huge sum to his leadership campaign.

Residents who live close to the Withyhedge site near Haverfordwest have been complaining for months about the noxious odours emanating there which have left locals “on all fours throwing their guts up”.

It’s owned by Resources Management (UK) Ltd which is part of the Cardiff-based Dauson Environmental Group which made the controversial £200,000 donation to the First Minister’s campaign to become Welsh Labour leader.

The company’s owner, David Neal, has previously received two suspended prison sentences for dumping toxic sludge in the Gwent Levels – a sensitive wetland area near Newport.

Workers at steel giant Tata have launched a work to rule and overtime ban in protest at the company’s plans to close blast furnaces at its Port Talbot plant.

Tata is switching to a greener form of production at the steelworks, which needs fewer workers as a consequence.

Unite said 1,500 of its members based in Port Talbot and Llanwern started industrial action on Tuesday, warning that strikes will be held if the company does not row back on its plans.

The Shadow Welsh Secretary has come under fire for displaying a “patronising and contemptuous” attitude towards Wales in a general election interview.

Jo Stevens was heavily criticised after an interview with Catrin Haf Jones on S4C’s Y Byd yn ei Le programme, during which she backed Wales’ embattled First Minister, claimed HS2 doesn’t exist and refused to commit to devolving policing to Wales – something long called for by Labour in the Senedd.

Asked whether Ms Stevens’ party was “undermining devolution” by ignoring a vote of no confidence in Vaughan Gething, she branded the motion, “a political stunt by the Tories aided and abetted by Plaid Cymru”.

The vote of no confidence passed in First Minister Vaughan Gething has led to tension between members of the Senedd Labour group and the party’s whips office at Westminster, we have been told.

Mr Gething lost the vote earlier this month when two Labour MSs – Hannah Blythyn and Lee Waters abstained on the motion that was supported by all three opposition parties. He has, however, refused to resign.

The motion, moved by the Welsh Conservatives, condemned Mr Gething for accepting donations totalling £200,000 to his Welsh Labour leadership campaign from a businessman who received two suspended jail sentences for illegally dumping toxic sludge in the protected landscape of the Gwent Levels.

Happening on the Welsh version of Wikipedia has led one man to create a brilliant online tool that allows people to learn how to pronounce Welsh placenames.

Dafydd Elfryn has created Map Llais (Voice Map) which features more than a thousand audio files of placenames in Wales, pronounced in local dialect.

It has become a great resource for many visiting Wales and those already living here.

Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth has accused Labour of showing a “complete disregard” for Wales in its General Election manifesto.

The Plaid leader said the document failed to back policies championed by Labour’s First Minister Vaughan Gething.

Mr ap Iorwerth said it demonstrated a “lack of influence” from Welsh Labour on the party’s UK-wide policy platform.

“Labour’s manifesto proves that the party in Wales is powerless under Keir Starmer,” the Plaid leader said.

“The complete disregard towards Wales shown in Labour’s programme for government exposes both Welsh Labour’s lack of influence and the UK leader’s lack of ambition.

“There is nothing on devolving the Crown Estate, nothing on HS2 consequentials for Wales, and nothing on the devolution of justice and policing – all policies supported by Labour in Wales.