A deputy Welsh Government minister has been found to misstated facts in an interview with the BBC but has been cleared of breaching the ministerial code as she had not intended to be untruthful.
The ruling follows accusations about sports and culture minister Dawn Bowden by Gower MP Tonia Antoniazzi, who alleged the minister had not told the truth in the interview, in which she had been asked if she should have intervened sooner in the sexism scandal at the WRU.
Ms Bowden had told the interviewer that the only communication she had received from the Gower MP before the scandal broke in a BBC documentary "was in very general terms" and she would have needed more concrete information to act than "a kind of sense that there wasa problem that couldn't be pinned down".
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Ms Antoniazzi had alleged that she had previously provided the minister with evidence about the emerging situation and the names of women who had been personally affected and who would be willing to speak about their experiences and their contact details.
She issued a statement which read: "“Contrary to the statements in her (the Deputy Minister’s) interview, I provided her with contact details of several women across the WRU who were willing to speak with her about their experiences…..I first raised concerns regarding sexism and misogyny at the WRU with Dawn in early 2022 and she indicated that she was happy to speak with any of the women involved. I followed this up on multiple occasions, sharing the contact details of the women affected who were willing to meet with Dawn, as well as making her aware of the emotional impact this was having on these women."
Following complaints from Ms Antoniazzi, Ms Bowden wrote to First Minister Mark Drakeford asking him to investigate the allegation that she had been untruthful under the ministerial code. Mr Drakeford ordered a report from the Welsh Government's director of propriety and ethics.
That civil servant, David Richards, has now concluded that Ms Bowden misstated the facts but that it did not amount to "untruthfulness or constitute a breach of the Ministerial Code."
He found that she had been given three names by the MP for Gower but "had not been given any details of the nature of their concerns, nor any statements from them." He blamed the row on "two different understandings of the same set of facts".
As part of his report he published summaries of the "amicable and constructive" exchange between the two politicians, in which he said the MP for Gower encouraged Ms Bowden to get in touch with the three women but Ms Bowden said she could not go searching for complaints and said the women would have to come forward themselves and make a written statement and formally complain.
He said: "I think that the Deputy Minister should not have said in her interview that she had not been given names by the Member for Gower, since that was not correct. But I also note that this matter was only one of a number of matters dealt with in a fast-paced and wide-ranging interview. She had made clear in her exchanges that she did not believe that the information provided by the Member for Gower was sufficient for her to take action, given her position as a Minister. This view was endorsed by the official advice which she received once a formal approach was made by the MP for Gower."
He concluded: "I do not think that the Deputy Minister was deliberately trying to mislead and I think that the thrust of what the Deputy Minister said in her interview was an honest representation of the exchanges which she had with the Member for the Gower."
