State of the State 2026: Wales | Deloitte UK
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The State of the State 2026
As in previous editions of State of the State, this year’s survey finds the Welsh public differing from the rest of the UK, notably:
People in Wales are more satisfied with levels of safety from crime than the UK average. However, they are slightly less satisfied with transport links to the rest of the UK and a range of other local factors.
The Welsh public is slightly less pessimistic about the future than other parts of the UK when it comes to the cost of living, crime, immigration and inequality.
The Welsh Government is the second most trusted national administration in the UK, after the Scottish Government.
The State of the State in the words of the people who run it.
For more than a decade, our State of the State reports have provided a view of the public sector from the people who run it. This year, we interviewed more than 100 public sector leaders including politicians, senior civil servants, police chief constables, council chief executives and NHS officials. From our conversations we’ve created a number of key insights from public sector leaders. Our interviews with public sector leaders described a system that is too often weighted against its own talent – and many shared views of how it could better serve the public.
“There are pockets of good things, but government need to do more than communicate – it needs to be very clear what, and how, initiatives are being implemented and what difference they will make.”
– Umbrella Body Chief Executive
3. AI innovation is seeing a thousand flowers bloom
“The pace of change with AI is scary and exciting. We were talking in January about what agentic AI can do and it had completely changed by June. It’s the dark arts.”
– Chief Executive of
Non-Departmental Public Body
5. Never underestimate the UK
“The UK is in an amazing position. We’ve got some of the most stable politics in the G7, a seat on the UN Security Council, the third most powerful military in the world, huge soft power and a pretty stable economy – but you wouldn’t believe any of that if you read the news.”
– Director, Government Agency
6. Has net zero gone quiet?
“Wales is ranked second in the worldfor recycling and I don’t think we shout enough about that.”
– Council Chief Executive
The public’s view of the public sector.
There is a real danger that public trust in government could continue to decline if the gap between rhetoric and reality is not closed.
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