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When a Prime Minister comes to Wales to make a keynote speech, it’s reasonable to assume they will have something significant to say about the nation they are visiting.

It might even be thought appropriate that they would have a positive announcement to make involving a tangible benefit.

Theresa May could have confirmed a £1.3bn City Deal for the Swansea Bay City Region, committed to support the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon or delivered extra funding for Wales’ rail network, including confirming that electrification of the Great Western main line will go as far as Swansea.

But she didn’t.

Instead, she spoke more about Nicola Sturgeon’s hope to stage a further referendum on Scottish independence than about the future of Wales.

Before she came, we were told she would be unveiling a new “Plan for Britain”.

But if she has one that’s been fleshed out, she wasn’t sharing it with those who had travelled to the Swalec Stadium in Cardiff to hear her speak.

Mrs May’s speech was long on rhetoric and short on detail.

Theresa May at the Tory Spring Conference

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What did become clear, however, is that seeking to project Britain’s imperial past into a post-Brexit future will be central to her narrative over the coming two years.

She spoke of the decision of the British people “to leave the European Union and embark on a new global role”.

That’s not how it was framed at the time. It was all about taking control of our borders and getting rid of unwanted immigrants.

But a global role was what colonists from Britain were seeking to fulfil as they conquered much of the world and exploited other countries’ resources.

Mrs May mentioned “an ambitious programme of economic and social reform” without specifying what that would amount to. She insisted that her Plan for Britain will deliver “a brighter future” and “a better deal for ordinary, working people”.

And she asserted that the Brexit vote was a call to make the UK “a country that works for everyone, not just the privileged few”.

The use of such language, repeated by other Cabinet Ministers at the Conservative Spring Forum, signified that the rhetoric of the left was being appropriated by politicians of the right.

Such tactics can be successful, as was demonstrated in the EU referendum campaign when the likes of Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson posed as representatives of an anti-elite out to topple the bastions of privilege.

Yet whenever a political figure asserts their determination to fight for a country that works for everyone, not just a few, they should expect to be pinned down on exactly what they are aiming for and how they intend to get there.

Amid the generalities, one term in particular was notable as Mrs May listed her objectives: “enhancing rights for workers”. Enhancing workers’ rights is a strange aspiration for a Conservative Prime Minister.

Her party has reduced protection against unfair dismissal, forcing sacked workers to pay when they want to take their case to an employment tribunal.

The law has been changed to make it more difficult for some workers, like those in the NHS, to take industrial action.

The concept of global free trade, praised by both Mrs May and International Trade Secretary Liam Fox, may sound attractive, but it can lead to the “dumping” of products created by slave labour or its approximations.

It endangered the existence of the Tata steelworks at Port Talbot, and will do again if tariffs are removed from cheap Chinese imports.

In the context of Brexit negotiations, despite the protestations of Mrs May and Mr Fox, the UK looks likely to face tariff and non-tariff barriers when trading with the EU – precisely the opposite of the vision they set out.

While Mrs May now seeks to play down the consequences of leaving the European Single Market, she was less sanguine when speaking to bosses at Goldman Sachs merchant bank before the referendum.

On an audio recording leaked to the Guardian, she said: “I think the economic arguments are clear. I think being part of a 500-million trading bloc is significant for us. I think ... that one of the issues is that a lot of people will invest here in the UK because it is the UK in Europe.

“If we were not in Europe, I think there would be firms and companies who would be looking to say, do they need to develop a mainland Europe presence rather than a UK presence? So I think there are definite benefits for us in economic terms.”

What a politician says in an unguarded moment is sometimes more worth listening to than what they say in a carefully crafted speech. The Prime Minister’s comments to Goldman Sachs certainly fall into that category.

It’s clear from her speech that she doesn’t have a full grasp of devolution.

She said: “So our Plan for Britain will provide a good school place for every child”, before launching into a renewal of her pledge to bring back grammar schools – a promise that doesn’t apply in Wales, where the Welsh Government is wholly against such a policy.

The use of egalitarian language like “protecting the vulnerable” and “advancing the common good” might have been more credible without knowledge of the way some disabled and sick people have had their benefits withdrawn in the cruellest of circumstances.

“A stronger fairer Britain” is a noble aspiration, but without a detailed explanation of how it will be achieved, the term itself is meaningless.

It’s important to evaluate the language used by politicians and measure it against their actions.

George Orwell, more than anyone, was aware of that when he wrote 1984.