Plaid Cymru settles row with Lord Elis-Thomas

Lord Elis-Thomas will remain a Plaid Cymru candidate for the 2016 assembly election after an agreement was reached to settle the row over his criticism of the party's leadership.

He won the backing of local party members in Dwyfor Meirionnydd at a special meeting on Tuesday.

Plaid's national executive was due to consider his fate on Saturday.

But the party said on Friday that "the discussions have come to an end" and "an agreement is in place".

Plaid Cymru would not reveal any detail of that agreement.

Lord Elis-Thomas, who led the party from 1984 to 1991, had been facing internal disciplinary action for questioning Plaid's election campaign priorities.

Party leader Leanne Wood told a meet-the-public event in Colwyn Bay on Thursday that there there had been disagreements with one AM but she "would not call that a split".

The assembly's former presiding officer had attacked his party's main general election demand that Wales should be treated in the same way as Scotland, saying it should have focused on Wales' future.

In 2014, he lost the chairmanship of an assembly committee after criticising Ms Wood's spring party conference speech, in which she said a vote for UKIP was a "vote against Wales".

One party member leaving Tuesday's special meeting had said that despite winning local party support, Lord Elis-Thomas would "have to make compromises".