Cynulliad Cenedlaethol Cymru

Good afternoon and welcome to this Plenary session. 

As you will all be aware, the Senedd currently has a petition calling for the default 20 mph speed limit to be rescinded, which is receiving an unprecedented number of signatures. I wanted to make all Members aware that, following usual process, a petition can collect signatures for up to six months, at which time it is referred to the Petitions Committee, and then, possibly, to the Senedd for debate. Once more than 10,000 signatures are received, then the petitioner herself/himself is asked if they wish to close the petition early in order to trigger the committee and Senedd stage of its consideration. In this case, there is currently no request for the petition to be closed at this stage, and this may be the case until the six-month window closes in March 2024. I merely wanted to make all Members aware of us following due process with this petition, as with all other petitions.

The first item is questions to the First Minister, and the first question is from Cefin Campbell. 

Thank you, Llywydd, and good afternoon, everyone. 

Well, thank you, Llywydd, and good afternoon, Cefin Campbell. Rail connectivity in mid and west Wales has not met the required standards over the summer. Action has been taken by Transport for Wales and the service has improved in recent weeks. Further improvement is still needed.

Thank you very much for acknowledging the deficiencies, and I'm pleased to hear that there have been improvements. But, First Minister, the taxpayers of Wales fund the HS2 project in England, and although it's been parcelled as a Wales-and-England project, it's clear now that there won't be any benefit for Wales. And, as opposed to Scotland and Northern Ireland, we won't receive a penny of the billions that we are owed. And, as I'm sure that you would have agreed and acknowledged already, we very much need to improve investment in our transport infrastructure in Wales. And one example is the iconic railway, the Heart of Wales line, which runs from Swansea through Carmarthenshire, Powys and on to Shrewsbury. In a recent survey, the performance of the service in stations such as Llandovery, Llandeilo and Llanwrtyd was so poor that, of the 2,700 stations across the UK, those three stations were amongst the 100 worst performing over the past six months, with 40 per cent of trains either cancelled or running over 10 minutes late. So, First Minister, could you explain to me how you intend to go about tackling these serious issues on the Heart of Wales line, and urge your leader to ensure that the HS2 funding does come to Wales?

Well, I thank Cefin Campbell for that supplementary question, and I hear the points that the Member makes, and I read his article in the newspaper earlier this month. And I agree, Llywydd, with what Cefin Campbell said, that the Heart of Wales line is a very important part of our rail network here in Wales. 

As I said in my original response, Transport for Wales has said that things have improved during September, and they are confident that the service will continue to improve over the remainder of the year, as new trains are introduced to that line, providing improved services to more passengers and cyclists. And that's important, and I know that the Deputy Minister has made this one of his priorities in his regular meetings with the service.

In relation to the more general point that the Member made about HS2, Llywydd, in many ways, I don't think I can do better than to quote Paul Johnson, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies. He said in an interview on Times Radio: 

'This whole thing, it just makes me want to weep. It just makes me despair.'

We're now going to spend billions and billions of pounds, and it will take longer to get from London to Birmingham than it will under the current system, because we now know that there's no prospect of HS2 departing from Euston station, as was planned—it will leave from a station conveniently near to Wormwood Scrubs. And when it arrives in Birmingham, it's not going to arrive at New Street in Birmingham either—it's going to require you to walk for 15 minutes across Birmingham to get from where you will be dropped by HS2 to where you will need to get your connecting train. Now, the truth of the matter is that it is a complete shambles, and it's a shambles, as Cefin Campbell said, in which Wales particularly has lost out. If, as we keep reading, HS2 is to be cancelled from Birmingham to Manchester, then the fiction on which the UK Government has relied that, somehow, that line is of advantage to Wales will be completely exploded. At that point, we need to have the Barnett consequential of the money that has been spent to date, and that would allow us to invest in the Heart of Wales line and many other parts of the rail network in Wales as well.

First Minister, ever since I've been a Member of the Senedd, a constant issue raised with me is bus and rail services aligning with each other, and the issue, of course, of trains leaving a station just before a connecting bus service arrives. Now, I know that the Government is moving forward with transferring the management of the TrawsCymru service to Transport for Wales, with the intention, of course, of a better alignment between those services. Now, I agree with that principle. I do have concerns, of course, that Transport for Wales is the organisation that would be responsible for both, because there are so many failures within Transport for Wales currently, but I agree with the general principle that that will help. I wonder if you can give an update in terms of where we are with that transfer, and when you believe that, as a result of that, there will be those better and more appropriately aligned timetabled services between bus and rail.

Well, first of all, can I thank Russell George for his endorsement of that principle that co-location, where that is possible, and certainly alignment between timetables of different public transport elements, is absolutely to the advantage of the travelling passenger? By giving Transport for Wales these new responsibilities, they will be in a much better position to do exactly that. The timetable is bound up in the bus Bill that will come in front of this Senedd in this legislative year, because that will provide the powers to make sure that bus services are planned and delivered in the public interest. And that is an agenda that is at the heart of the transport policy that's being pursued by the Welsh Government, and we will see a very significant step ahead on that journey when the bus Bill is brought in front of Members later in this year.

I thank Mike Hedeges, Llywydd, for that question. Over £250 million has been invested to date by the public and private sectors in delivering new mixed-use developments on this former docklands site. Developer and occupier interest remains high in a scheme that amply demonstrates the importance of public investment crowding in sizeable and significant investments by others.

Can I first of all thank the First Minister for his response? This development has been a huge success, regenerating a former dockland and storage area. It is a mixed development—a commercial, manufacturing and design, housing, university, and leisure development. Whilst Felindre is in Rebecca Evans's constituency, can I suggest you look at something similar for the Felindre site? And also, on SA1, can the First Minister try and speed up the passing of responsibility to Swansea Council for roads and drainage?

Llywydd, I thank Mike Hedges for what he said about the success of SA1. He's absolutely right—it is that mixed development. There are 1,500 residential units either completed already or in the process of being constructed. And it has that great mix of new activity that will give life to that part of Swansea—a new waterfront church, primary healthcare services, Admiral insurance as a commercial partner, a nursery for young children to be there, and student accommodation so that people of that age will be part of SA1. It really will be a vibrant part of the city and, as I said in my original answer, Llywydd, and this is the lesson, I think, that can be drawn for Felindre in the way that Mike Hedges has said, the strategic use of public investment, far from crowding out private investment, as is the theoretical belief of neo-liberals, actually has exactly the opposite impact. Used properly, it creates a magnet that draws investment by others into an area. That's what we've seen in SA1, and the point that the Member makes about Felindre is well made too. There is significant public investment there. It's not a complete parallel to SA1, because it is more directly focused on commercial occupation, but the use of public funds to make that happen in the best possible way is a lesson certainly that is there to be drawn.

As to the transfer of responsibility for highways in SA1—the adoption of roads—that is something that the Welsh Government is very keen to see happen. It is a three-stage process, as I've learned in reading my briefing for this question, and a stage relies upon Swansea city council issuing part 1 certificates. The Welsh Government wrote to the city and county of Swansea earlier this month, asking for those certificates to be issued. Once that takes place, we'll be able to move to the next stages, and then, in the way that Mike Hedges has asked, we can make sure that the roads in this part of the city are properly adopted and thereafter cared for by the city council itself.

First Minister, we can all agree that the SA1 development is a huge boost to the city and most welcome. However, the successful transformation of Swansea’s waterfront was not always a given. We had the less than stellar technium project that was supposed to spearhead the transformation. Who knows how much sooner the city’s transformation would have occurred? We see that the Copr Bay project is also beset by problems, with the main developer going into administration. First Minister, how do we ensure that the lessons are learnt from these developments so that they are successful from the outset, not years down the road?

Well, I thank Altaf Hussain for his recognition in starting his question about the success that has been created in the SA1 development. I think it is true everywhere that, if you are engaged in massive investment, and certainly the investments in Swansea have been on that scale, and will continue to be on that scale with further parts of the ambitious plan for the redevelopment of the city being taken forward by the city council, I'm afraid lessons from elsewhere tell you that if you're doing things on that scale, some unforeseen things will happen. As the Member said, a developer went into liquidation. That is not in the hands of the city council as the prime mover, nor in the hands of the Welsh Government. What I can assure the Member is that when you have investment on this scale, then, of course, we are always keen to make sure that we learn whatever lessons can be drawn from it, whether those be the successful lessons that Mike Hedges referred to, or whether it be places where things could be done  differently and better in the future, and we'll continue to approach the massive investment in Swansea in exactly that light.

Questions now from party leaders. The leader of the Welsh Conservatives, Andrew R.T. Davies. 

Thank you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, as the Presiding Officer mentioned in her opening remarks, there is a record petition before the Senedd's Petitions Committee at the moment, touching nearly 440,000 signatures. There's also another petition supporting the Government's position, of some 3,000 signatures. I don't disparage anyone who signs up to a petition, whether it has several hundred thousand or a few thousand, but the deputy transport Minister said on Friday night in a tweet that the 440,000-odd signatories to that petition were anti road safety. Do you agree with him?

I think that all petitions should be taken seriously, and that is exactly how the different petitions in relation to the 20 mph zones will be viewed by this Government. The process is the one set out by the Llywydd. The petitions are to the Senedd, not to the Welsh Government, and it is for the Senedd, through the Petitions Committee, to respond to them. But I can assure the Member that we on this side take all petitions seriously and will view these petitions in that light. 

At the heart of the case for moving to 20 mph speed limits as a default in built-up residential areas is road safety. This is a measure that will save lives. That is the basis on which it has been brought forward and that is the basis on which we will continue to defend a measure that only last week the leading academic journal in this field said was the most significant public health measure to have been attempted in the United Kingdom for nearly 20 years.

It is critical that people aren't disparaged because they engage in a protest when they have observations or concerns about a Government measure. As I said, the Deputy Minister called this petition 'anti road safety'. Well, it's not against road safety, it's actually highlighting people's genuine concerns about the way this policy has been implemented and their concerns about how it will unfold in their communities. I take it from the points that you've made that you don't regard this petition as being anti road safety and you look at it as a genuine means for people to express themselves and express the concerns they've had. 

One thing that is highlighted again by interacting with people who have concerns over the proposals that the Government has implemented is whether this will affect other national speed limits in this country. So, can you confirm today, First Minister, that there are no plans from the Welsh Government to adjust any of the other national speed limits here in Wales before the next Senedd elections in 2026?

Llywydd, let me make this absolutely clear to people who may have been misled by information that purports to inform them about plans in Wales but does no such thing: we're very used in Wales, on a single journey, to moving from a speed limit that might be 40 mph to 50 mph, 60 mph or 70 mph—none of those are changed by this policy and there are no plans to do so. This is a policy designed to make a default position of 20 mph on roads that serve built-up residential areas, with scope for local authorities to retain 30 mph where they believe that that is the right thing to do. 

Let me make just one other point to the Member. I think it is very important to take seriously the views that people express within our democratic process using the petitions system that we have here. I also think that that cuts both ways, and that those people who support the policy and those people who have brought forward the policy are entitled to be treated with respect as well. I'm quite happy to send the Member some of the vile messages that I've received from people who are opposed to this policy, and for him to say to them, as I agree with him about people who have a different view to mine—. I don't wish to disparage them. I think it would be good to hear from him that those people who are prepared to say things that are not simply disparaging but are directly threatening of people's physical safety—that those things are absolutely unacceptable as well. 

I am more than happy, First Minister, to join you in those comments. There is no space in our society for that whatsoever. I, myself, can send many, many examples—and it's open on my public social media feeds—of the remarks that I get thrown at me. I also get Government-funded purported news sites writing articles that say that I think that this type of language—that you, the Minister and others are collateral damage—. I have never said that, but by a journalist implying that I believe that, it puts a target on my back and my family's back as well, First Minister. I don't enjoy the protection that Government Ministers have, and when I see such posts put on a website that is funded by the Government, I think the Government has to think long and hard about the funding of that website.

What I would say to you, and to all politicians in this Chamber, is that this type of language is completely unacceptable, deplorable, and should be called out at every opportunity. I hear the Deputy Minister saying it's a bit rich. The article I just referred to on the Nation.Cymru website was reposted by many Members in this Chamber, and it hasn't a shred—a shred—of truth in it. So, it can, as you said, First Minister, play both ways. We must stand out against it, and I stand with you against that.

My third question to you, First Minister, is specifically about the road charging measures that are talked of in the Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill, because this is an area that many people have also sought assurances over, and what likely impact these will have across Wales, when these measures are taken by the Welsh Government. Can you outline today the vision that the Welsh Government has about road charging in Wales, given that in this important piece of legislation the Government is seeking to take those powers and ultimately implement, as the national transport plan talks of, a road charging scheme here in Wales?

The powers in that Bill are powers to do with improving air quality. I've heard the Member make very positive contributions on the floor of the Senedd about the importance of improving air quality in Wales. We know it is a public health issue. We know that there are thousands of people whose lives might be shortened if the air that they breathe is not of the quality that we would like it to be. The Bill sets out a whole series of ways in which we will aim to improve air quality here in Wales. It has, as a residual and fallback position, powers that could in the future lead to road charging, if all those other things do not work. But the point of the Bill is to make those other things work. Those are the things that the Bill focuses on, and those are the measures that we will be focusing on as a Government. If we succeed in doing that, then we will have achieved the aims of the Bill, which, as I say, are there as part of this public health approach—to transport, of course; to air quality, quite certainly. And that's the nature of the proposals that the Bill contains.

Leader of Plaid Cymru, Rhun ap Iorwerth.

Thank you, Llywydd. Child poverty levels in Wales are a national scandal. They are a national disgrace. Research by the Bevan Foundation, published in June, suggests that one in five children is living in poverty in Wales. In some areas—Ceredigion, Blaenau Gwent—it's as many as one in three.

The Children's Commissioner for Wales said in a Senedd committee yesterday that the Welsh Government needed to be clearer and braver in its approach to child poverty. Does the First Minister think that the Welsh Government was clear or brave when it decided to scrap its target to eliminate child poverty?

This Government is committed to doing everything that we can within the powers that we have and the resources available to us to tackle child poverty. My colleague Jane Hutt will be making a statement later this afternoon, which will focus on a number of those matters. I'm glad, of course, to have the children's commissioner actively involved in this debate. I haven't had an opportunity to read everything that she said at the committee yesterday, and I'm not surprised that some of her remarks have captured the headlines. We are fortunate, Llywydd, I think, that we have a history in Wales of children's commissioners, from Peter Clarke onwards, who have been positively influential on the policies pursued by the Welsh Government when it comes to child poverty. So many of the things we have been able to do in the last five years, for example on the cost of the school day, emanate directly from the work done by the previous children's commissioner, Professor Sally Holland. When I read the transcript of what the current children's commissioner has to say, I'm quite sure that, below the headline, I will see some further positive proposals that she will wish to make and that we will then be able to take into account as part of the consultation that we are currently carrying out on our proposed strategy.

The First Minister will know, of course, that the children's commissioner has been consistent, not just yesterday. This is what she said when the child poverty strategy went out for consultation in June:

'It’s hugely important that alongside a high-level child poverty strategy document the Welsh Government publishes a specific and measurable delivery plan. This needs to have clear targets showing how and when the Welsh Government will deliver'.

Yes, she was even stronger in committee yesterday, and Victoria Winckler too of the Bevan Foundation was equally strong, saying the plan, as it was, was incoherent, with a lack of targets or milestones. So, will the First Minister listen to both the children's commissioner and the Bevan Foundation, as well as other organisations like the National Youth Advocacy Service, for example, and ensure that that final strategy does have clear, measurable and specific targets, along with timescales?

As I've said, the strategy is being consulted on, which is why people are contributing their views. The Welsh Government has very deliberately created this opportunity for us to hear from people with direct expertise in the field. Then, of course, we will be listening carefully to what they have to say. I say again, though, to Members, so that I'm clear: what we are able to achieve through our child poverty strategy has to focus on those things for which we have responsibility, the powers that rest in this place, and the resources that we have available to do so. I don't think just rhetorical commitments make a difference in the lives of children. It is the practical things that we are able to do that really have their impact, and that's what we will be focused on when the final version of the strategy comes to be published.

Of course, the reason I'm asking these questions today is because I want to influence the way the Welsh Government responds to what it receives during that consultation. I don't doubt for a second that the First Minister is sincere about wanting to eliminate child poverty, but saying it doesn't achieve it, and when the children's commissioner said yesterday the ambition isn't there, you've got to wonder if the Welsh Government is even saying the right things.

I know that the Welsh Government responded to the criticism of the draft plan by saying that the major levers for tackling poverty—welfare benefits and many fiscal powers—are in the hands of the UK Government, and that's reflected in what we've heard from the First Minister today. But he is on record saying he would rather Westminster, ultimately, decides our welfare system. We don't want to keep asking the question posed by the Bevan Foundation, which said, 'What is the point of this document?' We want it to have a point. Will the First Minister finally concede that the full devolution of welfare would give Wales the meaningful levers to drive down levels of child poverty?  

I simply don't accept that point, and I don't think it's borne out by any serious analysis. I continue to believe that one of the strongest cases for the United Kingdom is that, in the right hands, it acts as a great engine for redistribution. It's not been in the right hands, clearly, in recent years, and one of the reasons why this child poverty strategy in Wales is published in that difficult context is that the Office for Budget Responsibility says, in terms, that the decisions made by the current Conservative Government will add hundreds of thousands of children to the numbers, already far too high, who live in poverty. The Member's answer is to hand everything over to an independent Wales where this will all be put right. I don't think that is ever likely to be the case. We will be as constrained, if not more constrained, by the same financial realities.

What I look forward to is a Labour Government in Westminster committed again to reducing child poverty. In the first decade of devolution, child poverty in Wales fell by a quarter and was falling year on year. With a Government in Westminster determined to join us in doing the things we want to do, we can make that difference. A Government in Westminster determined to do the opposite always creates additional headwinds for the things that we want to do here in Wales. I can tell you that this Government is absolutely committed to an ambitious approach to child poverty. There is nothing that has motivated me more in all the years I have been in politics than the lives of those young people in my constituency who, from their earliest years, are blighted by the fact that their families simply do not have the resources they need to offer those young people a chance of growing up in life in the way that we would wish to see them. I am as passionate about that today as I ever have been, and when we have that next Labour Government, we will be able to make a real difference.

Llywydd, the Bill will increase the frequency of elections and ensure that every vote counts, with all Members elected through a single proportional system.

I'd like to thank the First Minister for your answer. On the Welsh Government website, it outlines that the long-term aims of this Bill are to represent, respond to, and serve the people of Wales, and hold the Welsh Government to account. However, the voting system that you are proposing is that Senedd Members are elected on a closed party list system, which removes the option for people to pick their preferred candidate, and will take Senedd Members further away from the public, who elect us here to serve them. I grow increasingly concerned that this system could undermine our elections in Wales, and weaken our democracy. Respectively, some voters look to individual candidates to represent them, not political parties, and we should do well to remember that devolution is supposed to strengthen our local communities, not overlook them by taking away their choices. So, First Minister, do you agree with me that this legislation should be scrapped because a system that you are putting in place removes local accountability and takes politicians further away from the public, who rightly should be able to choose a candidate in an open system that makes individual Senedd Members more accountable to the public who elect them?

Well, of course I don't agree with the Member, nor, do I imagine, do those people who sit around him on the Conservative benches who are elected here on the closed party list system. What does he say to his colleagues? Let them read what he said to me this afternoon about their lack of democratic legitimacy because of the way that they have arrived here. Did he not think of that before he decided to put that point to me?

Let me say this to him so that he understands: in the system we are proposing, voters will have in front of them the entire candidate list put forward by a political party. There will be a list of Conservative Party candidates, and voters will be able to look at those names, as they will be able to look at the lists of every other party, and then, if voters respond in the way that the Member believes, they will be able to weigh that up and cast their vote according to their assessment of the calibre of candidates in front of them. They will be able to do exactly what he says. If his argument is that this will then just be a party list, then the system will allow candidates to stand in their own name, so the Member will be able to make his own decision; he will be able to be on a Conservative Party list, should his party choose to continue to support him in that way. If he thinks that is to break the bond between him and the good electors of Brecon and Radnorshire, then he has a solution: he can stand as James Evans, and they can continue to vote for him, should they choose to do so, in that way.

In an attempt to improve accountability, a number of Parliaments worldwide have introduced a process where, in specific circumstances, it's possible to bring the term of office of a Member to an end between elections. For example, in Westminster, they have a recall system. In the context of the populism that the First Minister referred to, there is always a danger that systems such as this can be misused, and that has certainly happened in the United States. But, despite that, does the First Minister see the benefits of us discussing this way of improving accountability in the context of the reformed Senedd, perhaps investigating an alternative idea made originally by Gordon Brown, for example, of empowering the standards committee to exclude Members permanently in specific circumstances, bringing the public into the process too through having lay members as part of that committee?

Well, Llywydd, I thank Adam Price for those interesting ideas. Perhaps I should start by explaining one fundamental thing. The job of Government in preparing the Bill before the Senedd was to respond to the Senedd committee report. The Government has developed the Bill, but everything that underpins that Bill were issues that the Senedd had agreed in the work led by Huw Irranca-Davies. And there was nothing in the committee report that suggested to us as a Government that that is what the Senedd wanted us to include in the Bill.

But now, of course, the Bill is before the Senedd, and as the Counsel General said when he introduced the Bill, the process now is to debate and develop the Bill, and that will be in the Parliament's hands. And I'm sure that there will be many ideas that will be of great interest to Senedd Members, and they can consider those when the Bill is before the Senedd. And Adam Price's suggestion this afternoon—well, I'm sure that that will be part of the discussion.

I'd like to follow Adam Price in some of that thinking, in fact, because when we're looking at increasing accountability and increasing the ability of the public to hold us to account in this place, one of the ways that has been tested in the United Kingdom Parliament, which I think is working very well, is the process of recall. We're seeing a number of by-elections taking place at the moment in England and Scotland, where Members have been recalled, because they've either broken the law or they've been subject to a suspension by the relevant committee in the House of Commons. And it is an important part and element of accountability, and the Counsel General, in answering questions on this matter, said it was a matter for scrutiny, which was a very enigmatic approach to answering the question. And I was wondering, or hoping, if the First Minister could give us an indication of the Government's thinking and whether a recall system in this place would be something that would engender support from the Labour benches. I can see the Conservatives nodding at this, and I can see some nods from Plaid Cymru as well. It might be something that unites this Chamber.

Well, Llywydd, I thank Alun Davies for that. I think I just need to repeat the point I made in my opening response to Adam Price, that the Bill is a Bill—yes, the practical work on it has been done inside the Government, but the Government was carrying forward the report of a Senedd committee, as endorsed by Members here, and there was no reference to recall in that report. If the Senedd, in the process of scrutinising the Bill, comes to a consensus on that matter or, indeed, maybe other matters that will become part of the debate, then, in a way, I'm not sure that it is for the Government to have a view on it. Because this is a Bill about the Senedd, and the Government is the vehicle for bringing it forward rather than it being a Government Bill by origin. No doubt if a recall possibility were to be part of that discussion, then some of the complexity about that will undoubtedly emerge. I know, for example, that in the Scottish Parliament, efforts were made to find a way in which a recall mechanism could be applied to list Members in the Scottish Parliament. And in the end, the committee that was charged with that in Scotland said that they couldn't find a mechanism by which that could be legitimately brought about.

So, I think the Government is just interested in the debate and in the views of the Senedd, knowing that in all of these issues—and certainly the Member for Carmarthen East will know this—sometimes, even the simplest ideas turn out to have more complexity behind them than you might imagine, and that's what the process of scrutiny will allow us to investigate.

I thank the Member for the question, Llywydd. Reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete-related loss of beds at Withybush has placed additional pressures on the hospital's A&E services. These have been mitigated by the huge efforts of staff at the hospital. Glangwili A&E department faces pressures in common with all health services, but has achieved a significant reduction in ambulance handover times this calendar year.

Prif Weinidog, the long-promised and much-discussed new hospital for west Wales has recently seen its build date shift back to 2031, which will be close to a quarter of a century from this project first being mooted, with still no decision on its final location. A recent independent report by Opinion Research Services has revealed that there are, and I quote, 'widespread concerns' about the inability to make a decision on the new site location, but also that the hardest hit by the relocation will be residents in west Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion and east Carmarthenshire. The final two sites are sparking considerable concern due to the poor road infrastructure, poor public transport links and traffic congestion in the surrounding areas, particularly over the summer months. And I quote:

'Related to this, there were real concerns over whether Welsh Government would invest in road network improvements given its moratorium on road building.'

Therefore, would you agree with me that the best way to alleviate these fears for the people of west Wales is to provide the best possible A&E services at both Withybush and Glangwili hospitals? Diolch. 

Well, Llywydd, the very first question I remember the Member ever asked me on the floor of the Senedd was to oppose the creation of a new hospital for his constituents, and I remember saying to him then that I hoped that he did not come here in order to prolong even further the length of time it has taken to arrive at final proposals for health services in the south and west of Wales. The health board has proceeded very carefully and it has had to because of the debates that Sam Kurtz has referred to this afternoon. It's now come to the position where it has two sites that it wishes to put forward, and the Welsh Government's role is to scrutinise those cases and see our response. That process is continuing. I think the health board has worked very hard to try to develop a clinical consensus that the proposals they put forward will be the ones that best serve that local population. I think it would help us a great deal to accelerate the process and to come to a conclusion if local representatives were prepared to put their weight behind proposals that have that degree of clinical buy-in.

Llywydd, Wales enjoys a strong relationship with Japan, with many significant economic and cultural ties. Our relations span many decades and continue to grow. I look forward to welcoming the Japanese ambassador to Wales later in the autumn to mark 50 years of Japanese investment in the Welsh economy.

Indeed, and it's that I want to turn to in a moment, but many years ago I remember meeting with a former ambassador of Japan to the UK who waxed lyrical not only about his visits to the Royal Porthcawl Golf Club links, but his previous role in his youth as a very keen hooker in his rugby team. And we would talk about Japan and Wales rugby with great admiration and, of course, subsequently we've seen the Blossoms flourish as a side and we wish them well—we wish them well—unless we meet them, of course, in the quarter finals. [Laughter.] But those links going back over 50 years—economically, socially, culturally—are very, very important indeed. They're very strong and they're based on strong community, strong family connections and a sense of working together in our common best interests. Would he therefore join with me also in welcoming the initiative that's been taken on Project Global Citizen, which is looking to work with schools throughout Wales to build on those relationships between Wales and Japan? Over 50 schools now have registered their interest; over 30 are actually signaling they are going to be taking part. And what a good way to take us into the next 50 years of Japan-Wales collaboration, friendship and co-operation. 

I thank Huw Irranca-Davies for that. I thank him for mentioning the rugby. We shouldn't have let this afternoon go by without reflecting on events of the weekend, and when I was lucky enough to go to Tokyo for the last Rugby World Cup, I do remember debating with the governor of Ōita, the province where the Welsh team was based, how we would manage our relationships were Wales to meet Japan in the final of the cup when it was being played in Tokyo itself.

Look, I agree very much with the points that Huw Irranca-Davies has made. Whenever I have met Japanese ambassadors—and I think this will be the third ambassador to the United Kingdom during the time that I’ve been First Minister—they are always hugely supportive of the companies that are here in Wales, but also the efforts that have been made to support those families who come from Japan and are here sometimes for a short period, sometimes for longer, and part of that has been the Saturday school that the Welsh Government continues to support, which teaches Japanese to children who will be returning to their own country, and, from that, a huge emphasis on cultural exchanges between young people.

Earlier this month—I beg your pardon, Llywydd; it was last month—we welcomed a delegation from Ōita to Wales, and a great deal of that was focused on exchanges between young people. Eight high school students from Kyoto are visiting Cardiff and Aberystwyth in November. The global citizen project sits squarely within that wider set of relationships that we have developed, and it is part of why, when Japanese businesspeople go home from Wales to Japan, they are such strong ambassadors for everything that they have experienced while they have been here, because we offer not just fantastic business opportunities, but a genuine sense of cultural exchange between the fantastic cultural experiences we have in Wales while recognising the importance to them of their own heritage.

The First Minister will be aware of the decision taken by the Japanese Government to allow the release of contaminated waters from the Fukushima nuclear plant that are toxic since the terrible accident 12 years ago and that include radioactive elements such as tritium, which are being introduced into the Pacific. Now, fish from those seas are imported to Wales—142,000 tonnes are imported from China and 71,000 tonnes from Vietnam. What discussions has the First Minister had with the Japanese ambassador on this, and does the First Minister agree that releasing this radioactive water into the sea is a matter of concern?

Well, Llywydd, of course I am aware of what has happened in Japan, and how they are now dealing with the impact that that has had in the country, bearing in mind the points that the Member has made. The responsibilities of the Government here in Wales don't extend to the points that he makes. There is a discussion and it's a very important one, but it's important for the people who are responsible to have that debate, and not for me as First Minister here to try and step into the debate when I have no responsibility whatsoever for the things that the Member has spoken about this afternoon.

Llywydd, we continue to work with local authorities and others to build models of automatic registration that can then be trialled in practice. Introduction of the Elections and Elected Bodies (Wales) Bill appears on the business statement for introduction on Tuesday of next week. 

Thank you very much, First Minister. I'm very pleased to hear that; as you know, the numbers voting can vary a great deal, even within one ward. In the previous Senedd elections we saw the greatest interest in the activities of this place, but some polling stations in Ely had a turnout of only around 20 per cent, and, in reality, we know that the figure is far lower, because as we canvass in some areas we visit house after house, street after street, where people haven't registered at all. Now, the registration system is old fashioned. It has a greater impact on young people and those who rent homes, and also, while 87 per cent of white people in Britain are registered, the figure falls to 72 per cent for black people. Does the First Minister agree with me that automatic voter registration would be an important step forward in trying to tackle these injustices? Thank you.

I agree entirely. That's why we are going to introduce the Bill to the Senedd. We will have to trial this to begin with. That's why there is a group working currently on the practical possibilities that we can bring forward if the Bill receives assent here on the floor of the Senedd. If we succeed in that work, I'm confident that the powers in the Bill can have a positive impact on the situation that the Member has outlined here this afternoon.  

Automatic voter registration is not something that I am against. But, of course, it does also have its challenges and problems. It depends on the system that you use to automatically register people to vote. But one of the challenges that is also out there is that there are some people who choose not to register to vote because they don't want to vote and want to opt out of the system. Can you assure the people of Wales, for those individuals who don't want to vote, who don't wish to be registered to vote, or who may choose not to be registered to vote because they want to protect their identity or whereabouts if they have fled domestic violence, for example, that there will be protections in place to facilitate them not being on any kind of public register that could put them at risk? 

Well, Llywydd, there are some important points in what Darren Millar has said. We are dealing with data, people's data. It needs to be treated responsibly, it needs to be handled securely, and it needs to be used ethically. Just to be completely clear, this is about automatic registration. Nobody is obliged to do anything as a result of your name being on the register. That is a completely different debate and one that Members here have already begun to surface, and it's an important debate. But the proposals in the Bill do not move in that direction at all. People's names would be on the register. If they want nothing to do with any of the consequences, they will be under no obligation whatsoever to do so. And there will be safeguards for the sorts of instances that the Member has outlined, as there are now, where people, for reasons of personal safety, for example, don't want their name to be visible to others. Indeed, the Bill will strengthen the ability of the system to respond to those concerns.

Well, Llywydd, as you said at the start of proceedings, it will be for the Petitions Committee to consider the petition in the first instance. The Welsh Government will then respond to the committee's conclusions and any preferred approach it may set out.

People across Wales are making their voice heard by signing the Senedd's record-breaking petition to rescind your Government's default 20 mph speed limit. Many of those signing that petition feel frustrated that they see a Government that they feel simply isn't listening to them. The First Minister's dismissive answer to me last week in First Minister's questions won't have helped with that perception. We've seen people, unfortunately, in all parts of Wales vandalising road signs as an expression of that frustration. Now, I condemn that vandalism, but I wonder whether the First Minister does too. I ask because I noticed an interview with the BBC when he first became First Minister. You talked about Welsh language protests in the 1960s and said that trashing road signs, was, and I quote, 'a fantastic thing' to do. So, do you endorse the vandalism of the road signs of today, or, if not, how do you justify your position in light of your past comments? Or, as usual, is it one rule for the Welsh Government, and one rule for everybody else?    

Llywydd, I don't intend to be drawn into the trivialising of an important debate in the way that the Member has attempted this afternoon.

Llywydd, 2024-25 is the last of our multi-year settlement. Indicative plans have already been outlined in previous budgets. Preparations for the draft budget are under way. The late UK autumn statement means it will be published on Tuesday 19 December.

Thank you for your response, First Minister. I certainly recognise some of the challenges that you'll face in the coming months in that planning. But one of the issues that residents raise with me when they hear, from time to time, about the challenges that you're facing in the next financial year, potentially, is some of the perceived waste in the way in which public money is handled. Indeed, there's a very simple example in my region in the village of St George, which I know my colleague Darren Millar has raised in the past, where a trunk road bridge has a temporary traffic light on it and it's been on there for more than four years now. This traffic light covers a distance of less than 20m. And there's a second trunk road bridge a couple of miles down the road in Abergele with similar temporary traffic lights on it. A freedom of information request has shown that these temporary traffic lights have cost more than £250,000 to taxpayers—that's £250,000 not spent on schools in my region, £250,000 not spent on hospitals in my region, for two temporary traffic lights. So, I know that there are challenges ahead, First Minister, and I know that it's a very specific example I've given you here today, but, when my residents see this, they are frustrated. So, how can you assure them that you're taking every measure possible to cut down on this type of waste so that our public services are properly funded?

Well, Llywydd, let me agree with the basic principle that we always want public money to be spent in the most effective way possible. And where there are examples where that could be done better, then I can assure you that my colleagues here will be only too glad to know of them and to put those things right—of course we would. I don't know the detail of the individual cases the Member has raised. He says that that £250,000 could have been spent on education services or housing services for his local population. I presume—but, again, I don't know the detail—that that £250,000 has been spent keeping them safe on bridges that otherwise would not have been so. So, I don't imagine that the highway authority has had traffic lights on the bridge for the sake of having traffic lights; there will have been a reason for it. Now, maybe the Member is right that the money could have been spent differently and more effectively. If there are examples of that, we'd be only too glad to hear of them.

I thank the First Minister.

The next item will be the business statement and announcement, and I call on the Trefnydd to make that statement—Lesley Griffiths.

Diolch, Llywydd. There is one change to this week's business. After the business statement, the Minister for Climate Change will make a statement on net-zero commitments. Draft business for the next three weeks is set out on the business statement and announcement, which can be found amongst the meeting papers available to Members electronically.

Thank you, Trefnydd, for your statement. Can I call for two statements, please, from the Government? The first one is on road safety on the trunk road network. I've raised issues before about this, but, in my own constituency, in the community of Pwllglas, which is on the A494 trunk road, that community has recently been successful in raising funds to develop a playground and fitness facility on one side of the trunk road, while all or most of the people in that village live on the opposite side. At the moment, the speed limit through the village is 40 mph. It had previously been 30 mph a number of years ago, but has been raised to 40 mph. There is also a nursery that fronts the road as well. It seems to me to be sensible to reduce that speed limit to at least 30 mph on the grounds of safety. Now, we've seen, obviously, a desire from the Government to make our roads safer, and I acknowledge that that is the desire. I would like to see this village road made safer, with a reduction on that trunk road to 30 mph in order to allow people to access these new facilities. And I think we do need an update on what the Welsh Government is doing in order to ensure that villages like Pwllglas have appropriate speed limits that are safe for motorists and, indeed, pedestrians.

Secondly, can I call for a statement from the Minister for Health and Social Services on calls from a constituent of mine from Abergele, who is a prostate cancer sufferer, who, unfortunately, has to use incontinence products from time to time? Clearly, he doesn't always have them to hand, unfortunately, particularly when he's out and about and may need to use a public convenience. There's been a great stride forward in recent years with the availability of period products in public lavatories; I think that's a positive development. But we don't have a similar development for all the people, like this constituent and others, who may need to use incontinence products. So, I wonder whether the Welsh Government could give us a statement on whether they have considered whether this is a policy that they would like to promote in public conveniences around Wales. Thank you.

Thank you. You raise a very important point in your second question. It's not something I'm aware of that we are currently considering, but, obviously, the Minister for Health and Social Services is in her place and heard your question. 

In relation to your first question, I think you did say it was a trunk road. So, obviously, that would be something that the Deputy Minister for Climate Change could have a look at. It might be better if you wrote to him directly, because, obviously, what you're talking about is a very specific point. 

Trefnydd, I'm aware that three community flood volunteer events have been organised by Natural Resources Wales. One is due to take place in Cardiff this week; there'll be one in Aberystwyth and Llandudno. I've been trying to access information about these events, because I understand that there's been some confusion around volunteers being aware. I wonder if a statement could be provided—an update from Welsh Government—so that we are better informed in terms of what these community flood volunteer events are, so that we can promote them, but also know how to engage. Given that winter's coming—we saw flood alerts last week—it would be good to have further information.

I'd also like to request a second statement regarding the south Wales metro, on, specifically, the Treherbert line. As you'll be aware, the line closed at the end of April. Works are due to be completed in January or February of next year. There are so many rumours online in terms of potential delays to the work, I think it would be very much welcome to have a written or oral statement, updating the Senedd in terms of developments, as this is obviously a key investment. Thank you.

Thank you. I think it is really important, if you've got these three community events, that people are aware of them. I'm not sure that the best way forward would be a written statement from the Minister for Climate Change, but I will certainly make some enquiries. Perhaps it would be better for local authorities to put forward that information.

With regard to your second request, I am aware that I have spoken to the Deputy Minister for Climate Change about updating Members, not just on the south Wales metro, but the north Wales metro, and I will certainly ask him to do so when it's the most appropriate time. 

I would like to ask for two Welsh Government statements, and a clarification from the Minister on her last answer. She talked about the north Wales metro and the south Wales metro. I'm sure it was a slip of the tongue when she didn't mention the west Wales metro as well. 

I would like two Welsh Government statements. The first is on co-operative housing. Some progress has been made, including new housing co-operative developments and Merthyr Valleys Homes transferring to become a co-operative housing development. What further proposals has the Welsh Government got to increase the quantity of co-operative housing in Wales?

The second statement I am requesting is on the use of fire and re-hire by companies trading in Wales. Has the Welsh Government got any proposals to not contract with those companies who engage in this vile practice, which should be outlawed? We can't outlaw it, but at least we can not trade with them.

Thank you. Well, I'll just clarify for the Member; it wasn't a slip of the tongue. I hadn't discussed that one with the Deputy Minister, but I absolutely take your point. 

Regarding co-operative housing, Welsh Government really does want to continue to support community-led housing in Wales, and I think the Minister's approach is that it's vital that we do that with a bottom-up approach, and the support we provide through Cwmpas is designed to encourage this. We have increased our support for community-led housing, and we are providing £180,000 of revenue funding each year to Cwmpas from 2022 up until 2023, and then, again, from 2024 to 2025. The nature of community-led housing means it has to be driven from community groups themselves, and our programme of support is currently working with 50 community groups who are all at various stages in their community-led housing journey. 

In relation to fire and re-hire by companies trading in Wales, we absolutely condemn the use of fire and re-hire as a negotiating tactic and employment practice. Using the threat of redundancy to impose inferior pay or terms and conditions on workers does not accord with our fair work or social partnership values. We use tools in this Government like the economic contract, for instance, and the code of practice on ethical employment in supply chains, to be able to articulate the values that we are prepared to stand behind and reward. As the Member knows, we recently legislated, through the Social Partnership and Public Procurement (Wales) Act 2023, to place new socially responsible procurement duties on our public bodies and certain contracting authorities. The duties haven't yet commenced, but we're working on the statutory guidance at the current time.

Trefnydd, could I request an urgent statement from the Minister for Economy on the support for businesses impacted by the RAAC issue? Last week, Bridgend County Borough Council was forced to close Bridgend indoor market at Rhiw shopping centre after an asbestos inspection found RAAC within the roof of the building. The indoor market closed with immediate effect. Whilst it's totally understandable that the building had to shut down on safety grounds, the plea of the traders must be considered. They have lost their only source of income. While, hopefully, the situation at the centre can be resolved swiftly, we can be sure that this will not be the last. Therefore, can we have a statement outlining how the Welsh Government will support businesses who lose trade as a result of the RAAC issue? Diolch.

Thank you. Well, as you know, the ongoing issue around RAAC in certain buildings across Wales, it began with education, and the Minister for Education and the Welsh Language made an oral statement more or less immediately after the first of the two schools were identified. The Minister for Health and Social Services has been requested to bring forward a written statement on health. And we continue to work with all our local authorities to identify what buildings on the public estate unfortunately have RAAC, and that is an ongoing piece of work.

I'm pleased to see the Minister for education in his seat today. I would like to have a written statement in relation to the impact of the discovery of RAAC and the effect of that on schools in my constituency on the way that pupils are assessed. I visited Ysgol Uwchradd Caergybi this week, which has been worst affected. I can only praise the leadership team there in Ysgol Uwchradd Caergybi for succeeding to arrange that lessons continue, either in parts of the school that can remain open, or other buildings in Holyhead. But this is clearly going to have an impact on the education of pupils. There are genuine concerns that that is then going to be apparent when it comes to assessments. I understand that the First Minister, when he visited the school—I'm very pleased that he went—suggested to the pupils that there will be consideration given to the impact of this on their education. The WJEC isn't willing to give that promise yet. I would genuinely appreciate having that assurance for pupils who, for the second time in a few years, are facing a very concerning time.

Thank you. Well, the two schools I referred to in my previous answer to Altaf Hussain were, of course, in your constituency. As you know, the Minister made an oral statement. I think then he did two written statements on RAAC in schools, and he'd be very happy to come forward with a further written statement, as you've requested.

Trefnydd, I have two requests to make today. Firstly, could we have a debate in Government time about what can be done to reduce the numbers of under-18-year-olds using vapes? We've all seen the figures: 20 per cent of students in years 7 to 11 say they've tried vapes, and one in 20 secondary school students use them at least once a week. Now, I welcome the new guidance for schools from Welsh Government and Public Health Wales, and the comments about banning disposable vapes, but I would also welcome the opportunity for Senedd Members to discuss and debate the issues more generally.

Secondly, you may be aware of the news over the summer that the Vale of Glamorgan Council are intending to pursue legal action against three big builders—Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey, and Barratt Homes—for their failure to provide the green space they promised to residents in a timely manner. Sadly, this story is all too familiar across Wales, and indeed across the UK. In my own constituency of Cynon Valley, Persimmon Homes only created their promised green space and play area on the Coed Dyffryn development in Aberdare a whopping eight years after the last home on the estate was built, and after a protracted campaign led by myself and the residents there. Could we have a statement from Welsh Government on how it will make clear to developers that green spaces are integral to the estates that they build, and, as such, should be provided as developments are constructed, and not become the bottom of their list of priorities?

Thank you. Well, as you stated, guidance was published last week regarding vapes. And as a Government, we've historically had a very cautious approach to e-cigarettes, given that the evidence on their long-term effects is developing, and I think that we also all recognise the potential appeal to children and young people. We are very clear that e-cigarettes should never be used by children, by young people or by non-smokers. Whilst it is recognised, of course, that vapes are safer than smoking and are used by some people to help quit smoking, we think the evidence on their long-term health effects is limited and it's still emerging. And, as part of our tobacco strategy, we are looking very closely at our policy position on e-cigarettes in Wales.

With regard to your second question, no community should have to wait eight years to have a play area provided, so, well done on your campaign. I think that our planning policies are very clear: the Minister for Climate Change expects new housing developments to provide green infrastructure, and that includes play areas and open space. Local authorities must use the tools that are available to them, and that includes the enforcement of planning conditions and section 106 obligations to ensure developers' promises are delivered, and the Minister absolutely expects companies to uphold their contractual obligations.

I'd like to request a statement by the Deputy Minister for Climate Change on the devastating impacts of the 20 mph law on bus services in Wales. I've had a letter from Arriva and they've written with huge concerns. They've previously discussed the challenges on service 5 Llandudno; various roadwork schemes; they're having to look again at their fleet; what to have to do with the network. Because of the introduction of 20 mph, we're seeing that long-distance and intra-urban services have been severely impacted, there are large reductions in punctuality, and trips are being cancelled in order to get the buses back on time. Welsh Government is now causing these issues, so they're having to look at frequency reductions, timetable amendments, route changes and route withdrawals. But one question they've asked me is: how did the Deputy Minister engage? Will he come forward with an oral statement clarifying what modelling took place? How did he engage with the bus services? Because this has literally been foisted on them and we're now going to see less of a service than we had before. Thank you.

Well, this hasn't 'literally been foisted on them'. The introduction of the 20 mph speed limit has been very well documented for a long time, and I'm very aware that Welsh Government has had a letter from Stagecoach saying the exact opposite. Now, with most of these policy areas, of course, you get opposing information coming forward. So, I think it's very important that we remember that the implementation only began on 17 September. I think it's really important that we all recognise that local authorities have the powers to exempt. They should be working with their local bus providers as well to ensure that any issues—and I don't doubt for a second that there will be teething issues—that they are worked through. I don't think an oral statement, really, at this time would be appropriate for the aspect of the scheme that you suggest. 

Trefnydd, I'd like to request a statement from the Welsh Government on the ongoing situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh region. Now, I spoke about this in a small debate—short debate, I should say—that I held in the Senedd a while ago, and the situation, of course, has escalated drastically of late. What was a blockade by the Azerbaijani Government on the region has now turned into a full-scale military offensive in the region, which has left hundreds of people dead, wounded or, indeed, missing. Now, EU nations, such as Germany, have expressed concerns about ethnic Armenians in the region, and David McAllister, the chair of the European Parliament's foreign affairs committee, shares similar concerns, including coerced or forced removal of the Armenian population in the region. Since the weekend, around 6,500 people have crossed into Armenia from Nagorno-Karabakh, and there's no doubt that the use of the military by Azerbaijan will obviously further exacerbate the crisis.

I know that 20 Members of the Senedd signed a statement of opinion on the situation there, which was jointly tabled by myself and Heledd Fychan, earlier this year. But with this most recent escalation and the increased tensions in the region, I think that we, as members of the international community, have to show solidarity with the civilians facing the brunt of the violence. We also have to make sure that there are no breaches of the Geneva convention, particularly the targeting of ethnic minority groups and the forceful transfer of civilian populations. So, although international affairs is a matter reserved to Westminster, we all have a moral responsibility to stand in solidarity with the local population and use our voice and the Welsh Parliament's voice, in this instance, to protect those in the Nagorno-Karabakh region who are suffering an abuse of their human rights. 

Thank you. Well, I absolutely recognise what you say about solidarity, but it is a reserved issue and I don't think the Chamber would be the best place to have that. But I do think a statement of opinion was absolutely correct.

I thank the Trefnydd for that statement.

Next we'll have a statement by the Minister for Climate Change on net-zero commitments. I call on the Minister to make her statement—Julie James.

Diolch, Llywydd. I'd like to open my statement today by agreeing with some points made by the Prime Minister in his net-zero announcement of 20 September. The Prime Minister said that there must be an honest debate about how we secure the country’s long-term interest. He also said we need a credible path to reach net zero by 2050 in a way that brings people with us. Unfortunately, Llywydd, I regret that he did not take the opportunity of his speech to address either of the fundamental challenges he set himself.

When we boil down the Prime Minister’s announcements, I believe the direct and material changes to our emissions will be unhelpful but relatively modest. Much of the froth he wished to generate came from scrapping proposals that never existed in the first place. However, by acting in the interests of his party rather than the nation, he has generated much more damaging and wider impacts. He has disrupted the confidence of businesses and communities alike and has missed another opportunity to tackle the real challenges of the climate emergency. Market analysts have been unequivocal. The Prime Minister has made the UK a less attractive destination for institutional investors who are keen to invest in climate projects.

The Prime Minister described significant costs on working people especially those who are already struggling to make ends meet. Yet many of the financial pressures on householders are as a direct result of being locked into a volatile, fossil-fuel driven economy. We need businesses confident in the direction of travel to deliver solutions that help those under financial pressure to go green—solutions with lower lifetime costs than their high-carbon alternatives, solutions that give Wales an economic edge. Instead, the less well-off have the prospect of watching the better-off reap the benefits once more under a Conservative Government. Ironically, electric vehicles and low-carbon heating are two of the areas where economic benefits for struggling families are possible, but where the Prime Minister has put the brakes on progress. In fact, the UK Government’s own analysis of the zero-emission vehicle mandate recognises the significant cost savings of a switch to zero-emission cars and vans. While additional investment will be needed upfront, the Climate Change Committee clearly state the savings in fuel costs would offset the investment costs in later years. That said, new cars are not an option for many people in Wales. However, the sooner the market shifts to new low-emission cars, the sooner we will see a healthier, lower cost second-hand market. The Prime Minister in his speech chose neither to help the transition from costly, polluting fossil fuels, nor to support a transition to active and public transport. I just do not see how this supports our shared climate ambitions or delivers on his promise to support working people in the long term.

Turning to low-carbon heating, this Senedd knows that decarbonising our homes will require a coherent and consistent package of policy that fairly, and over time, incentivises the uptake of energy efficiency measures and reduces the cost of adopting low-carbon heating solutions. We know more energy-efficient homes cost less to keep warm. The Prime Minister has decided to delay the 2028 requirement for all private rental properties to meet EPC C. We know homes in the private rented sector are less thermally efficient than in any other tenure. Therefore, any delay in improving the efficiency of these homes will see many tenants in Wales continue to rent draughty, inefficient homes and face high energy bills for years to come. It also means the opportunity to drive more green jobs into our economy has once more been lost. 

On off-grid homes, the Prime Minister failed to take the opportunity to unlock high returns on investment by enabling market mechanisms that replace oil heating with energy efficiency and low-carbon alternatives. Rather than reduce emissions and save householders money, many householders will remain locked in to higher cost, high-carbon, volatile markets. While the Prime Minister promised to increase the boiler upgrade scheme grants to £7,500, this primarily benefits the better off, who are able to fund the upfront costs associated with replacing their heating systems. A social tariff for energy would have been far more welcome, more effective and very much more efficient.

The Prime Minister went on to ditch so-called proposals that never existed to begin with. He mentioned taxes on eating meat—no such thing exists; new taxes on flying—I've seen no such proposals; compulsory car sharing if you drive to work—we've not seen those proposals; and a Government diktat to sort your rubbish into seven different bins. Well, given that England is so far behind Wales on recycling, you think they'd want to do something, and, of course, here in Wales we are very proud of the fact that we are currently third, soon to be second, in the world for our recycling. So, I think the Prime Minister has very seriously missed the opportunity once more to learn by our example.

In relation to flying, we know that 1 per cent of the global population are responsible for approximately 50 per cent of all aviation emissions, and I don’t believe a frequent flyer tax based on this 1 per cent would be either unfair or unpopular.

We’ve worked, as I've already said, Llywydd, with our local authorities and engaged our householders across Wales to achieve our record municipal recycling rates, and I'm proud of the vast majority of the Welsh public who have made recycling very much part of everyday life in Wales. Llywydd, you will know that we're very shortly to introduce regulations to extend that source-segregated recycling to workplaces across Wales also.

Turning to the challenge of taking our communities with us, the national survey conducted in 2022 in Wales found that 74 per cent of people in Wales are 'very' or 'fairly' concerned about climate change, while 93 per cent think that the general public have 'some' or 'a lot' of responsibility to tackle climate change. We must harness this appetite to act. We can tackle the climate and cost-of-living crises at the same time, but, to do so, we must encourage openness, dialogue, exploration and action. We know that where we have acted on climate change, we have seen wider societal benefits. We need to share these benefits and demonstrate that Government is working at pace to make green choices easier, more convenient and affordable, and prioritising support to where it is needed most, to ensure no-one is left behind, to ensure our children and grandchildren are not the ones making the 'sacrifices' the Prime Minister talked about. This is how we take our communities with us, not by arbitrarily ditching important targets.

I was asked in this Chamber last Wednesday how Wales's net-zero commitments will be impacted by the recent announcement from the UK Government. Our own analysis will be informed by that of the UK Government given it is their policies that have changed. Sadly, the Welsh Government was not engaged by the UK Government prior to the Prime Minister’s statement. I have written to the Secretary of State at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, reinforcing the need to work together, to ask for the assumptions and analysis underpinning the announcement and for a meeting as soon as possible. Llywydd, I will make a further statement when I have received and considered the UK Government data. Diolch.

Do you know what? It's not often I say this, but I would like to thank the Minister for this and for opening her statement by agreeing with some points made by the Prime Minister in his net-zero announcement of 20 September. You note that the Prime Minister said there must be an honest debate about how we secure the country's long-term interest. He also said we need a credible path to reach net zero by 2050 in a way that brings people with us, and who could disagree with that?

Now, the UK has had the fastest reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in the G7, down almost 50 per cent since 1990, whilst, in Europe, Germany and France have only managed 41 and 22 per cent. The UK has surpassed the targets most countries have set for 2030, such as Australia, Canada, Japan and the US. In fact, the UK has overdelivered, if that's a possibility, on all its previous targets to date, and our Prime Minister is committed to achieving the most ambitious target to reduce carbon emissions by 68 per cent by 2030, compared to 1990 levels, and 77 per cent by 2030. So, I do think you should join with me in expressing how proud we should all be that we are—and when I say 'we', collectively as the United Kingdom—the only major economy in the world to have such an ambitious target. Thanks to this progress already made, reaching the UK's 2030 and 2035 targets does not have to come at the expense of British citizens who are continuing to face a higher cost of living.

Now, the Prime Minister is ensuring that achieving net zero is not a punishment for the population. Will you do the same by scrapping your war on our drivers? You have advised that we need businesses confident in the direction of travel to deliver solutions that help those under financial pressure to go green, and that is exactly what our Prime Minister is doing. As of last week, up to 8,000 people, including current installers and those that are new to the industry, will be able to develop the skills and expert knowledge needed to retrofit homes and install insulation through a host of training providers thanks to the home decarbonisation skills training scheme. The energy security Secretary announced a £22 million increase in Government backing for renewables through the flagship Contracts for Difference scheme, taking the total budget to £227 million for the auction, which has resulted in successful projects in Wales. A grant worth up to £500 million, one of the largest Government support packages in history, is being made in a new Welsh electric arc furnace for greener steel production at Port Talbot, and a new multibillion pound electric car battery factory is to be built in the UK, one of the largest ever investments in the UK automotive sector. Here in Wales, we have massive UK Government investment in two amazing free ports that have energy, climate change and economic growth at their heart. So, the UK Government is enabling this green economic growth. Will you do the same by supporting our private landowners with the cost of renewable energy schemes? And, of course, we can’t forget that it was the Welsh Government—this Welsh Government—that stripped private hydro schemes of business rate relief.

There’s no escaping the fact that the Minister and, indeed, Welsh Government, are still a staunch advocate of the European Union. So, could you, Minister, clarify why there is now a problem with us aligning our policy on electric vehicles with Europe by delaying it by five years? At the end of the day, such a move will be of huge assistance to the Welsh Government, which has as yet not met five of its own nine targets to deliver electric vehicle charging infrastructure. Diolch yn fawr.

Well, where to start, Llywydd? You know, Janet, there was a time that I thought you were a conviction politician that believed in climate change, but what you’ve just spouted puts the lie to that. The UK is world class; it is absolutely world class. It is world class in overstating what it’s doing, and underdoing it. We had the fastest reduction because we started in the worst place. There’s a difference between fastest reduction and actual reduction. Read your Government’s Climate Change Committee report if you want to see what’s really happening. Read Chris Skidmore Conservative MP’s report. There are lots of Conservative voices who are pro climate change who railed against this last announcement. I honestly thought you’d be one of them; I’m very disappointed. There’s no point in countering what you said. It’s based in a fundamental misunderstanding of the economics of climate change. If you delay the introduction of something, you delay the investment, you lose the first-mover status, you lose upfront investment in climate change. And if you think investing in a single electric arc furnace in Port Talbot is the answer to that, there's no hope for you.

I’m very concerned about how this is going to have an impact not just on businesses, but on the most vulnerable people in our society, people who are least likely to be able to pay for all of these things, because, for as long as we remain as committed and as subject to these global markets of gas—we’ve seen in recent months how volatile those markets are—it is the poorest who will pay most. So, I’m really worried about that, and, Minister, I’m sure that you’ll agree about that.

We’ve got a situation here where the Prime Minister of the UK has decided—. We talk about people throwing caution to the wind; he’s thrown caution and reasonableness not into the wind, but into the fire, and I think that, as representatives of the people of Wales, it’s our duty to seek answers and clarity about how this profound shift—because it is a really profound and regressive shift—in UK policy is going to actually—[Interruption.] I don’t think that people will welcome it when their bills are high.

I was going to ask, Minister, how you think this is going to affect Wales’s journey to net zero. You’ve laid out quite a lot of that already in your statement. Could I ask what you think is going to be the most challenging aspect of this for the Welsh Government and what steps can be taken by the Welsh Government to try to mitigate the repercussions of that most challenging element?

And, again, I was going to ask you, in terms of engagement with the UK Government, if there had been any prior consultations or discussions between the two Governments before this fundamental shift in policy, and not just the shift in policy, but all of the accompanying narrative—you’ve already answered that in your statement as well—and whether any further avenues have been explored to protect Wales’s interests following Rishi Sunak’s decision over the past week. It is clear that this has come about because of perceived public opposition to green policies, but I think, more cynically, it was perceived perceptions in one particular by-election. Unfortunately, both of the major London parties had gone into some kind of race to the bottom. I'm worried about how that could result in either party that leads the next Westminster Government being weaker on climate policy. That would be disastrous for our planet. But, on a practical level, have there been any conversations that have taken place between the Welsh Government and any delegation representing what would be the next UK Government should Labour win that election, and can any clarity be given to us about whether that delegation would commit to keeping true to the policies that we need to actually be true to, for the sake of our climate and our environment? I do despair about how this is going to affect the poorest people in society.

Diolch, Delyth. Who would have thought that you and I would be on the side of Boris Johnson and George Osborne and Janet would be against them? In what world has that come to pass? But that is where we find ourselves, because it turns out that Janet just agrees with whoever the current Prime Minister is, regardless of their policies or their commitments. I really regret that that's what's happening on the Tory benches opposite us, because actually we did have a consensus in this Chamber on the need for climate change action, and it looks like that's unravelling, which is very unfortunate indeed.

It is absolutely imperative that we have certainty in the transition process for our businesses and for our investors. We will hold fast to ours. We need investment in the grid, which I really hope the Government is not going to water down—fortunately, it wasn't in this investment—and we need that investment to come fast, because we need—Janet even mentioned it herself—the free ports here in Wales to be able to take advantage of the opportunities in the Celtic sea. Unfortunately, Llywydd, we've already seen a watering down of the proposals for Celtic sea opportunities, so I really hope they can be accelerated again.

The one that really, really bothers me is the switch from gas heating. We will have to do some analysis of that, Delyth, but we really hope that we will be able to continue to invest in air-source heat pump manufacturers here in Wales, so that they will have an order book that means they can accelerate their investment, because without that, the price will not come down, as is the projected curve. You know how that works: you put the investment in upfront, the order books go up, the cost of each individual unit comes down, the cycle continues. You have the adoption of a new technology, and that technology becomes cheaper over time, as has happened with every other technology. What this does, in a frankly illiterate economic policy, is elongate the investment for that and therefore the probable curve. But I haven't done that analysis yet. We will hope that we can hold fast to ours.

We need to help society come to terms with changing. The aviation one is a classic example. If you do an analysis of the cost of travel by air and the cost of travel by rail, you can immediately see that we have a Government putting its subsidies into the wrong part of our transport network, because it's rich people who fly and it's poor people who use the train, by and large, and this is a Government that's for millionaires and not for the normal people. We will continue to do what we can. I will do a further analysis and bring it back, probably to the climate change committee, but, Llywydd, there'll be another statement here in the Senedd once we've done it. So, I hope we can hold fast, but there's no doubt at all that this is very disheartening.

Thank you, Minister, for your incisive deconstruction of Rishi Sunak's statement and the harm that he's going to do. Clearly, we have lost any claim, as the United Kingdom, to be a leader on the transition to a carbon-neutral future—totally depressing in the context of the UN conference that was taking place last week.

On a more local level, I have one piece of positive news. One of the petrol stations in my constituency, on the corner of Newport Road and Elm Street, is run by MFG, and they had already installed eight EV charging points, so I rang them up and they are reporting that they're not going to change their business plan in any way—that they are continuing, that they do not think that this is going to impact on their business plan, which is obviously really, really encouraging to hear. But not all businesses will be doing that. They're making a sensible transition, obviously, whilst keeping hold of their petrol station next door for the meantime. But clearly, the bigger decisions around the Celtic sea and other, much bigger ticket items are likely to be impacted.

Just looking more locally at the impact of the decision to delay the 2028 requirement for making all private rented properties energy performance certificate C, I just want to probe with you what impact, if any, the PM’s decision will have on Wales, given that we obviously have devolution of housing in Wales. For any of my constituents who are in private rented accommodation, any delay is further descending them into extreme poverty because of higher rents and colder homes that are much more difficult to heat. So, that's the one I want to focus on for now, which is something that I feel we ought to be able to do something about, in conjunction with private landlords.

Thank you very much, Jenny. There are a couple of things there. On the transition to electric vehicles, we very much hope that Welsh companies will hold to their investment plans. It does require two things. It requires the grid to be upgraded. It's great that, in Cardiff, you can do that, but there are many parts of Wales where that would not be possible because the distribution network simply isn't enough to power eight cars at the same time in some places. So, we have been continuing to have the conversations with both National Grid itself and with the UK Government about the upgrade necessary to be able to do that. There's also a collateral point, I suppose, that the grid is so bad at the moment that some of the energy that's being produced has to be switched off because it can't balance across the grid. If you directed some of that and put an incentive scheme in place to put electrolysers in, you'd be producing green hydrogen out of that energy, even before you've upgraded the grid. We've been pushing what are really pretty modest investment schemes that would transform the ability of people to green their fleets, for example, with the availability of hydrogen in small quantities all over Wales, which could happen very easily. So, there are some things that we're still progressing. I really hope the UK Government isn't going to row back on some of the commitments it's made there.

On the effect on the PRS, there are some things that we can do, but, of course, property law, in and of itself, is not devolved to Wales. The other issue is that we were hoping that to go alongside the EPC C requirement would come an investment strategy, because one of the other things we have to guard against is that people don't come out of the PRS altogether because they can't afford the upgrade. So, we're already doing things like our private rented sector leasing scheme. I'll just take the opportunity once more, Llywydd, to push it. I push it every time. If you're a private sector renting landlord, then if you come into our scheme, we will help you upgrade your house. You will get the standard local housing allowance rent all the way through with no voids, no exceptions, no difficulty and no hassle. And at the end you will get a better quality house. So, it's still worth it, even though the LHA hasn't been uplifted for quite some time. There are some things we can do, but we were relying on the UK Government's strategy to bring an investment programme with it, and we will have to look to see what we can do on top of that to do it here in Wales.

The other thing is, of course, that the private rented sector is subject to the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, so they have to make it fit for a human to live in, so that means they do have to have electrical certificates and all the rest of it, and we will be looking to see whether we can extend our Warm Homes programme to the PRS, because we're looking at doing whole streets and communities, and some of those will be PRS. So, I am hoping we'll be able to make some inroads, but it isn't the same as having a central Government investment scheme, clearly. We will look to see what we can do there. And, obviously, we've done things like we've changed our building regulations so that we have more energy efficiency, more thermal efficiency coming in, so we'll continue with those programmes.

In the end, what this has done is—. As I said, it has had a fairly marginal effect in and of itself, the announcement. What it's really done is put a massive pebble in the confidence pool for investors in the UK. That's the real damage the Prime Minister did last week, by actually taking away the interest of global climate change investors from the UK, because if they make u-turns at that speed without any prior consultation with anyone, they can do it again. That's the thinking. So, I'm afraid the sooner we have a Government that is committed to that kind of investment and can give certainty of investment structures, the better.

Minister, I also regret that we have to have this discussion today. I am saddened. You'll know from many discussions we've had that the region that I represent was devastated as a result of climate change and the climate emergency in 2020, and the risk that's still very real for many. I would like to dispute some of the things that have been said in terms of how the UK Prime Minister was thinking about poorer communities in this, because, actually, those who are suffering, as was rightly outlined by Delyth Jewell, are the very people who cannot afford to wait for us to take action. They can't afford to move from areas that are at risk of flooding; they can't afford insurance; their health is deteriorating because they live in damp homes, because they couldn't afford to fix them. So, how are we going to counter this extremely dangerous narrative? Because it's highly effective when you have a UK Prime Minister being broadcast into every home and able to say, 'This is going to save poor people money, isn't this wonderful?', when, actually, the cost of climate change is being felt day in, day out, not just in people's pockets, but with their lives. So, what is the Welsh Government going to be doing to counter this narrative and stay firm in our commitment to the climate and nature emergency, and not allow people to be gaslit by the UK Government?

Absolutely, Heledd; I couldn't agree more. As it happens, we were already embarking on a programme of what we call behaviour support across Wales, and that will be part of Wales Climate Week in this coming autumn now. We have Youth Climate Week as well coming on, and we have been deliberately reaching out to communities that didn't participate before to try and get them in; we've got ambassadors for many communities actually working hard in their own communities to try and engage people in that discussion.

There's no doubt at all that with the announcements made, what we've done there is let the rich people off the hook. They're the ones who cause the most climate difficulty, actually. They tend to have bigger vehicles, they take more flights, they have larger houses, et cetera, et cetera. The poorer you are, the less your carbon footprint, effectively, and that's one of the issues we need to address, isn't it? We need to get to a just transition, and we need to make sure that the investment is put in in order to do that.

So, we'll continue to push forward with our programmes and policies. As I said, the specific effect of what he said isn't that great; as you've correctly identified, it's the behavioural and signalling effect that's so—. I don't know what to call it. Depressing, I suppose, is what I want to say, really, because the message is that, somehow, the climate can be put off for our children and our grandchildren to deal with.

You've heard us say in this Chamber many times that we need to do twice as much in this decade as we did in the preceding 20 years. We have been quite fast in decarbonising from where we were, but that's because the UK was the dirty man of Europe not very long ago, and obviously it's easier to get from 'very bad' to 'not too bad' quite quickly. It's getting from 'not too bad' to actually world-leading in what we're doing that's the difficult bit, and that's the bit that they've just thrown away.

There's much to be disappointed about here when we've got a climate and nature emergency and a cost-of-living crisis. The Prime Minister's removal of home insulation targets and regulations is yet another climate crime, one that benefits fuel companies and unscrupulous landlords when it could really have helped people, especially with the cost-of-living crisis.

Another one I want to highlight is scrapping recycling. Like you said, the Welsh Government has invested millions over the years to become second best, hopefully, in the world, at recycling, and that material is extremely valuable as well, as a recyclate, and recycling has actually brought people along with it as well, and made them feel that they're doing their bit with the climate emergency, and wanting to volunteer regarding litter picking and other things as well, so it's really important. Minister, can I just ask you, though, with that, will it impact on any consequentials coming to Wales, and will it impact on what we're trying to do, which is really important? And the extended producer responsibility legislation, has that been scrapped now, on the back of this? Thank you.

Thank you, Carolyn. The recycling one is particularly depressing, isn't it? The Prime Minister said something about needing to have seven bins in your home in order to recycle. We know that that's not true if we live in Wales. Some people can have seven bins in their home, of course; actually, I happen to have seven bins in my home, but you can do our recycling schemes in Wales without doing that, and we've done very well right across the piece.

Our recycling journey is a really interesting one for the opposite benches, if any of them are interested, because, of course, we in Wales also had people kicking back against the loss of black bin bags and so on, but they very rapidly realised that if they recycle, not only do they lower the waste their household generates—and we've got loads of evidence to show that waste generated lowers considerably once you collect it in that segregated way, because people can actually see what they're wasting, particularly in food bin collections, for example—but we also know that that's made us a world leader in attracting reprocessing firms coming here to Wales, actively seeking out our recyclate and taking virgin materials out of the production chain. The Prime Minister has entirely forgotten that that's what recycling is about. This isn't about the inconvenience of a householder; this is about saving the planet's precious resources for our future generations and, actually, the green economy and the circular economy being the next industrial revolution. So, I couldn't agree more. Our councils right across Wales, and all of our people in Wales, have embraced that wholeheartedly. And it's just a real shame that the UK Prime Minister has decided to, well, once again, pull a cheap publicity stunt off the back of a piece of information that is at best, disingenuous, and at worst, deceptive.

Finally, Llyr Gruffydd.

Thank you, Dirprwy Lywydd. It's—I apologise—no coincidence; I couldn't remember the word. It's no coincidence that Rishi Sunak's approval ratings fell to their lowest levels ever very soon after he made this announcement on pausing climate change measures. We know that a failure to invest in these interventions that are required now will mean a higher cost when it comes time to do that in the future, and it will require more extreme action later on as the crisis intensifies. Now, what this also shows me is that there are still very significant weaknesses in the devolution settlement, that Wales's ambition on net zero can not only be held back, but indeed undermined to such an extent, and so easily, by the UK Government. Now, the First Minister is very keen to paint a picture that a Labour Government in Westminster would be some kind of nirvana, but, Minister, can you tell us what a Labour Government would do differently when it comes specifically to empowering this Senedd and empowering us with those additional powers that we need, not only to meet the climate challenge but to prevent the UK Government from undermining what we're trying to do?

Thank you, Llyr. So, I couldn't agree more. I mean, what we're talking about is a proper industrial strategy and a proper economic strategy that allows the kind of investment across the economy that we need in order to radically change our economy to a green circular economy. And we have had very good conversations with the Labour frontbench about Keir Starmer's very-often-quoted vision for a green energy superpower. You can't do that unless you have the upfront investment in the grid and the infrastructure, you have the investment in, for example, the Celtic sea—there are many opportunities around the UK coast—and if you don't harness the natural resources of an island nation such as ours in order to combat climate change, but also, frankly, in order to not be reliant on things like imported gas. One of the biggest problems we've had with our energy crisis is the cost of imported gas. The fact that we have an energy price tagged to the marginal cost of gas is frankly ludicrous, given the amount of renewables that we generate here. We have a grid incapable of taking the level of renewables we could be generating. The UK could be a net exporter of renewables very easily, if you had a Government with the foresight to invest.

So, I very much look forward to—and I agree with the First Minister—I very much look forward to a Government that actually acts in the interests of the UK overall and turns us into the green energy superpower we richly deserve to be. And, of course, for Wales, that will mean harnessing our tidal power. I know that you're very interested in that. We have done well in tidal power so far, but we could do a lot better with the right kind of investment.

I thank the Minister.

Item 4 this afternoon is a statement by the Minister for Health and Social Services: health and social care system resilience. I call on the Minister, Eluned Morgan.

Thank you very much, Dirprwy Lywydd, for the opportunity to update Members on the system during the winter months.

Dirprwy Lywydd, thanks for the opportunity to update Members on health and social care system resilience plans to cope with the pressures that we're expecting to face this winter.

Now, we've learnt the hard way that starting to plan for winter in September is simply too late. So, in Wales we've ensured that health boards build their winter plans into their annual plans, so that they can start to prepare from the beginning of the financial year in April. You'll all remember how challenging last winter was for the health and care service, and let me reassure you that this happened despite the fact that we had put significant plans in place. But a combination of COVID, a massive wave of flu at the same time as concerns around strep A, industrial action and cold weather meant the system was under extreme pressure. By starting early and working hand in glove with local authorities, we managed to deliver 670 community beds, which is not an insignificant additional number when you consider that there are around 9,000 beds across the whole of Wales. But anyone who works in the NHS today will tell you that things don't ease up anymore during the summer months. The pressure is relentless, and I heard this loudly and clearly in a conference I attended yesterday with leaders from our emergency departments.

But we all know that winter always brings significant additional pressure. This year, we will be facing that additional pressure at the time when the NHS in Wales and across the United Kingdom is under significant financial strain, and that's why we're gearing up already. We expect there to be a peak in COVID infections over the winter, which are likely to be driven by a number of variants. We hope the public will help us out with this. Today I have published a respiratory framework that outlines the public health context and our approach to responding to respiratory infections.

Infection prevention and control measures remain key to reducing transmission of respiratory infections in health and care settings, and the framework highlights priority areas of focus and key actions to help mitigate acute pressures in the system. We've already, for example, started on our COVID booster vaccination programme; we started this on 11 September and already 50 per cent of our elderly care home residents have received their COVID vaccination booster. We really need everyone eligible to come forward, and we're particularly keen for those people who work in health and care to take up the offer so that they can protect themselves and they can protect the people that they serve. Our flu programme will also offer protection to the most vulnerable. We need eligible people to come forward to give themselves the best chance of getting through the winter without suffering too much, which, in turn, will help us to protect the broader system.

We have a comprehensive programme to deliver a better performance in emergency departments. And, again, this year we've invested £25 million in the six goals programme, aspects of which are specifically designed to take pressure off the system through supporting people, particularly the elderly, so that they don't need to come into hospital in the first place, or supporting them to leave quicker if they are admitted. Keeping the system flow in our hospitals is one of the biggest challenges we face, and we have plans in place to improve the flow. Despite the financial challenges, we are holding on to some of the Further Faster ambitions, which means a deliberate shift of support from hospitals and secondary care to support people in their communities—hopefully again helping to avoid hospital admissions.

Health boards have been working with regional partnership boards to develop their own winter resilience plans. They're developing front-line services in the community that can respond to local sensitivities and respond to the needs of individuals, working often through the cluster planning groups. This will pleat in with the ambitions for the regional integration fund, which is a fund that is shared between health boards and local government, and also includes the third sector and aspects of the private sector.

I'm very pleased to see the health, social care and the third sector jointly planning, and this is happening regularly through regional partnership boards. Partners are now using the summer months to plan well ahead for the seasonal pressures that we know will inevitably arrive over the winter. On top of this, each health board has a joint ambulance improvement plan, and these were developed with the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust. Key actions in these plans will include: enhancement of services or pathways for respiratory and falls patients; clinical screening hubs to effectively clinically screen and signpost patients to the appropriate care, whilst reducing the number of people being conveyed to emergency departments. There will also be a specific and enhanced focus this winter on supporting care home residents to stay well, and where urgent care is needed, to access this in the care home; when appropriate, avoiding ambulance transport and admission to hospital; improving triage and assessment times in emergency departments; and safely reducing admissions through same-day emergency care services. 

Now, £3 million has been allocated to health boards through our six goals programme, and we expect them to use this funding to enable these actions. But I am keen to ensure that people are aware of how challenging this winter is likely to be. We are anticipating an even more difficult winter this year than last year. To this end, I am appealing to the public to ‘help us to help you’ and to always consider an alternative.

Two years ago we didn’t have any urgent primary care centres, nor did we have same-day emergency care centres. We were making very little use of pharmacies in the community, and we didn’t have the 111 service online and by phone for support for physical health, nor the '111 press 2' service for mental health support. Today we know that hundreds of thousands of people in Wales are taking advantage of these new methods of interacting with the NHS in Wales. For example, there have been 399,000 hits on the 111 website, and 71,000 calls to the 111 phone line in August alone. This is taking pressure off the ambulance service and emergency departments, but there are still some people who need help to navigate these new systems. That is why we will be switching back on our 'Help us help you' campaign again this winter.

We also expect health boards to deliver a major focus on planning patient discharge from the point of admission to hospital and on reducing pathway of care delays. This will ensure that patients and service users are receiving the right care and support in the right place. We know that prolonged periods in bed decondition older frail people, and reduce muscle mass, creating a need for more comprehensive social care packages. Long hospital stays also increase the risk of catching viruses. So, I am appealing to families to support their loved ones and relations by getting them out of hospital as soon as possible when they are clinically ready. This will help improve their experiences and clinical outcomes.

Each health board, therefore, has an action plan focused on reducing the proportion of hospital beds used by long-stay patients, i.e. those spending longer than three weeks in a hospital bed. We now have an all-Wales view and database of the reason for every delayed discharge. We can therefore hold those organisations to account. It may be that the patient is waiting for medicines, or waiting for a care home placement, or transport. But one of the biggest challenges we are facing at the moment is waiting for patients needs to be assessed.

I expect these plans, along with our trusted assessor model, to make a tangible difference this autumn and winter. A significant portion of the £145 million regional integration fund is being used to play a key role in supporting and increasing community capacity and enabling good system flow this winter. This winter, for example, we'll be investing £36.1 million in preventative community co-ordination; £24.3 million in providing complex care closer to home; and £29.6 million on home-from-hospital pathways and models of care.

I know that this winter will be another challenging one. However, I have been clear about my expectations, and we have a range of actions in place across health and social care to make sure the impacts can be mitigated this winter.

Can I thank the Minister for her very detailed statement today? I don't think it's possible to have too many statements when it comes to dealing with winter preparedness. Of course, I agree with the Minister; it's very important to start planning very early in the cycle. Now, we know it's going to be a tough winter, and I put on my record my own thanks to the great work of our NHS staff. But we are currently seeing some very significant long waiting lists. We're aware, of course, of those missed treatment target times, and we've all seen, of course, the chronic shortages of hospital beds and the limited critical care capacity. So, we know that this is all going to be a very difficult position for the Welsh NHS this winter. 

Now, Minister, you say in your statement that you expect there to be a peak in COVID infections over the winter, which is likely to be driven by a number of variants. So, perhaps you can give us a bit more information about any projections in terms of COVID infections and any particular peaks that you might expect. I know, during the course of the pandemic, much of those projections were available as well. But, in terms of the number of variants, perhaps you can give a bit of detail about those and are there any particular variants of concern that you think need to be addressed, or to be made aware of. Now, we do know, of course, sadly, during the course of the pandemic, that 25 per cent of those that sadly passed away from COVID caught COVID in a hospital setting in Wales, which was considerably higher in comparison to other parts of the UK. So, perhaps you could tell us, Minister, a little bit more about the measures that you've got in terms of preventing people catching COVID-19, and, equally, other respiratory viruses as well, in a hospital setting.

Of course, I'm concerned about workforce challenges in healthcare, so it would be helpful to know about what plans are in place to address potential greater workforce shortages in the healthcare sector in the event of sustained pressures over the winter. 

Now, collaboration across the UK on key data and best practice sharing, I think, will be pretty crucial in the event of extreme pressures, so I wonder if you could tell the Chamber this afternoon, Minister, how you are collaborating with neighbouring regions and the UK Government to co-ordinate responses to potential spikes in COVID-19 cases that may occur, of course, over the border, and other implications. 

Minister, you rightly talk about the need for healthcare staff to take up vaccination, and I wonder if you could tell us if you have any concern about the level of uptake amongst healthcare staff, obviously for their protection, but also the protection of those they serve—are there any particular concerns in that regard—and then, perhaps also, Minister, how you're addressing potential challenges relating to vaccine hesitancy or misinformation. We're aware of this, so that might be helpful as well, perhaps in terms of detailing what take-up is like compared to previous years, and any other information that there is in regards to hesitancy among those vulnerable groups in taking up the vaccination. And in the event of a surge in COVID-19 cases, I wonder what communication strategies you have in place to keep the public informed about the situation. 

We will have, of course, seen chronic shortages of hospital beds and limited critical care capacity, and this is of course going to put a strain on our healthcare system during emergencies, making it really challenging to accommodate a sudden influx of patients, as seen during the COVID-19 pandemic. So, we have seen cases rising. I wonder what is being done in terms of increasing hospital bed capacity. I know that you did say in your statement today that you've managed to deliver 670 community beds. I wasn't quite clear on that. Is that an additional 670 beds for winter pressures that will be stepped down after the winter? And in terms of the total capacity of bed capacity across Wales this winter, how does that compare to other years, comparing it with the pandemic, and pre pandemic as well?

And finally, Minister, perhaps you could tell us a little bit more about the current state of the roll-out of the booster jab and flu vaccination. Is take-up as expected in those vulnerable groups? And do you have particular targets in terms of take-up? And finally, I think the one issue—

You've said 'finally' once before, and you're well past your time, Russell.

Okay. I promise this will be the final question, but it will be a very long question—no, Presiding Officer, it will be a very quick question. Flu—one issue that there is, Minister, is that people will go for their flu vaccination on one date to one location, and then their COVID vaccination on an other date at another location. So, of course it's much better for the public to have both at the same time. Now, I know there are real complexities around that, in terms of the supply of those vaccinations, but there was some earlier discussion around there being one vaccination. Now that, of course, would really help in terms of ensuring that people got their vaccination, take-up was improved, and it would certainly help the workforce in rolling out those vaccinations as well. So, perhaps you could tell us, if that is not ready for this year, if you're aware of any discussion of that being available in future years.

Diolch yn fawr, Russell. Yes, we are expecting there to be significant winter pressures. We are expecting there to be another COVID peak during the winter. We are monitoring the particular variant BA.2.86 at the moment—you might have heard quite a lot about this. We haven't still found any cases in Wales as yet, but we're very much hoping to keep an eye on that. Our scientists are well informed as to how that is progressing—a lot of testing being done elsewhere in the United Kingdom. I think that there's a bit more confidence that it's perhaps not the variant that we feared that it might be, but it's still being monitored and still being developed. But who knows what other variants could come through during the winter. But we are expecting an uptick and a peak at some point during the winter.

You're quite right—infection control is absolutely critical in hospitals, not just for COVID but also for flu and other respiratory viruses. That's why there's very clear guidance on respiratory control within hospitals, and hospitals have been reminded of that very recently.

You talked about the workforce challenges. You're quite right—there are workforce challenges. It'll be perhaps more challenging this year because we are in a very different situation financially, so our ability to recruit will be more limited than perhaps it has been in the past. I've got a meeting coming up with the Scottish and English health Ministers very shortly, and I'm sure some of these things will be touched upon then.

Just in relation to the vaccination, health and care staff—I'm always a little bit disappointed, if I'm honest, in the uptake among people who are eligible for this vaccination, so we're trying to make sure that health boards can make it as easy as possible for their staff to take the opportunity, to increase the percentage of people who take up that opportunity. Just in terms of vaccine hesitancy, we do see that, every time we're offering a booster, it goes down slightly, but it's still not at a bad level, so I think we're reasonably pleased. But, obviously, one of the things we learnt during the height of the pandemic was how to chase down those hard-to-reach people, so we've now got quite a lot of experience in terms of how we get to those hard-to-reach people, and to get through to those people who perhaps were a little bit vaccine hesitant in the beginning.

Just in relation to bed capacity—. So, we switched on around 670 community beds last year. Some of those are still in the system. I think around 450 or so are still in the system. The number of beds we have at the moment is around 9,000. That's around 309 per 100,000. If you think about the Nuffield study that was done about 2019, they suggested that we were on 207 per 100,000 and England was on 170 per 100,000. So, we're still significantly above where England is at the moment. Listen, I think there's going to be a lot of pressure on the services. The financial situation is going to be very challenging. I just think we've got to bear in mind that that is going to increase the pressure in terms of our ability to make sure that we can keep the service where it is at the moment.

So, the take-up in terms of vaccinations so far, since 11 September, I think, is quite heartening. So, 50 per cent of all care home residents have already had their vaccination. So, I think that's exactly where we expected it to be, and, just in terms of co-vaccination—flu and COVID—there was a hope that that would be developed in time; it hasn't been developed in time. We keep in close contact with the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, and there was very clear guidance from the JCVI that, actually, we should switch the order in which we vaccinated people, because we were a little bit concerned about this new variant. So, we've started with care home residents, which are our most vulnerable cohort, and then we'll be moving on to other cohorts after that. Whereas, before, we were going to vaccinate them in the run-up to the heat and the peak of winter, but we weren't sure what was going to happen in relation to the new variant. So, JCVI, we generally follow their advice in terms of when things are available. We were hoping to have a more up-to-date vaccine by now; it hasn't materialised. So, we just thought, 'Listen, we need to give the protection as soon as we can; that's more important.'  

I thank the Minister for the statement and thank you for the opportunity to see it beforehand. We, in Plaid Cymru, of course, welcome this announcement. We led a debate, back in May, on lung health and pulmonary health, and we welcome this statement as a response to parts of that debate. And of course, as a grey rhino event, we see what's coming towards us. Like a grey rhino, it's huge, it's running quickly, it creates huge damage and, most importantly, it's entirely predictable. So, we must make preparations for what is anticipated, and hearing this announcement and hearing that you have been preparing since April is to be welcomed. 

As the Minister said, last winter was particularly hard for our health services for all sorts of reasons and forecasts suggest that this winter will be even more difficult. But, during January of this year, for example, we saw a number of examples where elderly and vulnerable people were being sent home from hospital without the fundamental care provided so that they could live their daily lives. This, in turn, led to people returning to hospital. So, whilst the Minister's statement today mentions social care and the need to provide packages of social care, it's very concerning that there is no talk here about prioritising and preparing the workforce in the social sector for the hard winter that we're facing. So, I'm eager to hear about the Minister's plans for the social care workforce, if there is such a plan in place. Does the Minister believe that the workforce is in a position to respond to the demand? 

As I mentioned last week, we are far too reliant on an army of volunteers when it comes to social care—people who don't have the training but have to undertake these very difficult duties of looking after their loved ones or neighbours, and they do so without remuneration. Today, we heard the Minister appealing to families to do more. Does the Minister feel that it's fair to expect people who don't have the expertise or the ability very often to do more—people who are, very often, old and vulnerable themselves, having to undertake those caring responsibilities without financial assistance? By failing to invest properly in the pay and conditions of carers, we have seen more people leaving the sector, placing more stress on unpaid carers. Does the Minister believe that our carers are paid sufficiently? If not, what plans does the Minister have to change that?

When it comes to respiratory problems, very often it's an issue that impacts women more than men. More women suffer from asthma, for example, than is the case with men, and have more asthma attacks than men. They are more likely to have to go to hospital, and almost twice as likely to die as a result of asthma than men. Indeed, as we heard in that debate back in May, one in five people in Wales live with a respiratory condition and more people die as a result of respiratory conditions in Wales than in any other nation in western Europe.

So, while the Government has introduced a quality statement on lung health, there is no implementation plan. So, when will the Minister publish an implementation plan? Will the Minister develop an improvement plan for respiratory disease to transform and improve the lives of people living with lung conditions?

Russell George mentioned vaccinations, so I won't repeat those issues, but the Minister referred to reducing the transmission of respiratory infections in health and care settings and the need for preventative measures. The Minister will undoubtedly remember the campaign by Nefyn GP, Dr Eilir Hughes, to ensure fresh air in all closed spaces. With an increasing number of COVID variants and cold and flu, we need to ensure that this message isn't forgotten. The Minister said that she will provide clear guidance. Will this guidance be shared to other public places as well, not only hospitals but schools and elsewhere, and will it also emphasise the need to ventilate buildings properly in order to help dilute, for want of a better word, the infectious aerosols? And will there be guidance on face masks and other preventative measures for places like care homes or places with particularly vulnerable individuals? 

The Minister mentioned the need for beds, or the fact that here in Wales we have some more beds than other UK countries, but Wales is still way below other European averages. We are already at capacity in many of our community hospitals and, in those places, we are seeing an increased level of hospital-acquired infections, and COVID and flu are two of those hospital-acquired infections. So, what plans does the Minister have to open more community beds?

Finally, we can't keep looking at the short term, we need a long-term approach. We know that respiratory illnesses are linked to poor housing, with increased reporting of mould and damp, for instance. The climate change Minister mentioned this earlier in her statement. So, what discussions has the Minister had with the Minister for Climate Change on tackling this and ensuring that each house is insulated properly and is in a liveable condition, so that we get to the root cause of many of these problems? Diolch.

Well, thank you very much, and you are entirely right that it is important that we focus particularly on those people who suffer with respiratory conditions. So, that's what we're concerned about, particularly in winter.

Just to be clear, we didn't send people from hospitals when they weren't ready in terms of clinical care last year, but it is important—and I hope this is something I made clear in my opening statement—and we do need to recognise that, if you remain in hospital for a long time, you are more likely to be exposed to COVID and flu, and you are also more likely to see a decline in terms of muscle use. So, it is beneficial to the patient to be discharged as soon as they are ready to be discharged. And I think it is important that families hear that message too. So, it is very difficult, and I understand that that means pressures on carers. And we understand that, in terms of care, even though we have increased how much we pay people for the care that they provide, there are still problems in attracting people to work in that field of endeavour. So, I do think that there is already an army working without remuneration to care for their loved ones, and it's important that we support them, and I know that Julie Morgan does that. 

I was trying to work out what 'y fogfa' is.

Asthma.

Asthma. That's it. And, yes, you are entirely right.

It is important to recognise that, actually, it is one of those things—. I have made it clear, in terms of the women's health plan, that, actually, there are a whole load of conditions where women respond differently or they are more affected by them, and asthma was one of those. So, you are quite right, and I hope that that is something that health boards will take into account when they are developing their response to the quality statement on women.

Just in terms of ventilation, I think that hospitals will be aware of this, but you are quite right, that it may be something that we need to think about cross-government a bit more in terms of giving that guidance. It's very difficult, isn't it, when you are going into winter and you have energy bills, and what you are saying is, 'Open your windows.' It's a really difficult message, I think. So, this is something that we will have to discuss, perhaps cross-government, in terms of how you land that kind of complicated message.

It may be that there will be times during winter when we see a significant increase in terms of the virus of COVID, and then we will have to take further measures, and we will have to consider things like whether you have to introduce face masks, and whether you step in, in a much more intentional way. We have already, for example, increased the number of PPE gloves just to make sure that we have got the stockpile exactly where we need it to be, for example. We may expand the community sentinel surveillance survey just to make sure that we know what's going on where.

We will, of course, take advice from the JCVI in terms of revaccination if we were to see that things were to increase beyond what we are expecting. So, there are lots of things that we can step up even further if it came to a point where we were to see the kind of increases that we have seen in the past. With testing, for example, we could reintroduce testing pre-admission to hospitals and care homes. We are not suggesting that we do that now, but we have got lots of things in our back pocket ready to go if that were the case.

You are quite right in terms of cross-government activity. Lots of the things in relation to health, if you are going to fix them, you have got to fix them early on. It's about prevention. It's about cross-government working. And you will see through the introduction of the clean air Act, for example, that that's exactly one of the measures that is being put in place to make sure that there's a response to making sure that we can get into that prevention space. Health results are not just going to come from the health service.

The WLGA statement last week said that overspending on social services in the last year alone was estimated to be about £93 million, with local authorities drawing approximately £193 million from their diminishing reserves. Furthermore, there is a severe recruitment and retention crisis. They also emphasised the need for investment in home and community support, which I hear today is the Welsh Government way, which is really pleasing to hear in your statement.

But, Minister, would you join with me and the WLGA in saying that public services as a whole need to be properly funded by the UK Government Treasury, and that it's not just about funding the NHS; it's about funding social healthcare and all of those public services, regarding preventative services, and that, working cross-government, we need to get that point across to them? Thank you.

Thanks very much. You're quite right: local government is under significant pressure. Everybody is feeling the effects of inflation. So, the effects on the health service—. You think about a £10 billion budget, and you think about inflation rates of about 10 per cent. That's a big number. That's a really, really big number. Local government is really up against it as well. So, we are all struggling with the impact of inflation, and that explains a little bit of why there is such a significant overspend.

That is why, actually, us working together with local government is absolutely crucial, and making sure that we link up as far as possible. I'm absolutely clear that we have to start shifting resources from secondary care, from hospitals, into our community. If people are ill, they would rather be ill at home than in hospital. What we have to do is make sure that we can wrap the care around them in the community. So, that's what our Further Faster programme is meant to do, to really make sure that we have that community support in place. So, it's expanding the number of community nurses, for example, and expanding the number of hours that they cover, so that they're working weekends and they're working late at night—all of those things—because people aren't just ill from Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. If they're not there, if the cover's not there, they're straight to A&E and then the whole system gets much more difficult to cope with.

So, you're absolutely right: public services need to be properly funded. We know that, under the last Labour Government, we saw a massive increase in public service spending and what we've seen under the Conservative Government is a huge reduction, relative to what they're spending on the continent. And there's a reason why our public services are in the state that they're in today; it's because they have been starved of public money to the extent that, actually, we are now up against it. Ten years of austerity, we're paying the price for that; we're paying the price for COVID and now we're paying the price for inflation. All of those things have a huge impact and I'm afraid, as a result of that, the public are likely to have to pay a price as well.

Thank you for your statement, Minister. I think it's fair to say that our health and social care system lacks resilience. Every year, we have a statement talking about winter pressures and urging people to stay away from hospitals. The messaging changes, but the problem remains the same. Minister, what discussions have you had with health boards about accelerating the creation of diagnostic and surgical hubs? What discussions have you had with local authority housing associations regarding the expansion of extra-care housing to relieve the pressure on social care? And finally, Minister, this lunch time, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society were telling Members about the role that pharmacists can play in relieving the pressure on primary and secondary care. Minister, what discussions have you had with the sector on accelerating both e-prescribing and pharmacist prescribing? Diolch yn fawr.

Thanks very much. Well, you're quite right, we prepare for winter pressures, and you worked in the health service for a long, long time and you prepared for winter pressures—everybody gears up for winter pressures in the NHS. So, you're quite right, we are developing diagnostic and surgical hubs; one, I was very pleased to go and open in Neath during the spring-summer and it's good to see that that's up and running now, and you'll be pleased to hear that it's an orthopaedic hub, so that's exactly, I know, what you've been calling for. We are also, of course, ploughing on with developing the diagnostic hub in Cwm Taf Morgannwg, so all of that is moving ahead and I'm pleased to see that happening as well.

We have constant conversations with local government. In fact, we had a meeting with them yesterday, preparing for winter, making sure that everybody's lined up and making sure that, for example, the trusted assessor system is something that is respected on all sides. But the responsibility for a care-home assessment, for example, is with local government. If they don't do it, the people stay in hospital, so we have to work together to make sure that we unblock that particular blockage. So, those are the kinds of discussions that we have in those particular meetings.

On the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, you're quite right, I think we make significant use of community pharmacies in Wales. We were way ahead of the rest of the United Kingdom when it came to pharmacy use. Ninety-nine per cent of our pharmacies now offer the common ailments system; one in six of them are offering a prescribing service and 47,000 people took advantage of that offer, and 26,000 people had their throats tested in community pharmacy last year. So, people are starting to hear about this, and part of what we need to do this winter is to make sure that people know that those alternatives that mean that you don't go to the GP are available. So, community pharmacy, for me, is absolutely fundamental to the way that we address this coming winter.

I too spoke to a couple of community pharmacists who are doing excellent work, working in GP practices, but also going into people's homes to ensure that polypharmacy wasn't resulting from the stock of old medicines in the larder that then get mixed up with the new medicines. That's one of the reasons why people go into hospital, unfortunately, if you're elderly.

I just want to pay tribute to the pink army of social care workers who work alongside clinicians in the emergency department in the Heath to identify people, particularly elderly, as you said in your statement, who don't need to come into hospital by providing additional support at home. It's fantastic to hear that people can be invited to turn around, knowing that they're going to get the support for their loved one or for the individual at home, because they do need additional support, but they don't need to come into hospital. Also, the pink army is doing fantastic work going on the medical ward rounds at the Heath to ensure that all the right questions are being asked to plan the individual's discharge as soon as they're medically fit, not just benefiting the individuals, but also making beds more available more quickly for those who need hospital operations.

My question to you is around how these winter resilience plans in the community and the cluster planning groups are ensuring that vulnerable individuals are getting one hot meal that is freshly prepared a day. Because I had a really heartbreaking conversation with somebody at the Maelfa gardening club around somebody with Alzheimer's who was waxing lyrical about the joys of having mashed potato, but she'd had her gas cooker disconnected for her own safety, and there didn't seem to be anybody available locally to do such a simple task as just give her the odd bit of mashed potato and other hot things to go with it. It's those sorts of people who can end up in hospital because they're not eating properly.

Thanks very much. You're quite right, and I think drawing attention to the issue in relation to medicines is really important. We know there are significant financial pressures. We spend about 10 per cent of our budget on medicines, so we need to make sure that people are using the medicines they need, but, actually, they need to stop using the medicines and tell us that they've stopped using medicines that they don't need. All of that is quite complex, and they're difficult conversations to have, but I think there are opportunities for us to make sure that we do a lot more in the medicines space. There's a huge amount of work being done, not just in our community pharmacies, but a huge amount of work being done in our pharmacies in hospitals—a significant amount of work being done there.

You're quite right to pay tribute to the pink army, and it's great to hear that. I am particularly concerned with the elderly coming into hospital. It just breaks my heart to think of some of them, particularly those with dementia who get confused, so it was really interesting to have a conversation yesterday with people from emergency departments who came together to try and start talking about a quality statement for emergency departments—what does that look like, what does 'good' look like. I'm hoping that frailty will be something that they consider in the context of emergency departments.

What we do know is, for example, with ambulances now, with about 15 per cent of the people that they go to pick up, they listen and they treat them on the spot. Trying to avoid hospital admissions for our frail is actually ideal, and if we have to bring the hospital out to them, that's what we should be doing. So, I'm very keen on that. There are lots of plans in place to do far more of that.

You're quite right; what most health boards are doing now is planning the discharge from the moment they arrive, and that is crucial to keep the flow going. There's a lot of work that community groups can do. We do have the RIF funding, which is the regional partnership boards co-working with health boards and local authorities. But 15 per cent of that money goes to the third sector. So, I think there's an opportunity there to talk about some of the things that you're concerned with in terms of making sure people get fed.

And finally, Gareth Davies.

Diolch yn fawr iawn, Deputy Llywydd. Thank you very much for your statement this afternoon, Minister. Winter is upon us, so I'm pleased this statement has been made in good time and in anticipation of dealing with our winter pressures, or at least attempting to. I'd like to ask what local factors the Minister is taking into consideration in regard to winter preparation. I ask this as I have Glan Clwyd Hospital in my constituency, with acute pressures in A&E and other departments with staff facing burnout and patients struggling to be seen in time by medical professionals. What assurances can the Minister make to my constituents in Denbighshire that local health services are resilient enough across Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board to deal with increased winter pressures and that it doesn't compound existing issues that are with us all year round?

Thanks very much. I hope winter's not upon us yet. I'm not putting my heating on for several more weeks, I can assure you. I'm sure lots of people in the country feel the same. But just in terms of local factors, you're quite right; I'm particularly concerned about Glan Clwyd, so I'm putting a lot of attention on that. I was pleased to go and visit the emergency department over the summer. The sense I got was that the atmosphere is changing there and that they're in a different place. They seemed far more buoyant than they had been in the past. That, for me, was the beginning of something far more positive. One of the things I'm concerned about is that actually there's not enough of an alternative to the emergency department in that area, so that is something I've asked the chair of the health board specifically to pick up on. We've got a new chief operating officer in Betsi now, and she's an expert in this area, so I know that she's on it. I'll be having a meeting, I think tomorrow, with the chair of Betsi, and this is one of the subjects I'll pick up on.

Thank you, Minister. 

Item 5 is a statement by the Minister for Education and the Welsh Language on the Welsh language charter national framework. I call on the Minister, Jeremy Miles.

Thank you, Dirprwy Lywydd. Before formally starting my statement, may I wish everyone a happy European Day of Languages?

The linguistic diversity of the world is something to be proud of. Here in Wales, the siarter iaith, the Welsh language charter, is a programme that empowers children and young people to be proud of the Welsh language and encourages its use. With the siarter now in use within hundreds of schools and by thousands of pupils, I am proud to announce a new chapter in the history of the siarter iaith.

Recently, as part of the siarter’s work, I was delighted to support a project celebrating the linguistic diversity and minority languages of Europe. As a result of the ECCA—European Charter Classroom Activities—competition, learners from Ysgol Garth Olwg had the opportunity to represent Wales at a minority languages campus for young people in Mallorca in May. The small group won a competition to attend the campus, and they have just returned from Brussels as well, where they presented their project and findings to the European Commission and the Council of Europe in collaboration with young minority language speakers across Europe—from Catalunya, northern Italy and Hungarian speaking regions. Unfortunately, the United Kingdom has left the European Union, but Wales hasn't turned its back on Europe, nor the rest of the world. Here we are, firmly part of a vibrant, diverse community of languages, ready to collaborate, willing to learn and work together, and there is no better example of this than the siarter iaith and the opportunities the siarter offers to celebrate our language by working together and learning from each other.

I'm ready to learn with and from our stakeholders, experts and learners here in Wales. In a world that is constantly changing, where technological and social developments are shaping the linguistic practices of our children and young people, the siarter iaith has never been as appropriate and important as it is today. This is the first therefore in a series of statements I will be making on the theme of increasing children and young people's use of the Welsh language.

The siarter iaith is an important tool for increasing the use of our language among our children and young people. I thank Cyngor Gwynedd for setting up the programme in the first place, and then allowing us to work with partners across the country to spread the siarter across Wales from 2016 onwards. Since this time, schools, learners and their communities have embraced the siarter and its principles, with schools of all categories and linguistic mediums getting involved and encouraging their learners to use and be proud of their Cymraeg wherever they are on their language journey.

Deputy Llywydd, this Government is fully committed to the future of our language. In 'Cymraeg 2050', we set out our ambition for our language and we have major plans to put the ambition into action. I'm ready to introduce changes to the way we think about Welsh and the role of education within that. In March, I published a consultation on a White Paper for a Welsh language education Bill, through the co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru. The Bill will take steps to enable all pupils in Wales to become confident Welsh speakers through the statutory education system. Social justice is at the heart of my vision for Welsh within the education system. I want future generations to have the same opportunities that I have had—culturally or economically. The Bill, if implemented, will lay the foundations for the realisation of an ambitious change programme, and the siarter iaith has a key role in supporting this.

The Bill is but one part of the puzzle of reaching 'Cymraeg 2050' objectives. Creating new speakers is vital, clearly, and using our language and ensuring that we purposefully plan for encouraging that is also critical. I often say that the Welsh language belongs to us all, regardless of our language ability. I've also said that the Welsh language is more than just something I speak. It's something I feel, and I want more of us to experience that feeling, in future generations, or our current young people, from whatever linguistic background. This is why I am publishing the new framework for the siarter iaith today.

We've worked closely with partners to design and create the new national framework. Although I'm publishing the framework today, we are still eager to hear from more people, and hear more of our children's and young people's voices. Involving young people in our language planning is vital. Therefore, my officers will be organising a series of youth engagement sessions very soon.

I am confident that this framework provides a strong basis for evolving the siarter iaith to meet the challenges and opportunities that we face. During the year, we will continue to work closely with partners, to consult with children and young people, and to create a new communication campaign to raise the profile of the siarter. All of this will ensure that the siarter reaches its full potential.

My vision is clear, Deputy Llywydd. I want our pupils to become Welsh-speaking citizens. I want them to become independent Welsh speakers; I want them to use Welsh of their own volition and to enjoy doing so; I want them to choose to speak Welsh to each other, whether they come from Welsh-speaking homes or not; and I want them to develop a positive attitude towards the Welsh language, and to be confident in its use.

The publication of the framework is a step towards achieving this. I am confident that, by working together, this new framework will empower school leaders and staff to put in place clear plans to increase the use of the Welsh language amongst children and young people and to encourage them to be proud of their language and culture.

The siarter will continue to change and evolve, but the principles will remain the same. I therefore look forward to continuing to work with children and young people, stakeholders and schools, to shape and implement the siarter iaith, to ensure it remains an appropriate and powerful tool in the future.

Thank you very much, Minister, for today's statement, and a very happy European Day of Languages to you too. On my party's behalf, I wish to make it clear once again that we support 'Cymraeg 2050' and we are committed to helping to achieve its aims.

The language charter framework, introduced earlier this year and now rolled out in every school across Wales, has an important role to play in terms of achieving the Government's objectives. The Minister is entirely right when he says that this framework isn't solely related to the teaching of Welsh; it is, rather, also related to engendering confidence in the use of the language, and fostering positive attitudes towards it.

One of the challenges connected to reaching the 2050 target is ensuring that pupils enjoy using Welsh, but that there is also an environment outside the classroom that encourages and supports the language's use. And I'm eager to understand the measures in place to encourage parents who don't speak Welsh to learn the language. Furthermore, is there a role for charities and other organisations to develop language skills outwith the classroom, and how are Wales's geography and dialects being taken into account?

Bearing in mind the financial pressures on school budgets and the fact that schools are responsible for the success of this framework, I wish to ask the following questions: have surveys been undertaken to discover what percentage of classroom staff have sufficient Welsh language skills for use in the classroom; in cases where skills gaps are identified, what support is available to assist schools to tackle these gaps; and how do we ensure that teaching jobs in Wales appeal to applicants outwith Wales who don't currently have language skills, perhaps, but who have valuable experience to offer?

And in terms of the recently introduced framework, have any initial issues or challenges arisen, and what steps have been taken to address them? Furthermore, what support is available to schools that have experienced difficulties in implementing the framework, and how will its success be ensured over time?

Minister, it appears that the language charter is primarily targeting primary schools, and that more informal methods are being applied in secondary schools. This echoes concerns expressed by groups, such as the Wish I Spoke Welsh, which has noted an 11 per cent decrease in the number of students who maintain their language skills when they transition from primary to secondary education. So, what steps are the Welsh Government taking to tackle this decline during the transition phase?

To conclude, I'd like to reiterate our support for this initiative. Our commitment is inspired by a desire to see positive transformation in the use of our language for future generations, so that we see the Welsh language flourishing in all aspects of our society. And the questions I've asked reflect our clear determination to ensure that the recent decline in the use of the language identified in the last census is but a temporary blip, and that Cymraeg 2050 continues to be deliverable. Thank you.

I thank Sam Kurtz for those supportive remarks and the constructive questions that he's asked today. He's right to say that we need to provide opportunities outside the classroom to encourage people to continue to use the Welsh language outside the school walls. And I know that criwiau Cymraeg are doing excellent work in schools across Wales, and in his constituency too, I'm sure, to ensure that their fellow pupils use the Welsh language outside the classroom, and I want to thank them for their work in doing that.

The Member asked some questions on what we've learned from the framework, and what we took into account in terms of feedback on the successes and the areas that require more work. Now, an evaluation has taken place of the siarter iaith to assess how the siarter iaith has been working, along with other programmes related to it. And stakeholders and partners across the education system have been working on that, including ensuring that the learner voice is an important part of this. There have been focus groups held with learners in five schools, I believe, to hear from them what they felt was successful and where further work was needed. And in addition to that, the siarter iaith surveys have been used since 2021 to hear directly from learners what their views are. Those are available on Hwb and to schools more generally, so that we can keep that evolution of the siarter going and ensure that it's a creative process.

The Member asked important questions on teacher skills and classroom assistant skills. Now, the work of assessing skills has been going on for some time now, and the picture is emerging over time. As he will know, we've invested very significantly as part of the co-operation agreement and more broadly than that in providing Welsh lessons. Those lessons are available for a 12-month course for £90, but most people get a very substantial discount on that, and if you buy at this time of the year, you can get a discount of around 50 per cent. So, that's significantly less expensive than it has been in the past, so that's encouraging. But also there are free lessons for the education workforce more generally. So, if there's anyone who works in a school and would like to have that opportunity in their own time to develop their skills and enhance their skills, then there's an opportunity for them to do that free of charge. And in addition to that, there's the sabbatical programme and other programmes that are purpose-built to provide intensive support to teachers. These are all now available on a website launched by the National Centre for Learning Welsh, so you can understand exactly what is available.

The Member made an important point: the emphasis of the siarter iaith is on primary schools. He will know of the PCAI project, which has been working over a period of years. That's certainly a plan that has evolved substantially. Any activity that continues to happen within that framework is called the siarter iaith uwchradd—the secondary language charter. So, that goes hand in hand with the development of the charter nationally.

Thank you, Minister, for the statement. Of course, I too wish you a very happy European Languages Day. It's excellent that we do have the opportunity to celebrate the Welsh language, but that we also celebrate all of the excellent work that is taking place across Wales related to the siarter iaith. Perhaps I should declare an interest because I continue to be a governor in a primary school, and I'm the governor who has to help the criw Cymraeg with the language charter. I'm delighted; it's one of my favourite things to do, to go into the school, because the fact that the children take ownership of this as a process and are excited about it is so important, rather than something that they have to do, that the teacher tells them to do—the fact that it's unique in every school.

One of the major advantages that I've seen is the collaboration between English-medium schools and Welsh-medium schools to eradicate those barriers between schools. Clearly, we collaborate in terms of the co-operation agreement, in terms of looking to the future of Welsh language education, but what is demonstrated, I think, is that importance of those links between schools that have, perhaps, been competing for pupils in the past in terms of student numbers, because that's a challenge for many schools in a number of areas, and to see that collaboration because of the commitment in terms of reaching the target of 1 million Welsh speakers.

I'm also very pleased that you've emphasised that this emanates from the sharing of good practice, and continuing to do that. The question I have: it's excellent when plans are new, and that ownership is taken of them, but one of those things that happens in the story of every school is that people move on—the pupils get older and so on, and they work up through the levels. And we see, in terms of the language charter, one of the things is what happens after you've reached that gold status and you continue to work, because the challenges are different in every school year in terms of you might have more in one year that come from a non-Welsh-speaking background, or their experiences might be different. In Rhondda Cynon Taf at the moment, there are many Welsh-medium events because the National Eisteddfod is coming. So, extra-curricular opportunities exist that haven't existed in the past, and the challenge then is how you continue to provide that. So, one of the questions I wanted to ask you is: how will you ensure that this is an ongoing part of the schools process, and in terms of teacher training, is it part of the teacher training programme so that everyone understands the benefits of being part of this?

I just wanted to pick up one of the points that Sam Kurtz made in terms of the financial challenges. It would be good to understand, in terms of the evaluation—. I think that's something that we do need to understand—some of the barriers, perhaps, that prevent this work, and is there variance in terms of different areas. The importance in terms of good practice talks about those extra-curricular post-school activities, and one of the challenges is that if you have to travel to school and you're dependent on bus transport, perhaps you can't take up those opportunities. So, how are you working to ensure that every child, wherever they are in Wales, can have those extra-curricular opportunities that are so important to the implementation of the language charter, so that it goes from strength to strength?

I thank Heledd Fychan for those questions. I should also recognise—I mentioned the role of Gwynedd Council in creating the first siarter iaith, and that's at the heart of the whole thing. I should specifically recognise the work of Siân Gwenllian, who was at the forefront of the development of the siarter in Gwynedd. And I agree with what Heledd Fychan said, that one of the things that's always encouraging is that you see the use of the Welsh language, and the charter in English-medium schools. And I always find it encouraging when you go into a classroom and hear some Welsh being used and our children getting used to pronouncing Welsh words in a way that is entirely normalised and part of their daily activities. That link with the community is something that is very important. There are a number of partners, as the Member will know, that are involved with the work of the siarter iaith: the Welsh Rugby Union, Museums Wales, the Urdd, BBC, Literature Wales, the Welsh-language children's laureate. There are a lot of people involved with the work of the siarter. And the grant scheme that's available can also fund social activities that can co-ordinate with the work of the siarter iaith.

The Member made an important point on how we can ensure—and I use this word—that this is mainstreamed into the work of teachers and schools more generally, so that we can standardise—as best we can, given the variance in schools—that we standardise the experience across schools. And she will know that work has been ongoing to raise awareness of the Welsh language, for example, in initial teacher training. But I also believe that this now has an important role in co-ordinating with the work of the curriculum more broadly. That's why there has been some delay in relaunching the framework, so that we could see the curriculum being introduced last year. This framework is a resource to support teachers in their day-to-day work, in transitioning between areas of learning and experience in the curriculum and extra-curricular opportunities and activities. And we will be publishing more guidance and resources to run along with the framework, so that we can facilitate that work in terms of how you can ensure that this supports the work of the curriculum more broadly. And in doing that I think we have the best opportunity of ensuring that this is a broader opportunity for more pupils.

Diolch i'r Gweinidog.

Item 6 is a statement by the Minister for Social Justice and Chief Whip on the cost of living. And I call on the Minister, Jane Hutt.

Diolch yn fawr, Dirprwy Lywydd. In January I made a statement to the Senedd about the relentless cost-of-living pressures that people across Wales were facing, and unfortunately there's been no let up. Earlier this month, the Resolution Foundation reported that the past year has seen the biggest inflation shock in four decades. The Bank of England has raised the base rate 14 times in a row over the last two years, putting further pressure on household budgets already under huge strain from high energy, fuel and food costs. We're committed to doing all we can to support people through this cost-of-living crisis, to mitigate the worst of its impacts, but also through the action we take to prevent people from experiencing poverty in the first place.

Over this year and the last, we have provided more than £3.3 billion in support through targeted programmes and schemes, which put money back in people’s pockets. This includes our childcare offer, our winter fuel support scheme, our 'Claim what's yours' campaigns and our advice services under the single advice fund, our fuel pre-payment vouchers, our support for emergency food aid and our discretionary assistance fund, which provides emergency support for those in crisis. However, we have to face up to the reality that as a Government, we're not immune to record inflation, financial shocks and strains. We're facing extraordinary pressures on our finances, both this year and next, and this means we're working through some very difficult decisions about how we use our funding and how we target our support to protect public services and those at greatest need.

After the UK spring budget in March, the Welsh budget was worth up to £900 million less in real terms than at the beginning of the last spending review in 2021. This is the toughest financial situation we've faced since devolution, but we will continue to do all we can to help those who need it most. This includes protecting funding for emergency food aid, for the discretionary assistance fund, for the single advice fund, and for support for those struggling to afford fuel and electricity costs. We continue to invest in our basic income for care leavers in Wales pilot, testing this innovative approach for those young people most in need of enhanced support.

Deputy Llywydd, many of the key levers for tackling poverty and the impacts of the cost-of-living crisis rest with the UK Government, and we continue to urge them to live up to their responsibilities to people in Wales. But there is much we can do using the levers we have in Wales to deliver a made-in-Wales, made-for-Wales approach. In June, I published the consultation on the draft child poverty strategy, which outlined the areas we will prioritise to tackle child poverty and increase the impact of our policy ambitions. And I intend to publish the final strategy later this year.

As part of our continued focus on the cost-of-living crisis, we've held regular meetings of the Cabinet sub-committee on cost of living. In August, the expert group that was formed to advise the sub-committee on the impact of the crisis on people in Wales recommended a series of actions they felt could be taken to mitigate the impact in Wales, and I've published this report today. We're extremely grateful for the expert group’s work, and welcome their valuable recommendations. There are many actions in the report that we are already putting into practice, or will be able to take forward at pace.

In line with their recommendations, I am pleased to confirm that, even in these difficult times, we are protecting funding this winter to those who are most impacted by this crisis. We will run another 'Claim what’s yours' campaign this autumn to encourage people to access what they're entitled to, including initiatives like ‘Help to Save’, and to help support people to maximise their income. We will drive forward our commitments to simplify the Welsh benefits system to ensure that Welsh benefits are delivered in a compassionate manner, based on rights and entitlements. We'll improve the accessibility of the system, enabling more people in Wales to take up their entitlement to financial support, delivering on the expert group recommendations and those by Policy in Practice on Welsh benefits.

We will continue to fund our single advice fund services and to work with the Money and Pensions Service to deliver independent and impartial advice in Wales. Alongside our breakfast scheme in primary schools, we continue to roll out free school meals in primary schools and to take steps to reduce the cost of the school day and the cost of school uniforms and continue to provide free period products in all schools in Wales.

We have substantially increased the education maintenance allowance for eligible further education students in sixth form or college, and increased our training allowance rate for young people on our Jobs Growth Wales+ programme. Our Wales transport strategy, 'Llwybr Newydd', aims to reduce the cost and improve the accessibility of sustainable transport for everyone in Wales, including students. And we've invested additional funding in the homelessness prevention grant and through discretionary homelessness prevention support to local authorities to help reduce the impact of the cost-of-living crisis on those who may be at risk of, or experiencing, homelessness.

Our new Warm Homes programme will help us to tackle fuel poverty by improving the energy efficiency of the least thermally-efficient low-income households in Wales. And I've met with energy providers and Ofgem on a number of occasions, and will continue to work with them to ensure those hardest hit by high energy costs are protected from damaging market practices. I've also advocated for the introduction of energy social tariffs and will continue to press the UK Government on this point.

We will also continue to work closely with the Consumer Council for Water, water companies and other key stakeholders to introduce measures to help customers struggling to pay water bills. Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water has led the way with the introduction of an affordable tariff scheme for households where at least one adult is in employment, but who are struggling to afford essential household bills. These customers are not typically eligible for help but are amongst those experiencing severe financial difficulties as the cost-of-living crisis continues. The Cymuned scheme was rolled out to its entire operating area in August this year, following a successful trial in RCT and Denbighshire.

Deputy Llywydd, we agree with the expert group that delivering a collaborative and joined-up approach across Wales will be key to achieving our policy ambitions on tackling the ongoing cost-of-living pressures, and more broadly on child poverty. Last week, I met a number of public bodies and local authorities to discuss how we can better align our preventative efforts around child poverty, including our respective duties under the Children and Families (Wales) Measure 2010 to ensure we deliver collaborative solutions to maximise our impact. However, given the extreme financial situation we face, there are some actions recommended by the group that will be more challenging, and will only be realised if significant additional funding becomes available. And these more challenging recommendations will continue to be considered by Ministers as we prepare for next year’s budget.

The expert group has also made a number of recommendations for the UK Government, to mitigate the impacts of the cost-of-living crisis and develop resilience for the future. We will, of course, raise these with UK Ministers, and I would also call on Senedd Members here today to do the same.

Finally, I want to take this opportunity to express our thanks and gratitude to all the front-line workers and volunteers who have worked so tirelessly over the last 18 months to help those most affected by the cost-of-living crisis, from all those providing advice, to the people who freely give their time to help in foodbanks and warm hubs. They will also have been struggling with rising costs while providing support to others. Diolch yn fawr.

Thank you for that. The global impact of the pandemic, followed by Putin's war in Ukraine, saw inflation rise, and this is a tax on people's income, causing pressures on household budgets, and must be tackled. When domestic inflation let rip in the 1970s it killed thousands of businesses and millions of jobs; in fact, the company my father had worked for crashed in 1978 because of this.

The current UK Government has provided unprecedented cost-of-living support worth an average of £3,300 per household between 2022 and 2024. Between 31 October and 19 November, millions of families on means-tested benefits will receive a second cost-of-living payment, totalling £900 across three payments. Eligible pensioner households will also receive a further £300 payment later this year as an addition to the winter fuel payment, and those receiving disability benefits received a further £150 cost-of-living payment between 20 June and 4 July. 

But things ain't easy. How do you respond to the recommendation in the report of the Wales expert group on the cost-of-living crisis released today, which you referred to, that the Welsh Government introduces an installment-based disabled person cost-of-living payment? The expert group recommends that Welsh Government implements the new Warm Homes programme with urgency, ensuring that the replacement demand scheme is procured and operational this winter. Earlier this month I asked you for an update on when the Welsh Government intends to launch its new Warm Homes programme, including the successor to the Nest fuel poverty scheme, highlighting National Energy Action Cymru's call for them to be operational as soon as possible as we're now nearing the winter months. In your reply, you stated that you were

'on track to move to contract award and begin mobilisation this year.'  

In practical terms, when will the scheme therefore become fully operational?

The expert group also recommends that both the UK Government and Welsh Government take action to improve the level of take-up of grants, allowances and benefits support already available to households. Earlier this year I highlighted the uptake of the Welsh Government's fuel support scheme for 2022-23, which offered a payment to eligible low-income households to help them with the rising cost of energy. You confirmed in written answers to my office that the Welsh Government made up to £90 million available for this, and estimated that approximately 427,000 households would be eligible. However, you also confirmed to my office that, as of 28 February this year, less than £65 million had been spent on this, and that local authorities across Wales reported that, at that stage, just 360,000 households had applied to the scheme, and that only 341,468 had received a payment, which meant that at that stage 78,000 fewer households than estimated by the Welsh Government accessed that programme, and £20 million to £25 million allocated for it wasn't utilised. So, how have you learnt from this, and what if any actions are being implemented accordingly to meet the recommendation referred to?

April's Bevan Foundation report on 'A common approach to Welsh benefits' stated that they have long called for a single framework of grants and allowances termed a Welsh benefits system for all the benefits the Welsh Government is responsible for, and that their findings demonstrate that establishing a Welsh benefits system is feasible in terms of data, and that millions of pounds of unclaimed benefits could support those on low incomes. They added that the regulations governing Welsh benefits are set by the Welsh Government, so it is within its power to introduce regulatory amendments to facilitate greater uniformity.

The expert group recommends that the Welsh Government takes the next steps towards a Welsh benefits system, through the introduction of common approaches to eligibility, application and the verification of evidence, implemented by working with local authorities and other bodies, to focus on the eligibility assessment and targeting. Although you refer to this in your statement, why do you not commit to the Welsh benefits system called for by so many for so long?

The expert group refers to publication of a new child poverty strategy for Wales, currently out for consultation. How, therefore, do you respond to yesterday’s statement in committee by the Children’s Commissioner for Wales, that the draft strategy lacks, quote, ‘ambition, clarity and detail’?

Finally, and I have to say this, given the statement by the World Economic Forum that the soaring cost of food and energy is affecting people across the globe, that inflation is currently higher in 16 European countries, and that interest rates are currently higher in 12 European countries and 10 other G20 countries than in the UK, wouldn’t only a very silly billy claim that the cost-of-living crisis was made in Westminster? Diolch yn fawr.

Diolch yn fawr, Mark Isherwood. In your opening remarks, you lay out the challenging global context. But, of course, the truth is that the UK Government has the key levers and powers to make a real difference to people's lives.

I have welcomed the report from our expert advisory group, and I've commented in my statement on many of those recommendations. I think that it is worth looking at the very first recommendation, which is actually about where the UK Government and Welsh Government can work together. That recommendation states that we should be taking action to improve the level of take-up of grants, allowances and benefits support already available to households.

I think that we all know, and certainly the evidence is there, that income maximisation and benefit take-up is the key activity, which we deliver through our single advice fund. It's a very innovative delivery model, as you know, with all of the advice and access partners. What's crucial about that is that, in the last year, over 80 per cent of people accessing the SAF services identified themselves as coming from a population group being hardest hit by the cost-of-living crisis. That includes older people, disabled people, and people from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities.

But, actually, since January 2020, those single advice fund services have helped people to claim additional income totalling £83 million. That is the result of our take-up campaign. We've actually urged the UK Government to take the lead on a UK-wide benefit take-up campaign, learning lessons from the excellent work that is being delivered by devolved Governments, which we continue to progress.

You raise an important question about the Warm Homes programme. Of course, this is something in terms of the statements by the Minister for Climate Change. What's important is that we continue to provide free advice on energy saving measures to all who need it, and to signpost households to support. You know that, in fact, the next iteration of the Warm Homes programme is going to focus on worst first, meaning that eligible families living in the least energy efficient homes will receive support to improve the fabric of their homes and improvements to their heating systems.

That's why I think it is so disappointing—and I was glad to be sitting in on the oral statement made by the Minister for Climate Change—that we feel that they are pulling back on many of the commitments that are particularly important in terms of ensuring that we move forward with achieving those energy efficient homes, which of course tackle fuel poverty, which is a priority of this Government.

We also have to look at the particular Welsh circumstances—the high proportion of off-grid properties, which are more likely to be occupied by low-income families. It's important to also acknowledge that the £50 million empty homes grant scheme is going to bring 2,000 long-term empty properties back into use. And of course, in terms of the Warm Homes programme, you know also that that has gone out for tender. Indeed, energy efficiency advice continues to be on track. In fact, the contract award and mobilisation of the Warm Homes tender programme is mobilising as we speak.  

It is important that we look to and very much welcome the recommendations in terms of the Welsh benefits charter. Can I say that this is something that we've always backed? We're accelerating our work to develop a coherent Welsh benefits system. A central part of that work is the creation of the charter for delivery of Welsh benefits, such as the council tax reduction scheme and free school meals. But it's a draft format, it's a set of underpinning principles to ensure that Welsh benefits are delivered in a compassionate manner, based on rights and entitlements, and we will, with the charter, improve the accessibility of the system. We're working, of course, to deliver on the Policy in Practice report, which was published in March, 'A common approach to Welsh benefits: Feasibility study', the work that was commissioned by the Bevan Foundation. I was very pleased to receive that report with a designated Member—very much a part of our co-operation agreement—to look at the way forward.

It is important that we take this forward in terms of the responsibilities that we have got in Wales, because as I said in my statement, we will use our levers and powers to do what we can. But I'm sure that you will also be interested, Mark Isherwood, in the report by the Westminster Energy Security and Net Zero Committee, its 'Preparing for the winter' report, which has just been published. I have to just say that one of the key things that they have said in their recommendation is that vulnerable households are facing a real challenge in terms of energy savings and that more energy-efficient homes and appliances are needed, and also calling in terms of the need for a social tariff, which, of course, we're calling for as well, but also that vulnerable households need more support.

Thank you for the statement and for the work of the expert group. It's clear to us all, I think, in this Chamber and everyone beyond it that both the UK and Welsh Governments need to act urgently to support the many thousands of households across Wales who are going to find this winter as hard if not harder than last year. We know that finances are tight for Welsh Government due to the unfair settlement we get from Westminster, in part, and we also know that the Tory UK Government care more about winning elections than they do about the needs of the people of Wales.

But turning to the report of the expert panel and your statement, there's nothing new here, really, is there? Poverty in Wales has been exacerbated—yes, by political choices and macro-economic developments, but it's not new. And the failure to tackle it over decades has, in fact, made the current cost-of-living crisis more acute and severe for Welsh households. And the message of the expert group isn't new. We've been told over and over, by organisations like Citizens Advice Cymru, the Bevan Foundation, the Child Poverty Action Group, National Energy Action—I could go on and on—that the numbers of people who are struggling financially remain extremely high; the levels of hardship faced by people this winter could be significant unless there is a change of course from all tiers of government, or a major improvement in people's financial positions.

The recommendations are not new, either. Many of them Plaid Cymru have been supporting and advocating for and have been asking Welsh Government to consider, because these are measures that are proven to reduce poverty. For example, we've got the free school meals, finally, in primary schools, thanks to the co-operation agreement, and the expert group talking about extending free school meals to secondary pupils; free bus transport for young people; a Welsh child payment—that was in our last manifesto; better data on intersectional poverty and on the delivery of cost-of-living measures. I recently was informed that the Welsh Government can't, for example, even provide Welsh child poverty data broken down by ethnicity. So, what's being done to tackle that, Minister, because we've had the equality data unit now for over a year and there was no mention of that in your statement?

And then, the need for a Welsh benefits system, of course. On that, as part of our scrutiny of the Government's draft child poverty strategy in the Equality and Social Justice Committee yesterday, we heard from multiple witnesses on ensuring that the support available reaches those who have a right to that support automatically. We don't need awareness-raising campaigns; this money needs to reach their pockets without the need to jump through hoops, when they've got enough to be dealing with, with putting food on the table. All the witnesses yesterday said that this is absolutely key, and it's something I consistently raise with you, Minister.

It's been estimated that improving access to the support available from Welsh and local government could put an extra £75 million into the pockets of Welsh families, helping them not only to get through this hard winter, but to stop them from falling into poverty in the first place. So, what progress has been made, because the nights are drawing in, it's turning colder, the rise in bills, although slowing down, is not going down? This work has been already woefully slow, and I note in the report that it says these are the medium-term measures, March 2024 to 2026. We've had that report from Policy in Practice since March, and the ideas have been talked about since way before then.

Turning then to tackling child poverty specifically, you didn't respond to Mark Isherwood's request for you to respond to the children's commissioner's description of the Welsh Government's draft child poverty strategy as one that

'really lacks ambition...detailed actions, timescales and deliverables by which Welsh Government could usefully be held to account.'

The commissioner was part of the expert group, Minister. So, did you listen to her? If so, why did she tell us that she felt that she had to make this forthright response to the consultation on the draft strategy, because it was informed by the message from young people and children with whom her office had engaged, including 8,000 who had taken part in her annual survey, because she told us they told her loud and clear that poverty was impacting on their lives? So, how are the voices of those young people and their families feeding into the Government response to economic hardship?

The children's commissioner questioned the clarity, coherence and ambition of the draft child poverty strategy. She berated the Government for the lack of accountability mechanisms in the draft strategy. The strength of her evidence, backed up by other experts, was striking and unequivocal. So, do you agree with her that we are in a time of crisis and that we need a coherent and robust child poverty strategy, in her words, that is clearer and braver to ensure children and young people don't miss out on the rights to which they're entitled under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child? Why was this draft strategy so lacking in ambition, because it's simply not good enough for this Government to wring their hands? The expert panel makes it clear that there are things the Welsh Government can do now and there are no excuses.

Diolch yn fawr, Sioned Williams. You're absolutely right, we do need to act urgently, and that's what we're doing. We're dealing and acting urgently with the levers, powers and responsibilities we've got, but within a very difficult financial situation, as you recognised in terms of the challenges that we've got as a result of the financial situation this year. It's not just because of the sky-high inflation, it is, in fact, because of that financial position we're in after the spring budget with, as I said in my statement, £900 million lower in real terms than what we expected and, indeed, what Wales needs at the time of the last spending review. There's less funding to do the things that we want to do, that we have done successfully in terms of the winter fuel support scheme, and to look at what works and how we can continue to deliver that and also move forward on the changes that don't necessarily need finance, but actually need the kind of collaboration and partnership working that, of course, is a key recommendation.

So, I just wanted to mention one priority area that you know that we've worked hard to safeguard, and, indeed, to enhance, which is the discretionary assistance fund that continues to increase. More and more people are turning to the fund for financial support. In fact, by August, 72,000 people had accessed the discretionary assistance fund. We made that additional £18.8 million available. It is what people need at a time of crisis, those emergency payments, the cash that they need in their pockets to pay for basic essentials. And also the fact that, from 1 April, we increased those payments in value by 11 per cent in line with inflation to give as much support as we can for those basic living costs such as food and fuel, and £10.5 million in grants already, and, as I said, over £5 million cash payments. So, I think the discretionary assistance fund is a really important indication of our support for those who are most vulnerable.

But it is important just to say in terms of the work, further recommendations that are coming through, and the acknowledgement of evidence: these were taken from academics from the organisations we work closely with, including the Bevan Foundation, Citizens Advice, National Energy Action, and indeed, commissioners. Of course, the evidence of what works is actually laid out in the policies that we’re delivering. Of course, we need more finance to enable us to reach out. We cannot at this point in time; there is no money to help us provide those payments, but as I said, we must look at this, we must look at the recommendations and consider those in line with where we hope we might be in terms of future financial prospects with our public finances.

Can I just reassure Members on the Policy in Practice report? Indeed, when we met with those who developed the report with the Bevan Foundation, they did say that Wales is in an excellent position to take the work forward. They said there’s a lot of good practice within local authority delivery models that can be built upon, and we are working at pace, as I said in my statement, to deliver on the Policy in Practice report.

Now it is important, and apologies that I didn’t, because I had a lot of questions from Mark Isherwood, but I do want to respond on the child poverty strategy and to recognise—and the First Minister did as well earlier on today—the importance of all the voices and all of the evidence, which is independent, of course, and that’s why we have a children’s commissioner. I was very pleased to be the Minister who actually appointed, helped, with the young people, to appoint the first children’s commissioner all those years ago, because we need those independent voices.

But I think what’s been important about this child poverty strategy is that it is actually to deliver on the Measure, as I said in my statement. It was preceded by that engagement phase with young people, and we spoke to more than 3,000 people to ensure that we had got our objectives aligned with the experiences of people across Wales. Of course, it included children and young people, families and communities, organisations that work with children and young people, children and young people with protected characteristics—we gave grants to organisations to have that engagement—and the feedback that we had from that consultation pre-draft strategy was, 'We want you to do what you do, continue to do it, deepen it where you can in terms of finances and policy', and that’s how we came up with those five high-level objectives, priorities and commitments. We closed the consultation on 11 September. We’ve had a very good response to the consultation, including, of course, a response from all those organisations that have engaged with it so fully. I think that we had over 150 responses, in fact, to the consultation.

Last week, I chaired a summit with local authorities and also with public bodies, because they have the duty—this is a shared duty, a duty to tackle child poverty—and we had some excellent responses from local government leaders across Wales, led by the cabinet member for equality and social justice for the Welsh Local Government Association, talking about how they were delivering on that statutory duty to tackle child poverty, and giving excellent examples of how they were working together on these issues.

I think it is important that the Equality and Social Justice Committee is undertaking this inquiry, and we are looking, of course, at the responses to the draft child poverty strategy. It’s intended to be a 10-year strategy. It's setting the strategic direction for us and subsequent Governments to tackle child poverty. But it is important that we invest in the immediate challenges that children and young people and families are facing.

Addressing the cost of the school day, that hasn’t been mentioned, and it’s a crucially important part of the cross-Government action; the provision of advice and support; emergency food aid; and I’m very pleased that I’m going to be speaking at the Big Bocs Bwyd evaluation day later this week to acknowledge all of those innovative initiatives that are now making such a difference in our schools. I'm very proud of the work that they've done, which we gave the financial support for, to take this forward.

But it is important that we do consider all of the responses to the consultation on the child poverty strategy, that we work at pace on the Policy in Practice report, that we do safeguard our discretionary assistance fund, and that we also recognise what the UK Government—. And I'm sure that you would also be joining with colleagues in Westminster, who actually called for a package of targeted support by the UK Government for vulnerable groups and for a more proactive and more empathetic approach to customer service by energy companies. I'm going to be meeting energy companies in the next couple of weeks as well to make these points, but I'm also raising these issues with the UK Government directly, particularly the new Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, because they have got to move forward on the social tariff for a fairer energy market for our consumers and the most vulnerable consumers in Wales.

Minister, I'm grateful for your statement this afternoon and, I must say, your consistent leadership throughout this difficult period of the cost-of-living crisis.

Minister, you'll be aware that I spent much of last winter highlighting the poor behaviour of energy suppliers and the impact that it had on some of our most vulnerable households in Wales and across the United Kingdom. Residents in north Wales continue to be let down by the suppliers, they continue to be let down by the regulator, Ofgem, and they continue to be let down by the UK Government, who have all failed to act when it comes to standing charges. Residents in north Wales pay the highest standing charges for electricity anywhere in the United Kingdom. That's over £80 a year more than residents who live in London. This is £80 a year more that my residents in north Wales can ill afford during this cost-of-living crisis. The reality is it is a cost-of-living crisis that not only has been made in Westminster but worsened in Westminster by the inaction of the Conservative Government.

Minister, this is not a devolved matter. This is a matter for Westminster. I'm sure all colleagues across the Senedd Chamber here, particularly those who represent residents in north Wales, will join me in wanting to send a message through, via you in your conversations with the UK Government and National Grid, that we need change in relation to standing charges, and we need a reduction in the standing charges for residents in north Wales. Do you agree?

I absolutely agree, and I thank Jack Sargeant again for the campaigning zeal and the influence that he's had in raising these issues. It's important also that you draw attention again, and it has been discussed in this Chamber, to the unfair way in which the residents of north Wales are facing the highest standing charges as well. Again, this is something that is the UK Government's responsibility in terms of the actions that they can take, but also energy suppliers. I've talked to energy suppliers as well about the standing charges. Some of them say that they agree that we should move away from those standing charges. And again, the Westminster select committee report, only this week, is also raising the issue of the unfairness of standing charges.

I think it's important, again, when I'm asked and challenged quite rightly about, 'Well, what are you doing in Wales and what can we do?', particularly and not only, if you like, given the strength of a ministerial responsibility—. I'm going to be writing and hopefully meeting with the new secretary for energy and net zero, Claire Coutinho, to actually raise the particular issues about standing charges in north Wales, but also with Ofgem as well, and to meet those energy providers. We've called also—and I know you would support me on this—consistently for the UK Government and Ofgem to introduce the social tariff, and I'll be raising that also with the Secretary of State for energy and net zero. It's the highest increase in Britain in terms of standing charges again, up 102 per cent, while south Wales is experiencing standing charges going up 94 per cent, the fourth highest in Britain. This now needs to go to the UK Government as an injustice to Wales. But what we can do in terms of the support for our Fuel Bank Foundation vouchers, which are now being taken up across Wales, particularly in off-grid areas, is making a difference, alongside our discretionary assistance fund.

And finally, Heledd Fychan.

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Minister, I must echo the comments of Sioned Williams. Yes, we understand the recommendations here, but it's time that we saw action. My question is how will you be responding fully to each of the recommendations. Because I've noted some of the things you've raised here. You’ve said that some aren't possible. I think it would be great to have clarity in terms of a detailed response in writing, underlining what your response is to each recommendation, which one you're taking forward, and the consideration. Because a number of them are key ones, such as free school meals over the school holidays and the extension of food and fun programmes. These are questions that organisations that you've rightly thanked are desperate to know the answers to, because that impacts directly on how they operate, the amount of volunteers they need and so on.

I have another cost-of-living network event coming up, and one of the things that has consistently come up, which is also echoed in this report, is the fact that there is support available, but much of it is ad hoc, some is taken away at the last minute—that inconsistency, and something that is coming through in the recommendations. But what I’d like to be able to communicate to those organisations is what exactly is happening, and I'm unclear from your statement today about how we actually take forward these recommendations, be honest about the support available, but also ensure the support that is out there is reaching people, and that there is no confusion amongst the organisations that are actually at the front line supporting people.

Thank you very much, Heledd Fychan. As I said in my statement, it was really important we published the report today, and I shared it with you earlier today. And you will see from the recommendations that there are many—and I've commented on them—that we're actually already delivering, but they're very important recommendations, which I can respond to more fully now that we've got them and that I've made this initial statement.

Also, just to say that there has been an external reference group for the child poverty strategy, and I think the recommendations and the way we implement very much align with our child poverty strategy. I think that's a vehicle that will help us take this forward and give that full response. But during the summer, I also visited a number of projects across Wales and met with people with lived experience of poverty. I listened to them about their priorities as well and their needs. The roll-out of the free school meals, which, of course, is such an important part of our co-operation agreement, is already making such a difference, and reaching out to so many. But also, just recognising that some of the cross-Government work that we're doing has already been acknowledged as making a difference.

Of course, yes, there are things that happen as a result of policy consideration and our work together that are quite clearly making a difference across that whole range of policy areas. I haven't been able to respond to them all today. I think our Cabinet sub-committee on cost of living is now going to look fully at this report, but I'm glad that I've able to share it at the earliest possible time today with you to ensure that, on record, we recognise the importance of these recommendations. We're delivering on many of them, and we're calling on the UK Government, which I hope you will join us with, to actually respond to the recommendations that call specifically for action from the UK Government and indeed from local authorities as well.

I thank the Minister.

The final item today is a statement by the Deputy Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism—Cadw: Engaging communities with heritage. I call on the Deputy Minister to make her statement. Dawn Bowden.

Thank you, Dirprwy Lywydd. Over the last year, Cadw has delivered innovative programmes to increase the engagement of Welsh communities with Cadw sites and the wider historic environment. This work demonstrates the contribution that our outstanding heritage can make to the well-being of the people of Wales and in particular its health and educational benefits.

Later this week, I will visit Cadw’s Neath abbey monument to discuss conservation and community engagement at the site. Over the last year, Cadw has linked with Dŵr-y-Felin Comprehensive School in Neath abbey to launch a young custodians scheme for this important Cistercian abbey site. This is part of a larger Cadw initiative, the young custodians Wales, to encourage young people to take ownership of their historic environment. Cadw has young custodians at several sites in north Wales, but its introduction at Neath abbey represents the initiative's first appearance in the south. The aim of the initiative is to create partnerships and learning spaces that complement the Welsh curriculum within communities and to encourage the young custodians to value and respect their Cadw monuments and the wider historic environment.

The response to the young custodians scheme at Dŵr-y-Felin has exceeded everyone's expectations. Many pupils volunteered to become young custodians, and at the end of the school year they assisted teachers as the site became an open classroom for Dŵr-y-Felin’s entire year 8 class for a day. Cadw and Dŵr-y-Felin are working together to build on the strong foundation created by the initial success of the scheme.

While Neath abbey has been furthering the learning of Dŵr-y-Felin’s pupils, its Cistercian counterpart at Tintern, in the Wye valley, has been supporting the rehabilitation of young offenders. Over the last few years, Cadw has been co-operating with the Newport youth justice team on an initiative in which young offenders work at Tintern abbey as part of their rehabilitation. The young people, who are accompanied by supervisors, weed, clear paths and clean delicate stonework, and also interact with visitors and work alongside Cadw’s ground maintenance contractors to gain valuable work experience. The project has been recognised as best practice amongst youth justice teams and has demonstrated tangible benefits to both the participants and the site. The scheme's success has seen the expansion of the initiative to Caerwent Roman town, with Cadw exploring its possible extension to other sites.

Cadw has also been working during the year to enhance volunteering opportunities at its sites. Volunteering affords opportunities to learn new skills, gain experience and work as part of a team. It can improve well-being and allow the volunteer to engage with the site and make a real contribution to the visitor experience. Cadw's volunteers at Plas Mawr, the Elizabethan townhouse in Conwy, provide a perfect example of the important part that volunteers play in creating a memorable visit. The Plas Mawr volunteers were highly commended in the museum and heritage awards, and won the Wales region award in the volunteers for museum learning category at the Marsh awards in November. Significant progress has been made in recruiting new volunteers at Castell Caerffili and also at Castell Coch.

The 'Anti-racist Wales Action Plan' has set challenging goals to support all parts of society to embrace and celebrate Wales's diverse cultural heritage. This includes working with black, Asian and minority ethnic communities to identify and lift barriers to accessing heritage sites. Cadw has supported communities who do not traditionally engage with our sites. For example, over 3,500 refugees and asylum seekers had free admission to Cadw's sites last year. Cadw has also worked to diversify its website, co-creating content with the Romani Cultural and Arts Company and commissioning creative celebrations of black people in Welsh history.

It's worth noting that we're now in the midst of the annual Open Doors festival that takes place throughout September. Funded and organised by Cadw, it is part of the European Heritage Days festival and promotes awareness of and engagement with the Welsh historic environment. This year, the ever-popular celebration of Wales's built heritage sees more than 200 of our nation's historic sites and landmarks offering visitors free entry, some of which have never been accessible to the public before. The festival this year will encourage Welsh communities to explore some of the country’s lesser known and smaller scale sites. For example, this weekend you could take a tour of Segontium Roman fort, on the outskirts of Caernarfon, or St John's House, which is the oldest habitable building in Bridgend, with beams dating back to 1511.

In closing, Dirprwy Lywydd, I would like to highlight some of Cadw's initiatives to engage in the digital realm. Cadw led a myths and legends podcasting workshop this year. Fifty young people from Youth Shedz and Youth Cymru venues across Wales got hands-on experience of podcast production, from research and scripting to acting and sound engineering. It enhanced their skills and raised aspirations in the arts and the heritage sector. An even more exciting development is the ongoing work of the new Cadw Minecraft education offer, to link in with the existing Hwb Minecraft resource. That resource provides access to the popular gaming platform for educators and learners in Wales. Cadw Minecraft education will help young people to engage with the historic environment on a platform that they already know and love.

In conclusion, the recent pandemic brought into sharp focus the heritage that is on all of our doorsteps. With people restricted to the areas around their homes, the heritage located in their communities became the focus of attention. Now that we've emerged from the pandemic, Cadw is seeking to provide people with the opportunity to engage in the wider historic environment, both in the real and the digital worlds.

I'd like to start by thanking the Deputy Minister for her statement. I'm delighted to hear of the scale of the youth work that is going on. I, like many others here, believe strongly that our heritage and historic places are a tangible and essential part of the learning journey for our future generations, to enable them to understand the history of our nation, the lives of our ancestors, and importantly, what has helped to shape our nation, good or bad, into what we are and who we are today.

As the Deputy Minister will know, I have questioned the First Minister recently about how we can promote heritage careers, and in particular encourage school leavers to consider training in traditional building skills in which we have a particular shortage of workers. With this in mind, in what way is Cadw helping to promote this during their engagement with the young custodians scheme and when they work with other volunteers on heritage sites? As we know, heritage is worth over £960 million to the Welsh economy and it brings in another £1.7 billion in spending from visitors who enjoy the heritage and history that we have to offer here. It is vital that we maintain and, indeed, grow this sector, promoting Wales as a tourist destination, and it is vital that we have the skills here in order to properly maintain and preserve these sites. Therefore, what funding have you allocated for young people in order for them to realise the opportunities that are available to them in the heritage sector, and support apprenticeships in traditional skills?

Cadw's website mentions diverse communities, which cover a number of progressive categories, including LGBT and people of colour. But I'm disappointed that we have seemingly ignored an important group who have a considerable part to play: that of faith communities. People of all faiths play a massive role in the preservation of community heritage. To take just one example, the hundreds of listed churches across Wales are maintained tirelessly by volunteers and have been at the centre of congregations for many hundreds of years. Church groups work actively to maintain their heritage in Wales and to promote it to the wider public. And listed places of worship are a vital aspect of local culture and heritage, which serve communities across Wales as community hubs. I feel that their contribution is not being significantly recognised, particularly since faith tourism adds considerably to the Welsh economy, and more needs to be done to develop working partnerships. So, Deputy Minister, what efforts are the Welsh Government willing to make to encourage Cadw to reach out to faith communities of all denominations and help them identify the preservation needs of local heritage, and to help them promote and develop the narrative of their faith in their community, to help expand the financial potential of the faith tourism sector?

We hear repeatedly in this Chamber how communities across Wales do not feel empowered to make the choices that are right for them, and with our heritage, we have a unique opportunity to engage communities and champion Welsh history. For example, we can help to champion local historic societies, which give people a real sense of their own local history and help others to learn and engage, and undoubtedly it helps people to realise how they can actively contribute. By encouraging participation in these groups, it's involving us all in the shared national story, built up from a local level, and giving us a sense of identity and belonging, because it's not just about buildings and objects—it's about people past and present. Therefore, what steps will Cadw and the Welsh Government be taking to involve local historical societies and communities in plans to preserve Welsh heritage? 

And finally, Deputy Minister, Cadw's race equality action plan calls for a political focus on race and sex-based elements of history, and as you will be aware, this interacts with another Welsh Government directive, that of the 'Anti-racist Wales Action Plan'. This is already leading to streets bearing the titles of Churchill and Nelson to be renamed, something we were always told would never happen. And by way of contrast, the Welsh Government seems very keen to embrace and celebrate the legacy of Owain Glyndŵr, and he is, of course, a national figure, but his reputation is also a controversial one and his rebellion and its response brought so much hardship and misery across Wales. We only have to look at the hundreds of bodies, many of whom were children, that were unearthed last year in Haverfordwest. All historical figures like Owain Glyndŵr, Churchill and Nelson need to be treated with balance that their legacies carry. Each figure needs to be evaluated against the context and struggles of their time, and yet it seems that these revisions to our history only seem to work one way. Therefore, Deputy Minister, what steps are you taking to ensure that all historical figures are evaluated equally when it comes to cultural heritage preservation, so that this process is undertaken sensitively and not at the behest of activists and single-issue groups? Thank you. 

Can I thank Joel James for those points, and he's covered a number of areas in that, starting with the youth custodian scheme, which is a fantastic scheme that we are now funding? It's an all-Wales scheme. It's been very successful in north Wales. We're now looking to move that to south Wales, as I said. We're developing partnerships and creating learning spaces that complement the Welsh curriculum, so we're trying to link that to the curriculum in terms of Welsh history and heritage.

But you also made a very valid point—and I know you asked the question to the First Minister last week—about the heritage skills in traditional building trades, and what we're doing to promote that. Now, I know in 2015 the construction industry identified that there were these types of traditional skills shortages for the heritage industry, and that has improved since then, since they published a report on responding to traditional building skills. And we do now see the roll out of a new built environment general certificate of education foundation and progression years, and that contains some of the basic knowledge and practical skills for work needed on traditional buildings. The Tywi Centre in Carmarthenshire, for instance, delivers a level 3 heritage skills national vocational qualification in stonemasonry, plastering and carpentry through the special applied skills programme, as well as a level 3 award introduction to repair and maintenance of traditional pre-1990 buildings. 

However, there's currently no stonemasonry apprenticeship, and I think that is something, from a Cadw perspective, we probably need to utilise more than anything. If anybody has the opportunity to go and see the work that is currently going on at Tintern abbey, for instance—the very, very delicate maintenance and restoration work that's taking place in that abbey—that is the preserve of very, very skilled stonemasons. So, what we are doing, we're in discussion now with the Palace of Westminster restoration and renewal programme team to see whether there is something that we can do within Wales, working with Qualifications Wales, to see whether we could develop a new stonemasonry pathway in level 3 made-for-Wales apprenticeships. So, that is something that we're very keen to ensure that we see happen for all the reasons that you set out in your question and your contribution.

You talked about the contribution of faith tourism, and I know that we've had discussions in this Chamber before about the historic churches of all denominations—the fact that some of those are now lying empty, they will fall into disrepair if they're not looked after. Some are listed, some are not. A number of the churches and chapels in Wales are listed, but there is no doubt that a number of those buildings around Wales are closing. And it is vital that we work with all the different denominations to discuss the future of those buildings, and that's what Cadw are doing. But we cannot, obviously, take into ownership all of those buildings and repair all of those buildings, so we have to work in partnership with the denominations, with the churches themselves, to find a range of partners where we can look at sustainable futures for those precious buildings and restore them to their former glory. In some places, they are the heart of those communities, and of course we do have things like—. We've seen churches and chapels turned into community centres. We do have Welsh Government support for community assets that can be taken over by organisations, by churches, by groups, by community groups, and funded through the community asset scheme and community facilities grants. So, there are opportunities for all of that to be done, and absolutely working with local historical societies is vitally important in all of that. 

You then mentioned the all-Wales 'Anti-racist Wales Action Plan', and I am absolutely clear, Joel James, that that covers all aspects of race in Wales. I've talked about, in my delivery, what we will try to do to encourage non-traditional communities to engage with our history, whether they are Gypsy and Roma Travellers, whether they are people with black, Asian and minority ethnic community backgrounds and so on. That is vitally important, as is recognition of our LGBTQ+ communities, as is recognition of women in our society. I often talk about—. You know, when I first became the Member of the Senedd for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney, I struggled to find anywhere in Rhymney where we commemorated the contribution that women made to that town. And in fact we ended up—Jayne, you might remember—getting a purple plaque for Ursula Masson in the end, who was one of the first women from Merthyr to be recognised with a plaque within the town. 

But you talked specifically, then, about the recognition through place names and commemoration. We are out to consultation with the guidance on how local and public bodies commemorate notable figures in history, and I've said this many times in relation to that—what we are not seeking to do is to rewrite history. History is history, but what we can do is we can frame people in history, and we can reference their part in history for good or for bad. And many of the people that we now know were connected with things like the slave trade—and you mentioned Picton—also did good things in life. So, we need to commemorate these people in the context of history and recognise that contributions that they made for good and ill. I won't go down the road of the contested history around Owain Glyndŵr. There are so many people in our history whose stories are contested, and people will have their own views on Owain Glyndŵr and many other historical figures. But we do want to recognise all of those people in our history. They all contributed to Wales and what Wales has become, and they need to be framed in the context of that. 

Thank you, Deputy Minister, for this statement today. It is good to have the opportunity to discuss heritage in this Senedd. We don't have those opportunities often, and I have to say, when I saw the title of the statement, I was wondering whether it was going to be related to the two written statements we've had from you recently on Cadw, which looked at the work led by Roger Lewis. I'd like to ask whether we could have an opportunity to discuss that, because I think it's very important. Of course, there are things to celebrate here today in terms of the community engagement, but I think, in looking at Cadw, clearly there was a major discussion back in 2017 on the governance of Cadw and so on, and I would hope that we could have that full discussion and debate here, and I hope that you will commit to that, because, as I understand it, you do have a draft this month, and perhaps the final report will be published next month. So,  if I could have that commitment, I'd be grateful.

If I may, you don't have to convince me of the importance of heritage and the impact it has on people's lives. As you know, I worked for Amgueddfa Cymru before I was elected here, and certainly many of the things you list here are the benefits of heritage, and why it shouldn't be seen as a nice to have. It is absolutely essential, it is transformational, and some of the case studies you've illustrated here are very much indicative of why this is important. And it may come as a surprise to some people to learn that Cadw are doing all of these things, but for me it's the bare minimum of what they should be doing because we have the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 here in Wales, they are part of Government, and, the same as with Welsh Government-sponsored bodies, we should be engaging people and there shouldn't be barriers.

And there are huge opportunities, for instance, as you have outlined, with the curriculum in a whole host of different areas, but skills and apprenticeships is another one, but also in terms of Welsh history. We tend to think of Cadw as some of the big sites, but there are around 120 sites across Wales, and my question is: how many of these sites offer volunteering opportunities? How many volunteers are currently active with Cadw? And how many hours do they currently contribute, along with the demographics? Because I was interested to read Amgueddfa Cymru's recent annual report, which showed that they have, across seven sites, or eight including the collections centre in Nantgarw, 604 volunteers, who contribute 26,273 hours, and they've got the demographic data. So, I'd just like to know how successful Cadw are in terms of the volunteering schemes.

Also, in terms of Welsh language opportunities, you've seen, through what you've said in terms of the Young Custodians Wales scheme, that, when there is an opportunity for young people to engage, the benefits are immense, but unfortunately not every school or every year group or every pupil has that opportunity to engage. So, can I ask how many staff are currently working on public engagement within Cadw? Has that team increased? Are there any plans to increase it? And are there any plans in terms of any profit? Because obviously, in terms of some of our sites for Cadw, there is a charge there, so how is that reinvested, then, in terms of public engagement? I know that, previously, it was a very small team working in terms of public engagement—doing a fantastic job, but just not enough of them, which meant that their resources had to be targeted. And seeing that it's not universal is something that, perhaps, I'd like to get clarity on.

And finally, if I may, just in terms of Cadw, I think it is important, and I would counter some of Joel James's comments. Heritage is powerful and we shouldn't be scared of taking a stance sometimes and questioning some beliefs. My experience of going to some Cadw sites as a child, as a teenager, even as an adult, was being frustrated at the lack of Welsh history on display there. It is improving, but not everywhere. We had a lively debate around Sycharth and should that be a Cadw site. You know my views very clearly on that, but I do think that there's still this emphasis on a narrative of Edward I, dominant castles and so on, and, some of our smaller sites, perhaps we are not fully realising them in terms of their potential for exactly what this statement describes. So, can I ask, in terms of that universal opportunity to engage in our heritage, how do we ensure that we are maximising the impact of every Cadw site in Wales and ensuring everybody can participate, not just those who are lucky enough to be invited to or find out by chance?

Well, thank you, Heledd for those comments. As usual, I find that, when I listen to you speak, your passion for heritage is something that resonates, and there's nothing that you say that I disagree with. So, we're not starting on opposite sides of the table on any of this stuff. 

Can I just start with Roger Lewis and the governance review? As you know, he's started that governance review. I asked him to look at that earlier in the year and I'm waiting for his report now. I know we're trying to arrange a meeting at the moment. This was a governance review that had already been set in train from the last review in 2017, so this is a commitment that we gave in that review, and I know that he has been engaging far and wide with interested parties across the sector. So, I'm hoping that I should have the final report by the end of November, and that will be something that I will obviously be making a statement on when that is published. And we can certainly have a conversation about its content and where that takes us at that point.

I absolutely agree with everything that you say about heritage and culture. These are not just 'nice to have' things. These are things that don't necessarily sit with people as being vital, like the health service does, or, you know, 20 mph, all of that kind of stuff. So, I absolutely understand that the headline stuff that we see are the things that impact on people in their day-to-day lives, whether it’s transport, whether it’s the health service, whatever it might be, but I am absolutely clear that heritage and culture is something that is integral to our way of life, and it absolutely contributes to the health and wellbeing of the nation. It is what we're trying to do in establishing the national contemporary art gallery, and making sure that we have a dispersed model that takes our contemporary art out to people across the whole of Wales and doesn’t rely on people coming to it. I think that that’s what we need to do with our cultural sites, and Cadw has a huge part to play in that through the engagement that you've talked about and through the volunteering that you've talked about.

Now, unfortunately, Heledd, I don’t have those kinds of figures at my fingertips, but I will make sure that you have that, in terms of at how many sites we offer volunteering opportunities. That is growing. We would like to see more. At some of our sites, of course, we don’t have any staffing at all; there are no custodians there. Where we have significant sites with a number of custodians, then those tend to be the sites where we have volunteers because, obviously, they need to work alongside people who are employed by Cadw as custodians as well. But I will make sure that you have that information about how many sites and where we're looking to improve that. Because the key part of Cadw’s work is engagement in the community and engagement in schools, so I'll make sure that you have all of that information provided to you.

The narrative on smaller sites—I absolutely agree with you. This is why the Open Doors month is so important. When you look at the sites where the doors literally open for people, some of these are sites where, again, we don’t have custodians there, we don’t have volunteers there, but they play an integral part in our history and our heritage. So, we need to have the opportunity for those sites to be open and available to people at least part of the year, if not all of the year.

Unfortunately, a lot of this does come down to what funding is available. In an ideal world, of course, we would have far more money for our heritage sites, and we would be able to invest far more in our heritage sites. But Cadw has a very clear responsibility for maintaining and ensuring that our sites are protected and are maintained. This is why the question that Joel James was raising earlier on, about heritage skills, is really important as well. Because if we are going to protect these sites into the future, we need to have people with the skills that can do that as well.

Thank you for your statement today. I've learned so much more about what Cadw does, so it was really welcome. Last week, we debated a petition about preserving and protecting Owain Glyndŵr's home, Sycharth, and how the bards connected communities with news and told the stories of history through the ages, so we didn't forget. And the new curriculum asks children to search out what it means to be Welsh as a project. I spent time on a project recording elderly people of the village, who talked about what it was like growing up 70 to 80 years ago in the village. Stories are captured in local books, but they are quite scarce. So, I was wondering how is the Welsh Government working to protect the stories that our local communities hold so dear, so that they can be enjoyed for generations to come.

Well, I think that that is hugely important. I saw my own children coming home from school when they were younger, and they were doing projects in school and speaking to my mother and my grandmother—who died a long time ago, but she was their great-gran—and actually asking her about what it was like growing up in the war. If we don't capture those stories, we lose them. So, it's not the big, historical stories, is it? It is about the everyday lives that people led, and we need to make sure that we have a record of that.

I'm absolutely determined that, within the national curriculum, we make space for that to happen, because that is part of the Welsh heritage that we were talking about. It is part—. For the first time, we do have Welsh history in the curriculum. But, as I say, that Welsh history is not all about Owain Glyndŵr and all the fighting knights and Edward I. It's about ordinary people, and it's ordinary people who make history. So, I'm absolutely determined that we should be able to do that. And everything else that we're doing around Cadw, whether it is through the 'Anti-racist Wales Action Plan', whether it is through our other equality policies, the LGBTQ action plan, whether it is through the work that we do with our archaeological trusts, where we provide grants for them to make sure that we have a record of things that we're about to lose—. I went to visit the—I'm just trying to think of the name of the place—Porth y Rhaw promontory fort in Pembrokeshire. And we're going to lose it; we know we're going to lose it because the cliff is crumbling. And so it's really important that the archaeological trust is out there, with grants from Cadw, to record that for posterity. So, lots that is being done, Carolyn, and lots more that needs to be done. But I do think that the young custodian scheme is crucial to that, as well; getting as many young people involved with actually working with our heritage sites as well I think would be—. To increase that I think would be enormously helpful in terms of the work that we're trying to do to record all of that.

One thing I would also say, just very briefly, is about the digital work that Cadw is doing, because that is hugely important for recording our history as well. I talked in my statement about the work that we did to record local history; we had something called 15-Minute Heritage, which was on the Cadw site, so when we were in lockdown and people could only go out for an hour a day, you could go onto the Cadw website and literally have a look and see what was available within a 15-minute walk of your home, and, how people connected with their local history during that time, that's what we're looking to continue. And we've been able to digitise a lot of that information so that we do have digital access to our history, as well as the physical access to it, because not everybody can get out to all of those sites.

Can I declare an interest as a trustee of the Evan Roberts Institute, an organisation that promotes faith heritage here in Wales?

Minister, I'm delighted to hear your words, in your response to Joel James, about the work that the Welsh Government wants to do to engage with faith communities to protect that aspect of Welsh heritage. I think it's very important that the Welsh Government is a facilitator, if you like. I appreciate that there's only so much money that can go around, but, certainly, there are some very unique faith heritage buildings that have been at risk over the years—I can think of one in your own constituency, for example, which, I'm delighted, now has its future safeguarded, the synagogue in Merthyr Tydfil. There are many others, of course, across Wales and no doubt desperate pleas could be made in respect of many of them. I'm also a member of Capel, which is the Welsh chapels heritage society, which works closely with Addoldai Cymru and other organisations to try and identify the very best examples of faith architecture, if you like, across Wales to make sure that we don't lose them for future generations. I wonder whether the Welsh Government would consider having a summit of all those organisations that are interested in faith heritage, bringing people together so that we can have a round-table, commonsense discussion on how we can identify those buildings across Wales that are very important and are really unique in all corners of the country, to make sure that the limited resources that we do have can be focused, if you like, on the very best examples of those buildings.

And if I may, there was a reference to military heritage as well. I know we've had some correspondence on this in my capacity as chair of the cross-party group on the armed forces and cadets, but I really do think that there is a need for a national military museum in Wales. We have a number of national museums, all of which I think are absolutely superb in terms of conveying the story of Wales to people. I think a national military museum is something that is missing from the offer at the moment; there's nowhere where people can go and learn about the history of the Royal Air Force in Wales or the Royal Navy here in Wales. We've got a number of army museums, but they don't really act as a network, and I wonder to what extent you'd be prepared to discuss with the cross-party group the possibility of trying, again, just to give an opportunity for those local stories and national stories to be told in terms of our military heritage here in Wales.

I thank Darren Millar for those points. In fact, if I deal with that last one first, because you did write to me, Darren, and I responded to you at that time. I'm not sure that things have moved on any further from when I wrote to you about that, but I absolutely acknowledge the points that you're making about the need to have somewhere where our military history is accessible to everyone. Now, whether that needs to be—this is something we talked about—a new-build museum, and I don't know where the money for that will come from—that's the starting point for everything at the moment, and I know you understand that—but that doesn't mean that we can't find some more imaginative ways of making sure that this is done.

I was interested when you spoke to me about this recently that there isn't actually anywhere where you can go to see the RAF or the navy. We've got army museums, but we don't have anywhere to look at the contribution that the other services have made to Welsh life. So, I think there is still a conversation to be had. I think there is still something that we could look at and we could probably involve Amgueddfa Cymru in all of that. I can't stand here and say that we're going to present you with a shiny new museum, but I think that there are ways that we can work with the existing structures to see what we can do, so I'm happy to continue having that conversation.

In terms of the faith heritage, again, I think if we can have a conversation about how we can promote faith heritage more effectively than we do now, then I would, again, be more than happy to do that. Actually, in advance of this statement today, I received a letter from the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales, who talked to me about the Catholic churches in Wales and how they've been overlooked in terms of listing and so on. So, I'm conscious that this, as you say, goes across all denominations.

You referenced the synagogue in Merthyr Tydfil, which is going to be absolutely amazing, but what has happened is somebody has got hold of that building and they have worked tirelessly to get funding for it, so Welsh Government have contributed, but there are private investors, Cadw is involved and we will end up with a national Jewish heritage centre on that site for the whole of Wales. It will be absolutely fantastic.

So, yes, I absolutely get it. Some of the churches and chapels that we've got across Wales, they tell a story in and of themselves of faith across the country. So, again, if there is something we can do, Darren, in terms of talking about how we might be able to bring people together, with the limited resources that you've identified, to see if we can do more about promoting faith heritage, then I'm absolutely happy to do that.

And finally, Sioned Williams.

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. As someone who's long campaigned for the heritage sites of Neath to have better access and to be better promoted, it was good to hear you mention Neath abbey, Deputy Minister, and the positive response of Dwr-y-Felin school pupils to the young custodian scheme there. I really welcome the aim of increasing the engagement of communities with these sites, but that engagement, do you agree, must be inclusive? Neath abbey has four parking spaces, none of which are disabled; there are no toilets, disabled or otherwise; there's no cafe or visitor centre, nowhere you can buy a postcard, let alone a guidebook; and Cadw's website calls it one of the most

'impressive monastic remains in south-east Wales.' 

I can assure you it's not in south-east Wales.

So, Neath abbey ironworks nearby is equally impressive, an important site of the industrial era, and the Friends of Neath Abbey Ironworks do an incredible job there as volunteers, excavating the site, holding work days, and it's recently been one of the open door days with Cadw. But I'd like to know, both, how are you going to improve access to these sites and also better promotion of these sites, bringing all these sites together in one imaginative heritage offer for places like Neath that really need it?

Thank you, Sioned, for those comments. Now, I'm not particularly familiar with Neath abbey. It's not a part of the world I'm particularly familiar with, as I've spent most of my life around south-east Wales, and I'll make sure that the website's amended to correctly locate where Neath abbey is. But I am going to Neath abbey on Thursday as part of the celebration of tourism for tourism week. So, Neath abbey is on my list for Thursday, so I'll get the opportunity to have a look at that first-hand and see for myself what we think may need to be done.

As you say, it absolutely is a scheduled monument that needs to be protected, and people encouraged to see it. And it’s striking that balance—we talked about this with Sycharth, didn’t we—striking the balance between ensuring that a scheduled monument, something that is so important to our history, is accessible to the public and that we encourage people to engage with and to visit, but that we ensure that that in itself doesn’t damage the building and the site. So, we have to manage that very effectively, yes.

So, it does need to be managed effectively, but I take your point: there’s a lot of work that needs to be done there. The young custodians initiative there, that you talked about, that’s creating all those kinds of partnerships that we want to see, bringing these sites to life. But I will take a good look at the issues that you’ve raised today, Sioned, when I visit Neath abbey on Thursday, and I will get back to you and perhaps have a conversation with you about what we can or can’t do on the site.

I thank the Deputy Minister and that brings today’s proceedings to a close. Thank you, all.