Cynulliad Cenedlaethol Cymru

I call Members to order. 

The first item on our agenda this afternoon is questions to the Minister for Economy and Transport, and the first question is from Paul Davies. 

Via Superfast Cymru, we have provided over 111,350 premises across west Wales with average broadband speeds of 82 Mbps, investing over £32.3 million. Our successor scheme will provide connectivity to a further 1,348 premises, alongside support from Access Broadband Cymru and the Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme. And a new community fund is also being developed. 

I appreciate that response from the Deputy Minister. I've previously raised the situation faced by the people of Mynachlog-ddu in my constituency, who, unfortunately, experience a slow and intermittent broadband service, coupled with stranded technology where wires are effectively hanging on poles. As the Deputy Minister will know, Pembrokeshire is currently twentieth out of the 22 local authorities when it comes to the number of premises in Wales where broadband infrastructure operators are present. I appreciate that the Welsh Government has launched a £10 million rural broadband fund recently. So, can I ask the Deputy Minister how he intends to ensure that this funding reaches counties like Pembrokeshire, and when will that much needed funding be delivered so that communities like Mynachlog-ddu can be confident that their situation is being addressed?

Well, thank you very much, and I have sympathy with the people of Mynachlog-ddu, because, clearly, this is a vital piece of connectivity we now all rely upon. But I repeat again to the Member that this is not a devolved matter. The UK Government has the lead responsibility for connecting people through telecommunications policies, and this is an area where they should be taking the lead, and have failed to take the lead. Now, due to that failure, we instead have stepped in, and we've made significant progress—95 per cent of people in Wales are now connected to superfast schemes, and we've diverted funding from devolved areas into this non-devolved area because of market failure and UK Government inaction. Some £200 million in total has been spent. 

So, I do get a little fed up when I get letters from Conservative MPs in particular, asking what more is the Government going to do about this, when this is their own Government's responsibility that they have not discharged. I appreciate that's not the answer the Member is looking for, but it's a truth he must confront.

I did have a very good meeting on Monday with Councillor Paul Miller, the cabinet member for economy in Pembrokeshire, and clearly the local authority are taking a very active role, which I commend them for. They have appointed now a digital team, as have Carmarthenshire, which I commend. They are working with the UK Government on a bid for £4 million through the Local Full Fibre Networks programme to connect 80 public sector sites, which they then should be able to span off into private connections. And they're also looking at how they can aggregate the vouchers that are available through the creation of 88 zones, which can further connect households.

As Paul Davies has mentioned, I've announced a £10 million fund, which is specifically looking at unconventional approaches to this, because, especially in deep rural areas, getting full fibre connection direct to premises, to houses, many of which are not connected to mains gas or sewerage, is a stretch, especially if the UK Government aren't prepared to intervene. Boris Johnson, in his leadership campaign, made extravagant promises on this front and I look forward to seeing them fleshed out, because he is right to say that this is an area of digital infrastructure that really does need more attention. 

But the £10 million fund is being co-produced with the local authorities, including Pembrokeshire. We hope to have those bids by April to start spending that money, and look to see how we can connect those people who have yet benefited from the intervention the Welsh Government's made when the UK Government failed to act. 

I agree with you, Minister, that Paul Davies would be better off asking his masters from Westminster about having some money here to fund something that they are ultimately responsible for. And the other thing, of course, is, because we have, the Welsh Government have had to invest money in a non-devolved area, they will be asking us for funds for something else that is devolved, and we've had to use our funds to fill in the gap that they've refused to fill.

But there's another gap that is potentially coming along the way, and there has been significant EU money invested in delivering superfast broadband. So, I think the other question is: where and how sure are you that we are going to have access to those funds in the future, through your good offices, assuming that you've had those conversations with Westminster? And I'm also assuming, since Paul Davies is so concerned about it, that he's had those conversations as well.

Thank you very much. Joyce Watson is absolutely right to point out the European dimension to this, because the £200 million that we invested in Superfast Cymru was a combination of UK Government funding, European funding, and Welsh Government funding. So there was a contribution from the UK Government, but it took the Welsh Government's leadership to put that package together, and deploy that money, and manage that money, in an area that should have been done from Westminster. And now, as we look forward to what happens after we're outside of the EU, there remains a gap. We're currently carrying out an open market review, which allows us to gather information about the plans of commercial providers for future roll-out. And through that, we will then have an accurate picture of where the gaps remain. We'll be working with the UK Government to make sure we can marshal and draw down the investment to fill those gaps. But as I repeat, it does take the leadership of the UK Government to step into that space in a non-devolved area to bring the investment and make it happen, and not simply rely on us to make it so.

Yes. We have created a special taskforce group to investigate the issues around pavement parking and decide on how best to implement a solution to this problem. The group is due to report on its findings in June of this year.

I've had concerns, via e-mail and letter, from constituents who are concerned about pavement parking. Many new housing developments are being constructed with very narrow carriageways and insufficient space for cars. That applies to the Cwm Calon Redrow development in my constituency, which is a relatively new development, and people have no choice, because of the bad design by Redrow, but to park on the pavements. One particular issue that any further steps need to consider also is the issue of contractors and trades vehicles that people are driving home from work. These have caused significant obstructions in various different parts of my constituency, and I think it's a planning as much as it is a transport issue, which needs to be addressed. I feel the way forward, following the task group, would be to examine how further consultation will happen, and residents must be included in that, but also developers too. So, can you tell me, once the task group reports, what will be the further plans and how will that then be taken forward?

Thank you. I think all of us have fresh experience of walking miles around our constituencies in recent months, and we'll have seen for ourselves that this is a problem in a variety of communities. And Hefin David is absolutely right: in some, especially the newer estates, households, especially if they have more than one car, often don't really have much alternative other than parking on the pavement. That is why I'm concerned that, when I set up this taskforce, we need to have a solution that meets the realities of the communities that we now have.

So, Phil Jones, who did excellent work for the Welsh Government in coming up with our active travel design guidance, is leading this taskforce for us, and the taskforce on 20 mph speed limits. And I want to see both of them as part of the same solution. Because pavement parking is a symptom of our society's car dependency—it's not the cause of it. And we do need to address these negative effects, what is, in effect, anti-social behaviour in many cases—the careless way and thoughtless way that many people do park—but also, rolled into that, as Hefin David points out, in some areas there's little choice but to do that.

So, that's why the taskforce that Phil Jones has brought together is a pragmatic one. It's got to find a solution that works, that doesn't alienate people and turn people away from the broader cause of behaviour change that we're trying to achieve, and that doesn't make life more difficult for already stretched local authorities. This has to be something that's going to work. So, we've a range of work streams: communications is one of them, because this needs to be, ultimately, about behaviour change. It also has to be about enforcement. So, essentially, we have two options: we either have a blanket approach, which tries to ban all pavement parking, and there are some questions about whether or not we have the powers to do that, or we have a more discriminating approach, which gives local authorities the powers, through civil enforcement, to address hotspots, as they see fit. Now, I'm not going to prejudge the recommendations of the expert panel on this, but as I said, the important thing is that we need to address the problem because it is a problem, but we need to address it in a way that's not going to penalise people and make life more difficult, and it has to work in the longer term.

Can I add my voice to that of Hefin? I think we've all had casework as well as observing really poor practice. I commend Living Streets Cymru, which commissioned a research survey of over 1,000 people—so that's a lot of people in Wales—and that found that 83 per cent of respondents favoured banning pavement parking. Now, I know, in practice, that would create some problems, particularly in those areas that have been so badly designed that there's little option but to park on the pavement or on part of the pavement, but the basic principle should be that you should not obstruct pavements. What on earth are parents with pushchairs or people who are wheelchair-dependent, or just pedestrians, supposed to do?

This is not the way we should be conducting the design of new urban spaces. But it's a long-standing problem in many areas where people really don't have to park on the pavement, but they do so because then it allows traffic to flow in urban areas both ways. Sometimes, we should see that queuing traffic as part of traffic control, and you don't have a right to race through at any speed just to get from A to B. The pedestrian ought to start to be king here.

I thank David Melding for that. As well as commending Living Streets for their research, I would have hoped that he would have commended the Welsh Government for taking action in this area. We are working closely with Living Streets. As I say, he's highlighted some of the complexities that are involved in introducing a ban, and we are going to work through those. Because the current legislation available is a complex mix of criminal and civil sanctions.

So, it will take time to decide what is the best option to proceed with this for Wales, but I hope to keep Members informed over the coming months and provide some briefings about how exactly we intend to do that. But as I say, we need to see this as part of the broader suite of measures we have, alongside 20 mph speed limits, to start bringing about modal shift and addressing the dominance the car has in our society, but that'll only work if we give people alternatives as well.

I'm grateful this matter has been raised because there's another issue in Caerphilly that I'm sure that you'll be aware of, where local residents are unable to park and it's in Bryn Heol in Bedwas, where the residents have just been left exasperated by Caerphilly County Borough Council's indecision or the lack of any action to deal with the problem. They're told they can't park outside their houses on the street, but they also can't park on the pavement for obvious reasons. And the council had announced that they were going to be taking action to help them, but then they've withdrawn from doing that. So, obviously, whilst I completely support what the Government is doing in terms of its ambition to ban pavement parking, would the Deputy Minister agree with me that, in order for this to work, appropriate parking spaces have to be provided by local authorities so that residents can park safely outside their own homes?

I think we shouldn't knock local authorities here because they are in a very difficult position. The problem at heart is the number of cars many of us now own. And the streets simply were not designed to cater for the volume of vehicles that are trying to squeeze into a street that was designed for the horse and cart.

So, it's not simply a case of providing extra land for more car parking, because where will that end? And is this the best use of land in our community—providing it for cars? Surely the real answer is to try and give people alternatives so that they don't need to own multiple cars in their households, and there are other ways to move around.

I think the advent of electric cars and driverless cars, where cars are far less likely to be owned, they're more likely to be leased and shared because the capital costs will be so high—it will be on-demand, responsive transport, and this is only 15 to 20 years away. So, technology does offer us some solution here.

In the short term, councils do have a very difficult problem of trying to arbitrate between these conflicting demands that people have to want to park as closely as possible to where they live. I think we need to give them a set of tools where they can use their judgment of what's right for their communities, but also send the very clear signal that parking willy-nilly where they want when that's blocking people with pushchairs and disabilities from getting around isn't on.

Questions now from the party spokespeople. Conservative spokesperson, Russell George.

Diolch, Llywydd. Minister, do you believe that the Welsh Government's support for business represents value for money?

Absolutely, and I'm sure that the Member would welcome the fact that, as a consequence of the hard work by businesses and organisations and, of course, the Welsh Government, we have now achieved the lowest ever rate of unemployment in Wales, the lowest level since records began, just 3 per cent lower than the UK average of 3.8 per cent. Moreover, I'm sure the Member will welcome the fact that gross value added and GVA per head in Wales is growing faster than at the UK level and that we have a higher business birthrate in Wales than the UK.

Thank you for your answer, Minister. My question was specifically about businesses having good value for money when it comes to Welsh Government support. Following the work looking at the Welsh Government's financial support for business, the Public Accounts Committee, of course, questioned the Welsh Government's support for business and has said that it is concerning and unacceptable that the Welsh Government has failed to fulfil its own commitment to report publicly on its progress in delivering its previous economic strategy. The committee was, I think, fairly scathing in saying that the failure has hindered accountability and effective scrutiny by this Senedd. So, I do wonder if the failure is because your Government is embarrassed by its record on the delivery of the economy over the last 20 years. And for the sake of accountability and transparency, can you outline what specific steps that you will be taking in the future to report on the outputs achieved each year by the Welsh Government's business support activities?

Can I just deal with the final point first, Llywydd? We have administered the help of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development to examine key performance indicators and to monitor outputs in terms of economic development in Wales. But in terms of looking at the record on employment and the economy over the last 20 years, in addition to us now having the lowest level of unemployment since records began, we also have at or near to record numbers of people in work; inactivity rates have been coming down consistently over the last few years. We now have, in this Assembly term alone, 75,000 apprenticeship opportunities established and taken by ambitious people in Wales. In contrast to that, across the border in England, apprenticeship figures have fallen off a cliff, because they ripped up an established method of providing apprenticeship support and introduced a bizarre mechanism of taxing businesses for employing people.

I'm confident that as a consequence of our interventions, including those by Business Wales, we have been able to establish a strong and resilient business community in Wales that is employing people at record numbers and driving up GVA and productivity rates at a higher and faster rate than the UK.

Well, thank you for your answer, Minister, but we are on the fourth economic strategy—all of which have sadly failed to improve the Welsh economy, and I say that and I look at your education Minister who has previously said that she was concerned that being the bottom of every public service table is now just becoming a habit. When it comes to economic productivity, we are at the bottom, sadly, of the league table, and when it comes to weekly earnings, we're at the bottom of the league table again. And when it comes to regional inequality, Anglesey languishes way behind Cardiff, and your Deputy Minister himself says the truth is we don't really know what we're doing on the economy.

What I would suggest we need is a fresh and ambitious Welsh Government that is proud of publicly reporting on its progress on delivering the new economic direction that our country needs, rather than hiding behind public scrutiny. We need a Government that supports small business, for example, by scrapping business rates for small businesses, and a Government that will roll out ultrafast broadband for every business, and has the correct rail and road infrastructure to help businesses to grow.

So, would you agree with me that we need a Welsh Government that has the same ambition and positive vision for the Welsh economy as the new UK Government has and to take advantages of the opportunities of Brexit and selling Wales to the world and unleash Wales's potential? Are we—when are we going to have, Minister, I would ask, the kind of business support that the Government itself can be proud of and demonstrate overall value for money of its own financial support for businesses?

What the people want is access to high-quality jobs. That's precisely what our economic strategy has and is delivering. We're creating jobs at record numbers, jobs of a higher quality, jobs that people can access. We've got a skills training system that is the envy of the rest of the United Kingdom, and you can take, as I've just mentioned, the apprenticeship completion rates, for example, which remain higher than the English average—far higher than the English average. We have also access to a development bank that, again, is the envy of the rest of the UK. Governments in Scotland and beyond are looking at the Development Bank of Wales, examining how they can replicate the services that are offered here in our country.

I would welcome any expression of optimism in a bright future, but you have to back it up with cash, you have to back it up with investment. And the fact of the matter is that over the past 10 years, there's been a £1 billion raid on rail infrastructure in Wales. Now, as we approach the budget in March, I pledge this, Llywydd: I will work hand in hand with the UK Government in delivering better rail infrastructure in Wales if they do what they are meant to do, which is to invest in it properly. The underinvestment in Wales's rail infrastructure must end, and it can do so in the budget in March.

Plaid Cymru spokesperson, Helen Mary Jones.

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. It's my pleasure to address this Chamber for the first time in my new role as the shadow Minister for the economy, tackling poverty and transport.

I was interested to hear the Minister say in his response to Russell George that he feels that our economy is doing well and we have to accept that, yes, we do have a low rate of unemployment. But I wonder if the Minister would accept that that reflects underemployment—many people doing part-time jobs. It reflects a situation where many families are working very hard for very low wages, and while they may be employed, they are hardly living well when we have a third of our children in poverty. I think one of the things that I very much hope in this role is that we will avoid any complacency from the Welsh Government, because while things may be better than they might have been without some Welsh Government interventions, as I say, we still have a third of our children living in poverty, and the majority of those children living in poverty have working parents, sometimes two working parents.

I want to turn to a specific major recent Welsh Government investment. Given the scale of the Welsh Government investment and stake in Aston Martin, can I ask the Minister what assessment he has made of the recent situation, the developing situation, with regard to the company's position?

Yes. Can I first of all welcome Helen Mary Jones to the role? I believe you are the third Plaid Cymru spokesperson to take this particular role during my time as economy Minister, and I hope it's third time lucky, that you'll see it out in the next election, and that we have many opportunities to debate the economy and transport system in our country.

I would agree that in terms of employment figures, they often mask other challenges, and we still do have a challenge in terms of underemployment and in terms of presenteeism, and that's precisely why this Government is determined to press forward with the fair work agenda.

In terms of Aston Martin, Llywydd, this is an investment that the Welsh Government is very proud of, and I would really wish to see the Member welcome the investment that the Government has made in Aston Martin and the investment that the company is making in Wales, because it will contribute, over the next 30 years, £0.5 billion to the Welsh economy. It will lead to the employment of 1,000 people in south Wales, and many, many more opportunities in the supply chain.

Now, of course, there's been much speculation recently regarding the financial position of Aston Martin, not least because there was speculation that a major stake could be taken in the company. We are constantly assured that the Bro Tathan site is the future of Aston Martin, that it is its main concern right now and will be in the years to come, as it develops the south Wales facility as the home of electrification in Wales.

We also know, Llywydd, that the new model, the DBX, has already secured orders of almost 2,000 units. That's a phenomenal success for a luxury brand so soon after announcing the development of a sport utility vehicle of this type and so soon after unveiling it. The future of the company is very bright indeed. It will be unveiling a new car every year for the next seven years, driving not just the number of units that it produces, but also its profitability.

I'm grateful to the Minister, both for his kind words with regard to my new portfolio and with regard to what he's told us about the position with Aston Martin. But I would submit that there are still some questions for which we need answers and that there are some concerns. I mean, the fact is that Aston Martin sales have fallen overall by 16 per cent from July 2019 to September 2019. The Welsh Government has pledged £18.8 million, which is a very substantial chunk of investment, and, of course, in return, as the Minister has said, Aston Martin has said that they will make the St Athan plant its home for electrification. But we're now seeing reports that the company will be scrapping the flagship electric car, and we need to know whether that is the case because we want, I'm sure, the Welsh Government investment to be supporting the green economy.

I just specifically want to ask the Minister, in the light of the 30-year guarantee given by the Welsh Government that will see Welsh taxpayers' money covering the rent for Aston Martin if they decide to leave the St Athan plant—and I very much hope that the Minister is right and that that will never happen, but if they were to do so—I think we need more transparency in terms of the arrangements and the commitments to Aston Martin, particularly with regard to the 30-year guarantee. What would the cost be to the public purse if Aston Martin did have to withdraw?

It's a superfluous question, because the future of Aston Martin is incredibly bright. I still haven't heard any Plaid Cymru spokesperson welcome the fact that we have Aston Martin in Wales. This was a huge success story for the Welsh Government. It was a historic moment when we were able to announce the fact that Aston Martin were coming to Wales, because it's the first time in over 50 years that cars are actually being produced in our country. Yes, sales were down, but operating costs and higher selling costs also contributed to the profit falling. However, we know from the sales figures of the DBX that the company is turning its fortunes around. And as it announces and then unveils more models, it will further increase the number of sales that it achieves.

Well, I'm slightly disappointed, Llywydd, that the Minister didn't hear what I said, because I said that I very much hope that this would be successful, but I think there are concerns. The Minister has to acknowledge that there are concerns. Aston Martin is saddled with a $1 billion debt, it finished last year with just £138 million in cash, and that doesn't sound to me like a company that we can be 100 per cent sure is secure.

Now, I would put it to the Minister that this type of investment really reflects a kind of old-fashioned approach to where we need to spend our economic development money. Flagship companies may have their place, but surely we should be putting this level of investment—as the Deputy Minister has said in the past, the old-fashioned approach of bringing big international companies in doesn't work terribly well, and I would agree that we need to be focusing our investment into growing middle-sized companies, into looking at the contribution of the foundation economy and the green economy.

So, if the Minister is so confident that the future of Aston Martin is secure—and I hope he's right, let me make that absolutely clear, and so does everybody else on these benches—I must press the Minister to publish his correspondence with Aston Martin prior to setting up the deal. I completely understand that there may be ongoing conversations that are commercially confidential, but once the deal has been sealed, these things ought to be in the public domain so that we can all scrutinise this level of investment and be sure that it is as secure as the Minister would have us believe, which I very much hope it is.

Look, we have heard it now. Plaid Cymru would not have supported an investment in Aston Martin Lagonda. We've heard it here. It's very, very clear: Plaid Cymru would not have invested in 1,000 jobs in a flagship company for the Welsh economy. I think it's important now that the people of Wales recognise that that is Plaid Cymru's position. You would have spent the money elsewhere.

We have already trebled the value of the foundational economy fund, a fund that is designed to drive innovation in the foundational economy, and it does sound to me that rather than welcome—which I still haven't heard—Aston Martin to Wales, there is a wish that it will fail. Now, the fact of the matter is that the Aston Martin Lagonda brand has been with us for decades upon decades. It's regarded globally as one of the highest quality automotive brands in existence, and far from—[Interruption.] It is good news. It is good news, and Members around this Chamber should start welcoming the fact that we have record employment figures in this country, that we have record low unemployment figures in this country, that the productivity rate of this country is rising faster than the UK, and people should stop talking down Wales.

Brexit Party spokesperson, David Rowlands.

Diolch, Llywydd. Well, can I start by saying that Brexit still congratulates you on you bringing such an iconic mark to Wales and you will have our continued support in your operations with that company?

Would the Minister consider supporting the use of co-operatives to rejuvenate our town centres and high streets?

Yes, very much so, and this is something that I know the Deputy Minister is looking at very keenly, as well as my Deputy Minister, with specific regard to growing the foundational economy—those areas of, if you like, mundane economic activity that contribute so much to employment in Wales.

I thank you for that response, Minister. The reason I posed this question is to acknowledge co-operatives as a dynamic, thriving sector of the Welsh economy. Not only are there many individual co-operatives doing well, the sector as a whole is outperforming other types of businesses. Eight of Wales's co-operatives are in the top 100, by turnover, of UK co-operatives. These eight alone have a turnover of more than £165 million.

With the decline of our high streets and town centres, is it not now time to look at promoting co-operatives where there are gaps in a town's retail make-up? The Brexit Party believes the Welsh Government should give financial and administrative support for such initiatives, perhaps even encouraging the Development Bank of Wales and Business Wales to put in place specific departments to deal with co-operative set-ups. There could also be the possibility of aligning co-operatives with credit union organisations.

My Deputy Minister has just reminded me that we are funding the social entrepreneurs academy. We are also funding Business Wales, of course, to take care of the needs of social businesses in Wales. And we also support the Wales Co-operative Centre, where magnificent work is done in supporting co-operatives across the country. My view of co-operatives is that they are absolutely vital in driving inclusive growth—fair growth—across all communities in Wales, as well as contributing to that important agenda that I've already mentioned, which is fair work.

Well, a vast amount, including the £5 billion rail franchise agreement and hundreds of millions of pounds for improved roads; specifically, £600 million for improved roads in the Member's region of north Wales.

I'm very grateful for that response. One of the key routes, of course, in Wales is the east-west route along the A55 corridor, which as you've already indicated does go through my constituency. Now, I know that there has been some effort by the Welsh Government to invest in some of the pinch points along that road. But would you agree with me that it's time that we had a major upgrade of the A55, so that we can lift it into a motorway status, where it receives the significant investment that it needs in order to cope with the demands that are being placed upon it? As the main artery in and out of north Wales, it is the economic lifeblood for the region, and we need to make sure that we deal with the congestion that is regularly appearing on there in a much more substantial way than we've done to date. 

Can I thank the Member for his question? It gives me an opportunity to update him and others on how much we are spending on road improvements and pinch points in north Wales. Our list of improvements amounts to £600 million, and it stretches from the far west of north Wales, right across to the border with England—hugely important programmes of work on the A55 that will improve cross-border and cross-community transport, utilising the main artery of north Wales. 

But it must be said that it's not just about roads, rail is vitally important as well in terms of east-west travel. That's why I am hopeful that, at the budget, the UK Government will make a down payment of £215 million, which is roughly per capita what we would have expected to have been spent in north Wales had the UK Government delivered the same amount of investment to the region as it did to other parts of England.

Minister, transport networks are more effective when they combine modes of travel and modes of transport—buses linking into rail stations and railway links. That approach allows us, as the Deputy Minister answered in an earlier question, to be more effective in our transportation system. However, when there are no buses moving along, we have problems in putting that combination together.

We see many problems with buses. I know that a Bill is going to come forward through the Welsh Government on improving buses, but if the buses aren't going to be there in a year's time or in two years' time, when local authorities will have the ability to regulate them, we are going to have a huge problem, because those people are going to lose out.

What can you do now to ensure that those bus services are going to be working for people, both in the Valleys, in the Afan valley, and across many other communities? We are seeing buses being cut because the operator is seeing commercial opportunities disappearing. They see that it is no longer commercially viable. Now, if we want those people to work around the area and to be able to access jobs because they are using a combination of networks, the basic one is the bus. Will you ensure that we have bus services, please?  

Three things in response to Dai Rees's question. First of all, you're right: the Bill will achieve much in terms of giving local authorities a range of tools that they've been deprived of for several decades. But the Bill alone will not solve the problems that we face with bus services across Wales. The bus services support grant is vitally important. We've been able to maintain it through a sustained period of austerity at £25 million a year, but I need to make a very clear statement regarding the continuation of the BSSG. There will be an expectation that this money that the Welsh Government makes available to local authorities is in addition to, not in place of, local authorities' own funding. It's absolutely vital that local authorities, even during this period of austerity, are able to make contributions to local bus services. And the third point I would make, Llywydd, concerns the legislation being taken forward by the Minister for Housing and Local Government, and specifically the ability for local authorities to be able to plan transport interventions, specifically bus services, on a regional basis. The establishment of corporate joint committees will be invaluable in this regard.

Minister, as you know, there's a great deal of frustration and impatience at the fact that the Newport to Ebbw Vale passenger rail link is yet to be established. Are you able to give us an update today regarding the necessary work to make that link a reality?

Yes, of course. As the Member is aware, Transport for Wales have undertaken an outline business case study of the Ebbw Vale line on behalf of the Welsh Government, and we are now reviewing its findings in order to set out next steps. I can confirm also that the outline business case has identified an estimate of the total capital cost to achieve four trains per hour on the Ebbw Vale line.

It's important to note that this route is owned and maintained by Network Rail and, as a consequence, it's answerable to the Department for Transport. Therefore, the ability to deliver any infrastructure improvements over the coming years will be wholly dependent on full UK Government support. I will, Llywydd, make a further announcement on future opportunities for improving services very shortly.

Question 4, Gareth Bennett.

Diolch, Llywydd. Minister, there was some discussion in the Chamber yesterday about the proposed—

Would you ask the question on the order paper? Question 4.

Sorry. Apologies. 

Thank you. We continue to work with Transport for Wales and with local authorities to transform our transport network not only in South Wales Central, but across the whole of Wales, so that it truly does become sustainable and fit for future generations.

Yes, thanks for the answer. I was just trying to say, there was a little bit of discussion yesterday about the proposed congestion charge—that you're going to be involved in compiling the report with Cardiff county council, and that's good news, that there is going to be some hopefully meaningful liaison between the two of you.

Now, could I just raise one of many issues that you may need to consider? It's connected to something that a couple of your own party's Valleys Members have raised recently, which is people who can't get into Cardiff in time for work due to the problems of late services or changes in services, and they're facing sometimes disciplinary procedures in their workplace. This seems somewhat archaic because, in many offices, output can be recorded and monitored. I don't see the need in all cases for people to be at work for 9 o'clock. I wonder is there any chance of incentivising companies in Cardiff to allow more flexible working, which could possibly look at the issue from a demand side, and possibly reduce the demand for transport at peak hours into Cardiff.

The Member very much sounds like an advocate for the fair work agenda, actually. What we are doing through the economic contract is encouraging employers to behave more responsibly, not just for the environment and for future generations, but for their existing workforce. As a result of the economic contract, we expect businesses to be able to demonstrate how they're improving the well-being and mental health of their workers, and we're already finding that this particular intervention is incentivising businesses to apply those sorts of flexible working structures that the Member has outlined.

The Member also mentions the work that the Welsh Government will be commissioning concerning the future of road management and demand management. I think it's absolutely essential that work takes place because the UK Government will have a very big question to contend with in the coming years, and that is what they do with vehicle excise duty and fuel duty. The transition to ultra-low emission vehicles will mean that the potential duty taken in terms of VED and fuel duty will fall dramatically. At the moment, it amounts to something in the region of £35 billion a year. That's between 4 per cent and 5 per cent of revenue for the UK Exchequer. If, as we expect, the transition to electric cars takes place more rapidly as we move towards the end of the decade, then that revenue take will fall dramatically, and the UK Government will have to do something in order to address it. That's why I'm very keen to ensure that our work dovetails with any work that's being undertaken by the UK Treasury or Department for Transport.

Obviously, with the climate emergency that is facing us, we all understand the need to rapidly decarbonise our travel. The white paper that Cardiff Council has produced, looking at travel around the city, is clearly part of that agenda. But I'd like to associate myself with some of the comments raised by some of my other Labour backbench colleagues from the south Wales Valleys. My concern is that this cannot, if it goes ahead, be a tax on some of the most challenged communities around Cardiff where, currently, public transport is not effective in getting people into the city and to their place of work. Even when the metro is fully up and running, Minister, I am concerned that the statistics show that there will still be a huge volume of people who need to use their cars to get into the city—unless, of course, we can crack the problem of bus travel. So, I'd like to know your views about, in particular, the mention in the white paper of the regional express bus project and how bus travel might be a crucial part of this agenda moving forward.

Can I thank Vikki for her question? I very much agree that, in terms of the proposals that have been made, it's absolutely essential that we need to undertake detailed consideration and examine all equality and fairness issues, not just in terms of how a congestion charge may apply, but also how any revenue raised from it may be spent. In regard to the vision of improved bus services, not just within the city, but also in the region, I very much welcome that strong, bold vision that the council has been able to provide.

Obviously, the Government has various levers that it can pull in the public transport field and transport models that it can support. The Anglesey air link, obviously, is one model of public transport I would suggest that is supported by the Government, and I have to say, the service has improved dramatically over the last 12 to 18 months, and uptake has been enormously popular on this route. The environment Secretary, in her interview on Sharp End, highlighted that, actually, because of the declaration of the climate change emergency, this is an area of public expenditure that the Government should be reconsidering. Is that Government policy, to reconsider the subsidy that it makes available on that air route, bearing in mind the comments that the environment Secretary made on Sharp End on Monday?

In light of the fact that we have declared a climate emergency, of course, in future years, when we consider whether to continue this service, we'll be paying more attention to the emissions that are caused as a consequence of operating the service. But, in the meantime, I am pleased that the Member has recognised improvements in that service. It provides a valuable service for many people in Wales, but there is no doubt that, just as we are doing with all other forms of transport support through the Wales transport strategy, we will be looking at low-carbon transport as a priority area for Welsh Government investment.  

I want to return to the question of buses, which is a particularly important mode of transport in areas, like the Rhondda Fach, that are without a single train station and have a bypass that stops halfway up the valley. This wouldn't be so bad, of course, if the bus service was brilliant, but it isn't. In fact, I think it's fair to say that, at times, it's abject. The routes to Cardiff can take two hours, as most journeys—with the odd exception—can call at nearly 100 stops along the way. A night out in Cardiff is off limits, if you rely on public transport, for anyone living in the Fach. So, understandably, people feel completely cut off, and they deserve better. Can you provide further information about how the Government plans to improve bus transport for places like the Rhondda Fach and indeed the Rhondda more generally? Are you confident that the proposed London-style bus system, which aims to encourage operators to bid to provide services, is the solution to these problems?

Can I thank Leanne Wood for her question? I do share her concerns over a lack of opportunity for many people in many remote areas to be able to access work and services, because of the lack of available bus services or because they're too expensive for people to use. It's true to say that the buses Bill will make a significant difference in terms of allowing local authorities greater power to be able to intervene and, indeed, to run services themselves. It will ensure that the primary motive for running bus services in Wales moves from driving profit to meeting passenger expectations. I'm confident that the Bill will go a significant way to improving local bus services in Wales. In addition, as I said in response to Dai Rees, it's absolutely vital that we plan services on a regional basis more so that we can get people from Rhondda Fach to Cardiff quicker and with more reliable services, and also, that we ensure that the future subsidy regime amounts to additionality and not replacement funding. 

Should the economy Minister not have been clearer in his letter to his party's leader of Cardiff Council that, in seeking to raise money for public transport, it is wholly unacceptable to structure a charge in such a way that it is only paid by people outside his council area, while everyone inside the area is completely exempt? 

I think I've made it very clear not just through the letter but also in my answers today that any such proposal—and at the moment, it is only an idea—is applied in a fair way; that a proposal such as this does not lead to communities feeling that they are being pitched against one another; that they're interests are in some way being prioritised below or above another community; that everybody feels that they are benefiting from a regime of this type; and that everybody is equally contributing to it. 

I stated in my letter to the leader of the council that I'm very keen to work with the local authority and with the region's authorities in examining the mechanisms by which we can accommodate the needs of the travelling public, but also make sure that we respond adequately and appropriately to the climate crisis. And that means that we do need to turn the dial in terms of inspiring modal shift not just in this region, but across Wales. 

Yes. Alongside considering improving connectivity across the region, a Welsh Government transport appraisal guidance stage 1 study has identified improvement options between junctions 43 and 47 of the M4. Solutions will be progressed through a stage 2 study, aiming to tackle congestion, safety, poor journey times and also poor air quality.

When traffic problems on the M4 are discussed, the problems of traffic jams during peak periods between junctions 44 and 46 tend to be overlooked, though not by those of us travelling along those roads. The reasons for traffic hold-ups include vehicles changing lanes and vehicles entering and leaving the motorway—the same reasons that we have hold-ups everywhere else on the M4. I'm requesting signage on the M4 to direct traffic accessing the enterprise zone to use junction 45 rather than junction 46, because junction 45 is a superior junction and it does have the advantage that traffic, on doing that, does not have to slow down on the motorway in order to join the roundabout. 

Can I thank Mike Hedges for his suggestion? I will certainly relay the suggestion of better signage at junction 45 to officials. As I've already said, the WelTAG stage 2 study between junctions 43 and 47 will determine the best solutions to tackle congestion, to tackle safety and poor journey times. Clearly, if for safety reasons or improved journey times it's deemed that better signage should be installed where the Member has suggested, then we will respond positively.  

We continue to support a number of businesses in the Islwyn constituency, backed by the launch of our economic action plan. We continue to assist Welsh businesses to start, grow and thrive through Business Wales and the Development Bank of Wales alongside the establishment of a dedicated regional office.

Minister, thanks to the interventions of the Welsh Government between 2011 and 2016, the number of people in employment in my constituency of Islwyn has increased by 10.9 per cent, and that is above the Welsh increase of 10.6 per cent. Additionally to this, the number of people unemployed in Islwyn over that time has fallen by more than a half, again exceeding the reduction seen in both Wales and the United Kingdom. Would the Minister agree with me that, in order to build on this important economic performance, high-quality transport infrastructure investment is vital to continue attracting strong inward investment and to supporting more people into good quality high-skilled jobs, such as at Ebbw Vale and in neighbouring communities? Would he therefore give an outline of planned metro investments on the Rhymney line, which also serves Islwyn constituents, over the next five years?

Well, can I thank the Member for her question? The Member is absolutely right—the performance of the local economy in Islwyn is something to be celebrated. A Member earlier mentioned weekly earnings as a concern in Wales. Well, I'm pleased to say that, as a result of our hard work, average gross full-time weekly earnings in Islwyn stand at around about £598. That's significantly above the average for Wales and also the UK average. It's something that the Member, I'm sure, is very pleased about. But the Member makes an important point that in order to drive sustained economic growth that applies fairly to all communities we have to invest in connective infrastructure, and that why we're investing £738 million to upgrade the railway lines to Aberdare, Coryton, Merthyr Tydfil, Treherbert and, of course, Rhymney. We're investing £800 million in new rolling stock by 2023, and we're electrifying something in the order of 170 km of track. We're upgrading all of our stations and signalling, and building at least five new stations for the metro.

The December timetable change was the biggest change to services for over three decades. This has benefited some rail users, whilst other services have unfortunately been affected. Transport for Wales has sought to introduce alternative measures where services have been affected, and are reviewing further timetable amendment possibilities as part of the May timetable change.

This is a case of a question being answered before I have an opportunity to ask it, but there are still some important issues that need to be discussed. A number of constituents contacted me following timetable changes disappointed that services to the smaller stations in Môn—Bodorgan, Rhosneigr, Valley and Llanfairpwll—had been reduced. Yes, we need swift services, but we also need to serve our communities too.

I am pleased that Transport for Wales has got back to me now, since I tabled this question, to say that there have been changes to timetables that meet some of the complaints that were made. Having said that, there are still a number of concerns about the availability of trains to smaller stations at the end of the school day and so on. Transport for Wales have admitted to me, ‘No, we perhaps didn’t consult sufficiently with the communities in making these decisions’, and I think the other concerns about trains at the end of the day is another example of something that could have been flagged up had there been proper consultation undertaken. Does the Minister agree with me that we must have a commitment to very careful consultation with communities in terms of how proposed changes are going to impact them?

Yes, I'd very much agree with the Member, and the issue of proper consultation is something that I've raised with Transport for Wales as we approach the May timetable change. I think it's essential that stakeholder groups, that communities, are informed well in advance of proposed changes so that they can have some input into whether those changes are beneficial or otherwise. There is a contractual obligation, of course, in place to ensure that no stations receive fewer services than was the case when the franchise was let, and that is something that must be upheld, and it's the reason why Transport for Wales have been working to determine alternative services up until May, when those services that were withdrawn from some of the smaller stations can be addressed.

And, finally, question 8—Neil Hamilton.

Yes. Transport for Wales responds to disruptions depending on a number of factors, such as the time, the location and the resource availability at the point of an incident. TfW will always endeavour to run services where possible, utilising cancellations if necessary to recover the service and to avoid further disruption later in the day.

I thank the Minister for that reply. I'd like to raise with him a constituency case that he might have seen. A constituent of mine was travelling by train from Birmingham to Aberystwyth, had to get out at Shrewsbury because of a single failure on the line from Shrewsbury to Welshpool, but the bus replacement missed the connection for the train at Welshpool and then had to continue the whole journey to Aberystwyth, three hours long, by bus, but the bus was a double-decker bus, which was a hundred seater with no wheelchair access, and this doesn't seem to me to be a suitable vehicle for a rail replacement service for such a length of time on such roads. So, I wonder if the Minister could tell me how many of these old and unsuitable buses TfW operates or contracts for with external companies and what plans there might be to phase them out and replace them with more suitable vehicles.

Can I thank the Member for his question? I'm aware of the case, and I believe that apologies have been relayed to the constituent in question. Clearly, on that occasion, it was a signal failure. That is a responsibility that is out of the hands of TfW; it's with Network Rail. But the Member is right that bus replacement services are not always what passengers should expect—not up to the standard that they should expect. For that reason, I've asked Transport for Wales to examine the possibility, when they're able to come out of the contract that was arranged by their predecessor, Arriva Trains Wales, to establish themselves a fleet of buses for rail replacement services, because I think it's absolutely essential that passengers know that if a replacement service via a bus is to be deployed, it will carry them in the way that a train service should have carried them, in a timely way.

Thank you to the Minister. 

The next item, therefore, is questions to the Counsel General and Brexit Minister in respect of his Brexit Minister responsibilities today. The first question is from Joyce Watson.

Llywydd, I understand that you've given permission for questions 1, 4 and 5 to be grouped. I met with the Secretary of State for Wales on 9 January and reiterated, as I have with other UK Government Ministers, the Welsh Government's position of, 'Not a penny less, not a power lost' for replacement EU funds in Wales.

Thanks for that answer, Minister, but I think the two big questions regarding the UK shared prosperity fund are: will it match the money that Wales currently receives from Europe, as the Brexiters promised?' and 'will it be devolved?' Has the UK Government deigned to share its plans with Wales yet, or, for that matter, Scotland or Northern Ireland?

Well, I thank the Member for that further question. The UK Government has committed to replace the funds lost to Wales through European structural funds. What we have asked for is for that to be quantified and for it to be by way of adjustment to the block grant so that the expenditure of that money, a hundred per cent of that money, is in accordance with the devolution settlement and enables the Welsh Government, as it does today, to deploy those funds in Wales to the best advantage of the people of Wales and to do that in a way that it can integrate with the other sources of regional funding across Wales.

Minister, I raised an issue with your colleague, the First Minister, some weeks ago, regarding the shared prosperity fund and the First Minister gave a fairly positive answer to that. But in designing a new scheme, can you give us some information on how that new scheme will address areas that haven't previously been able to secure finance via the EU structural funds?

Well, the Member will know that the EU structural funds are designed to deal with income inequalities and so forth in particular parts of Wales that qualify for the expenditure of those funds. In designing funds that replace those, it's open to the Welsh Government to cast the net more widely geographically, within Wales. We've been mindful of that opportunity and have worked, as part of the work that Huw Irranca-Davies's steering group has been working on, well, this has been one of the issues. We are keen to make sure that there is an opportunity for all communities in different parts of Wales to benefit from those funds, and the priorities that we have set for regional funding are around healthy and fairer communities, income inequalities, productive businesses and zero carbon Wales, which are issues that all parts of Wales would, I think, regard as priorities, and indeed opportunities to benefit from subsequent funding. I hope that the UK Government will take the steps that we call on them to make, so that the work that we have been doing with stakeholders across Wales—and I thank those stakeholders for their work—is able to be put into practice in a way that can benefit all parts of Wales. 

There are a number of elements that we're needing reassurance about regarding the future of the funding that's going to take the place of structural funds. The sum of money that’s going to come in the next few years is one issue and, in one way, that’s one of the easy things for the UK Government to do: they'll want to be seen to be giving the same amount of money for the period that’s to come. But, of course, there’s this question about how the money is controlled. I don't agree with everything that’s been done with the spending of European money in Wales; there have been spending decisions that I don't agree with. But where the funding has had a real impact, that has been led by the fact that decisions are being made here in Wales by people who understand the Welsh context. Do you, as a Minister, agree with me that that is the great risk now, that the UK Government doesn't have the capacity or the understanding to decide how to spend money sensibly in Wales, and that keeping control on where to invest funding in order to ensure fairness to the Welsh economy is important now—as important, really, as the sum itself?

Well, that question of capacity and understanding is very important, and the question of constitutional powers is also relevant to this. That inevitably is the case given the fact that those decisions have been made here in Wales by the Welsh Government over the past two decades, and slightly longer than that, indeed. So I agree with the point that the Member makes, that we do need clarity and agreement on that fundamental principle from a constitutional perspective, but also—and I think this is implicit in the Member’s question—from a practical point of view, that is, the ability to spend that money in a way that does have an impact and can work with other funding sources available to the Welsh Government and other organisations in Wales. And I also think that it’s important that there is an opportunity for us here to make decisions at a regional level within Wales, as well as doing that at a national level.

David Melding.

No, sorry. 

David Rees.

Diolch, Llywydd. Minister, as has been clearly said, we haven't got a clue what the shared prosperity fund is going to be doing yet, but what we want to be able to ensure is that the money we would have received from European funding is matched by the money that comes from the shared prosperity fund to Wales, and allows the Welsh Government to make decisions on what best suits Wales. You've had discussions with the Secretary of State for Wales. The previous Secretary of State indicated that he was going to have a consultation process. Do we know if that consultation process is going to go ahead? What are they doing? When will we have a definitive statement from the UK Government as to what the shared prosperity fund will be; how we will be able to access it? Will there be any controls placed upon it to look at what they want it spent on, or will we have freedom? It's important we continue to have this detail, because without the detail, we're still talking about fresh air; we haven't got a clue what's happening. 

I share the frustration of the Member. We do welcome the broad, admittedly, but positive commitments from the UK Government to work with us in a consensual way in relation to this. But we do need that to move into practical implementation, and it's absolutely vital that the UK Government now shares with us the detail of what it proposes. We have been working up—and I've been open about this with the UK Government—we've been working up in detail what we think are well-designed proposals for consultation, as it were, but it is important now for the UK Government to come forward with a very simple commitment, I think, that the funds currently available to Wales through those funds can be deployed in Wales, and that all of them are subject to the existing powers the Welsh Government has on behalf of the people of Wales, and that they form, effectively, an adjustment to the block grant, so that those can be deployed effectively on behalf of people in Wales. But I share the frustration of the Member: we don't yet have the detail and the thinking that we should have at this point, and I hope that will be remedied sooner rather than later.

I have regular discussions with the UK Government, and with Welsh stakeholders, about the number of EU citizens who have applied for the EU settlement scheme in Wales, as do my officials. We as a Government have put in place a broad range of services to support EU nationals with their application, and continue to press the UK Government to provide further support to EU citizens here in Wales.

The report published this week by the3million organisation really encapsulates the anxiety, the anger, and the sense of being unwanted that all the people surveyed were feeling, even when they had already got settled status. It was disturbing to read, in the light of the Windrush scandal, that women, the self-employed, the unemployed, pensioners, students, and those out of work for medical reasons were all more likely to be asked for additional information. And many of these people have only received pre-settled status. In light of the anxiety expressed by all the respondents, and the sense that cut-and-paste phrases of friendship and protecting the rights of European citizens are encapsulated in the responses, it's really important that, instead of banging the bong on 31 January in a sense of triumphalism, we reach out with that hand of friendship to all the people who've lived in this country for many, many years. So, I just wondered what assurance the Welsh Government can give to people, based on your conversations with the UK Government, that families won't be split up in the long term, and that the settled status isn't anything more than just an exercise, and then attempting to get rid of people who are inconvenient.

I thank the Member for highlighting that very serious concern that a number of people have, and that I've had expressed to me directly as well—more or less in the terms in which the Member described them today. We have between 70,000 and 80,000 citizens living in Wales who were born in other parts of the EU, outside the UK, and we want them to stay in Wales and to continue making the full contribution that they do to our society and to our economy. I recognise entirely the point that she makes about the anxiety that many people feel in relation, in particular, to the question of being awarded only pre-settled status. I think, across the UK, the number of applications that result in that is currently running at around 44 per cent, which is pretty extraordinary really. I raised that point in terms, actually, with the UK Government, when I met with Ministers the week before last, and I was told that, effectively, pre-settled status becomes automatically settled status over time, which isn't in fact the case, as we know. And I've written to them to set the record straight, and to make the point that we need to do more to tackle this issue of concern.

As a Government, we have committed around, I think, £2 million to date, more or less, in seeking to communicate with people who should be taking steps to seek settled status in Wales. We've done that through—. We've recently had a new online campaign, but there's a large cohort of people for whom that won't be their main channel of communication. So we've been working with Settled and others to advertise, as it were, the availability of the scheme, and the various range of support that the Welsh Government, and other organisations, are making available, and seeking to target those in places like shops and cafes and churches, where EU citizens might be able to access that information in ways other than online. So we are seeking to find different channels to communicate with people, whilst at the same time I meet pretty regularly with Home Office officials, and take each opportunity to highlight some of the practical points that the Member makes in her question that are causing concern to so many people in Wales.

Minister, I think you've mainly answered my question just now in your answer to Jenny Rathbone. What plans does your Government have to work with the Westminster Government regarding the handling of the settled status of EU citizens, and what extra roles do you envisage for the Welsh Government, apart from what you're doing now?

We will continue with the work we have been doing. We've been funding various advice services and a communication campaign. We've also been pressing the UK Government in relation to the availability of digital scanning centres in Wales. The Member may be aware that, at the start, there was only one. We're looking at about seven, I think, at the moment, and are also pressing for an expansion of the assisted digital centre provision, which enables those EU citizens who need extra support to make the application. There are now, I think, 26 of those in Wales, and we've been pressing very hard over the period of time to ensure that those numbers increase, and with some success.

For most people, getting that extra support won't be necessary, but there'll be a significant cohort who do need that extra help in order to be able to register. But there are some design flaws in the scheme itself, which we are also pressing with the UK Government. One issue, which Members will be, I think, aware of, is the lack of a physical manifestation or document that encapsulates the settled status. Whilst most of us probably would be comfortable with having an online acknowledgement of that, which we can share with organisations and bodies and agencies if we wish, again, there will be a lot of people who will feel much more secure in having a piece of paper or a physical badge of that, and so, we've been pressing in relation to that point as well.

Questions now from the party spokespeople. Plaid Cymru spokesperson, Dai Lloyd.

Diolch, Llywydd. Whilst the new Welsh Secretary, Simon Hart, last week stated that the UK shared prosperity fund, about which we've heard a fair amount already would not, I quote,

'drive a coach and horses through the devolution settlement',

he has, unfortunately, not given a firm assurance as to whether the Welsh Government would control this new fund. Any loss of control over European funding, of course, would be a power grab. This week, local government leaders in Wales have also expressed concern about the uncertainty around the level of funding within the fund, given its importance in terms of regeneration plans in many parts of Wales. So, can I ask: have you spoken to the Welsh Secretary since last week? What is your latest understanding of the UK Government's proposal, and will you give a commitment to ensure that the voice of local government leaders in Wales is heard?

I thank Dai Lloyd for that question and I welcome him to his new role. I have spoken briefly with the Secretary of State in relation to another matter in the context of a larger meeting, but not specifically about that point. We still await, as I mentioned in my earlier question, details in relation to the acknowledgment, effectively, that those funds are the subject of devolved powers. It's a very simple point to agree and to acknowledge. The point simply is that the equivalent sums currently received through Wales should be passed on to the Welsh Government by way of an adjustment to the block grant and at the full disposal of the Welsh Government to be able to deploy those funds in the way the Member's question implies, with other partners in Wales—so, with local government, which is itself a significant investor in the jobs and infrastructure that benefit from that sort of investment. And that is the opportunity, certainly important from a devolution point of view, but it's also important from the point of view of being able to integrate that investment with other investments that the Welsh Government makes.

Can I thank the Minister for his welcome to my new role? Plainly, I won't be as dazzling as my colleague Delyth Jewell in the role, but I hope to muddle through in my usual understated sort of way anyway. [Laughter.]

In your written statement yesterday, you noted that you're due to host the next Joint Ministerial Committee (EU Negotiations) meeting later this month in Cardiff, and that your hope was for that meeting to focus on finalising proposals, including reaching a firm conclusion on the role of the devolved Governments in future EU negotiations. So, have you had any signs from the UK Government that they are prepared to listen to or accept any of your suggestions to ensure that the Welsh Government has some sort of seat at the table, if not the whole table itself, or any other article of furniture?

I'm going to resist the temptation to extend that particular metaphor. But I think what I will say to the Member is, yes, it is the case that I'll be hosting the JMC(EN) here in Cardiff next week. At the last JMC(EN), I took the opportunity, as I have, and as other Ministers have, over many, many months, of making clear our position about what we think is the appropriate role for the Welsh Government in the context of the negotiations that will follow in the months ahead. So, I think it is absolutely the case the UK Government can be in no doubt of what our, I think, very reasonable expectations are of our role, i.e. that the UK Government should not advance a negotiating position that relates to a devolved competence other than having normally sought to agree that position with a devolved Government in advance. I think that is a practical way forward. It gives confidence to our negotiating partners overseas that the UK Government is able to deliver on the commitments it makes in those negotiations and, of course, importantly, it recognises the role of the Welsh Government and the devolution competence and settlement.

With regard to what I expect from the next JMC(EN), I hope that that will be an opportunity for the UK Government to respond substantively to those proposals and bring forward its own proposals for involving us in the months ahead. At the last JMC(EN), the indications in the discussion were that they were planning to do that and had heard, certainly to some extent, what we have been advocating for for many months. I hope very much they will take on board fully what we and the other devolved Governments have been pressing for now for a very long time.

Minister, in pushing ahead with clause 21 of the EU withdrawal Bill and in ignoring the Sewel convention, the UK Government is showing exactly what it really thinks of devolved legislatures in the United Kingdom. Coupled with the fact that the Conservative Party does not enjoy a majority in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, do you not share my concerns that this UK Government only speaks for one nation within the United Kingdom, and what do you think that this means for the future of the union?

Well, I think yesterday was an important constitutional moment because all three devolved legislatures have now expressed their clear opinion in relation to the withdrawal agreement Bill. The debate that we had in this Chamber yesterday I felt set out very clearly the case for defending the constitutional rights of this establishment and the Welsh Government, and those of us who voted against the LCM yesterday did so for that reason. And I'm very pleased that the Assembly of the Senedd was so clear in its view. I think the UK Government should take note of that and should not proceed in the teeth of that opposition.

The Sewel convention provides, of course, that there were circumstances that may be not normal, and I'll take some comfort from the words in the Secretary of State's letter of Monday of this week that he would regard the circumstances as 'specific'. But I think it's undoubtedly the case that the Sewel convention is an important convention that, as currently designed, is not exactly fit for purpose. It provides too much discretion to the UK Government; it doesn't provide a sufficiently clear understanding of when it applies and when it should not apply. I think there's a case for going further than the convention to make it clear that the UK Parliament should never legislate when a consent has been withheld in relation to a devolved matter.

What I will say about the future of the union, and I've said it before—I think there are choices that lie ahead in the coming months, and the nature of those choices will affect the capacity of the union to survive. I very much hope that the Prime Minister will follow the direction of travel that we as a Government outlined in our publication earlier this week, because I fear that if we head down the road of a very hard Brexit, a very, very minimalist free trade agreement, the pressures that currently exist on the union will just be exacerbated.

Conservative Party spokesperson, Darren Millar.

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. Minister, what analysis has the Welsh Government made of the opportunities arising to Wales as a result of Brexit?

Well, the Member opposite will be aware that earlier this week we published our view of the kind of relationship that Wales and the UK should have with the European Union, recognising that the Prime Minister has won a mandate in the recent general election and will begin those negotiations from the perspective of a free trade agreement. Our view is that a free trade agreement, as contemplated in the political declaration, is damaging to Wales, and we are hoping to steer the direction of travel away from that to an area where there are more opportunities for Wales to continue to benefit from that kind of relationship with the European Union.

I think sometimes we are invited to the view that the freedoms that exist, so to speak, to negotiate deals with other countries, as a consequence of the sort of description of the relationship that the Prime Minister has set out in the political declaration, is a huge prize for us. Whilst we will always take the opportunity on behalf of Welsh businesses and exporters to develop new markets, the reality of the situation is that the benefits to the Welsh economy of those deals is marginal compared to the loss of market, if that should happen, to the European Union.

Minister, thank you for your answer, but for me, like the majority of people in Wales and indeed across the whole of the United Kingdom, I'm really looking forward to a week on Friday, at 11 o'clock, when there will be a bell ringing in my house to celebrate the fact that Wales will be leaving the European Union, along with the rest of the United Kingdom. And it will be leaving the European Union in spite of the best efforts of the Welsh Labour Government, of the Liberal Democrats and, indeed, Plaid Cymru, all of whom have been trying to put obstacles in the way of the democratic will of the people being implemented in this country. And as we move on to the next chapter in our nation's story, we see, in the Conservative Party, that Brexit is an opportunity, and it's an opportunity to deliver for Wales in a way that your Government, frankly, hasn't for over 20 years. There are people, businesses and public services that will benefit from the free trade arrangements and deals that we will now have the freedom to strike with different nations and trading blocs around the world. And, of course, we will not just be limited to having deals with the European Union. Like you, I want a decent free trade agreement with the European Union. And, of course, we'll be able to spend our own taxpayers' money on a new and ambitious regional investment scheme that doesn't just favour certain parts of Wales, like west Wales and the Valleys, but also we can focus attention on other areas of deprivation outside of those places.

Now, I think what has been rather disheartening in recent weeks, since the general election—and there appears to be some changing of the commentary coming from the Welsh Government, certainly today, which I welcome. But there has been, really, a rehashing of the same old arguments, I think, and there hasn't been the sort of positive attitude that I think we really need to have here in Wales about how we can engage with Her Majesty's Government, going forward, to make sure that we are at the table with a strong and powerful voice. So, can I ask what assurances can you give us that you and your colleagues in the Welsh Government will now begin to engage positively and not in a hostile way with the UK Government as it seeks to deliver a positive Brexit for the whole of the United Kingdom, including Wales?

Well, it isn't clear to me the extent the Member was paying attention to what we've been saying over the last few weeks in relation to relations with the new UK Government. I'll remind him, since he invites me to do that, in effect. What we have said, as we have always said, is that the UK Government will find us a co-operative Government, seeking to work in the best interests of Wales, but we will not do that where the devolution boundary is not respected. There is a role for the Welsh Government and there is a role for the UK Government, and the relationship will work best and at its most constructive when that boundary is understood and respected in practice.

What I will say is that I'm not entirely sure that I've heard the Welsh Conservatives's argument descend beneath the rhetoric on any of these points of substance. I'm not conscious of any publication by the Welsh Conservative Party setting out its own view of the kind of Brexit that would work in the best interests of Wales. It has, throughout this process, largely simply trotted the party line in Westminster.

What we have had on this side of the Chamber is a set of reasoned proposals and policy documents that take into account specifically the interests of Wales. That has not been matched by any level of thinking on the opposite side of this Chamber, and it's evident to me that the Member doesn't even actually follow his own Government's analysis, which, on their own numbers, tells us that the free trade nirvana that he is describing brings illusory benefits to the economy of Wales.

Actually, what we've seen from the Welsh Labour Government is document after document with prophecies of doom. Of course, your pessimism around Brexit is completely out of proportion with reality. Where we Conservatives, as set out in our manifesto and other documents, see opportunity and long-term prosperity outside the European Union, I'm afraid that you see short-sighted gloom, and all you seem to be doing is trying to stoke fear and scaremongering. It's like you want Wales to fail in order that you can celebrate that your Nostradamus-type prophecies have come true. But we see a future where businesses in Wales will be able to export goods around the world in a competitive way and be competitive in those markets that the EU has currently blocked off.

And, of course, we'll have a fair immigration system—an immigration system that works for the whole of the United Kingdom, which is fair, which will work for businesses and work for Wales, but also one that is fair to people no matter where in the world they come from, whether that's in the EU or outside of the EU. I, for one, am optimistic. I'm excited about the opportunities that Brexit has to bring.

I know that you don't like to talk about those opportunities, and you don't like to talk about those benefits, but will you at least acknowledge that there are some opportunities, particularly from this new immigration system that we will have, which will be a points-based system that is fair to everybody around the world, where people can come and live and work in Wales, where they can bring a benefit to those communities in which they will live and to Wales as a nation?

Well, I'm not sure if the Member heard the exchanges to the previous questions about the challenges that EU citizens already living in Wales are facing as a consequence of the migration policies of the UK Government. I suggest that he reads the record of the exchange that we had in relation to that. I would be very interested in his views on an immigration system where the salary levels are completely out of kilter with the needs of the Welsh economy, the skills profile doesn't match in any way the needs of our economy and is designed entirely from the perspective of the south-east of England. [Interruption.] I actually think that there is an opportunity here. I actually think here that, for the UK Government, in redesigning—. We would want to see a very different migration system. We would want to see a system—[Interruption.]—that gives preferential arrangements to the European Union—[Interruption.]—and ties that more closely to employment. But if the Prime Minister is bringing forward changes to that system, there is an opportunity here for him to reflect the needs of the economy in Wales in a way that is absolutely not being done by the current proposals.

Can I just make the point that it doesn't help, when a Minister is seeking to answer a question, if the Member who has asked the question is shouting 'Rubbish' across the Chamber—[Inaudible.] It just doesn't help to get good scrutiny in operation.

Question 3—Mick Antoniw.

The Commission on Justice in Wales found that proper access to justice is not available in Wales, and that it can only seriously be addressed by transferring authority for justice to Wales. Brexit will diminish access to justice further, for example by denying the people of Wales access to the Court of Justice of the European Union and recourse to the EU's charter of fundamental rights.

Thank you for that answer, Counsel General. It's very important that we have an understanding of some of the changes that are likely to take place now in the post-Brexit environment. It is very clear that we will not have the fundamental protections of the European Union in respect of employment rights. Already, there are very many adverse consequences to what may happen with regard to employment legislation. The UK Government has indicated that it intends to abolish the Human Rights Act 1998. It also intends to abolish or to restrict the ability of judicial review in terms of Government actions. It has also indicated that it wants to interfere with the independence of the judiciary by changing the appointment system for judges.

All these have very significant consequences in terms of undermining the rule of law, and that makes your particular point about losing, I suppose, the jurisprudential umbrella of the European Court of Justice very significant indeed. Do you agree with me that, perhaps, one of the ways forward now is not only with regard to the devolution of justice functions, but that we need to actually look at ways in which we can empower our own citizens in Wales, and we need to look at the creation of a Welsh legal aid, advice and assistance scheme that stands on its own merit within Wales to empower citizens in this new world that we are likely to face?

I thank the Member for that important supplementary question. I know that he will share my dismay that the withdrawal agreement Bill no longer contains the protection on EU-derived workers' rights that was in the previous Bill, without any rational or reasonable case being made for that change. In the context of a UK Government seeking to press ahead with a radical deregulatory agenda, I know that he will share my concerns about what that means in practice. He mentions the Supreme Court, we saw of course the decision in the Unison case where the UK Government sought to limit access to employment tribunals, and I was very pleased with the Supreme Court decision in relation to that.

On the specific question that he raises of legal aid and legal advice, the Thomas commission proposes, very interestingly, I think, that the funding for legal aid and for third-sector advice should be brought together in Wales in a single fund under the strategic direction of an independent body. I think that's a very significant recommendation for the commission to make. Obviously, as with many other of those recommendations, we will be giving that careful thought in terms of how we present our position to the UK Government.

We are in regular dialogue with companies in the sector, with the Welsh Automotive Forum, and with national sector bodies regarding the potential impact of Brexit. Having an ongoing and frictionless trading relationship with the EU is very important for the automotive sector, and indeed for other sectors. 

I'm grateful to the Minister for his answer. Of course, he'll be aware that it's almost a year to the day since the Schaeffler automotive factory in Llanelli announced that it would be closing with the loss of 220 jobs—and not just jobs, but good-quality jobs, jobs that could sustain families productively. The Minister will not need me to tell him there are real concerns in the sector about the access to markets. What further discussions will he be able to have with the UK Government to try and ensure that we do have a voice—the Welsh Government on behalf of the industry—around the table when negotiations are being made, with regard to both the new trade deal that we'll hopefully have with the European Union and any other free trade deals, to ensure that there are no unintended consequences? For example, allowing access to markets for vehicles and vehicle parts from outside Wales that might have a negative effect on the supply chain that companies have put a lot of effort into building up over many years.

I thank Helen Mary Jones for that further question. I think one of the points that is evident from her question is the level of integration in the car manufacturing sector through different parts of the UK. Impacts in one part of the UK can very significantly impact companies in the supply chain that may be in other component nations of the UK. I think this just goes to the heart of the need to ensure that the kind of relationship that Wales and the UK has with the European Union following Brexit is one that—.

And I welcome the indication in the political declaration that the Prime Minister is seeking a tariff-free relationship; obviously, that is to be welcomed. The tariffs, the World Trade Organization tariffs, on cars, as she will know, run at about 10 per cent, and would seriously damage the sector in Wales and across the UK. But it's also important in those negotiations to ensure that non-tariff barriers are also kept to an absolutely bare minimum. That assurance actually isn't given in quite the same way in the political declaration, though I hope that that will be the direction the UK Government seeks to take the relationship.

PwC estimated recently that deliveries to Germany from the UK, which can currently be achieved in 12 hours, could take up to 72 hours when the UK is outside the customs union. Obviously, in a sector where just-in-time delivery of components and so on is so fundamental to productivity, that sort of additional delay could be very seriously disadvantageous. It's those sorts of considerations—which aren't perhaps unique to Wales, but we have companies in the supply chain that cross the UK—that we would wish to advocate if, as we should, we have a role in those negotiations.

John Griffiths is not here to ask question 7. Question 8, Vikki Howells.

Welsh Government legislation that requires Ministers to give due regard to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child when developing or reviewing policies or legislation will apply after Brexit, and the Welsh Government will continue to promote children's rights in our discussions with the UK Government on the future relationship with the European Union.

Thank you for your answer, Minister. I know that the decision of the UK Tory Government to drop proposals to protect child refugees from the EU withdrawal Bill was discussed during First Minister's questions last week, and I'm sure, like me, you've been watching the progress with regard to the Dubs amendment too. Many refugees are children, so this is a particularly cruel action, especially when we recall that only 5 per cent of child asylum applications in Europe are actually made in the UK; that's less than 5,000 vulnerable children, to take the first half of 2019. The First Minister gave us a passionate denunciation of the policy, but can I ask: will you, as Brexit Minister, commit to raise this decision in all appropriate discussions with UK Ministers, and make sure that children don't suffer from Brexit disproportionately?

This is a very important matter that the Member has raised today in the Chamber. I obviously echo the point that the First Minister made last week in relation to this important issue. What is extraordinary to me is that the previous legislation itself did actually contain a duty on the part of the UK Government to negotiate the continuation of the Dublin III arrangements—the refugee family reunion arrangements—and so the weakening of that, I think, is an extraordinary act. She will be aware that the Deputy Minister and Chief Whip and indeed the Deputy Minister for Health and Social Services have written to the Home Secretary making clear the Welsh Government's position in relation to this matter. I think that it goes to the heart of the kind of country that we want the UK to be as we leave the European Union, and I think that weakening the legislation is a moment of danger in that regard. I hope that the UK Government will continue to advance its previous stated position, even if that's not on the face of the legislation. I know that she and many other Members in this Chamber would feel very strongly that they should do that, as do I.

David Rowlands is not in the Chamber to ask question 9. Therefore, question 10, Janet Finch-Saunders.

I recently met with senior UK Ministers and had constructive discussions on our shared commitment to the union. But March will be two years since the inter-governmental relations review began, and June will be three years since our 'Brexit and Devolution' paper. We need to make urgent progress on reform.

Great. Earlier this term, you spoke of the need for a more shared vision of the governance of the United Kingdom and a new culture of mutual respect and parity of esteem in the kind of inter-governmental relations. A similar message is conveyed in the document 'Reforming our Union: Shared Governance in the UK'. For example, proposition 1 speaks of a voluntary association of nations, and proposition 8 of the need for the four Governments to work on the basis of a partnership of equals. I welcome the fact that the focus is not only on our relationship with Her Majesty's Parliament, but indeed on all four legislatures. One consequence of Brexit is that we have seen the Welsh Government work in union with the Scottish Government. Now that the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive have been restored, does the Welsh Government have any intention to strengthen its own inter-government relation with Stormont? And if so, how?

Can I first take the opportunity that the Member's question presents to say that I welcome very much the restoration of power sharing in Northern Ireland and look forward very much to working with the Northern Ireland Executive? I will, if I may, take this opportunity to pay tribute to the work of the Northern Ireland civil service who, in difficult circumstances, have represented Northern Ireland in many inter-governmental fora, if I may say, extremely effectively.

She is right to say, and I think it's implicit in her question, that the Welsh Government will always seek every opportunity where it has shared interests with any other Government in the UK, a devolved Government or the UK Government, to represent the best interests of Wales. We have been, I think, creative and imaginative in the proposals that we have advanced for strengthening inter-governmental relations and putting them on a basis of mutual respect and parity of esteem and participation, as the question sets out.

There are many manifestations to that, which the document, 'Reforming our Union', sets out more fully. It's an important moment, I think, for the UK Government to recognise that we are in a different world as we leave the European Union, and that the constitution of the UK requires a fresh look on their part. We have engaged constructively with positive proposals. We think they are reasonable, we think they are rational, we think they're necessary for the future success of the union, and I hope that the UK Government will take them in that way.  

Thank you, Minister. 

The next item on our agenda is the legislative consent motion on the Direct Payments to Farmers (Legislative Continuity) Bill, and I call on the Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs to move the motion, Lesley Griffiths. 

Diolch, Llywydd. I welcome the opportunity to explain the background to this LCM. The Direct Payments to Farmers (Legislative Continuity) Bill, the direct payments Bill, was introduced by the UK Government on 9 January 2020. This Bill provides the Governments of all four nations the legal basis to continue operating the direct payments scheme in 2020, giving our farmers much-needed stability in this period of uncertainty as the United Kingdom prepares to leave the European Union. 

The withdrawal agreement Bill, if passed by the UK Parliament, when read together with the withdrawal agreement, will disapply the direct payments regulation and other related EU legislation governing the 2020 scheme here in the UK. The direct payments Bill will incorporate EU legislation governing the direct payments scheme in 2020 into domestic law, and provide time-limited regulation-making powers to amend the incorporated legislation, ensuring it is operable once the UK has left the EU. Not only will this allow us to continue making payments to farmers in 2020, it will also allow us to continue to monitor, audit and enforce cross-compliance standards. 

To ensure the legal powers needed are in place by exit day, the UK Government has introduced the direct payments Bill through an expedited process, with Royal Assent expected to be given by 31 January. As a result of this compressed timescale of parliamentary passage, the LCM for this Bill has not been able to undergo committee scrutiny. However, in deciding whether to recommend legislative consent for this Bill, I've taken into consideration the comments raised by the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee and the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee during their scrutiny of the UK agricultural Bill. 

The provisions in the direct payments Bill are limited to direct payments regulations applicable to the 2020 scheme year only, and are essential to the immediate continuity of direct payments support to the agricultural sector after Brexit. Given the time available, I believe the UK Bill is an appropriate vehicle to achieve this. As the purpose of the direct payments Bill relates to agriculture and the common agricultural policy, I'm of the view it makes provision regarding devolved matters. However, I am content these provisions should be made in the Bill for Wales, to ensure we have the necessary powers in time to continue supporting farmers through the direct payments scheme.

As we have made clear to the UK Government, our recommendation for the Senedd to withhold consent for the withdrawal agreement Bill was based on specific concerns with that particular Bill. This recommendation, or the Senedd's decision, does not affect wider inter-governmental relations. I would, therefore, ask Assembly Members to support this LCM for the direct payments Bill, and I move the motion.   

I call on the Chair of the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee, Mike Hedges. 

Diolch, Llywydd. I am pleased to be able to contribute to today's debate on behalf of the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee. Before turning to our views on the LCM, I'd like to point out that we had very little time to consider and report on it. Within the time available, it wasn't possible to consider the LCM or the Bill's provisions in any great detail. That said, what we do know is the Bill will enable the Welsh Government to continue to pay farmers in the form of direct payments in the immediate post-Brexit period.

Since the outcome of the European referendum, the committee has taken a keen interest in the future of agricultural support following Brexit. In our report on the previous UK agriculture Bill, we highlighted the unprecedented uncertainty facing Welsh farmers in the run-up to Brexit. We have been clear about the need to provide stability for farmers by ensuring the continuation of direct payments in the immediate post-Brexit period. We know that the Welsh Government plans to introduce a new system of financial support for farmers, and we look forward to scrutinising the Government's final proposals when they emerge.

But any new system is still some way off. Until then, farmers will need to rely on the system we will inherit from the European Union, of which direct payments is a very big part. The Bill will enable the Welsh Government to continue to provide direct payments to Welsh farmers as we leave the EU. With the Brexit deadline a matter of days away, to not legislate is not an option—including provisions in the Bill is pragmatic and necessary. The committee therefore finds no reason to object to the Assembly agreeing the legislative consent motion associated with the LCM, and I would hope that all Members would do so, because to not do so would be catastrophic for Welsh farmers.

I call on the Chair of the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee, Mick Antoniw.

Diolch, Llywydd. We considered the legislative consent memorandum for the Direct Payments to Farmers (Legislative Continuity) Bill at our meeting on Monday of this week, and we laid our report yesterday. Given the limited time available to us, it was not possible to look in detail at the LCM and the proposals in the Bill. However, we have made three conclusions. Before speaking about our first conclusion, I want to briefly note the regulation-making power in clause 3. Clause 3, which relates to the retention of EU legislation, has five regulation-making powers, all of which permit the modification of primary legislation and are, therefore, Henry VIII powers. We welcome the fact that clause 3 regulations will be subject to the made or draft affirmative procedure. 

Our first conclusion relates to the regulation-making powers in clause 6(1), which can be exercised by Welsh and UK Ministers. It is a Henry VIII power, but the regulations will be made under the negative procedure. Our long-standing position is that regulations that permit the modification of primary legislation should be subject to the affirmative procedure. Our first conclusion reiterates this point.

The Henry VIII power in clause 6(1) is also relevant to our second conclusion, which relates to amending the Government of Wales Act 2006, an issue that was raised yesterday during the debate on the LCM for the EU withdrawal agreement Bill. We're concerned at the apparent lack of any limitation on the face of this Bill in terms of preventing the amendment of the 2006 Act. This is particularly important because the Henry VIII power in clause 6(1), a power that could be used to amend the 2006 Act, can be exercised by regulations subject to the negative procedure. Our second conclusion repeats our established view that any modification of Schedule 7A or 7B to the 2006 Act should be achieved via the process set out in section 109 of that Act.

Our third conclusion relates to the UK Ministers making regulations in devolved areas. At present, Standing Order 30C applies to UK Ministers making regulations in devolved areas under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. Our general view is that Standing Order 30C should be extended to apply to regulations made by UK Ministers in devolved areas with the consent of Welsh Ministers under any Brexit-related Act. Our third conclusion reflects this position.

Before closing, I would like to mention the sunset provision applicable to regulations made under section 3. We acknowledge that the regulation-making powers in clauses 3(1) and 3(3) to make provision appropriate to prevent or remedy any deficiency in retained EU law governing the CAP direct payments scheme will sunset on 31 December 2020. We noted that the Minister's called this an important safeguard. However, I would just draw attention to clause 6. The regulation-making powers in clause 6 are not subject to such a time limit. 

Thank you, Deputy Llywydd.

Thank you. Can I call on the Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs to reply?

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I thank both Mike Hedges, as Chair of the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee, and also Mick Antoniw, as the Chair of the CLA committee, for their comments. I think Mike Hedges explained very succinctly why this LCM was required and I thank him for his support.

In relation to Mick Antoniw's comments, I have read your report that came from your meeting on Monday, and if I could just say, in relation to the Henry VIII powers, I do note that you prefer an affirmative procedure, but given the very narrow scope of the power and that any consequential provisions made are likely to concern highly technical issues, we do consider the negative resolution procedure is appropriate.

In relation to the sunset provision applicable to regulation-making powers, again, given the very limited scope of the power in clause 6(1), which is just really to address any consequential matters arising from the other provisions in this very narrow Bill, a time limit on the power is unwarranted in this instance.

Regarding your third conclusion about UK Ministers making regulations in devolved areas, I hope I explained in my opening remarks why we did this, but in relation to Standing Order 30C being extended, that would be a matter for the Business Committee, Deputy Presiding Officer, but it does remain the Welsh Government's intention to ensure the Senedd's attention is drawn to any regulations made by UK Ministers in devolved areas with the consent of Welsh Ministers. Diolch.

Thank you. The proposal is to agree the motion. Does any Member object? No. Therefore, the motion is agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36. 

Item 4 was topical questions. There have been no topical questions accepted.

Item 5 is the 90-second statements, and we have one this afternoon—the Llywydd, Elin Jones. 

Fifty years ago, in January 1970, an innovative charity was established in Ceredigion for blind people offering the first service of its kind in Wales and the United Kingdom, a service that would enable the blind people of Ceredigion to hear the latest news in the local press. That scheme was the Ceredigion talking newspaper.

The talking newspaper was set up by Ronald Sturt, a lecturer in the College of Librarianship Wales in Llanbadarn Fawr. Initially, the recordings of local voices reading articles from the local press were on tape cassettes and provided to 18 people. Nowadays, the recordings are on a USB and there are over 100 regular listeners of the talking newspaper, with more than 60 volunteers contributing regularly. The recordings are released weekly and include articles from the Cambrian News, Golwg and Y Cymro. One reader, Eileen Sinnet Jones, has volunteered continuously for 50 years. What a contribution by Eileen.

I’d like to congratulate the Ceredigion talking newspaper for  breaking new ground in 1970, for 50 years of service and for bringing the news in both Welsh and English to those who cannot see or read it in Ceredigion and beyond.

Diolch.

Item 6 on the agenda this afternoon is the Member debate under Standing Order 11.21(iv): Suicide Bereavement Support, and I call on Lynne Neagle to move the motion. Lynne. 

Thank you, Dirprwy Lywydd. I'm really pleased to open this debate on suicide bereavement. I'd like to thank Dai Lloyd AM and David Melding AM for co-submitting the motion with me today, and Dai Lloyd for closing the debate. I'd also like to thank all the Members who have supported the motion.

Today, I want to start by recognising that losing someone to suicide is a uniquely devastating loss. It leaves people in a deeply dark place. Now, I know that grief is a very personal thing, and that everyone experiences it in their own way and copes differently. I do not mean in any way to minimise the impact of other bereavements, but in order to ensure the right support for those bereaved by suicide, we have to recognise the ways in which it is different to other losses and just how uniquely devastating it is. Indeed, it is hard to even put into words. In addition to the heartbreaking loss of someone you love, there's often stigma and isolation, destructive feelings of guilt, and a lifetime of asking, 'What if?', 'If only', and, above all, 'Why?'—a question that some people will never be able to find the answer to. 

The loss of someone to suicide can also have a major impact on those well beyond the deceased's immediate family and friends. I have previously described suicide as like a large rock falling in a pond. The waves ripple outwards and are wide and far-reaching.

Each year in Wales, around 300 to 350 lives are lost through suicide. It used to be claimed that six people are impacted by every suicide, but more recent research has found that, in fact, 135 people are affected. The loss of someone to suicide devastates families, friends and whole communities. We know too that losing someone to suicide is a major risk factor for dying by suicide, especially for young people who are in a high-risk group. So, support for those bereaved by suicide is one of the most effective things we can do to prevent people dying by suicide.

Members will remember that the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, so ably chaired by Dai Lloyd, undertook a major inquiry into suicide prevention in Wales in 2018 and produced a report called 'Everybody's Business'. As part of that inquiry, we looked carefully at the support available for those bereaved by suicide, including meeting with people living with suicide loss.

I've spoken before in this Chamber about the committee's visit to the Jacob Abraham Foundation in Cardiff where we met a group of relatives, all of whom had lost sons, husbands, fathers, and brothers to suicide. One lady had lost not one but two sons to suicide—an absolutely heartbreaking reminder of the risk that suicide bereavement poses. Shockingly, not one of those families had received any specialist support, apart from the support offered by the foundation. They had not even been able to access 'Help is at hand Cymru', the excellent Welsh Government booklet on suicide bereavement. Now, the Jacob Abraham Foundation receives no statutory funds and has been operating on a hand-to-mouth basis since it was set up by Nicola Abraham following the death of her son Jacob by suicide in 2015. In 'Everybody's Business', the committee said very clearly, and I quote:

'We were staggered to hear of the lack of support available to those bereaved by...suicide.'

That is why the committee went on to make three recommendations on bereavement support. We called for a Wales-wide postvention pathway for suicide to be taken forward as an immediate priority. We called for 'Help is at hand Cymru' to be more actively promoted, and we called for Welsh Government to give active consideration to providing funding for support groups for those bereaved by suicide. We made those recommendations back in November 2018, and now, more than a year on, nowhere near enough has changed.

I welcomed the £500,000 additional funding made available in response to the health committee's report to fund the role of a new national suicide prevention lead in Wales and regional co-ordinators. I recognise that there's been a delay in appointing that person, which has slowed progress, but now that an appointment has been made, we really need to move at pace. I welcome, too, the 1,500 copies of 'Help is at hand Cymru' that the Welsh Government got printed following our report, but I am still meeting people bereaved by suicide who are not being signposted or given this vital resource. And there has been no investment in support groups and, indeed, the final survivors of bereavement by suicide group in Wales has, in fact, closed.

Whenever I have raised my concerns about suicide bereavement in the past year, I've been pointed to Welsh Government's bereavement services review, although I have said time and time again that I don't think we needed a review to tell us that suicide bereavement services are woefully inadequate in Wales. That review has now reported, and I have to say, I am really disappointed with it. I just do not recognise the picture it paints of the support it claims is out there for suicide bereavement. Apparently, there are six services offering suicide bereavement support in Torfaen. Caerphilly, Cardiff, Flintshire, Pembrokeshire, and Rhondda Cynon Taf fare even better with eight each. Who knew? Certainly not the people bereaved by suicide that I have met. To be fair to the report, it is clear that the majority—81 per cent of providers—are offering information and support and signposting to other support services, which, for me, raises many questions about what this suicide support looks like. Is it a flyer, an e-mail, a phone call? And shouldn't the report have been clear about what kind of support was being offered and by whom? We know from the report that specialist support is thin on the ground, but it tells us nothing about who is delivering that support, how long people have to wait for it or anything about the quality of services or, indeed, anything else about it.

The Minister knows that young suicide is a cause very close to my heart. The 2 Wish Upon a Star charity provides bereavement support for families who lose a child or young adult in a sudden and traumatic way, including through suicide. It was set up by Rhian Mannings, following the death of her baby son, George, which was followed by the tragic suicide of her husband, Paul, just five days later. Just like Nicola Abraham, Rhian has used her lived experience of suicide bereavement to try to prevent other families going through what she has done. They are doing really fantastic work across Wales. The memory boxes they provide for families whose child has died in hospital provide a little comfort at a time that is undoubtedly the darkest any parent will ever experience. Their ability to offer support shortly after the bereavement, or whenever that support is needed, is literally, for some families, a life saver. They also provide much needed support for bereaved siblings. Yet, despite taking referrals from every health board in Wales, and providing a service in every A&E department and most critical care departments, 2 Wish Upon a Star receives not a penny of public funding from any of the health boards. That is just wrong. 

The Welsh Government urgently needs to implement the recommendations in 'Everybody's Business' to develop a postvention strategy for suicide. That strategy should be co-produced with those with lived experience of suicide bereavement, and ensure that flexible support is available to people when they need it, whether that be in the immediate aftermath of a suicide, in six weeks, in two, three or 10 years down the line. It must also include timely access to specialist treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, which is often suffered by those bereaved by suicide, especially those who found their loved one. 

We are behind other parts of the UK on this. England already has a postvention pathway that could help inform ours, and there are fantastic examples of suicide bereavement support in England, many co-produced with bereaved families. But it is not just about supporting individuals; it is also about postvention in organisations where there has been a death by suicide, whether that be a school, a fire service, a hospital, GP practice or a railway station. We in this Assembly should know better than many the crucial importance of a postvention response to the loss of a friend and colleague to suicide. Particularly close to my heart is the need for suicide postvention in every school in Wales. In England, new guidance has been published, stating that a single suicide in a school should be treated as a potential cluster because young people are so vulnerable as a high-risk group for suicide.

I warmly commend the new guidance that the Welsh Government commissioned from Professor Ann John on talking about suicide with young people who are suicidal and self-harming, but it is not enough. We need to ensure that mental health and suicide prevention is embedded in the curriculum in Wales, to reach those young people who nobody knows is suicidal until they tragically take their own lives. We also must ensure that all schools undertake postvention following a suicide. I know that some schools have been quick to use the Samaritans' Step by Step postvention programme, but there are others I know of that, other than some counselling sessions, have done nothing at all. I'm delighted we now have Papyrus with a base in Wales, and we must ensure that schools draw on the organisations of them and the Samaritans. It cannot be an optional extra; it is too late when another young person has died. 

And, yes, this will take additional resources, but to anyone who says we can't afford it, I say we can't afford not to. It has been estimated that every suicide costs the public purse £1.6 million. How much better would it be to do what the Government talks so much about and invest in early intervention and support for those bereaved? We have some brilliant people and organisations working in this field in Wales. I want to pay tribute to Professor Ann John, who chairs the Welsh Government's national advisory group on suicide prevention. Ann works tirelessly, and I thank her for it. But we must ensure that people like Ann have the resources and the full commitment from Welsh Government to do the job that they so want to do. 

Social media gets a bad press a lot of the time, and I'm sure we can all understand this here. However, I have found Twitter a fantastic opportunity to network with like-minded people. Through Twitter, I have come to know a group of mothers who have lost children to suicide. Some of them are from Wales; others are from elsewhere in the UK. They have nicknamed themselves 'The Warrior Mums', and warriors they are, each and every day. 

So, I want to close today by paying a heartfelt tribute to all the warrior mums, the warrior dads, and to the courage of all those who are living with suicide loss every day. Our duty, Minister, is to honour their courage, by working with them to deliver the suicide bereavement support that is so desperately needed in Wales, and, in doing so, to save lives.

David Melding.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, for calling me in this most important debate. Can I just start by paying tribute to Lynne Neagle, who is an outstanding voice and leader in this field, both as Chair of the committee, and in general in our debates here, and has done so much to hold the Government to account, to commend the Government when it's doing well, but also to remind it when there's still a huge gap that needs to be filled?

I think all of us who have served as Assembly Members for any length of time would have had casework in this area that's tender and very, very painful. I have to say at least two cases come to mind in my own experience, and the complication of the cases, the length of time required in our own efforts to support those affected, was immense, and of some value in terms of improving public services, but of course, by way of direct therapy, of no particular use to the people that we were supporting. And that's when I really did experience this insight that, for some of my constituents, the first time they were really talking to someone outside their immediate family or group of friends about this issue was when they'd come to talk about the difficulties they were having in accessing adequate support.

I have to say, I've also met people who have then spoken out—and Lynne talked about this—and given incredible witness. What an act of generosity it is, to come to a meeting here, perhaps, in the Oriel or the Neuadd, or indeed even in formal committee session, and indeed also in the all-party group that Lynne has established, and to talk about their experiences, to give that witness, so that others may be spared this terrible pain. And you were quite right, Lynne, to pay tribute to all those who have done that.

When suicide afflicts children and young people, it is, I think, overwhelmingly painful. And I do pay tribute here to the work of Swansea University and Public Health Wales for their recently published thematic study, which is a great help I think in giving us a fuller understanding. And this was a study of all those aged between 10 and 17 who probably suffered suicide. Their deaths were rarely due to a single reason, but a complex combination of risk factors, circumstances, and adverse experiences. But families will often blame themselves and suffer appalling guilt, which itself then increases the risk of suicide. And it's at that point, because it is a natural tendency I think for many, to ask the question, 'What could I have done?', or even to say, 'What didn't I do?' These are not justified questions. These circumstances are overwhelming, but they are the thoughts that come to mind, and they are dark and unpleasant thoughts, and thoughts that eat away at people's own resolve very often, unless they can talk them through, and then are supported by people who realise that this is the inevitable response, often, that people who have suffered this trauma will experience.

Clearly, bereavement services can play a crucial part in supporting those affected by suicide. The voluntary sector play a great role here, being highly innovative, and, as Lynne said, 2 Wish Upon a Star is a gold-standard example, in my opinion, of this. But there's also the likes of Cruse Bereavement Care Cymru. It provides support for about 360 people a year bereaved by suicide, providing one-to-one support and group support, but also giving incredible insight into the sorts of services that are required. And Cruse points out that it's critical that the right support is available at the right time, and that will be different for various people. Very structured approaches and therapeutic approaches may not be possible immediately or desired immediately by those affected, but then much needed later. So, you need to look at the whole case and whole pathway. But Cruse has pointed out that there are very limited counselling support services available to those bereaved by suicide, and I do think that that is something that we need to focus on this afternoon in our debate.

I do think it's proper to balance our remarks by commending the work that the Welsh Government has started. And I did notice from the mid-term review, conducted by Swansea University and Health Promotion Wales, that the Welsh Government's five-year suicide prevention strategy has achieved some excellent progress and made developing local suicide prevention action plans a reality, and that they are coming into play. But they all need to be looking at what bereavement services are available. That's a key area in terms of preventing suicide. As we've just heard, those that have had a close friend or relative that has suffered suicide are themselves at risk, but have also given us those insights that are needed to plan effective services. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. 

And I'd like to just start by thanking Lynne Neagle and others for tabling this debate this afternoon. However, it is extremely sad that we have to have this and debate this subject today, not just because suicide bereavement support is limited and, frankly, not good enough, but because suicide is still occurring on an enormous scale and is a public health crisis.

Last year, I spoke during the debate on suicide prevention and I set a challenge to all of us. The challenge was for all of us to do better and to understand and accept that suicide is everybody's business. I asked Members and members of the public to do more to support each other and to do more to prevent suicide. Now, I did this, Deputy Llywydd, because I simply do not want another family to go through what mine has gone through and continues to go through. So, let's remember, Deputy Llywydd, that we should never stop trying to help others, especially when it can save lives. 

At the start of the debate, Lynne Neagle mentioned the fact that those bereaved by suicide are at risk of suicide and more at risk from suicide, and that is no surprise to me. I myself, following my experience, am a sufferer of depression and PTSD. So, I want members of the public and Members of the Chamber to understand what life is like for the bereaved and why it is so important that we ourselves do more and also the Governments in Wales and across the United Kingdom do better—do better to support those bereaved when suicide occurs and to support those suffering before it's too late. 

So, what is suicide bereavement? It's the sleepless nights; the nightmares when you do sleep; the not being able to get out of bed to face the world; the flashbacks and anxieties when you do; the knowing that someone's life has ended too soon; the feeling that you'll never go to the football with your best friend again; and it's the realisation that while others may be able to move on, it's that realisation that your life will never be the same again. 

Deputy Llywydd, awareness of behaviour can impact on those that have lost someone has to improve. The reporting of suicide is a particular example and those that seek to inform this type of reporting should answer this very simple question: what effect will my actions have on the bereaved? 

Finally, Deputy Llywydd, I'd like to comment on mental health services as a whole and the role that they can play in suicide prevention. Now, we are very much more open in talking about this issue at the moment, but as I said at the start, suicide and mental health illness is a public health crisis. We always say that mental health should be treated with the same urgency and respect as physical health, well, now it's time to prove that point.

And in closing, if I may, I'd like to say that, in the absence of the adequate support for those bereaved by suicide and those suffering with mental health illness, there is an army, an army of volunteers and members of the public, who step up to the plate each and every day to provide support. And I'd like to finish, Deputy Llywydd, by thanking them, each and every one of them, for changing lives, for saving lives. Diolch.

As chair of the cross-party group on funerals and bereavement, I welcome this debate. We understand that between 300 and 350 people die by suicide each year in Wales, according to Samaritans Cymru, with the male suicide rate almost three times higher than that for females.

Samaritans Cymru reports the figure that Lynne Neagle referred to, that at least six people are deeply affected by each suicide. Lynne indicated, actually, that the multiplier is far, far higher than that, and that a person bereaved by suicide is far more likely to attempt suicide themselves. And they add that many people who are bereaved in this way find it hard to get the help they need and that we must provide better information and support to those bereaved or affected by suicide, and that support for this group must be recognised as a key element of suicide prevention.

Reference was made to Rhian Mannings, the founder of the all-Wales charity 2 Wish Upon a Star, and the charity and Rhian take part in the cross-party group. This charity, as we heard, provides essential bereavement support for families who have suddenly and traumatically lost a child or young adult aged under 25, which may be from suicide or may be through accident or illness. She told me that sudden death is the forgotten death in Wales. And although the charity has effectively become a statutory service in Wales, working, as we heard, with every health board and every police force, they're receiving no statutory support whatsoever, having to raise every penny themselves, despite reducing pressure on mental health teams, helping tackle the unforeseeable trauma of unpredictable death and loss.

Rhian Mannings states that she started her fight after her husband and son were taken from her suddenly—no preparation, no warning and then nothing, she said—and that the lack of support they received directly led to her husband taking his own life.

Cruse Bereavement Care launched their manifesto for bereaved people two months ago. They believe that access to the right support, tailored to the need of each bereaved person, can help them deal with the challenge of grief and build a meaningful life, whilst remembering and celebrating the lives of those they have lost. This, they say, can in turn help improve mental health and reduce the impact on NHS services.

Amongst other things, Cruse is calling for a named Minister with responsibility for bereavement and a cross-departmental strategy, and for local funding for high-quality bereavement support, where they say too many people still lack support after bereavement, where in too many areas, there is no statutory funding for the agencies and charities helping bereaved people. And they call for more compassionate communities where everyone knows enough about grief to play their part in supporting people around a death. 

Marie Curie states that ensuring adequate support for families experiencing bereavement is an important part of the process of death and dying. And 2 Wish Upon a Star notes the correlation between those organisations, funded by Welsh Government, local authority or health boards, which predominantly signpost or refer into organisations and those who provide bereavement services, but receive little or no funding. And they state that services need to be widely known and a multi-agency approach undertaken to ensure support can be delivered Wales-wide and that severe long-term consequences can be reduced.

The cross-party group on hospices and palliative care, which I also chair, proposes four recommendations to improve the care and support of bereaved people in Wales, and thus ensure better outcomes for people following the loss of a loved one. Firstly, to improve data on the need for bereavement support where, due to the lack of robust needs assessment, it is currently very difficult for services to plan for meeting need or to understand what resources they may need to do so. Secondly, to make bereavement a key feature of all relevant policy to be considered and embedded in Welsh Government strategy and policy, including adult mental health and well-being and children's mental health and well-being. Thirdly, to embed bereavement support in schools. And, fourthly, to make the provision of bereavement care sustainable where the lack of strategic and policy prioritisation for bereavement support is evidenced in the very low levels of statutory funding for care for the bereaved.

Lynne Neagle made reference to the publication last month of 'A Scoping Survey of Bereavement Services in Wales: End of Study Report' commissioned by the Welsh Government. This identified that more bereavement services were available in the south-east of Wales, with the least number being available in the north and west of Wales. It said

'Respondents described a number of gaps and challenges in bereavement service provision...Many appeared to relate to the lack of a clear framework for the commissioning and delivery of bereavement services and included non-prioritisation of bereavement care within organisations, lack of access to funding and restricted access to training and appropriate facilities.' 

A key—

Are you winding up, please? Wind up, please.

Yes. A key consideration from the results, therefore, is the development of a national delivery framework for bereavement care. This is urgent and must include support for those bereaved by suicide, co-produced by those with lived experience. Thank you.

I think this is a very important but difficult debate, but what I'd like to do is just use my five minutes to focus on the preventative agenda, because, obviously, the parliamentary review of people aged 13 to 17 that took place—happily, it only affected 33 people. But, obviously, there are a lot more people who might have committed suicide, and we just have to focus on what we can do to endeavour to prevent suicides where at all possible.

We've come quite a long way, historically, since the stigma of suicide at the time when my grandfather took his life in 1928, because, at that point, churches would just simply refuse to even allow the family to bury their loved one in a churchyard. Most people tried to cover up what had happened and pretend that there was some other cause of their death. So, the fact that we can now speak openly about suicide, and Jack, obviously, is absolutely an exemplary example of doing that—.

We have to endeavour to ensure that all public services and, indeed, other stakeholders are engaged in the business of preventing suicide. So, whilst many young people have suicidal thoughts, only a small number die in that way, and that's in that parliamentary review. So, we have to focus on those who might become so desperate that they actually do it, and we know some of the signs and we need to ensure that we tackle them. They are there in the opportunities for prevention that are recommended.

We know that self-harm is a potential sign, and we need to get much better at ensuring that everybody knows who is self-harming and what services we're making available to them, because self-harm is a cry for help until it becomes suicide.

Prevention of alcohol and substance misuse: ongoing action to restrict access of children and young people to alcohol. I went to an excellent drama called Smashed aimed at year 8 pupils in Ysgol Bro Edern in my constituency. It's really important to outline to students who think that toying with alcohol is a cool thing to do, when, actually, they are opening themselves to being exploited by people if they're out of control, don't know what's going on, can't get home safely. These are some of the risk factors that young people need to understand, and it's no use telling people not to drink because it's all over the place. But they need to do it in a controlled and safe way.

Mitigation of adverse childhood experiences: we know that things like adoption, things like a parent in prison, sexual abuse—these are all risk factors. Lynne Neagle and I attended the launch of Papyrus last Friday in Cardiff Central, which the First Minister also attended, which indicates the importance he gives to this matter. It was very humbling to hear the experience of the chair of Papyrus, who explained that he'd had to give up becoming a headteacher when his adopted son killed himself. But it wasn't that it wasn't a perfectly loving family. It was the background, the reasons why this child, then a young adult, had become adopted—that was haunting him. We know that, once people go through puberty, this can become a major issue. The report that we did with the Children and Young People Committee in the fourth Assembly told us how complex that is.

But we need to ensure that all schools are taking this agenda seriously. Some schools do absolutely brilliantly, and other schools think that it is somebody else's problem. I think I'd like to highlight the report that came out from the Samaritans over the summer, which was about exclusion from school in Wales, and the hidden cost. We know that some schools will use every opportunity to dump kids on somebody else and get rid of them because they just don't want them appearing in their exam statistics. This is absolutely not good enough. We need to ensure that all schools are aware of their well-being responsibilities towards young people, and we need to be vigilant that people aren't using covert ways of getting rid of people and making it somebody else's—. Because we know that the people who are living in poverty are bound to have more issues around status, around self-worth, and these are people that we absolutely need to be ensuring that the school is embracing as their second family if their first family is unable to provide that loving home that most of us are happily able to have.

Thank you. Can I now call on the Minister for Health and Social Services, Vaughan Gething?

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I welcome today's debate on what is a deeply emotive and important issue. The impact of losing someone to suicide is devastating and unquestionably has far-reaching effects on families, friends and communities, as Lynne Neagle set out in opening the debate, and was added to by every other Member in a different way during the course of it.

I recognise, as speakers do, that bereavement by suicide is a unique sense of loss, and that people experience a wide range of emotions. No-one can predict exactly how people will react to such an event, but it is important that support is available in the right places and at the right times for those who need it. I recognise that people who are bereaved by suicide can be at risk themselves, so ensuring that appropriate postvention support is, I recognise, critically important. I am committed to improving postvention support as part of our broader programme of work to prevent suicide and self-harm.

Understanding the complexity of circumstances and risk factors that contribute to suicide is key if we are to prevent future deaths by suicide. The recent review by Public Health Wales, referred to earlier and last week, into the deaths of children and young people by probable suicide is part of helping us to understand this. The review highlighted the significant number of children and young people who were known to public services, for instance health, social services and criminal justice, challenging all public services to consider future opportunities to intervene early to prevent death by suicide. It is clear that no one person or agency can prevent suicide and self-harm. So, partnership and cross-sector working are critical to maximise opportunities for prevention. Creating a culture—as we have taken some steps towards—that encourages people to talk, and taking a public health approach to supporting emotional well-being are also an essential part of improvement.

Our 'Together for Mental Health' strategy is underpinned by meaningful collaboration and partnership, delivered by a range of organisations, from public sector to third sector, and overseen by a multi-agency national partnership board. A recent announcement in the draft budget commits a further £20 million to mental health services, raising the ring fence to £712 million, which demonstrates our continued commitment to improving the services. That builds on the additional £0.5 million announced this year specifically for suicide prevention and support. I've also committed to doubling the funding, together with the education Minister, for the whole-school approach work, and of course that is funding that comes from both the education and health portfolios.

The new 'Together for Mental Health' delivery plan, which will be published on Friday this week, positions preventing suicide and self-harm as a key action, making it a priority for the next three years. Actions include the development and implementation of a bereavement support pathway for suicide, as well as a commitment to further improve access to valuable resources, such as the 'Help is at Hand' resource that has been referred to several times today.

This will build upon the work we've already put in place to improve the emotional well-being of our children and young people. Our recent work included extending the schools in-reach pilot to expand capacity, enabling specialist staff to work with more schools, and publishing new guidance on suicide and self-harm. The guidance aims to support teachers and other professionals on early intervention and self-management of self-harm and suicidal thoughts when they arise. The whole-school approach forms a key element to our focus on prevention and ensuring early access to support. As has been mentioned, last week, the First Minister attended the launch of Papyrus, a particular organisation for the prevention of young suicide in Wales, reaffirming cross-Government support in this area.

Within this financial year, we've also supported a range of regional suicide prevention programmes, including innovative approaches such as working with rugby teams to encourage men to talk about mental health, and providing additional bereavement counselling sessions. At the end of the month, I will update the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee on our actions to deliver our response to their 'Everybody's Business' suicide prevention report, and that will include our work to improve bereavement services in Wales. We know that access to good quality bereavement care is of primary importance. It helps with a healthy grieving process for the bereaved and should include actively following up on all those who have been bereaved, even if support is initially refused.

The bereavement services scoping review taken forward by the end of life care board at Marie Curie in Cardiff University was published in December, and again referred to in the debate, mapping existing support, ranging from signposting through to specialist counselling, and identifying areas where further resourcing is needed. The scope of the report covered the broad range of bereavement support, including suicide. It highlights gaps and challenges in bereavement service provision, and raises a number of considerations for development and improvement. These are centred on the need to develop a national framework for the delivery of bereavement care in Wales. This would then facilitate the prioritisation of bereavement support at organisational and regional levels, and help to provide equity and access to appropriate types and levels of support that are responsive to local need.

A national delivery framework would also support the establishment of clear referral pathways, approaches to risk and need assessment, training for staff and volunteers, and the development of a directory of the available bereavement provision. Finally, a national bereavement framework will support improvements in how services are evaluated and assessed, and standards could then be further developed for use as audit and quality improvement. To take the development of the framework forward, we're in the process of recruiting a dedicated project manager. We have asked the national clinical lead for end of life care, Dr Idris Baker, to establish a national bereavement steering group to support this work. As many of you will know, Dr Baker has considerable knowledge and experience in bereavement care.

As an interim measure, I've recently agreed additional in-year funding to strengthen existing suicide bereavement support provided by the third sector. Five organisations have been supported. In addition, Welsh Government regional funding is being used to create a new bereavement support service for north Wales. I'll make a written statement before the half-term recess to outline our longer-term plans.

I can also confirm that we have now appointed a national suicide prevention co-ordinator for Wales who will be vital in joining up approaches and leading the development and implementation of new action to prevent suicide and self-harm in a much more co-ordinated and effective way. The co-ordinator will be supported by three regional posts to deliver on action plans across Wales. The inclusion of people with lived experience will be fundamental to the development of the postvention pathway. A key focus for the national co-ordinator will be the development of that postvention pathway as part of our broader work to improve bereavement support. The national advisory group on suicide and self-harm are now planning three regional stakeholder workshops to inform that work.

I hope this helps to demonstrate the importance we continue to attach to this agenda, and outline action that we are taking, both to prevent suicide and self-harm, and also to improve bereavement support. I recognise the ambition of Members across the Chamber for further pace in delivering that improvement. I will include more details on timescales for the bereavement pathway in the written statement that I aim to issue before half-term recess.

Thank you. I call on Dai Lloyd to reply to the debate.

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Can I say, first of all, how proud I am to be able to take part in this debate? Because we've had some powerful, emotive expressions of what are true, deep feelings here from everybody who's contributed. It's been a truly spectacular debate, really. I know it won't get hardly any coverage outside, but it has really been a privilege here to witness what everybody has said. Because, as Lynne Neagle in opening said, this is the utter devastation of bereavement by suicide, and she outlined, in some cases, the paucity of the support available to those uniquely bereavement by suicide.

There were 360 deaths by suicide a couple of years ago in Wales; that's one a day. If anything else was causing one death a day in Wales, people would be out there protesting and stuff, we'd have urgent questions here every other week saying, 'What's happening?' I hear the Minister saying there is a lot of stuff happening, and I commend the approach of the Government, but we need so much more, because there is an opportunity.

There are two different preventative aspects. The first is the prevention of suicide in the first place, and that is about how we deal with people who self-harm—not all of whom go on to do anything else, other than a cry for help. But the challenge for us in primary care is to pick up on who is likely to go on to do something far more devastating. And when we decide as GPs that that person needs to be seen there and then, they need to be seen there and then.

We keep talking about how physical health and mental health should have a parity of esteem, but if somebody's acutely mentally ill, that parity is not obvious to me as a GP. It was 20 years ago when, if somebody said they were suicidal, I would ring up the nearest psychiatric hospital and a doctor would see them there and then; as would happen if you came to see me if you had chest pain, and I would refer you to the nearest physical health department there and then. That no longer happens with acute mental illness. We need to look at how acute mental health emergencies are dealt with.

The current situation is that crisis teams will ring the GP back later that day, the following day, or offer an appointment for the following week. It just does not do it. Because GPs do know a fair amount about psychiatric illness and suicide, which is not always recognised in the secondary care sector. Otherwise, people are left bereft and we are left in these devastating situations so eloquently outlined by Lynne, David, Jack Sargeant—I pay tribute again, Jack, to your unique insight into this—and Mark Isherwood, as well as Jenny.

Yes, there's a primary prevention of suicide in the first place, but important in the context that we're talking about today is the prevention of suicide in those already bereaved by suicide. We always say, and it was obvious in the health committee's report, 'Everybody's Business', that suicide is everybody's business. Can I just say, be kinder to one another, people, all right? As Jack is always saying, 'Be kind to one another.' If somebody looks distressed, ask them how they are. There's a good piece of suicide prevention. You may be the only person that's spoken to them that day.

Talking about suicide, in the first place, does not make it more likely that suicide will happen—that's important to remember. But once suicide has happened in a family, a family member is more likely to have a death by suicide as a result of the devastation of the suicide in that family. And that's where we can have a unique opportunity, through the suicide bereavement support services coming in at that point, to prevent a further suicide in that family. So, that's what's before us.

There needs to be a step change in performance. I welcome all the hard work that's going on, and we've heard about the excellent work in the third sector: Papyrus, 2 Wish Upon A Star, Cruse, Samaritans and, yes, Survivors of Bereavement by Suicide—what a tremendous organisation—and that is people with the lived experience. We need to tap into that. The step change in behaviour needs to keep on stepping and changing. 

To finish, Lynne mentioned there's a load of warrior mums and warrior dads out there in these difficult family situations. I'm looking at a couple of warrior AMs, I have to say, in Lynne, Jack and others. We need in this situation to all be warrior AMs with a warrior Government. Diolch yn fawr. 

Diolch. The proposal is to agree the motion. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Object. Therefore, we will defer voting until voting under voting time. 

Item 7 on the agenda is a debate on the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee Report, 'Mental Health in Policing and Police Custody', and I call on the Chair of the committee to move the motion, Dai Lloyd.  

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm pleased to take part and to open this debate today on the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee's report on mental health in the context of policing and police custody. 

During two Assembly committee inquiries, Assembly Members have heard from police representatives that an increasing amount of police resources are being used on managing mental health crises. The committee therefore agreed to hold a short inquiry with a focus on partnership working between the police, health and social care services, and others. We were particularly keen to see how effectively services are working together to prevent people with mental health problems from being taken into police custody, and to assure ourselves that vulnerable people in mental health crisis get the care and support that they need.

Sections 135 and 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 give police officers powers in relation to individuals who have, or appear to have, a mental disorder. The Policing and Crime Act 2017 made some significant changes to sections 135 and 136. These were intended to improve responses to people in mental health crises who need urgent help with their mental health in cases where police officers are the first to respond.

Previously, section 136 applied to people in a public place, section 135 required a magistrate-issued warrant for a police officer to enter private premises to remove a person to a place of safety for assessment. The 2017 Act introduced changes that allowed for that assessment to take place in a person's home or private premises under certain circumstances, and removes the need to be in a public place.

The Act introduced a number of other changes, including that police stations cannot be used as a place of safety for people under the age of 18. In the case of adults, police stations can only be used as a place of safety in specific exceptional circumstances. Now, we recognise that the police frequently respond to people with mental health problems, but for the purposes of our inquiry we have focused on the use of section 136, because this is usually used when people are at their most vulnerable.

Too often and for too long, vulnerable people experiencing mental health crises, who have committed no crime, have found themselves in a police cell because there is nowhere else for them to go. We therefore welcome the assurances we received from senior police officers, inspectors and Welsh Government officials that police custody is no longer being used as a place of safety for those detained under section 136, apart from in exceptional circumstances.

Further, we were reassured to hear that there have been no cases of a police cell being used as a place of safety for a person under 18 in Wales since 2015. We were also pleased to hear that inspections of police custody in Wales have generally found that, where adults are detained in police custody for exceptional circumstances, the provision of mental health care is good.

While the number of people in mental health crisis being held in police custody has decreased, the number of detentions under section 136 appears to be increasing. Data published by the Home Office showed that there were 2,256 detentions in Wales under section 136 in 2018-19, compared to 1,955 in 2017-18. The police also report an increase in demand from people in mental health crises.

We recommend that the Welsh Government works with the police to seek evidence about why the number of detentions under the Mental Health Act 1983 is increasing, and to provide some analysis of national and local data to explain the regional variations. In his response to this recommendation, the Minister emphasises that seeking and analysing evidence about the number of detentions under the Mental Health Act 1983 and providing analysis of national and local data to explain the regional variations, is a core responsibility of the mental health crisis care concordat assurance group.

We were also told that provision of mental health triage services is variable and not consistently funded across Wales. Triage services can play an important role in reducing the use of section 136 detentions and police cells, and hospitalisation via the emergency department or acute mental health services. To that end, we have recommended that the Welsh Government works in partnership with the police to review the emerging evidence on the effectiveness of the different triage schemes in Wales.

The evidence we received was generally very positive about the contact people had with the police when experiencing a mental health crisis. We were told that individuals and their families who have called the police during a mental health crisis have been grateful for the support they received. This challenges the general assumption that people experiencing a mental health crisis have negative views of being detained by the police. 

We therefore recommend that the Welsh Government should work with Healthcare Inspectorate Wales to ensure the thematic review of crisis and out-of-hours care includes a review of the care pathway for people detained under section 136, looking at the quality, safety and responsiveness of the care provided to people detained under section 136.

Section 136 also allows for a person to be detained for assessment by a doctor and an approved mental health professional to enable arrangements to be made for treatment or care. We heard, however, that the majority of people detained under section 136 are discharged following assessment without further treatment. In figures provided by Mind Cymru, 68 per cent of those assessed in 2016-17 were not admitted to hospital for treatment. This accounts for two thirds of the overall number of section 136 detentions that year. It is worrying that the majority of people detained under section 136 are discharged following assessment because they do not need urgent mental health in-patient treatment. 

The code of practice to the Mental Health Act 1983 requires that people being detained under the Act are always taken to hospital in the manner most likely to protect their dignity and privacy—i.e., not in a police car. However, the evidence we heard suggested that this is not happening. In fact, the South Wales Police partnership group told us that

'the vast majority of S.136's are still being brought to place of safety by the Police.'

We also heard that operational pressures on the ambulance service and mental health services meant that the police are filling the gap, and police vehicles are consistently being used to transport people to mental health establishments.

We were told by the Minister that there are pilots under way in Aneurin Bevan and Hywel Dda health board areas to look at non-emergency conveyance. He has also asked the NHS collaborative commissioning unit to undertake a mental health urgent access and conveyance review to look at how and where access is provided.

We therefore recommend that the Welsh Government should, as a matter of urgency, implement its conveyance review. It should also state how it will ensure that alternative patient transport will be provided for individuals experiencing mental health crises, thereby limiting the use of police vehicles in the conveyance of individuals detained under the Mental Health Act to hospital.

While I welcome the Minister’s acceptance of this recommendation, it is disappointing that, despite the committee’s calls for urgency in this area, the findings of the mental health urgent access and conveyance review will not be available until April, with further action dependent on its consideration by the MHCCC assurance group.

In conclusion, I think we would all agree that it is unacceptable to hold mentally ill individuals in police custody, and that the practice of detaining people under section 136 of the Mental Health Act should only occur in exceptional circumstances. We welcome the progress that has been made to date but we believe as a committee that greater pace is now needed. Thank you.

Can I thank the Chair for his introduction and quite detailed explanation of the report? It doesn't leave us much to say. Can I also thank the clerking team and the witnesses who came before the committee? 

Dirprwy Lywydd, we regularly discuss in this Chamber the way in which Wales addresses mental health provision. In fact, we just had a debate that highlighted very much mental health and how we tackle that and the prevention of suicide. We often reflect upon the ability to deliver crisis care and care and treatment planning, sometimes linked to physical health care and sometimes, as well, to mental health care. Just look back at the debates of the past few years, both on the health and social care committee's reports and on the children and young people committee's reports. They've produced several reports around mental health in particular.

Now, we all know the figures. I know it's often quoted: one in four will suffer from mental health. And it's hugely frustrating that this still exists in society. There remains a stigma about mental health, and that, undoubtedly, stops people from speaking out and getting the support they need, though I am pleased to see action being taken to change that and I very much support all the steps being taken to do so. 

There are many recommendations in the report, and I'm pleased that the majority have been accepted by the Government or accepted in principle. However, I have concerns regarding the rejection of recommendation 11. I have had representations from many organisations in my role as chair of the cross-party group on mental health around crisis care and care and treatment planning and the pace at which previous recommendations and actions for their consequent delivery has been undertaken. 

Now, we all recognise that the mental health crisis care concordat is an ambitious agreement between Welsh Government and partners to improve the care and support for people experiencing or at risk of a mental health crisis. The concordat is underpinned by the following four core principles and expected outcomes: effective access to support before crisis point; urgent and emergency access to crisis care; quality treatment and care when in crisis; and recovery and staying well. Providing excellent crisis care requires a resolute focus on the person experiencing crisis, recognising them as an individual in need and responding in a person-centred way. The concordat makes clear that supporting individuals experiencing crisis is a multi-agency responsibility, which requires a joined-up approach, and we must not lose sight of the key issue: the needs of the person experiencing a mental health crisis.

The committee heard that since 2015, when the concordat was introduced, there has been a 90 per cent reduction in the number of individuals detained in police cells who are in mental health crisis, so it can help. Whilst this inquiry looked specifically at the use of section 136, recommendations, if implemented effectively and with pace, can have a broader impact and support the delivery of transformative change, which was the ambition of a crisis care concordat. The Twilight Sanctuary in Llanelli—the first of its kind in Wales—is an example of partnership working under the concordat with Dyfed Powys Police, Carmarthenshire County Council and Hywel Dda health board, having commissioned the service working with Mind and Hafal. I look forward to seeing the reflection of the good practice in Llanelli being introduced across Wales. 

I'd also like to discuss recommendation 8, which is based around care and treatment planning. Care and treatment planning is vital to people, irrespective of whether they're suffering with a physical health condition or a mental health condition. However, for those living with mental health illness, the failure to deliver a holistic care and treatment plan can be hugely detrimental, and we can see many getting caught in the revolving door of coming out, going back in, coming out, going back in and being detained. We've still not seen enough progress on care and treatment planning. Effective care and treatment plans are a great tool to prevent crises from occurring, as well as ensuring that people, whether it be those suffering with mental health or their carers and families, know how to access urgent support when they need it. However, there is significant evidence to show that care and treatment plans, in particular crisis plans, are not being used effectively. We are falling short in this area, and as a Welsh Government it's important that we must ensure that this is addressed as a matter of urgency. 

Now, I raised this during business questions back in November, and I raise it once more here: we must get the care and treatment plans right and we must ensure that those people using them have confidence in their care and treatment plans and don't feel that they're merely warm words that do not deliver for them. Dirprwy Lywydd, mental health care, whether it be in the community or in police custody, must continue to improve and we must do more.

I thank the committee for undertaking this report. Whilst the Welsh Government has accepted seven of its 11 recommendations, I urge the committee to monitor the actions proposed by the Welsh Government where it has only accepted recommendations in principle. 

Section 136 of the mental health Act is designed to allow police officers to remove from a public place, for their own or the public's safety, someone who they believe is undergoing a mental health crisis and to take them to a place of safety. As the report states, the use of police custody as places of safety has fallen significantly over the past four years. Additionally, the chair of the mental health crisis care concordat assurance group stated that there has been a 90 per cent reduction in the number of individuals detained in police cells who are in mental health crisis since the introduction of the crisis care concordat in 2015. As the report adds, this, and the subsequent passage of the Policing and Crime Act 2017, marks significant reductions in the use of police stations as places of safety, despite the general trend of rising section 136 detentions. However, as we've heard, the number of detentions in other units have gone up between 2017-18 and 2018-19. We therefore need a better understanding of why certain force areas saw differing rates of increase in these detentions and to see if lessons can be learned from police force areas such as Gwent, where figures actually fell.

The figures also demonstrated different approaches in the way that mental health triage schemes were implemented. These schemes are intended to bring police and mental health practitioners together to jointly assess a mental health incident in order to reduce the use of section 136. Although North Wales Police saw a 70 per cent increase in section 136 detentions between 2014 and 2019 to 795, mental health clinicians are working alongside North Wales Police to provide a new triage service based at the force control centre. This aims to help people identified as being in mental health crisis and to improve the flow of information between North Wales Police and Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board.

The Welsh Government accepted recommendation 2, which states that better understanding is needed on which model of joint working between the police and health staff is helping to provide people in crisis with the right help and support, which can contribute to reducing the use of section 136 overall. The National Police Chiefs' Council evidence in the report suggested that provision of health-based places of safety is patchy across Wales, both in terms of geographical spread and times of access.

Health boards pointed out that many had suitable facilities but these were not adequately staffed or that their irregular use may mean that staff used in these facilities did not have the right skills to deal with complex cases involving patients presenting different forms of emotional distress. Evidence received by the committee detailed a range of good practice models such as the scheme in Aneurin Bevan University Health Board that had developed a single point of contact accessible 24 hours a day for individuals, family or professionals.

The Welsh Government accepted recommendation 5, which outlines the need for additional health-based places of safety to be developed where required. However, it is then relying on the health boards to provide assurance that their current capacity is meeting demand in order to help them and their partners understand which elements of the crisis pathway need to be strengthened. We therefore need assurance that the associated costs will be met should additional health-based places of safety be required.

Autism is not a mental health condition, but many autistic people develop separate mental health problems that stem from a lack of appropriate support and mean that autistic people can develop more significant needs. However, although the proportion of autistic people in UK prisons is thought to be more than double that in the general population, the UK Government strategy on autism includes prisoners, and HMP Parc prison has been awarded the National Autistic Society autism accreditation, I can find no reference to autism in this report. Worryingly, the Inns of Court College of Advocacy planning to question someone with an autism spectrum disorder, including Asperger's syndrome guidelines, applicable to both witnesses and defendants, are all too often ignored. But as these state—and a message for everybody—consideration must be given not just to the types of questions asked but also to the manner in which this is done. Thank you.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I wasn't a member of the committee during this inquiry, and I look forward to rejoining the committee as I undertake my role as shadow Minister for health once again. But I am very grateful to the committee for producing a report that is exceptionally interesting and teaches us a great deal. The specific issue and what we're trying to achieve here is something where there is quite clear consensus and there has been over a number of years. But the actions that need to be taken in order to achieve that aim is one area where we may disagree in terms of the approach.

Nobody truly believes that it is appropriate for vulnerable people experiencing mental health crises to be sent to police stations, but far too often in the past, that is what has happened, and that was because there was nowhere else for the police to take those individuals. I was very pleased to read in this report that no-one under the age of 18 experiencing a mental health crisis has been sent to a police station since 2015, and the numbers of adults who find themselves in police stations is also reducing.

But we also see in this report that the number of cases of imprisonment under section 136 has increased, generally speaking, and the police told the committee that they felt that they were still being called too often to deal with issues that, in reality, relate to health and care or social care. What’s highlighted, if truth be told, is the fact that the kinds of 24-hour, seven days a week mental health services that we would like to see don’t exist, and people are still required to use the services that are available 24/7 and, of course, they are the police and emergency departments at hospitals, and so on.

So, we return to a theme that has emerged a number of times in a number of inquiries—I can refer back to our previous debate on suicide, for example—the feeling and the evidence that our health and care services are not fit for purpose, out of hours, certainly, and that that then places pressures on other services that are available 24/7.

Another general theme that emerges in the report is the fact that communication is inadequate between services, particularly between services that are devolved and those that are non-devolved. We must tackle that issue.

So there are themes there that are very familiar to us, if truth be told, and they are themes that I feel haven't been given the attention that they deserve in terms of the Welsh Government’s response to this report. So, I will finish by asking the Minister how this Government is going to improve the provision of crisis care, out of hours particularly, so that people who do experience a crisis or those who are looking after them will know who to contact and, more than that, will know that support will be provided to them when they make that call.

Thank you. Can I now call the Minister for Health and Social Services, Vaughan Gething?

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'd like to thank members of the Health, Social Care and Sport committee for their work in producing the 'Mental health in policing and police custody' report. It's important to acknowledge the role of the police in helping people in mental health crisis. In many cases, the police are the first point of contact and the support that they provide to some of our most vulnerable people is critical.

The recommendations made by the committee look to further strengthen the approach we're taking to improve crisis care, which is one of the key priorities included in the Welsh Government's 'Together for Mental Health' delivery plan that I expect to publish at the end of this week. The recommendations made in the committee's report align with the approach we are taking with partners to support people experiencing crisis through the mental health crisis care concordat, and I was pleased that many people recognised the improvements that have been made in terms of the numbers of people being detained. That has not come by accident; that's come through partnership working across health, the police and other sectors.

But I do recognise the ongoing concerns raised by the police regarding officer time spent responding to issues where mental health is deemed to be a factor. Some of this demand will be a properly appropriate use of the police's role and time under current mental health legislation. But, it will also include making sure that vulnerable people can access the right support, and that is provided across a range of agencies. From an NHS perspective, I made improving crisis care a priority, supported by additional funding. However, I recognise that the NHS is just one partner in the crisis pathway. We work closely with a range of partners, including the police, local authorities and the third sector, to improve support and outcomes for people. I was therefore pleased to agree, or agree in principle, 10 of the 11 recommendations in the committee report.

I agree with the committee about the importance of robust data and evidence on outcomes. The mental health crisis care assurance group has developed a revised data set for section 135 and section 136 detentions, which was published for the first time on 5 December. The data provides more information than was previously published, for instance, with the inclusion of ethnicity and the type of conveyance, and will now be published on a quarterly basis. We plan to continue to work with partners to conduct further analysis of the data to help inform our approach and practice over time. All partners agree that, to improve the crisis care pathway, we need a system that is able to respond to the range of ways in which people experience personal crisis. A one-size-fits-all approach will not work. To do this, we need to better understand and have a shared understanding of the demand currently described as mental health demand within our entire system.

In response, we have commissioned the NHS national collaborative commissioning unit to conduct a mental health urgent access and conveyance review. That review is being overseen by a multi-agency steering group and is analysing data across a range of partners, including the police, local authorities, 111, and the wider NHS family, including the Welsh ambulance service. The review, which will report in April, as has been mentioned, will help us understand the current demand, for instance, if it is mental health illness or distress due to social factors. This will enable all partners to consider their role in ensuring that needs are met as we improve crisis care and outcomes for people.

I accepted recommendations calling on the Government to work in partnership with the police to review the emerging evidence on the effectiveness of the different triage schemes across Wales. A key aim of the concordat assurance group is to collectively understand which approaches are most effective in improving outcomes for individuals. Regional partners are required to report local developments and initiatives to the concordat assurance group to enable that learning and to share improvements. We are working with mental health clinicians, local health boards and 111 to identify opportunities to develop a mental health crisis pathway. That will allow us to identify which approaches could then be scaled up at a national level.

In line with the committee's recommendations, we are fully committed to investing in early intervention and prevention, to reduce the risk of mental health crisis in the first place. Both the 'Together for Mental Health' delivery plan and the mental health crisis delivery plan reflect that focus. All regional mental health and criminal justice partnerships will have local plans in place to deliver on early intervention and prevention.

So, crisis and out-of-hours care remains a priority, both for the NHS and in the new 'Together for Mental Health' delivery plan for the next three years. We will continue to work collaboratively with our partners to improve the response with and for people in mental health crisis, and I will of course keep Members up to date on progress as we make it.

Thank you. Can I now call on Dai Lloyd to reply to the debate?

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, and thank you for your patience, because I understand that I have little time to respond to this debate. May I thank, therefore, in the time that does remain to me, everyone for their contributions? I think it’s relevant for us to pay tribute to the police’s work in this difficult context of responding to mental health crises in emergency situations. Over the years, I've been there with them, very often in the middle of the night. When there are crises in people's lives, the police are there to help us as medics to deal with the situation, as well as to help the family. So, I'm pleased to have this opportunity to pay tribute to the police for their work.

May I acknowledge the important contributions made by David Rees, Mark Isherwood, Rhun ap Iorwerth and also, of course, the Minister? May I also thank all of the witnesses that provided such excellent evidence to us during our inquiry as a committee? And, of course, I’ll take this opportunity to say thank you for the hard work of the clerks and the researchers on the health committee, because I don't always remember to do that. So, thank you very much to them.

To conclude, therefore, there are major steps that have been taken in this field. It does continue to be a very important, difficult and serious issue, because as we know, policing isn't devolved here, whereas health and mental health have been devolved, but experience increasingly shows that there is excellent collaboration that can happen. Having said that, a number of challenges remain in this area. Thank you.

Thank you. The proposal is to note the committee's report. Does any Member object? No. Therefore the motion is agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.

Item 8 on the agenda this afternoon is a debate on the External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee report, 'Changes to freedom of movement after Brexit—the implications for Wales', and I call on the Chair of that committee to move the motion, David Rees.

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. I am pleased to open today’s debate and to move the motion tabled in my name on our report on changes to freedom of movement after Brexit and its implications for Wales. Let me place on record our thanks to all those who contributed to our work, particularly those EU citizens who have made Wales their new home.

Our report addresses three broad areas related to changes to the free movement of people after Brexit. They are immigration policy after Brexit, the operation of the EU settlement scheme, and the potential case for regional variations to immigration policy in the future.

We published this report in a highly uncertain policy landscape. I should also note that whilst nationality and immigration are reserved matters under the Government of Wales Act 2006, there are a number of Wales-specific proposals in the UK Government’s White Paper and the wider policy debate that merit detailed consideration by this Assembly. Furthermore, we have a duty to represent the interests of the people of Wales. This includes ensuring that the impact on devolved areas are reflected in UK policy.

Turning to our recommendations and the Welsh Government’s response, we made a total of 12 recommendations and I am pleased that the Welsh Government has accepted 11 in full, and one in principle. I do acknowledge the reason provided in the Welsh Government's response as to why they could only accept in principle.  

In addition to our recommendations, we make a number of conclusions. These conclusions formed the basis of our committee’s submission to the Home Office, and largely concern the operation of the EU settlement scheme, which I will cover in more detail a little bit later. We will continue to monitor the situation in relation to the scheme and intend to press the case with the Home Secretary now that the dust has settled on the 2019 general election result.

The UK’s withdrawal from the European Union will bring about some of the biggest changes to immigration policy in decades. Crucially, it is the Government’s policy that freedom of movement will end and that a new Australian-style points-based immigration system will replace the current system.

Central to this will be the proposals for a £30,000-a-year salary threshold to be applied to most immigrants coming into the UK from the EU after Brexit. This will be in line with the current system for non-EU workers. Most of the evidence we received highlighted concerns with the proposed salary threshold. Many highlighted the fact that the vast majority of EU nationals currently living and working in Wales earn under that salary threshold, even those in medium and high-skilled roles.

Our report welcomed the fact that the migration advisory committee has been tasked with reviewing this threshold. In undertaking this review, it was clear to us that the migration advisory committee should take into account the fact that a £30,000 salary threshold would set the bar at a higher level than the average earnings in Wales. Our first set of conclusions and recommendations highlight these concerns and call on the Welsh Government to use all the means at its disposal to ensure that the threshold is reduced in order to better reflect the Welsh context. I do note that there are reports today speculating that the threshold will be either abandoned or lowered. I will await the publication of the MAC's report, which is due shortly. If those reports are accurate, I very much welcome the possibility of this change.

We also heard wide-ranging concerns about the operation of the EU settlement scheme in Wales. Our work on the EU settlement scheme was informed by an online forum and face-to-face discussions with citizens from other EU nations living in Wales and representatives of charities and organisations working with them as individuals and families.

In particular, we heard of low levels of registration in Wales compared to the other nations in the UK. The figures as of November 2019 were around 59 per cent of EU citizens in Wales had applied to the scheme, compared to 79 per cent in England, 63 per cent in Scotland, and 66 per cent in Northern Ireland. So, we are at the bottom of those levels. Concerns around the digital-by-default aspects of the scheme and the general awareness of how and where to access the advice and support were highlighted. Now, we share these concerns, and noted the views of the House of Lords' EU justice committee that the lack of physical documentation provided to citizens has clear parallels with the Windrush scandal.

There is clearly a role for both Governments to play here in providing not only advice and support to EU citizens accessing the scheme, but also in providing reassurance that their status will be secure and permanent after Brexit. It is for this reason that we call upon the Welsh Government to provide a stronger lead in signposting citizens to the package of measures it has in place to support them, and to reiterate its messages of support loudly to EU citizens here. In conveying this message, we should also be mindful that our colleagues in the European Parliament have also taken a keen interest in the rights of citizens after Brexit. Indeed, key figures in the European Parliament have repeatedly stated that the rights of EU citizens will be among their primary considerations when it comes to giving their view on whether or not to agree the UK-EU withdrawal agreement, which, if I am right, will take place next week.

And we should be fully aware, therefore, that last week, the European Parliament adopted a resolution—by 610 in favour, 29 against, and 68 abstentions, so quite a large majority—expressing wide-ranging concerns about the UK Government's approach to securing citizen's rights after Brexit. In many areas these concerns chimed with our own, including the absence of physical documentation for successful applicants, and issues surrounding accessibility of the scheme. I therefore repeat our committee's calls for these issues to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

Our third central theme explored whether there is a case for different immigration rules for Wales after Brexit. We received a significant amount of evidence that highlighted the particular demographic challenges and economic needs of Wales. The challenges, particularly an ageing population, are likely to be exacerbated by the end of freedom of movement. Furthermore, it is the case that some sectors of the economy are likely to be hit harder by the end of freedom of movement than others. We did not draw a firm conclusion on whether the Welsh Government should press the case for greater control of the immigration system in Wales after Brexit. However, we would draw the attention of the Assembly to examples in other countries, most notably Canada and Australia, where such differentiation does occur.

And similarly, we agreed that the Welsh Government should undertake exploratory work on a spatially differentiated immigration policy after Brexit. This should include research on future demographic trends and the potential impact of lower levels of migration for the Welsh economy. Only then will we have the robust evidence base needed to inform future policy in this area, which is tailored to the needs of Wales. And I did note in the Welsh Government's response that the indication of a reduction in the population in the years ahead of us is something we need to reflect upon, particularly as we are an ageing population. If we have a reduction in population, it's more likely that the younger people are not going to be here.

Finally, before concluding my opening remarks, I would like to reflect upon perhaps the most important message that I took from our work in this area. We heard directly from EU citizens living in Wales about the toll that negative rhetoric around migration is having on their emotional well-being and that of their friends and families. I call upon all of my fellow Members in this Chamber and other elected representatives at all levels, from all political parities, to reflect upon the damaging effects that some of the rhetoric and language that has been used around immigration is having on the people affected. Perhaps we don't always understand the words we use and the impact it has on people. We need to be careful. We have a duty to act on behalf of these people who told us of their sense that they feel unwelcome and unwanted in our country because of the language being used, and that language being reiterated by individuals in our public life. We have a duty to lead on that. We need to ensure that these people—who are here to help and work, who are not here for any other reason—feel welcome, that they feel part of our community. They want to be part of our community. It is our job to ensure that the nation speaks in one language, and that is a welcoming language for these people. It is for that reason that I say today that we stand with you.

I therefore move the motion and ask the Members to support the report.

I thank David Rees, the Chair of the committee for the way he—well, he always conducts the committee in exemplary fashion. This was a very important inquiry, and I'm happy to support the motion and the report today.

I think David has covered the main points that struck us, but let me amplify them. I don't think they're reduced in any way by repeating. The salary threshold at £30,000 was clearly the major issue we faced and, as has been pointed out, that's considerably above the average wage level in Wales, and I too am pleased to see that this is now undergoing some review. And I think we were quite right to recommend some variation being allowed in Wales should it remain at £30,000, so that at least we could adjust it. But around the whole scheme, we did hear from employers the higher recruitment cost they may be facing, the particular difficulty in vulnerable sectors where, even if the threshold reduced a bit, they may still not be captured, such as those in social care—especially if they're part time, for instance—agri-food, hospitality. These are all vital areas to the Welsh economy.

I too noted the lower rate amongst EU citizens in Wales applying for the settled status scheme, and it's quite significantly below the other parts of the UK. And I have to say, to some extent, this does reflect my own experiences over the last year or 18 months with the Greek community in south Wales. They've raised these concerns about information and how they go about it, and many of them have been here for decades, some of them Greek Cypriots here since the 1970s. I think there was a large amount of uncertainty and anxiety, some of it misplaced, no doubt, but that lack of clarity was a real issue.

And if I could make a plug to fellow Members, Presiding Officer, that a week today, in conference room C and D, there will be a presentation on the contribution of the Greek community over the last 150 years to Cardiff in particular, so I urge Members to come along. It would certainly make, in very vivid tones, the point that David concluded on about our need to welcome immigrants as they brings us so many gifts and enrich our own cultural heritage, as well as the Greeks have in Cardiff and south Wales and, indeed, other parts of Wales in all probability.

Can I say that a points scheme, if that's where we end up, possibly would allow for more regional variation? I understand the Welsh Government is reluctant to go down the sort of scheme that would give it a lot of variation over something like the threshold, which may be difficult to administer, whereas allowing more points for immigrants coming in looking for work, and being able to settle in Wales and in particular jobs, perhaps, may be a way forward, and I think that should be considered very carefully. I appreciate the thought that's gone into that from the Welsh Government.

And also, the need for a shortage occupation list, as they will have in Scotland, I think could combine with this and start to allow us the maximum flexibility, because our economy is very different from the ones quite close to us around Bristol, and certainly around London and the Thames valley. So, I think these things are justifiably points to raise and to consider, because we're about to have a big shift in practice in terms of people from the rest of Europe that will seek to live and work in Britain and, in our case especially, in Wales. These changes have to be managed very, very carefully. They affect a lot of people, potentially—those that are already settled; their relatives have a higher propensity to come and work where they've got family connections. So, these are profoundly important points.

Whilst we are now about to go through all the realities of Brexit and the big changes, there's still a lot of scope to respond to these very justified concerns that we're getting, even at this stage, through the consultations and the inquiries. And I do welcome that the Welsh Government does respond in the correct, I would say constructive, spirit to take these points and to make suggestions, and promote some of the ones that we have that really could enhance the scheme and don't, at their heart, have any intention to undermine the practicalities of what will face us in the post-Brexit world. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer.

This week is my last as a member of the external affairs committee, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Chair, David Rees, and all other members of the committee for the welcome and friendship that I've experienced over the past year, as we have scrutinised various elements of the Welsh Government's and UK Government's plans in terms of exiting the European Union.

One aspect of the work of the committee that made an impression on me from the very outset was that, although we were taking an international overview—despite that, the impact of the policies, the legislation and the decisions do have an impact at a local level, and, in many cases, are unique and individual. This was particularly true with the inquiry that we're discussing today, namely changes to freedom of movement after Brexit.

I would like to associate myself with the comments that have already been made, in terms of thanking the individuals and institutions that contributed to our work, particularly the EU citizens who participated in our focus group.

When the 2016 referendum happened, there wasn't a huge amount of clarity as to the meaning of that vote. Many now believe that people did vote in order to reduce immigration, although there is no robust evidence that this is the case. So, it is a cause of sadness for me that we have to lose those four freedoms that can't be shared.

Freedom of movement opens horizons. People living amongst us in our communities have benefited from this freedom—people who will now see those horizons disappear. It is a remarkable and deeply sad phenomenon, but here we are.

I mentioned the focus groups that we held as a committee, and their testimony was devastating: people who have lived much of their lives in Wales who no longer feel welcome because of Government policy, because of uncertainty and because of the deeply damaging rhetoric that has poisoned debate—those demons awoken by some elements of the referendum debate. The people in the focus groups talked about this dystopian situation that was facing them, the barriers in their way to applying for settled status, the hoops they have to jump through, the anxiety about finding out you've only been awarded pre-settled status, and the Kafkaesque fact that, even if you're granted settled status, you don't get any hard-copy proof of that status—like a nightmarish mirage. The thing that stung me to the heart was the stories we heard about children being picked on in school—as young as five or six—because their parents weren't born here, or because they weren't born here, and they were told by their classmates, 'We voted for you to go home.' What kind of nation do we want to be: one where people who've chosen to live their lives here are welcomed and supported, or one where we put up barriers?

The report also makes clear how pernicious and damaging the £30,000 salary threshold will be for our economy. The price that the UK Government has chosen to put on the welcome that we give to some citizens doesn't fit with our needs in Wales. And our report makes it clear that the vast majority of EU nationals living and contributing to our economy in Wales already earn far less than that threshold. And they matter. They contribute. They are our neighbours, our colleagues, our friends. Unless this is challenged and changed it will have a terrible impact, yes, on our services, on our NHS, but also on us as a people.

Llywydd, if you visit Shakespeare and Company in Paris—though that may be more difficult to do after Brexit, who knows? But, if you do go, there is a wonderful quotation on the wall:

'Be not inhospitable to strangers lest they be angels in disguise.'

Now, in this, I'm a disciple of John Donne. I believe that no man is an island, that we are not truly strangers to one another, regardless of where we were born. I am an internationalist, and I believe firmly that the way we treat our fellow women and men pays dividends.

EU nationals contribute to our society. That contribution won't diminish after Brexit, and our appreciation of them must not diminish either. We and our policies should follow the better angels of our nature, not our worst.

Can I say at the outset that we shall be supporting this motion? However, I have to point out that I believe every party in this Chamber has expressed its belief and support for those EU citizens now working in the UK, and how they should be allowed—no, even encouraged—to stay, and that that especially applies to those living and working in Wales. So, this debate on the external affairs report will add little or nothing to what has been said and agreed in this Chamber before. What we must not forget—[Interruption.]

Will the Member give way?

Yes.

I thank the Member for taking the intervention. I had to get up because I've been sitting in this Chamber and I've heard comments about 'foreigners' in this Chamber. Do you agree that that type of comment doesn't help the agenda when we're talking to people? They are a part of our communities, they are a part of our society, and for them to be talked about as 'foreigners' is inappropriate.

Absolutely. I think that's a very unfortunate epithet, David. There's no doubt about that at all. [Interruption.] Well, I've not used it in this Chamber.

What we must not forget, however, is that freedom of movement was the biggest single issue raised by the people of the UK, and especially those in Wales. The Labour party, and to a certain extent Plaid Cymru, have paid a heavy price for ignoring the concerns of its former working class supporters.

I've read through this report, and the Government's responses, which of course include all the usual platitudes whilst ignoring the true reality of what mass immigration has meant, not only for the indigenous population but for the vast numbers of immigrants who have found themselves cruelly exploited with none of the rights afforded them by the oft-lauded European workers' rights legislation. Many are little more than slaves, and I refer here not just to the sex trade, but to many other so-called occupations, such as the car washers, which I have raised often in this Chamber. 

There is no mention in this report or in the Government's reply about taking this Brexit opportunity to address these exploitative occupations and to seek to help those engaged in such work to have the freedom to return home and release themselves from the bondage imposed by the criminal organisations that exploit them. I shall remind this Chamber that we had no such practices in the UK until the introduction of mass immigration, especially from former eastern European countries. Surely, addressing these practices is a far more pressing and humanitarian need than a plethora of initiatives designed to inform those who are probably already well aware of their right to stay after Brexit. Indeed, many thousands have already filed the necessary papers to secure their continued residence.

What this report does not address is why we need those people from other countries in the first place. After all, Wales has 22.7 per cent of its population—that's almost a quarter—economically inactive. The answer lies, of course, in both the Labour and Tory parties' neglect in providing the facilities and training opportunities for our indigenous population. We often hear that we could not run our national health service without foreign nationals, yet, every year, 80,000 nurse training applicants who have the necessary qualifications are turned down, and many thousands who, after avleave of absence, wish to return to the health service are turned down, because their skills qualify them for the higher wage bands. Better to plunder cheap labour from abroad. The shortage of doctor training places throughout the UK, including Wales, has been highlighted many times in this Chamber.

So, the Brexit Party sees little in this report or the Government's responses that has not been previously addressed, either by the UK Government or the Welsh Government, and that many of the Welsh Government's responses have confirmed. I'm sure the people of Wales do not want to see good, hard-working European workers removed, repatriated or any other such form of rejection implemented. But what they clearly want is a controlled immigration policy that follows that of the Australian points-based system, now partly proposed by the Tories, but one that some of us have advocated for a very long time.

I have been a strong supporter of freedom of movement for the whole of my adult life. I remember as a teenager being at the border posts that used to exist in our common European home. I have a stamp on a passport from France. I remember having to show my passport to cross the rivers and roads of our continent. One of the greatest gifts that the European Union gave us was to remove those borders and to remove those border posts, to remove that need to demonstrate that we were unable to move from one piece of turf to another.

Our common European home, so often the place where we fought our civil wars, became a place where we could reach out and not build further walls. It's no coincidence that those border posts also were marked by the images of warfare. Moving beyond those borders and looking at a world through the spectacles of, 'Are you indigenous? Am I indigenous? Is somebody else indigenous?', has led to one of the greatest freedoms that we have all enjoyed.

But freedom of movement is also one of the most misunderstood and misrepresented of those freedoms. It is, of course, the free movement of labour. It is the ability of people to move and to work across 28 different territories. It is a freedom that they will not lose, but we will lose. It is a freedom that has enabled people, both in this Chamber and people we all represent, to have enjoyed the opportunities that our forefathers could only dream of. But it's also a freedom, of course, that has been weaponised in many ways, and we've seen the headlines of the gutter press, of the tabloid press, who have used race as a means to create prejudice, and we've heard that this afternoon in this debate.

Let me say this to the Brexit Party: Wales is a nation that was built by immigrants and on immigration. My community—[Interruption.] No, I'm not going to give way to you. I've had enough of you. Wales is a country that has been built on immigration and by immigrants, and my constituents are the consequences of that immigration, as are most of us in this room, in this Chamber today. Our forefathers moved to this country and made it the country it is, the country that we celebrate, the country that we love, the country that we invest our lives in; built and made by wave after wave of immigrants, and we should welcome that.

It is also one of those areas where the United Kingdom Government has abused people in the most appalling way. The failure of the EU settlement scheme has created more needless distress than almost any other policy area, with the possible exception of universal credit. Like Delyth Jewell, I spoke to those people, I looked in their eyes and I saw the disappointment, the hurt and the distress that had been caused not as an unintended consequence of policy but as the intended consequence of policy, and by the words that were used by UK Government Ministers and the prejudice we've heard in the Chamber this afternoon. That has created distress in our communities amongst the people we seek to represent, and we should be deeply, deeply ashamed of that.

And also, we know that the UK Government has got this policy wrong. We know that the salary cap, the salary threshold, will create difficulties for our NHS, will create difficulties for our public services, and will create difficulties for our economy. But do you know what this policy and this approach will do more than anything else that will affect all of us? It will give the impression that we are a mean-spirited people and a mean-spirited country, a country where the term 'indigenous' is used in political debate. And I'll be absolutely clear to you, the only other time I've heard the word 'indigenous' used by a politician has been with the British National Party and the National Front, where race is used to discriminate.

And we should always, all of us who share the liberal values that have created the society that we have today, fight and fight and fight that prejudice, and fight it again. And we will take on the people who spout that prejudice, and do you know what? We will defeat them. Because this is not a mean-spirited country and not a mean-spirited nation. We are a country that welcomes people into our communities, that welcomes people into our towns and villages, and we are a country that recognises and understands our history. And as a consequence, we will fight prejudice and we will prevail.

Mandy Jones.

[Inaudible.]—and black people.

You're a racist.

Diolch, Llywydd. I'm sorry, Alun, but it's people like you who actually stir division where there is none.

As a member of the External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee, I'd like to take the opportunity to thank the committee support staff for their help and assistance throughout this report. It's also important to recognise the contribution of the EU citizens and those from other nations who have settled here in Wales who took the time to come and speak to the committee, who added real value and insight also to this report. Finally, I'd like to thank all the stakeholders for their contribution and, of course, a thank you to David Rees as Chair of the committee for all his hard work.

During the EU referendum, immigration and the lack of control was a clear concern for a large part of the public, whether you like it or not. But it is also very important to understand the concerns were mainly to do with a broken immigration system and not total prejudice towards those who come from EU nation states or otherwise. As I said before, it's people and speeches like that that actually create division where there is none.

In gathering evidence for this report, the committee held two focus groups, and from those who attended it is clear that the UK Government must really do more to communicate with citizens from other nations on how they apply for their settled status and provide the reassurance needed. I really do hope that today's news about the £30,000 threshold being lowered or even removed actually comes into practice. Thank you.

It's been an interesting debate this afternoon already. It does remind me of the quote from somebody who was born in 1911, Max Frisch, who said:

'We asked for workers. We got people instead.'

People bring with them their own cultures, their own interests and opinions, and they bring with them a wealth and a depth of tapestry of their own background and their family needs. They don't just come here as workers, but they come to settle, and they come to settle here and be part of this society. They come here and, sometimes, do you know, they want to bring their families with them? They don't want to come on a short-term thing that is just for them, because if they want to come here and contribute and pay their taxes, they'd actually like to bring their wife and their children along sometimes as well.

'We asked for workers. We got people instead.'

It's as true now as it was then. And it does strike me that we are—. And I do thank David for his chairing of this committee, and all the members for their good participation in the evidence that we heard, which was compelling, very personal and very human. But it does strike me that we are often extremely conflicted in our views on immigration generally.

One area that we're not discussing today, for example, is the several hundred people who come into predominantly London each year on the golden visas. So, we're not discussing those who can hand over £2 million a year to the UK Government in order to buy access to the UK, much of it money that—. It was suspended at one time because of the fears of money laundering and corruption, and Russian money, and money that was being translated across several different countries and coming awash here, and then the impact on the London housing market. It was suspended for a short time; it's back in place. It's now at its highest for five years. So, we're not discussing that today.

We're quite conflicted in our approaches to immigration. What we're discussing are things like the people who are below the £30,000 cap. The average salary in Wales is £26,000 a year, not £30,000. The research has suggested that if the £30,000 cap is actually maintained as it is—and I do hope they change their views on this—it could have an impact as substantial as 57 per cent on immigration over the next 10 years within Wales. Well, that 50 per cent impact on our immigration will be tangible. It will be the care workers—it won't be just those people who serve you coffees, although it will be—it will be the care workers, and it will be the health workers, and it'll be the people in manufacturing, working on the production lines, and all of that.

Now, that is why I think the UK Government has to rethink this. Or alternatively, as they've been pushing relentlessly, for an Australian points-based immigration system, which is the zeitgeist. It's a catch-all phrase and so on—. In Australia, they do have the ability to have regional variation in that. So, regional Governments can actually demand variation; they can say, 'Well, for our particular sectors and particular areas, and for our wage levels, we need something different. We need incentives to encourage people to move out of London and the south east and actually move to Wales, to Scotland, to the north east, to the north west, and so on'. So, I hope that the UK Government will be flexible on that.

I just want to note one interesting aspect of this, and it was picked up, in fact, on an interview that our Chair did this week. I think that it's appearing today or yesterday within the press. I found it quite interesting because it actually quoted from one of the people who gave evidence to us—a Polish person, working, paying tax in Swansea, who said:

"The message repeated by politicians appears to be the same: 'You will be allowed to stay—'"

—so, here's the difference between the golden-ticket people arriving in London and those EU people working, paying a wage—not making a million, but working in the Welsh economy.

"The message repeated by politicians appears to be the same: 'You will be allowed to stay. We want you to stay.' Of course, economically speaking they need us to stay, at least for the short term. But there is a big difference between being allowed to stay, and being welcomed."

That's what this is about as well. It's the tone of the debate that we set. I welcome some of the contributions today because they try to get that tone right. But, I have to reflect on members of my own family who, first of all, when challenged with the opportunity to achieve settled status and, at that point, to actually pay for the privilege of doing so—. It did remind some of us—because I have a mixed Irish-Italian background, as well as the Welsh in me as well—that there were times during the wartime conflict when Italians were locked away from wider society. That's what my family has been through. Settled status reminds of that: you are the other.

Now, this is where we have to be exceptionally careful in taking this forward, but I am glad to see that the Government has accepted all of the recommendations, one of them in principle. I think that's wise. I would encourage them to keep engaging constructively with the UK Government and, hopefully, they will listen. Yes, this is about workers. Yes, this is about filling employment opportunities. But, as Max Frisch said: 'We asked for workers. We got people instead.' That's what this is about. We are all immigrants.

The Brexit Minister to contribute to the debate—Jeremy Miles.

Thank you, Llywydd. May I begin by welcoming the report and the vast amount of evidence that was gathered during the inquiry? I’d also like to thank everyone for their contributions.

Most contributions, at any rate, were thoughtful and constructive.

Before I turn to the substance of the report and the three issues in it, namely the proposal for the future immigration system, the settlement scheme for EU citizens and the arguments over differences in migration methods between areas of the UK after Brexit, may I take this opportunity to speak directly with those citizens from other parts of Europe who have chosen to settle here in Wales, to lay down roots and to enrich our communities? I’d like to assure you that we do appreciate your contribution to Wales and there will always be a welcome for you here.

Turning first to the immigration system in future, it continues to be unclear what the system will be and how it will be operated. Apart from the end of freedom of movement and regaining control of our borders, there were no details available for over two years before the publication of the White Paper in December 2018. After the election of Boris Johnson, we’re not even clear whether that reflects the point of view of the current Government.

Despite that, we continue to understand that the intention is for the new migration system to be in effect from 1 January 2021, less than a year away. But let us be entirely clear: the immigration policy for the UK will have a deep impact on communities and the economy of Wales. As opposed to the confusion within the UK Government, we have explained our priorities for immigration policy very clearly. In 'Brexit and Fair Movement of People', we proposed that freedom of movement should be maintained, but to connect it closely with employment, and we do still believe that.

We have used evidence to back up our challenges to the UK Government about the nature of their proposals, particularly the current proposal for a selective approach to future immigration based on skills and salary with the potential threshold of £30,000 that many Members have referred to. The report that we commissioned the Welsh Centre for Public Policy to undertake last year on the impact of migration in Wales after Brexit underlined the damage that a salary threshold would cause to Wales, and if the press speculation that Members have referred to on the dropping of the salary requirements are correct, the Welsh Government would welcome that development. 

We also know that there will be some sectors that emerge as being particularly vulnerable to future reductions in EU migration. These include, of course, social care, health and manufacturing, including agri-food, tourism, hospitality, retail and higher education. The impact will be particularly stark for the food manufacturing sector in Wales, where over 80 per cent of employees earn less than £30,000. Our opposition to a salary threshold, particularly one set at such a high level, has resonated with stakeholders, particularly within the business community, and we must hope that the migration advisory committee, which has been asked to look at this again, will actually come up with a lower and less damaging threshold, or no threshold at all, when it reports in a couple of weeks' time.

That report will also look at the Australian-style points-based system, again which many Members have referred to. Whilst the Prime Minister has talked warmly of introducing that sort of system, it isn't by any means clear how that would be compatible with an employer-led system rationed by a salary threshold. So, we will continue to argue for a migration policy that meets the needs of Wales, and the UK Government, we hope, will listen and act on those views. To date, there has been far too little meaningful engagement with ourselves and the other devolved administrations.

On the EU settlement scheme, I'm still very concerned that there are many people who do not know, or don't fully understand perhaps, what the scheme means for them. There are those who find the digital-only process difficult to navigate. There's confusion about getting settled status or pre-settled status, and what that means in reality for people. Even UK Ministers are confused on this point. One asserted to me only a couple of weeks ago that those with pre-settled status would be automatically upgraded to settled status after they had fulfilled the criteria of five years' residence. That is, of course, not the case.

To be clear, the Welsh Government does not support the scheme; we would much prefer a system that doesn't rely on evidence that can be difficult to provide and that provides a hard copy of the evidence, instead of simply a digital copy, of the right to live and work in our country. However, we are committed to doing all that we can to support EU nationals in Wales to successfully navigate the application process. So, as a Government, we have therefore provided additional advice and support for EU citizens here in Wales. This includes funding the EU settlement scheme advice services through Newfields Law, through Citizens Advice Cymru, and also additional funding for Settled to manage a network of volunteers providing advice and support to EU citizens. We've also recently made additional funding available from the EU transition fund, to increase our communications with EU citizens, as well as providing additional resources to local authorities to increase their involvement.

I'm committed to doing everything that we can to support EU nationals in Wales to secure their status, especially those who are vulnerable and hardest to reach. We are committed to supporting them, and we ask the UK Government as well to recognise the need to adequately publicise their scheme.

Finally, in terms of the possibility of a more spatially differentiated immigration policy, let me say the following: as the WCPP report points out, we in Wales have common cause with the rest of the UK outside London and the south east in terms of the damaging impact of that £30,000 threshold. Our first priority must be to work with others, including businesses and trade unions, who are generally sceptical of having different approaches in different parts of the UK, to ensure that a threshold is not imposed on the UK economy as a whole. But if we are unsuccessful, then we will, of course, reconsider. In the meantime, if the UK Government is serious about a points-based system, which, let me say, I don't think is really compatible with a hard threshold in terms of salary on an employer-led system, then to the point that David Melding made, we will certainly want to discuss with the UK Government and with stakeholders the potential for additional points being awarded to individuals intending to move to Wales, or indeed to other parts of the country, where migration is lower and perhaps where demographic trends are unfavourable.

Would the Minister give way?

Yes, certianly.

Before the Minister finishes his remarks, I just wanted to raise something that has not been raised today. I wonder whether he's had time to get any clarity from the UK Government on the impact for Welsh employers. Because my understanding is that, for tier 2 non-EU workers who are coming into the UK—non-EU, which is what it's all going to be now applied to—there is a surcharge, an immigration skills charge, which is generally £1,000 per year per worker. I look around at small business people here in this Chamber with experience. The impact of that on small to medium-sized businesses could be significant if that was now to be applied right across the board, which I suspect it now will.

Well, certainly, that sort of issue is the kind of issue that, in the number of round-tables we've had with businesses large and small across Wales, those kinds of concerns are very near the top of their list. In particular, as the Member says, in relation to the impact of costs on smaller businesses.

In concluding, can I just stress that migration isn't just about abstract notions of economics and demographics; it's about real people with real lives, real talents and real feelings?

I am grateful to the Minister for allowing me in at this late stage. In watching this debate, I heard the word 'indigenous' used. I don’t know what 'indigenous' means, because every single person in this Chamber is the descendent of an immigrant. It's simply a question of when our families came. Would you agree with me that when the word 'indigenous' is used, it is capable of being used in a far nastier way than it would first appear?

Well, I would identify with the comments that the Member for Bridgend has made. I think what has struck a chord with me in this whole discussion and the discussion of the committee is the importance of language and rhetoric. And throughout the last three and a half years, I've been shocked by some of the occasionally thoughtless language that politicians have used, particularly in relation to EU citizens in this country, and I've been appalled to hear the use of language such as 'indigenous populations' and 'mass immigration', which are well-established dog-whistle terms, and we've heard them today in this Chamber from politicians in a way that is not thoughtless, actually, but deliberate. And over the course of this year, we as a Government will do all that we can in terms of how we help to shape the public climate in Wales to try and reverse some of the damage that is caused by the use of that language, and to make sure that when EU citizens listen to proceedings of this Chamber, they will continue to feel welcome here in Wales and know how much we value them. And as David Rees said in his contribution, in making EU citizens living in Wales feel welcome, we are all leaders in doing that.

David Rees to reply to the debate.

I'd like to thank all Members for the contributions to today's debate, and the Counsel General and Brexit Minister for setting out the Welsh Government's position. And before I continue my contribution to close, I want to put on record my thanks to the clerking team and the research team who actually set all this up, because without their hard work and commitment, we wouldn't have had the forums to talk to the people. It's very much appreciated. I'll try to highlight a few of the points raised during the debate, and I'll try and keep it as quick as I can because I'm aware of the time.

David Melding, I very much welcome your valued contribution to the committee. You always give us deep thinking and you remind us often of the historical contribution of our nation through immigration, particularly in your case, for example, you've talked about the Greek groups—but there are many others from other EU nations and from nations outside the EU as well—and how we've benefited. You also reminded us that the points scheme needs consideration to ensure that Wales does not lose out, which the Counsel General also highlighted.

Delyth, you are a passionate internationalist and you demonstrated once again your strong credentials in that area. And she reminded us of our four freedoms, and the result of the referendum is that we will lose those four freedoms.

And the stories we heard from the people, particularly the children and how they've experienced what I'd call disgraceful behaviour from other children, who probably picked it up from their parents. It's something we should never be accepting here in Wales. No child should have to be told, 'Go home' by another child simply because they're from a different nation. It shouldn't happen.

Alun reminded us again of the freedom of movement of labour. That was an issue with people coming to Wales and, yes, there are many who come to Wales, and the former First Minister in his interjection also again reminded us that we are all immigrants. And I'll be honest: my mother was from Belgium. My father's history goes back a couple of hundred years in Port Talbot, but my mother was from Belgium so, technically, my mother was an immigrant coming here after the second world war. So, we are a nation of mixed races and conditions, and we work together, we live together and that's how we should always be. We should never be challenging someone else's past or history; we should be looking to the future, and I hope we do that. 

Huw raised the question about the individual from Poland, and he also said this: that the EUSS—remind me what it is—settlement scheme—I couldn't remember—and the European immigration proposals after Brexit are not simply about administrative processes; they're about people. And Huw reminded us that when we talk about workers, it's about people. When we talk about this today, we are talking about people. We are not talking about some abstract concept; it's about people—the person who lives next door to you, their child, the child who plays with your child—that's who we're talking about, and let's not forget that. When comments come in regarding—. I won't repeat those comments because I don't think they're appropriate. It shouldn't be laughed at, it shouldn't be supported; it should be put down straight away and challenged. We should never be using language that changes that. 

And Mandy, I do welcome your position that you do not seek division and you do not believes division occurs, but both you and David unfortunately kept on highlighting immigration as an issue. I agree with you: immigration I think was an issue in the referendum, but only because it had been raised as hysteria. If we look at the contributions immigrants make to our nation—

Will you take an intervention? 

Yes, I'm more than happy to. 

Don't you think that the hysteria really comes from, say, Labour and Plaid benches? You whip up all this division. You honestly do.

You said Turkey was coming into the EU.

Did I? 

No, I don't think it comes from our benches. I think our benches try to reflect, unfortunately, what's going on in society because of other comments being made, mainly by right-wing parties, and I think it's something we should be challenging on every occasion because we are talking about people who want to live here, who want to work here, who want to contribute here, and those are important to us. We should make them always feel welcome. We should never try and link them to a concept of mass immigration. We should never try and link them to a concept of not being welcome. We should always link them—. Oh, sorry. We should always link them to a concept of welcome. 

I thank the Member for giving way. Does he share my sadness that UK citizens will now be only able to live and work in two countries—the UK and the Republic of Ireland—whereas EU citizens will be able to work in 28 countries and Irish citizens will be able to work in 29 countries, such as my wife and two children? And isn't it sad to see that, and isn't it the case that, in fact, those citizens who will lose out the most from the ending of freedom of movement are actually UK citizens?

I thank the Member for his contribution. He's quite right: the individuals who will probably have more restrictions placed upon them are UK citizens, and it is disappointing that that will be the situation. And let's not forget UK young people who actually want to go and explore. We are limiting their chances in life as well. 

The Brexit Minister highlighted the Welsh Government's actions, and I very much appreciate them. I can appreciate very much the continued challenges that you're going to put to the UK Government to ensure that the immigration policy works for Wales. It is extremely important that we do that.

Llywydd, it's an evolving policy area and I appreciate that. It's the intention of our committee to keep a watching brief on the activities of both Governments as we await the outcome of the migration advisory committee's review, which I expect to be published shortly. And I want to reiterate my message, and the message from the vast majority of Members here today, that people who have come here to work, who have come here to be part of our community, who have come here to build a life are very much welcome, very much supported, and whether you've got a piece of paper or not, we consider you our friends.

The proposal is to note the committee's report. Does any Member object? The motion is therefore agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.

The next item is the Conservative Party debate on workforce skills post Brexit, and I call on Mohammad Asghar to move the motion. Mohammad Asghar.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. It gives me great pleasure to open this debate today on recognising the importance of further education in developing the skills of the Welsh workforce. The Welsh economy is failing to meet its full potential. It faces a number of fundamental challenges. These include a skills gap in advanced technologies, and the requirement of a workforce with the flexibility to adapt to the ever-changing economy of the world. 

The importance of ensuring that Wales has a sufficiently skilled, flexible workforce to help create a resilient economy and to meet the demands of employers is clear. The Welsh Government itself states that:

'Every person should be equipped with the skills they need to get a job and the opportunity to develop new skills through their working life.'

Quote closed. However, a skills gap has developed in Wales that is costing businesses approximately £155 million.

In 2019, the 'Open University Business Barometer' found that 67 per cent of senior business leaders reported that their organisation is currently experiencing a skills shortage; 54 per cent of employers said that they could not recruit enough staff with the skills they need, particularly in the field of engineering. A recent Barclays LifeSkills report found that more than half of Welsh over-16s are failing to demonstrate all the employability skills needed in the future workplace. The figures regarding digital skills are also a matter of concern. According to the Office for National Statistics, Wales has the lowest proportion of internet users who possess the five basic digital skills. Only 66 per cent of internet users in Wales have these basic five skills, compared to a UK average of 79 per cent.

The importance of further education in tackling these problems cannot be overstated. However, ColegauCymru pointed out that there is a need for longer term funding arrangements to be put in place. The current one-year funding cycle hinders long-term thinking and planning. Overall grant funding for the FE sector has fallen in real terms by 13 per cent between 2011-12 and 2016-17. Funding for part-time provision and specific programmes fell over 70 per cent in real terms. The Welsh Conservatives believe this funding uncertainty must end to enable further education colleges to continue to deliver leading skills training and encourage more people into FE and lifelong learning.

Not everyone is able to take time out of work to participate in full-time education. The Open University in Wales says that education should not be a one-off for young people; it should be lifelong, throughout a person's career. We need a comprehensive adult education, skills and employment funding plan to grow our own resident workforce. Whilst the Welsh Government provides a grant for those aged 19 and above studying in FE, both the numbers of applications and the number of successful applicants has decreased. We would introduce an adult learning allowance to use for a degree course, technical training or specific courses. This would make the skills, courses and training more accessible for people, regardless of their financial position.

Wales is behind the curve in rolling out degree apprenticeships. [Interruption.] Wales is behind the curve in rolling out degree apprenticeships. In response to increasing employers' demands for higher level skills and work-based learning routes to a degree, degree apprenticeships have become an increasingly desirable mode of delivery. In Wales, the number of degree apprenticeship routes is limited. In England, there are currently 70 degree apprenticeship standards approved for delivery. We need to significantly expand the number of degree apprenticeships available, particularly in the new sectors. We also need to level up opportunity across Wales, by ensuring that everyone can fulfil their potential, irrespective of where they live or where they come from.

Wales has around 14 further education colleges, but only two are located in north Wales. We believe the potential of north Wales should be enhanced and nurtured to make the most of the opportunities that will be created by the north Wales growth deal. We would address this imbalance in the provision by developing an institute of technology in north Wales, focused on STEM subjects—science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Presiding Officer, to meet the goal of strengthening the Welsh economy, we must focus on some of the key issues facing us. These include the skills gap that threatens to leave Welsh workers behind the rest of the United Kingdom. Only then can we take advantage of the opportunities created by technological advancement. We must take the action required to help people meet the needs of the ever-changing economy of Wales, United Kingdom and the world. We can play a great part to make sure our lives are better. Thank you.

Thank you. I have selected the four amendments to the motion and I call on Bethan Sayed to move amendments 1, 3 and 4, tabled in the name of Siân Gwenllian. Bethan.

Thank you. I'm pleased to be able to take part in this debate. I won't go through the whole of the motion, because I believe that we've exercised much of that in previous debate, so I'll go through the amendments.

I think it is a bit ironic for the Tories to say that they want people to fulfil potential, because our first amendment is something that may be threatened by that, because of the prospect of the precariousness of the future of Erasmus+, which has been a vital part of the education mix in higher education and further education for many years, and youth organisations and schools can also apply for Erasmus as well as adult learners. The skill enhancement potential is clear and Erasmus can offer invaluable experience of new ways of working and studying, allowing insight into different practices from across Europe and greatly improving employability and the prospects of those who participate. Last year, ColegauCymru secured £1.57 million of Erasmus+ funding for FE colleges and colleges remain committed to supporting European mobility for their learners and staff, despite the uncertainty of Brexit. And this funding will enable over 640 vocational learners, apprentices and staff from colleges across Wales to take part in that exciting training programme.

For some students who come from very socially deprived backgrounds in Wales, this is a real life-changing experience for them. One childcare student who went to do a two-week work placement in Italy didn't even have a passport and had never travelled before on her own. So, in fact, if she hadn't have had that opportunity, she may never have had the prospect, then, of studying in another country and widening her horizons, which I think some of us in this room need to do more of.

The UK Government have said, and I quote:

'The Government is committed to continuing the academic relationship between the UK and the EU, including through the next Erasmus+ programme if it is in our interests to do so.'

How is it not in the interests of Wales to be a part of this programme? I don't know why they had even bothered to use that word. They can see, can they not, how important Erasmus is to the people of Wales? They would be foolish to end their involvement.

With regard to our amendment 1, an apprenticeship should not only be considered an access point into one type of skilled employment, but an educational experience as well. And many apprentices do tell us, and they've told my office, that they would like the option and access to opportunities for other educational and skills engagement. And, particularly, young apprentices and those on foundation level apprenticeships tell us that at times they can feel disengaged and not part of the wider further education community. It's also crucial to maintain quality, and whilst the great majority of providers offer apprenticeships to a high standard, with a focus on the intended skills and work, some do not and some are better than others.

I've said it before in this Chamber, and I'll say it again: we were told of one example where a young woman was in an apprenticeship at an architect's firm in Wales when it emerged that at some point during the apprenticeship a receptionist went off sick, she was sucked into being that receptionist and then never went back to doing the actual apprenticeship course she was there to do. So, I think that's criminal, really, that a woman was deprived of that experience.

This speaks to a need to have a better, more formal and uniform process of ongoing engagement with apprenticeships, which could include all apprentices under the age of 21 being formally partnered with an FE college in order to secure appropriate support, including access to college days or off-site training/education for key skills or other education choices that the apprentice may want, and in partnership with FE colleges to ensure access to student voices within that further education situation.

Time is tight, so our amendment 4: living costs and pay are one of the most significant barriers to apprenticeships and on-the-job skills training. While we in Plaid Cymru would like the Assembly to have powers over statutory wage levels, we don't. But in principle we should recognise pay as a significant barrier.

The Economy, Infrastructure and Skills Committee, which I sit on, recognised this problem in a report delivered in 2018, where we said that a living support grant for apprenticeships, comparable to living support given to those remaining in full-time education, was needed. Currently the national minimum wage for all first-year apprentices, whether 16, 26 or 46 years of age, is £3.90 for every hour in work and training or study. That's £7,605 per year. How does this allow someone who may have financial commitments and wants an apprenticeship the ability to retrain? We don't think that that happens very well at the moment and we believe that this should be rectified to increase first-year pay to the corresponding minimum wage relevant to someone's age.

There are many other points that we would have liked to have added to this motion, but we can't discuss that today. We should be looking at the Augar review for England so that we are encouraging more part-time study. I know that the Minister actually has worked really hard in this area and has improved those statistics. We'd also like to see degree apprenticeships expand further, understanding the need to match the numbers qualifying with skills needs, but this cannot be the only focus because it won't be sustainable.

The last point I'd make is a point I made in questions to the Minister this week. It's about significantly looking into how we can address the brain drain here in Wales and how we can support and encourage people to stay in Welsh institutions so that we can encourage those institutions to thrive and to prosper for the future.

I'm going to call on the Minister for Education to move formally amendment 2, tabled in the name of Rebecca Evans.

Formally move.

Thank you. Paul Davies.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm pleased to take part in this debate this afternoon. The previous speakers have championed the importance of the FE sector here in Wales, and highlighted some excellent examples of the skills and courses that our FE providers deliver. As we leave the European Union, it is essential that our providers are able to continue to deliver these vital skills.

In my own constituency, as the Minister knows, Pembrokeshire College offers a wealth of different programmes from traditional A-levels to apprenticeships to work-based learning courses, and it's that variety of choice that makes FE so attractive to many people across Wales.

Now, not everyone can study between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., not everyone is suited to a structured academic degree, and so the flexible learning opportunities offered by FE providers are vital to parents, older people and those in full-time work. FE providers like Pembrokeshire College open their doors to students of all ages, not just to young people between the ages of 16 and 21, and so they're very much at the heart of upskilling the nation and providing lifelong learning opportunities.

Of course, it's especially important to recognise the vital contribution that further education and vocational skills make to learners, but they also make a very important contribution to the Welsh economy too. A recent study, conducted by the economic modelling company, Emsi, has shown that we receive £7.90 in return for every £1 invested in FE colleges in Wales, with the average annual rate of return on their investment being 24 per cent. I think we should take a moment to reflect on just how valuable that investment is. 

Colleges bring wealth into their region through the employment of staff spending on goods and services, and workforce skills that are added to a region by students who find work in the area after leaving. In that sense, FE colleges and providers are very much social enterprises, working with learners of all ages by increasing their employability and raising their individual potential. Members will have heard me call for more of this type of activity within our school system as a way of promoting enterprise and life skills, and I hope the Welsh Government will look at encouraging secondary schools to establish social enterprises to be managed and run by pupils.

Of course, one of the most important ways of delivering a strong FE sector in Wales is by ensuring that the sector is funded on a more long-term basis, as Mohammad Asghar mentioned earlier. The Wales Audit Office has called for a more integrated and longer term approach to delivering FE funding in the past, because a longer term approach would certainly help colleges plan more effectively in the medium term and address sustainability issues within the sector. 

Now, I remain unconvinced that the move to introduce one-year funding allocations has resulted in better support for FE institutions to plan for the medium term, and, in fact, it's more likely to be the case that this has had a negative effect on attracting students. The inconsistent funding arrangements in the sector have also hit staffing numbers too. We know that the total number of staff in FE providers was just over 9,300 in 2012-13. It then dropped to around 7,800 in 2015-16, before then increasing to around 8,500 in 2017-18. Therefore, it's quite clear that the FE workforce needs investment to make sure that its skills and expertise remain up to date and can maintain links with other industries.

Wales is an ambitious nation, but we now need to underpin that ambition with the right networks to ensure that local opportunities are on offer. We also need to ensure that any strategy is co-ordinated with other Government departments so that the full picture is being considered. For example, it's crucial that local areas have public transport networks that encourage learners to take up courses, particularly for learners in rural areas. We also need to ensure that learners have the opportunity to study through the medium of Welsh, and we also need to ensure that learners with additional needs also have access to further education opportunities. Therefore, when the Welsh Government considers how best to support the FE sector in Wales, it is essential that it takes an approach that encompasses all departments, so that Ministers are considering the bigger picture when it comes to supporting the sector.

Deputy Presiding Officer, for Wales to flourish in the future, we must ensure that the FE sector is sufficiently supported and that learners have access to the courses and programmes that they offer. Further education providers are responsive to the skills needs of their local area and work closely with local employers. Pembrokeshire College recently hosted their fifth employer lunch event, sponsored by Dragon LNG and supported by local employers like the Port of Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire County Council and the Hywel Dda University Health Board. It's this type of collaboration that we must build on and develop to help ensure that learners are leaving education with the skills they need for the workplace. Therefore, I urge the Minister to work with stakeholders to carefully consider the future shape of the FE sector and ensure that it receives the crucial investment that it needs, and I therefore urge Members to support our motion.

I feel I have to begin my contribution by acknowledging the huge number of initiatives the Welsh Government have introduced over recent years to enhance the provision of a skilled Welsh workforce, particularly where they have shifted the focus to vocational training. We should also acknowledge the positive impact that skilled immigrant workers have contributed to the economy of Wales, but the fact remains that we have become far too reliant on immigrant labour, very often to the detriment of our indigenous population. I use the word 'indigenous', but I'd like to point out that in their document 'Prosperity for All', the Labour Government has used the word 'indigenous' on many occasions. [Interruption.] As I mentioned in the earlier debate, the health service in the UK turns down—[Interruption.] The health service in the UK turns down 80,000 suitably qualified British nurse applicants every year simply because it is cheaper to plunder third world countries for their trained staff.

There's no doubt that the Welsh Government has, especially over recent years, greatly expanded its skills-enhancing facilities, both in the FE and HE institutions. The flexible funding facilities now in place have greatly enhanced the ability for students to increase their skills on a part-time basis, and many are taking up the opportunities offered by the Open University to obtain higher qualifications. There has truly been a sea change in the approach taken to occupational qualifications, and I believe that this is now beginning to bear fruit in the number of the new vocational apprenticeships being taken up. Whilst we all acknowledge that it will take some time to make us less reliant on European labour—indeed, we shall always be reliant to a certain degree on workers from across the globe to fill jobs that cannot, for a variety of reasons, be filled by the indigenous population. But this, in many ways, is a desirable situation; the mixing of people from different countries helps to emphasise how alike we all are and why our country should co-operate for the well-being of all of us.

Will the Member give way?

Yes, of course.

There seems to be some objection from Labour Members to his use of the word 'indigenous'. I wonder whether, when people come to make their lives in Wales, it's right that we should welcome them as we wish or whether we should denigrate those individuals as 'visitors'.

Absolutely. I think that, if they come to live in Wales, they become part of the Welsh economy.

So, let's not look on Brexit as a negative thing, but rather as an opportunity to build a vibrant, outgoing nation, embracing our diaspora with the world in general, not just Europe. By thus building a strong, vibrant economy we shall create, by default, a skilled workforce that is agile, changing those skills to adapt to changes taking place either in their own work environment or in seeking new job opportunities.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute in the debate today. It is worth reflecting that two thirds of young people do not attend university, and, actually, the FE sector, whether it be part time or full time, is the main learning plank for them to enhance their career prospects. I think that's an important consideration. The leader of the opposition did touch on the enormous amount of staff that are tied up in the teaching in our FE colleges the length and breadth of Wales, which in 2013 was 9,330, sadly declined to 7,815 in 2015-16, and has seen a welcome increase up to about 8,500, but that's still some 800 teaching positions down on where we were some six or seven years ago, and that is a critical part of the teaching element that does need to be rectified if we're going to increase the productivity and upskilling of our workforce here in Wales.

It's also worth reflecting that, in our FE colleges, for example, nearly 170,000 students, in one shape or form, participate in educational experience within FE colleges the length and breadth of Wales, but I'd like to focus on the agricultural sector and in particular, sadly, the very, very small number of agricultural apprenticeships that are offered here in Wales. It seems to be that 1 per cent of apprenticeships offered in Wales in the last two academic years were in agriculture, and that surely is a very worrying concern. Because, obviously, from my own personal experience, if I could touch on that for a moment, the way the agricultural industry has developed over the last 30 years, it's almost today unrecognisable to where we were in the 1990s. And that's driven by consumer choice, because obviously consumers have an ability to choose the product they wish to buy and the consumer wants to be more informed about how that product has been developed and how that product has been produced, and in particular how that product is presented on the shelves of our supermarkets.

So, we need an agricultural workforce that is skilled, that is in touch with its consumer base, whereas maybe 30 to 40 years ago it was traditional that many farmers, just as soon as they'd left the farm gate, paid no attention at all to the way the product was delivered and what added value can be put into that product. And that's where FE colleges have a critical role to play, I would suggest. And so we do desperately need to increase that percentage of agricultural students that see their learning environment in the FE sector. I'd be grateful if the Minister, in her response today, could give us some indication of how the Welsh Government will look to increase those numbers of agricultural apprenticeships that are available via the FE sector, because staying at 1 per cent is something that's not going to be acceptable in the future, in particular as nearly 4 per cent of the workforce is based in the agricultural industry.

And it is also worth reflecting that, as the Welsh economy faces its unique challenges, demographically that's one of the biggest challenges we face, because between 2016 and 2041 the number of 16 to 64-year-olds is set to decrease by nearly 5 per cent. So, if we're going to increase the productivity of our workforce, and in particular our overall economy, we need to make sure that the skills levels do increase so, ultimately, per worker we can get more work and productive work that adds value to our overall economy. And that ultimately then will drive up wage levels, which proves to have a more prosperous economy. And how do you drive up wage levels? Well, that's by upskilling that very workforce that we spend so much time, week in, week out, talking about here.

And so, again, I would very much welcome to understand how the Minister, along with our FE colleges and those within the sector, will seek to drive up that productivity that, sadly, in Wales has been so stubbornly behind the rest of the United Kingdom. I think I'm correct in saying that, on GVA per hour worked, the only part of the United Kingdom that is behind us is Northern Ireland. Surely, with the 14 colleges that we have here in Wales and some of the excellent facilities those colleges have invested in in recent years—. Cardiff and Vale College just down the road on Dumballs Road is an exemplar of good progress, and, in my own region, many students also access Bridgend College and the Pencoed campus. So, we do see the campuses there, but what we're doing is seeing this stubborn lack of productivity feeding into the economy overall. In particular, if the Minister looks to her own area of Powys, for example, where productivity is 35 per cent below the UK average, I'm sure that that's something that the Minister will focus on, and seek to try and address and reverse that 35 per cent decline in productivity that has Powys, for example—the largest county within Wales, and a large agricultural county—lagging so far behind. Because that's not good for local services and it's not good for the local economy in particular, because that keeps low wage levels within that particular area.

So, I do hope that there'll be a positive discussion about the important role that further education plays within our education estate here in Wales—the recognition of the size of the FE sector, but the importance of both part-time learning and full-time learning within that particular sphere of education here in Wales. And let's not forget that there is a good news story to say about FE, but we mustn't also take our eye off the ball about where some of these stubborn problems exist around productivity, around correcting the demographic problems that we face with a declining workforce aged between 16 and 64. And, above all, making sure that we can actually drive forward that experience that encourages more people to access FE education, both by investing financially and investing in the courses available, and that means putting more lecturers and more teachers into those colleges so that we address that shortfall. I hope that Members will support the motion that's before them this afternoon.

Skills have become our Welsh dragon's Achilles' heel. Sixty-seven per cent of senior business leaders have reported that their organisation is currently experiencing a skills shortage; 54 per cent of employers said that they could not recruit enough staff with the skills they required. And the skills shortage is costing business in Wales approximately £155.2 million. 

So that Welsh businesses can make the most of the expected benefits of Brexit, the skills of our workforce must be developed to meet the demands of the Welsh economy. If you don't believe me, the Wales Centre for Public Policy found that

'there is good evidence that skills…are important factors in driving growth in lagging regions.'

Central to strengthening skills, of course, is fair funding for further education. ColegauCymru has highlighted that the current one-year funding cycle hinders longer term planning, and the Graystone review recommended that you should move towards a three to five-year planning cycle. Also, the Wales Audit Office has called for a long-term approach to FE funding. So, really, there's no excuse now for these recommendations not to be implemented.

Similarly, I support calls for the creation of an adult learning allowance. As the Open University in Wales has argued, education should not be a one-off for young people. The number of successful applicants for the learning grant for those aged 19 and above has decreased. Less than 1 per cent of those who participate in apprenticeships and workplace learning schemes are older people. These facts actually contradict your own aim of providing people with equal opportunities to gain skills for life. There is even worse news when considering the Older People's Commissioner for Wales's finding that the economy is increasingly now becoming rather dependent on our older workers. Clearly, I would hope to hear you address this today and to carefully consider our plan to boost lifelong learning through the introduction of an adult learning allowance.

Now, of equal interest to Aberconwy is how to improve skills across north Wales more generally. I've been working with others to set the ball rolling last term, with a written Assembly question asking for private sector influence on skills taught in further education. Employers are supposed to be able to influence through the regional skills partnership. However, the Economy, Infrastructure, and Skills Committee found that the role of the partnerships in developing the Welsh skills base remains unclear.

We have two excellent FE colleges in north Wales, and I would in particular like to pay tribute to the excellent work of Mr Lawrence Wood, principal of Llandrillo college. He has recently seen an extensive refurbishment of the institute of health and social care, which enables students to explore all aspects of bedroom care and learn in a hospital ward simulation suite, using virtual reality equipment to explore organs and blood—just like being inside a human body. Also, his college is working with the north Wales growth deal, UK Government and Welsh Government to deliver a £14 million project.

The aims of the north Wales tourism and hospitality centre of excellence also include the provision of targeted skills development in the region to accelerate the growth of the tourism and hospitality sector. This is brand new, this is inspirational, but we need to be doing more to connect high-quality teaching to business. One answer would be to create a science, technology, engineering and mathematics-focused institute of technology in north Wales. It would certainly help to ensure that my residents and businesses can influence and secure skills needed in this region. In fact, it could actually be one of the treatments that our Welsh economic dragon’s Achilles' heel—skills—needs. Thank you.

Can I call on the Minister for Education, Kirsty Williams?

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. It's been interesting, and sometimes illuminating, to hear the contributions this afternoon, but I think we can all agree that developing the skills of the workforce is essential if Wales is to thrive and prosper post Brexit. 

This Government is committed to supporting FE, HE and apprenticeships to ensure our people have the necessary skills to meet the challenges of a post-Brexit economy and, after all, uniquely within the UK, Wales responded to the challenge of leaving the EU with a dedicated transition fund, and this has already resulted in an additional £10 million of investment specifically for education and skills. From this fund, over £6 million will support employers in the automotive and the aerospace sectors, enabling them to forward projects to address potential skills deficits exacerbated by leaving the EU. Alongside this, £3.5 million has been allocated to enhance our international education links, maintaining our reputation as a welcoming place for students despite the decision to leave the EU, as well as our dedicated scheme to offer more outward mobility opportunities for Welsh students. 

Now, the Conservative motion that we're debating today predominantly calls for investment in degree apprenticeships, in adult learning allowances and in the further education sector more generally, all of which, Deputy Presiding Officer, are featured in the Welsh Government's draft budget. Janet Finch-Saunders, in her contribution, said she couldn't understand what was stopping us from moving to a three-year funding cycle. Well, let me give you a very good reason—one very good reason—Janet: I do not have a budget for next year. I cannot—[Interruption.] I cannot possibly give FE colleges a three-year budget when I only have a year's budget of my own. 

Now, in total—[Interruption.] In total, in the new year—[Interruption.] In total, the further education budget is set to increase at the start of this new financial year by over £25 million, including additional funding to support mental health, funding for professional learning for those working in FE, and funding to support pension and pay pressures. [Interruption.] Yes.

I just wanted to know, of the £24 million—. Because I chair the Culture, Welsh Language and Communications Committee; we did ask the Minister who came in there how much of that money would be going to apprenticeships through the medium of the Welsh language. Because we didn't find fully information about how much that would be, and, if you could clarify, that would be very helpful. 

Well, my colleague, the Minister for the economy, will have to clarify that, because actually apprenticeships fall under his department, not within the education department. But I will ensure that that information is made available to you. 

The motion does discuss—[Interruption.] The motion does discuss degree apprenticeships, which, again, are already a feature in the draft budget. Both the Minister for the economy and I remain committed to the expansion of degree apprenticeships where they work for the benefit of employers and learners. Now, it seemed to pass some of the speakers by, but we already have a pilot running designated to create an integrated programme that has the credibility and prestige of an academic degree and the applied industry skills that you would expect to find in an apprenticeship. Those pilots are already up and running, with students recruited and currently studying for degree apprenticeships in digital, in engineering and in advanced manufacturing. Now, this is something that I'm sure that we can all agree we have to get right, and let us not forget that, only this month, a think tank run by a former adviser to the Westminster Government stated that half of the apprenticeship courses in England could be considered fake, while finding examples where existing undergraduate programmes were, in essence, simply being rebadged as an apprenticeship, rather than the approach that we are taking here in Wales. So, let me be clear that the future development of the degree apprenticeship programme in Wales will be dependent on the outcome of an independent evaluation and value-for-money considerations, and I think that's in sharp contrast to what we can see happening across the border.

The motion also calls for the creation of an adult learning allowance, and clearly some of the Conservative speakers have missed the fact that in Wales we are leading the way in this area with the establishment of personal learning accounts. Now, this initiative, piloted at the moment by both Coleg Gwent and Llandrillo Menai, is available to people who are currently in employment but are earning less than £26,000 a year. It ensures that people have an opportunity to obtain the skills, knowledge and qualifications they need either to embark on a career change to a better-paid job or to be able to find opportunities within their current work for advancement. I'm looking for an early opportunity to expand that pilot to another setting within Wales.

Mohammad Asghar spent a lot of time quoting the Open University and the need to support part-time education. This country is unique in the fact that we do not make a distinction between support available either for undergraduate or postgraduate, full-time or part-time, and I am delighted that, since the introduction of our student finance reform package, the Open University here in Wales is reporting a 46 per cent increase in the number of people beginning to undertake a degree with them—a 46 per cent increase—and we're only in the second academic year of those reforms. 

Can I also say—can I also say—that we need to look at skills on a wider level? Whilst we absolutely need to ensure that skills are addressed at a lower level, we also want to see more people studying at a higher level, including Master's, and I have set myself some very stretching targets for the number of Welsh students I want to see studying for a Master's. But I have to say, since the start of this session of this National Assembly for Wales, we have seen a 33 per cent increase in those starting Master's programmes—a 33 per cent increase.

We also have an innovative scheme to support Master's programmes for the over-60s. Because of Treasury rules in London, we cannot allow the over-60s to have access to the student loan book, but we were able to find a workaround, and, therefore, if you're over 60 in Wales and you want to study for a Master's you will receive support from the Welsh Government via our Welsh universities.

Quite rightly, Bethan asked about what we're going to do to attract more people to return to Wales. Now, we have universal support for Master's students regardless of which part of the UK they are studying in, but if you return to Wales or come to Wales to study for a Master's in certain key areas you will have a bursary on top of what you can claim and what you can apply for from the usual student support system.

Paul Davies mentioned the issue of Welsh-medium provision. I'm committed to expanding Welsh medium provision in the FE sector. That's why, since coming into office, we have increased the role of the coleg cenedlaethol, not just to cover HE, but also to cover FE. I'm delighted with the work that they have done, alongside ColegauCymru, to establish a very clear plan of how we can increase Welsh-medium provision in the FE sector.

Andrew R.T. Davies, you're absolutely right—we need a renaissance in agricultural training for our young people if we're to have a vibrant agricultural sector in the future, and I have already had numerous conversations with the providers that we already have at an FE level on what a reformed curriculum can look like, making sure that children who are coming out—'children', they're all children to me; young people, sorry—young people who are coming out of those colleges have got the work-ready qualifications, skills and competencies to be able to be really successful in that industry. [Interruption.] Of course.

[Inaudible.] On this specific point, because it has been stubbornly low at only 1 per cent—the number of agricultural apprenticeships—out of a figure of in excess of 30,000 apprenticeships. Where, with these discussions, do you believe that figure might be in two or three years' time? Are we generally going to see an uplift in the number of agricultural apprenticeships? I'm sure no-one wants to keep it at that, but we need to see a roadmap to lift these numbers.  

As I said, I'm not responsible for apprenticeships, but I am responsible for our FE provision, and I do want to be able to work with our colleges to make sure that that and agricultural qualifications are as good and as relevant as they need to be for the sector going forward.

Sorry, I know I'm trying the patience of the Deputy Presiding Officer, but I want to turn to the amendment of Plaid, especially on the issue of Erasmus+, because I think that that is of real importance to this Chamber. Over the last five years, an estimated 10,000 students and staff in Wales have benefited from participation in the Erasmus+ programme, and it is hugely disappointing to see the stance that is being taken in London at the moment.

To conclude, the Welsh Government's draft budget is one that delivers significant investment for our FE institutions, to raise standards and support students. I'm proud that, unlike in England, we're providing investment to ensure that FE lecturers in Wales have pay parity with their colleagues in schools. I'm proud that we continue to provide investment to support colleges with financial pressures that fall upon them as a result of pensions. As I said: £2 million for mental health; £5 million for professional learning; and £10 million for the skills development fund. We are supporting our FE institutions, supporting our students and learners, and we're developing the skills Wales needs to meet the demands of our economy.

Thank you. Can I call on David Melding to reply to the debate?

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I think we've had a very interesting debate, and I thank all Members who have made a contribution. Mohammad Asghar started in very robust form and framed this debate, I think, very positively. We need to reach our full potential as a people and as an economy, and I think we all agree with that. A skilled workforce is at the heart of a resilient economy; again, that is a profound truth. But, at times, skills shortages are holding us back, and in meeting this shortfall, FE is absolutely crucial. I don't think anyone disagrees with that as the real kernel of importance in this debate. Indeed, Oscar, I heard many mutterings from the front bench in complete agreement with the attitude you were taking, and commending the approach that you made.

Bethan Jenkins talked about Erasmus+ and other matters, and I would like—[Interruption.] I beg your pardon, sorry. She talked about Erasmus+, and I do want to spend a bit of time on this because I think it's a really important issue. I believe Erasmus+ has been of massive benefit to the students of Wales, enriching their experience and allowing them to flourish, and it has great economic benefits. I will urge the UK Government to ensure that we negotiate well so we can participate in this programme in a way that will ensure future benefits. But, to put it into the EU withdrawal Bill, I think, would have restricted our negotiating policy profoundly, and I do not think that is the best approach. But—and my colleagues agree with me—we will be emphasising how important this is to the UK Government, as the Minister did. So, on that, we are in agreement.

Paul Davies talked about Pembrokeshire College. There were many specific references to local FE colleges and just how they are at the centre of so much life in our regional local economies. Doors there are open to people of all ages, and I really think that's the classic thing that FE has delivered. We do have a very good record traditionally in Wales. Wales was one of the few places after the second world war where technical colleges really did take off. It was one of the failures of the reforms of that time that technical education did not gain the sort of prominence that more academic approaches did. But, in Wales, we did actually do well in that sector, and we've seen our FE colleges take that tradition forward. But Paul did emphasise the need for a longer term funding model, and this became quite a debate during the course of our discussion as well. I'll return to that, perhaps, in a moment.

Then, the link between FEs and employers, again, was made by several Members. David Rowlands, I thought very fair mindedly, started with a tribute to the Welsh Government's vocational programmes, as he put it, and commended what he thought was a lot of activity that had been positive. He did then kind of lapse into his previous speech in the debate that we held earlier, and there were lots of lexicological disputes about a particular word, which I'm not going to mention. But I do think we need to be slightly kinder to each other sometimes. I think tone, context and intent is what drives the usage of words, and I have to say that I have some sympathy with the irritation he felt earlier.

Andrew R.T. Davies then talked about FEs being the main route for many young people to develop their skills. We quite properly talk about universities a lot, but for many, many students, FEs are much more significant, and I thought that did rebalance the debate. He talked, of course, about the agricultural sector—this is what we'd expect—but with such force, and he was the only person to really address this in this afternoon's debate. Sadly, only about 1 per cent of apprenticeships are in the agricultural sector at the moment, and that is quite a sobering thought. He mentioned the great capital investment that's gone on at Cardiff and Vale College, and I understand there are other examples. Anyone who goes to the Dumballs Road site—it's just a pure pleasure to see those students surrounded by these outstanding facilities. I recommend the restaurant there, amongst many other things that they have.

Janet Finch-Saunders, I thought you had the best image of the day: skills are the Achilles' heel of the Welsh dragon. That image really captivated people and made them think about how important it is that we rectify the current drag we have in too many areas because we're not strengthening skills as much as we should. Because they do drive improvement in economic performance as well as bringing great benefit to people individually as well. You also mentioned that private sector influence is important, and the partnerships that are there so that employers can drive many of the strategic approaches taken to skills development. I think these were very, very important points. I would add, in terms of skills, that is probably the best lever we have. We have a lot of power there, and we expend a lot of money as well, it should be said. We need to do that efficiently and effectively. This is something that I think is sometimes overlooked—just how powerful that lever is to a devolved institution.

Kirsty then replied and, I think, agreed with a lot of what we put forward. Of course, this Government is committed to improving skills, as the Minister said, so that Wales can thrive. I don't think anyone doubts that that commitment is a very sincere one and that this is even more important for a post-Brexit economy. And again, I think everyone in this Chamber would agree.

If I might be permitted, Deputy Presiding Officer, at this point, a hint of criticism. I did think a certain didactic tone then entered your peroration at this point, as you told us off for having a motion that just referred to what was already embedded in the Welsh Government approach. I then thought, 'Well, this, in a way, is a funny kind of compliment', but then you sort of spoiled it by saying it's impossible to have three-year budgets. The fiscal environment has been very challenging—that is certainly true. We've had big changes in terms of administrations, then a general election, and much of this has led to further challenges. I do politely remind you that it was your party and the Labour Party that prevented us having an earlier general election. If that had happened earlier in the autumn—[Interruption.]—then these things may have been a little easier to manage.

I do appreciate the point that our budgetary approaches in the UK have not been terribly well fitted to three-year budgets. We need to get better here, so that we're developing indicative budgets and approaches where there is some sort of assurance about the level that will be given. I don't think—at least, I'd sincerely hope that we're not going to be seeing the sort of sudden financial disruption that we had in the financial crisis. So, I don't think we're going to have a sudden change in the UK Government's approach, and they have said that we are now moving beyond the austerity period. 

Can I finally say, I thought the point you made about the need to look at higher skills was both very well made and added a lot to the debate? Master's degree programmes: there's again a lot of evidence that they're even more important to an economy than the number of PhD completions, because many people who do Master's programmes then want to use them in some entrepreneurial fashion. So, I thought the point you made was a very positive way to finish.

I do thank everyone for their contributions this afternoon, and I do urge you to support our motion, unamended. 

Thank you. The proposal is to agree the motion without amendment. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Thank you. So, we defer voting on this until voting time. 

We are now moving to voting time, unless three Members wish for the bell to be rung. No. Okay.

So, we now move to voting time. The first vote this afternoon, then, is on the Member debate under Standing Order 11.21(iv), suicide bereavement support, and I call for a vote on the motion, tabled in the name of Lynne Neagle. Open the vote. Close the vote. For the motion 35, 12 abstentions, nobody against. Therefore, that motion is agreed. 

We now move to vote on the Welsh Conservatives' debate on workforce skills post-Brexit. I call for a vote on the motion, tabled in the name of Darren Millar. If the proposal is not agreed to, we will vote on the amendments tabled to that motion. Open the vote. Close the vote. For the motion 13, no abstentions, 34 against. Therefore, the motion is not agreed and we move to amendment 1. 

So, I call for a vote on amendment 1, tabled in the name of Siân Gwenllian. Open the vote. Close the vote. For amendment 1 20, no abstentions, 27 against. Therefore, amendment 1 is not agreed. 

I call for a vote on amendment 2, tabled in the name of Rebecca Evans. Open the vote. Close the vote. For the amendment 34, one abstention, 12 against. Therefore, amendment 2 is agreed.

I call for a vote on amendment 3, tabled in the name of Siân Gwenllian. Open the vote. Close the vote. For the amendment 34, 13 abstentions, nobody against. Therefore, amendment 3 is agreed.

I call for a vote on amendment 4, tabled in the name of Siân Gwenllian. Open the vote. Close the vote. For the amendment nine, eight abstentions, 30 against. Therefore, amendment 4 is not agreed. 

I now call for a vote on the motion as amended. 

Open the vote. Close the vote. For the amended motion 38, nine abstentions, nobody against. Therefore, the motion as amended is agreed. 

We now move to the short debate. If people are going, can they go quickly and quietly, please?

We now move to the short debate, and I call on Hefin David to speak on the topic he has chosen. Hefin. 

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. The approach I'm taking to this short debate is one that I've discussed with the Minister. I haven't actually written a speech. I have notes, but I haven't written a speech, so I don't know what I'm going to say in this speech. But what I've also agreed with the Minister is that he hasn't written much of a speech either, and he's not relying on civil service notes; he's going to answer what I'm saying. Some people may say it's a unique approach to a short debate; I'd like to call it 'short debate unplugged.' 'Short debate unplugged' is what I'm going to call it, although the Minister called it something else, which is not repeatable in this Chamber.

What I'd like to look at is the Bevan Foundation's 'Anchor Towns' report, which was their contribution to some of the debate, and I think was focused towards some of the debate around the Valleys taskforce, and what the Valleys taskforce is doing, although they make clear that the concepts in this report can be applied to the whole of Wales. And what I'd like to do is look at this concept of anchor towns, not as Huw, sitting next to me said, 'Irranca' towns. He said that if it had been about that, he would have stayed to listen to the debate, and I promised him I'd work that joke in. 

I want to talk about the concept of towns and anchor towns, and the difference between the two, and then focus on some of the positives and some of the difficulties, I think, with this concept, and try and find out from the Minister really what chimes with his view. What does he think the Welsh Government should pick out of this report, and subsequently do? I think anchor towns comes as an evolution of the strategic hubs, which were in the original Valleys taskforce, and the former Minister here has kindly stayed to listen to this debate; I hope he stays for the whole thing and doesn't walk out—

Well, that depends on whether you make it interesting. [Laughter.]

He said he's going to stay as long as I make it interesting, so, if he does go, we know what he's thinking.

And the definition within the report—they describe anchor towns as sub-regional centres of employment, education and key services with strong transport links, and they support new and growing businesses and provide a large enough customer base for local businesses such as food shops, restaurants and cafe and local services, such as post offices and banks, to thrive alongside a strong cultural and community offer. Now, those of us in this Chamber who are representing communities with towns that are in difficulties will know that that is almost the holy grail; that is quite difficult for us to achieve, that is quite a big challenge for us to achieve. And it does link within the report as well, Deputy Minister, the foundational economy. That makes a very positive statement towards the foundational economy, which I think kind of began and developed on the Labour back benches and spread across this Chamber and was taken into Government very effectively by the Deputy Minister. The reason the foundational economy has been championed in Government is because of that Deputy Minister right there; I don't praise him very often, so, please, Minister, make the most of it. 

There are a limited number of towns that can be classified as anchor towns, and not all display those characteristics. Inevitably so, because they are so very specific and difficult to achieve. Yet, according to the Bevan Foundation, small towns are home to 40 per cent of the Welsh population, and many live closer to a town than a big city. And I remember growing up in Penpedairheol, which was a village; we would talk about going on a day out with my grandfather to Bargoed—that was where you'd have the day out, not to Cardiff, not to Blackwood, but to Bargoed. I doubt that people in Penpedairheol talk these days about going out on a day out to Bargoed. That is part of the tragedy. People love their towns—people love their towns—and they turn to despair when the towns are downtrodden and are not as effective as they used to be. I'm thinking also, Alun Davies, about Brynmawr, and the campaign to save the Market Hall Cinema. That's an example of a love of a town, and that campaign ran throughout the town of Brynmawr, and people felt incredibly strongly about it, and I know you do as well. 

And in my constituency, amongst others, we've got Bargoed, Senghenydd, Bedwas, Nelson, Ystrad Mynach, and of course, Caerphilly, and they would all consider themselves to be towns to some extent or another. So, let's think about anchor towns. Can they be anchor towns, and what are the positives of this concept? Let's have a think about that. 

Well, first of all, as I said, I think this report has been a valuable contribution to the debate, and there are things in here that I think should inform Welsh Government strategy in the future. It sits well with the original iteration of the Valleys taskforce—the original Minister's iteration of the Valleys taskforce. I think it particularly sits with that, and perhaps more so, with that than the subsequent iteration that was developed by the Minister. Having said that, it also moves beyond that flawed concept of strategic hubs. And I do think they were flawed, and I'll elaborate on that later. And the concept of anchor towns talks more about services that are integrated into the concept of place in a way that the strategic hubs, I don't think, did.

Another positive I think as well is that anchor towns are away from the M4 corridor. So we are talking about a rebalancing of travel, away from, in the morning, north to south, and start to move south to north—more about east and west in a minute. And I think that is a very good thing, and it certainly will do more to take cars out of Cardiff than this ridiculous congestion charge that is actually a tax when there are no other alternatives for people to get into Cardiff than using their car. So I think this concept of anchor towns is far more positive in that it offers an alternative to travelling into Cardiff, in my view.

It also seeks, as I've said, to complement Government policy on the foundational economy. And on page 8, it actually talks about foundational liveability, and it says,

'Success is about whether places work in a liveable way for many types of households. Not whether they are deficient by the GVA measure or lack the accoutrements of stylish middle class living.'

I quite like that, and that is their view of foundational living, which chimes very nicely with the Minister's foundational economy championing. It considers those services that already exist also, which was my criticism of strategic hubs.

But let's be positive—there are some things in the concept that say that these things should connect into anchor towns, and those things are: hospitals and health boards, educational institutions, local government, other public bodies, such as government offices, and housing associations. So, if I look at my constituency, I can see, in Ystrad Mynach, Ysbyty Ystrad Fawr, I can see Coleg y Cymoedd, I can see the Tŷ Penallta council offices, and the Tredomen business offices, I can see housing associations—well, at a stretch, I can see United Welsh, which is on Beddau Way, closer to Caerphilly, but at a stretch you could do that. And also I've added my own little category—sports activities. Because the Newport Gwent Dragons centre of excellence is situated across the road from Ysbyty Ystrad Fawr. So, you've also got this as well. But, the point they make—the point they make—is it only works if these institutions work collaboratively together. And if you speak to anyone in Ystrad Mynach, they would not see the Dragons centre of excellence as a community facility; it is seen as an elite facility, that actually causes more problems for Penallta rugby club than it solves. So, the centre of excellence is seen as an elite training facility, and it's very difficult and expensive for the community to access. So there are ways in which these anchor towns can open up access. In the way we talk about community-focused schools, well why not community-focused public bodies and business bodies as well? We need them to focus on a fair and inclusive economy.

So what about the difficulties? So, there are the positives, here are some of the things I think are difficult about the concept of anchor towns. I think it's based on a previous conception of the Valleys taskforce, which we are moving away from. So what does that mean for strategic thinking? Does that mean that the Minister, therefore, will reject anchor towns? Does that mean, Deputy Minister, that you feel that anchor towns are a concept not worth considering by the Welsh Government, or are there things in there that you would like to use? But it is certainly more in tune with your predecessor's view of what the Valleys taskforce should be—I think—than what you currently see it to be.

By the strictest definition also—here's a parochial criticism—the only real anchor town in my constituency is Ystrad Mynach. Bargoed, Senghenydd, Nelson, and Caerphilly even—Caerphilly at a stretch—would not be categorised as anchor towns. That creates some difficulty if you are concerned about the multiplier effect that might be created by anchor towns. 'Is there a multiplier effect?', is a very good question to ask, because it could be reinforcing advantage. Ystrad Mynach already has all these services; Bargoed doesn't, Senghenydd doesn't. What are we going to do for those communities? This is the same problem I had with strategic hubs. Strategic hubs were developed in communities like Ystrad and Caerphilly, where people want to build houses, where people want to grow businesses. But what about those communities that aren't anchor towns? How are they going to link with those communities? How can a multiplier work beyond the snow line? How can you make that happen? And this is a question I'm asking you, Minister.

My constituency is quite linear—it moves north to south. Does it only work—can anchor towns only work where there is concentricity? Ystrad Mynach is concentric; it's the only concentric town in my community—all the others are linear. Is that part of the reason for their success?

Now, also, we're not talking about creating new towns—we're working with what we've already got. And if we were building new towns, we'd build them like anchor towns, but we aren't; we're working with what we've got, and what we've got maybe isn't conducive to creating that. It requires transport infrastructure and connectivity in order to succeed. Ystrad Mynach has that, but we are a long way from an effective public transport system yet. Just this morning, I was on the train service to Caerphilly. Along with all the other passengers, we had to get off at Caerphilly and get on to a Stagecoach bus, which was very hot and sweaty, and as a result, I missed committee—I didn't get in until 10:38. If I was an hourly paid worker or didn't have an understanding employer, I would have great difficulty. Our transport connectivity is not there yet. Fortunately, the chief whip forgave me today.

And the other thing, of course, is that this requires a big public subsidy—these kinds of transport activities. Currently, Caerphilly council pays £81,000 a year to the bus service to run a bus connecting Blackwood to Ystrad Mynach station, east and west. That is under threat because of local government cuts. And the other thing is that we tend not to look east and west in the Valleys. Merthyr Tydfil is identified in the report as a potential anchor town. Let me tell you, I've only been to Merthyr Tydfil town centre three times in my life, and one of those times was to visit Dawn Bowden. I've not been there. I've been to Cyfarthfa Park—[Interruption.] Well, I'll make a point of going there, seeing as I have recommendations from the floor. I've been to Cyfarthfa Park and I've been to the retail park, but Merthyr Tydfil town centre—I haven't been there. It isn't something we think of in my community. We don't look east and west. I've been to Aberdare a bit more often recently than in the past, but that's more out of necessity.

So, what chimes with this report? I think we must work with how people really live, not with how Welsh Government civil servants think we do, and therefore, it needs to be developed by the people themselves. It needs to be done collaboratively with the Cardiff capital region, working towards a strategic development plan, which itself was undermined, by the way, by the Cardiff congestion charge proposal. We need to work together and collaboratively on it and that is what is failing to happen. 

It demonstrates the valuable role of public services boards. I like that, but, do you know what? At the end of the Economy, Infrastructure and Skills Committee last week, I asked Members of all parties around the table how involved they'd been in public services boards, and we said, 'What's a public services board?' We haven't been involved with them; we haven't been engaged with them. They haven't approached us. Russell George, Bethan Sayed—that's right, isn't it? We haven't. We had that discussion, and therefore, if public services boards are going to play a role, they've got to be up there, doing it, involving us and collaborating. At the moment, I don't see it.

And the other question is the Bevan Foundation make reference to the social partnership Bill, linking public, private and voluntary sectors together for the common good. Great—excellent thing—but what will be the detail of that, Deputy Minister? How will the social partnership Bill enable things like anchor towns to flourish? I don't know; I'd like more detail.

This is a debate, and I've set out a couple of questions. While I'm not completely convinced by the concept of anchor towns, the underlying principles of community collaboration, of co-production and of ground-up principles are something that I support and am very, very much behind. But, Deputy Minister, it's for the Government to answer that question as to how those principles are then enacted in practice. The big question I'm asking as a result of this debate, and as a result of this concept of anchor towns is: where does the ministerial taskforce for the Valleys want to go with this? And perhaps in your peroration, you might answer that question.

Thank you. Can I now call the Deputy Minister for Economy and Transport to reply to the debate? Lee Waters.

Yes, thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. Hefin David's opening reminded me of the remarks said of A. J. Cook, the trade unionist—that he didn't know what he was going to say until he started to say it; he didn't know what he was saying while he was saying it, and he couldn't remember what he said after he finished saying it. I'll go in the spirit that he has implored me to, and it's possibly one those debates for other Members to intervene on the Minister responding, so I'd be happy to take interventions from the few remaining Members, should they want to intervene.

I appreciate the spirit in which he's offered this subject up for discussion, because I think it is a ripe time to discuss it. And as it happens, I have invited the Bevan Foundation to attend the next meeting of the Valleys taskforce to debate this very paper. Because, like him, I read it and was engaged and convinced instinctively by much of it, and sceptical about other bits of it, and I really want them to come in, go through it and discuss it. I've also, by the way, issued a standing invitation for them to attend all future meetings of the taskforce, but explicitly with a mandate to challenge. I don't want to bind them into the taskforce and they're reluctant to do so, but there's a standing agenda item for them to come in and have a pop if they want to, because I think, just like Alun Davies before me in leading this, and Hefin David in the spirit of his remarks, we don't have a template here, exactly. We're trying to find a way against a tide that is pushing towns in a particular way, that's denuded them of much of their economic purpose. And even though, as Hefin said, people love their towns, sadly people are using them less and less, and that's the paradox of towns and the role we find, I think, as politicians in wanting them to thrive and doing a bagful of stuff to make them thrive.

The only bit of the civil service briefing note I shall use is just to very briefly touch on four things that we are doing to help towns. We've got a £100 million targeted regeneration programme. We've got a £54 million building for the future fund for the acquisition and redevelopment of unused buildings. We've got a £31.5 million town centre loan scheme, and we're spending £23.5 million on business rates relief. So, we are doing a lot. I guess the challenge could be is whether that is sufficiently focused, and are we clear what the vision is. This is often true of local authorities. Certainly, my own in Carmarthenshire has been very good at renovating old buildings, but it's not clear to me what the town centre strategy and plan is, and that's a point that the Federation of Small Businesses have made in their work.

So, I don't think we all have a clear answer about this yet, but the challenge is a correct one, and I want to continue in the spirit of dialogue in shaping the Government's approach to try and get that as right as we can. 

I think he slightly overplayed, if he doesn't mind me saying so, the differences between myself and Alun Davies on the role of the strategic hubs, and whether the previous conception is different to the current one and how does that fit with the Bevan Foundation's. I think there is some truth in it, in that in the original iteration the strategic hubs were a funding vehicle and they're no longer a funding vehicle, but they're still a very important part of the work of the taskforce and the work of Government, because they give a spatial focus to our work.

Will the Minister take an intervention?

I'm happy to take an intervention. 

Since I was the Minister who invented these things and they've been debated a number of times, it might be useful for me to actually say what lay behind it at the time. The strategic hubs were never a way of doing anything except focusing investment in particular places, because the criticism that we'd heard and the criticism that's been made—fairly, I think, in the past—has been that the Welsh Government has a limited resource that it has then spread so thinly as to make no real impact. And the consideration was that if we are to have a serious impact and achieve the targets that have been set for us during a four or five-year term, then that demanded and required investment in particular places. 

But we used the term 'hubs' partly because everybody else uses the term and, secondly, because we tried to avoid the anchor towns debate. For example, in my constituency, that would be saying to Ebbw Vale, 'You have all of this investment', and by the same token saying to Tredegar, to Brynmawr, to Nantyglo, to Blaina, to Abertillery, 'You're not having that investment.' And it was important therefore for us to say that we want to focus investment in and around particular places that are the transport hubs of the future, and the rest of it, but which would then lead to further investment. They were never seen as the be-all and end-all of the policy.  

I agree with that and, of course, there was a methodology behind the selection.

Yes, there was.

So, this was not a back-of-a-fag-packet exercise; there was a lot of work that went into coming up with them. I think Alun Davies has hit upon the nub of the problem with the strategic hubs as I've seen them, which also applies to the anchor towns. It's not the concept that's wrong; community parochialism is the challenge, because how many do you decide upon? When I took over this brief I said to the civil servants, 'Why have we got seven strategic hubs? That seems a lot', and the civil servant replied, 'We were quite pleased we kept it down to seven.' And that's the challenge I've put to the Bevan Foundation in sponsoring this idea because I don't object to the principle, but how are you going to stop—? Maybe if you can decide on three there'd be a force to the argument, but we're never going to decide on three, so is it really worth the grief?

I feel that Alun Davies wants to interject once more. 

I would say the first iteration didn't include any strategic hubs in the Valleys either, so it was a longer process than perhaps people think. 

Absolutely. And, as I said, we are keeping strategic hubs as a spatial planning tool. With the example of Caerphilly, a lot of work has gone on and investment in the Caerphilly master plan that simply would not have existed had the strategic hubs concept not been there. [Interruption.] I'm happy to give way. 

I did have a meeting with the chief executive of Caerphilly council, and you're absolutely right, the reason they went for the Caerphilly master plan was because of the strategic hubs. The problem is it left out Senghenydd. So that itself had that exact effect.

Yes, and there we come again to the problem. 

So, what do we do about this? I'll just touch on this as a final main point: the public services boards and the role that they have, and how the foundational economy concept fit in. I should properly acknowledge that the foundational economy was a movement of supporters that Hefin David, Vikki Howells, Jeremy Miles and Jenny Rathbone on our benches were part of, and Adam Price and David Melding on the other benches were part of it, too. It was a cross-party movement, and it's important that it remains such. 

We have, as you know, tripled the size of the foundational economy challenge fund, but the real prize is spreading and scaling good practice, and that's where the public services boards have the potential to achieve their purpose. I would agree with his comments that, so far, they're little understood and, beyond producing strategies, have really not themselves made an impact. So, my challenge to the public services boards is starting now, as we are just about to appoint a partner to work with four clusters of them to spread and scale the Preston model of procurement and then, as the experimental funds show promise—and I was in the United Welsh offices in Hefin David's constituency on Monday to meet with the Valleys projects of the experimental fund—we want to spread and scale those quickly across the public services boards. 

And if we get that right, especially on procurement, then the benefit of public spend, which is £6 billion a year in Wales, will flow to those communities in his constituency that currently feel neglected. And then, I think, whether we call them 'anchor towns' and the number we have are almost side issues. The point is: how can we nurture and encourage the fabric of our communities that have felt neglected, and for good reason? And that's the entire purpose of our everyday economy approach and the role of public services boards in doing that. Whether we can do it and whether we can do it quickly enough to show an impact, well that remains to be seen, but I'm certainly focusing my energy on trying to do that. But there are significant frustrations, stumbling blocks and delays along the way. 

I'll just finish on the congestion charge point that Hefin David has made. I think the point he made about transport connectivity is a key one for how people feel connected to their towns, and the dilemma he mentioned that his own local authority faces of having difficulty in sustaining the subsidies to socially necessary but not commercially viable services. Our privatised bus model is broken, and we're trying to hold it together and it gets harder every year. I think, to give credit to the leadership of Cardiff council, they have looked at mounting congestion in their city, the side-effect of the agglomeration model that we've praised in this place for a long time, which is basically people work in Cardiff but live elsewhere and we build up the city. The problem with that, of course, is that people travel distances into the city to get to work, and that has led to a congested capital city with dangerous and deathly levels of air pollution. And something must be done about that. Simply looking at the supply side of producing ever more capacity doesn't work. [Interruption.] I'll just finish the point and then let you in. To be fair to them, they are beginning the conversation of addressing the demand side. 

But I think the problem with their proposal at this point in time is that there is no other way for people to get into the city. The trains are at capacity, the buses run far too late for work. I had massive problems this morning. The people will still travel in exactly the same numbers, they'll just pay the charge. It's a tax, as the proposals are currently set, until you get public transport radically improved and people have confidence in it. 

I don't take the proposals Cardiff have brought forward as the final word on the matter. I think they're the beginning of a conversation.

Will you take an intervention?

I haven't finished the point, but if I have time, I'm happy to. 

They have said—. Sorry, Deputy Presiding Officer, are you trying to give me some guidance?

You have time. You have up to 15 minutes. 

Excellent. 

But at 15 minutes, the mike will go off. 

And we're all going home. Excellent. Let me just briefly respond to Hefin's point before asking Alun to come in.

We're at the beginning of a conversation. They are not going to come in for four years. There are pragmatic reasons for doing this in the way they've done, because the entry points into the city are fewer, and you can put the infrastructure to capture the number plates, whereas if you were to apply it to all Cardiff residents, you'd need cameras all over the city and that is going to be difficult and expensive to do. So I can understand pragmatically why they've done it in this way. But in four years' time, by the time this comes in, if the local government Bill that Julie James is bringing forward is approved by this Senedd, then transport will be being managed on a regional basis. It simply won't be the case that the city region can come forward with a transport plan that only addresses Cardiff. The local authority leaders around that table will demand a whole-region approach.

So, I think this is the beginning of a conversation. All the local authorities over the next four years will be able to shape that, as indeed will the people of Cardiff through local government elections, and I suspect the proposals we end up with will be different from the proposals we've started with. But I think we should give cover and courage and support to the leadership of Cardiff in being willing to tackle the difficult issue of demand management, because simply addressing supply is not going to work. I'll happily give way to Alun Davies.

I'm grateful to you, Minister. I will come in to support the comments made by my good friend from Caerphilly, because it does create a very much us-and-them environment between the hinterland and the city of Cardiff, and the one thing history has taught us is that if Cardiff succeeds, the Valleys succeed, and if the Valleys succeeds, Cardiff succeeds. Separation and division will not enable either of us to succeed.

I do welcome the White Paper from the council in Cardiff. I wish other local authorities had the same capacity to develop similar proposals. But the point made about a Valleys tax is well made, and it will not be acceptable to Members representing central and eastern Valleys constituencies.

But I would say to you, Minister, that I do applaud the thrust of your argument, but the point you make on buses would be a better point if the Welsh Government wasn't proposing to cut the current subsidy to buses in the current budget. What we need to do is certainly have the legislation that you've debated and discussed, and I will be very happy to support that, but in the meantime, we need to sustain and support the bus services we currently have.

In terms of the point on division with the Valleys, I think Ken Skates, the Minister for economy, has made the point in his letter to Cardiff council, which has been released, that this has to be done on a regional basis. As I've just said, I think for a number of reasons that that will be the case.

On the point about bus services, I am a big supporter of sustainable transport. We have a series of practical problems, not least a very difficult budget settlement that has been painful to agree, which has meant the freezing of the support grant—not a cutting. I appreciate that in real terms the effect is much the same, but that has been a very difficult settlement and we have a practical problem in that the revenue funding available to us—and revenue funding is what runs bus services—in transport is extremely limited, and the problem we all have if we are sincere about addressing the climate emergency is that we need to address behaviour change. Behaviour change is about people, it's about services, it's about revenue funding. There is a structural problem we have in the Welsh Government budget that no Minister can easily get around, in that in order to achieve modal shift we need more revenue funding, and we simply haven't got it. It is easier to find funding for capital. So, that is something we're all going to have to confront as the Wales transport strategy comes out this year, and we follow through on our commitment for modal shift, and that absolutely has to be realised to achieve the vision that Hefin David has set out for replenishing and rejuvenating our towns. I pledge to continue a dialogue with all Members on this.

Well done. Thank you very much. That brings today's proceedings to a close.