Not timed: the Record publishes no broadcast time for this contribution, so Siambr cannot place it on the stage.
Contributions
97 contributions on record. Newest first, by sitting day. Page 1 of 3. Counted by Siambr
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Thank you for that answer, Minister. As you will be aware, the bombing of the RFA Sir Galahad was both a military and a Welsh tragedy. Forty-eight people lost their lives in that incident, 32 of which were Welsh Guards, and others, of course, suffered life-changing injuries. The survivors, veterans and bereaved families are still living with the consequences of that day in June 1982, and they're still awaiting answers from the many sealed documents and the lack of evidence that is in the public domain about what happened. In fact, some of those documents remain sealed, as I understand it, until 2065, which is obviously a very long time away and probably beyond the lifetime of some of those individuals who suffered that day and continue to suffer. Do you agree with me that the failure of the UK Government to publish that evidence is inconsistent with the armed forces covenant? Will you make representations as a Welsh Government, given the impact on Welsh families? And will you join me in asserting the rights of Falkland islanders to self-determination by agreeing with the statement that the Falkland Islands are British?
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Diolch, Lywydd. I will say, it's a bit rich of the Labour leader complaining about broken promises when we've still got hundreds of thousands of people on waiting lists and lots of people waiting over two years in spite of your broken promises. Now, if I can turn to the First Minister. First Minister, back in early 2025, I was contacted by Emily Vaughn. She was a victim and survivor of grooming gangs. She was trafficked around the UK and raped more than 1,000 times by hundreds of men. Your predecessor as First Minister declined every invitation I made to meet with Emily Vaughn. Instead, she said that Emily would be involved in the Welsh Government's own work on tackling this issue, but there's been a lack of progress. I raised concerns about this last year, and again in February. Emily contacted me again just a couple of weeks ago. She's still heard nothing now for months, in spite of these assurances. She's heard nothing about the work that Ministers are doing on modern slavery; she's heard nothing about the promised adult victim survivors advisory group. And yet this is in spite of the fact that, in September, the Deputy Minister for Social Care, Mental Health and Women's Health told this Chamber that survivors' voices would be heard and that their experiences would drive change. Well, I say this to you, First Minister: Emily has a voice, she wants to be heard, but she doesn't feel as though anyone in the Welsh Government is listening. Will you take the opportunity today to agree to meet with Emily and me in order to listen to what she has to say?
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Well, thank you for that response, First Minister. I think it is important that she meets with you, as the leader of the Welsh Government, in order that we can assure her and other brave victims who have talked about their experiences that you will be determined, as we all need to be, to stamp out the abuse, the horrible abuse that's been experienced by people like Emily and many others, especially when they were children, at the hands of these evil and wicked perpetrators. One of the things that you and I still have yet to agree on is the need for a Wales-wide inquiry. We clearly have a UK Government-initiated inquiry into grooming gangs. That has taken the decision now to undertake an investigation in Wales, and that is welcome. But in spite of that, we know that Wales is very different from England. It's a more rural nation; we have more fragmented local government; social services legislation is different; we have a rights-based approach to legislation around children; and community safety is devolved, while policing isn't. These are the same sorts of arguments that you used to posit when you called for a Wales-specific COVID-19 inquiry. So, after meeting with Emily, which I hope can be scheduled very, very soon, will you agree to look again at the case for a Wales-specific inquiry into grooming gangs, so that we can be sure that we learn lessons and prevent more vulnerable children from being groomed and raped by gangs of paedophiles across our country, and so that we can hold public services to account for any failures?
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Trefnydd, can I call for a statement from the Cabinet Minister for enterprise on the Global Centre of Rail Excellence, a company that is owned by the Welsh Government and therefore Welsh taxpayers? In 2021, £70 million-worth of public funding was invested into this project on the promise that hundreds of millions would be delivered by the private sector on top of the Government investment and that many jobs would follow. But what happened was the Welsh Government simply bought a big hole in the ground, which is largely still a big hole in the ground. There doesn't appear to have been any progress on securing any investment, and the Welsh Government at the moment has simply kicked down the road a further decision on what to do about the project until next year. In the meantime,
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In the meantime, the chief executive's remuneration package has risen by more than 11 per cent in two years and now stands at more than £267,000 per year, with £39,000 per year in employer pension contributions alone. They are eye-watering sums. The taxpayer deserves to know whether they're getting value for money from this project. So I would like a statement demonstrating who will authorise those sorts of pay increases, when the promised private investment and jobs will materialise and whether we can have some clarity from the Welsh Government on the timetable, because many people think that the taxpayer has been sold a pup on this issue and that we need to make sure that we safeguard our money in the future.
- Not timed: the Record publishes no broadcast time for this contribution, so Siambr cannot place it on the stage.
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Thank you for that answer, Cabinet Minister, but there's a clear link also between attendance and educational outcomes, and we know we've got a huge attendance problem in Wales, with over 100,000 pupils every year missing at least 10 per cent of their lessons in the last year for which we have figures. In fact, the attendance records that have been provisionally published for 2025-26 suggest that this attendance problem is actually getting worse, not getting better. There's been a fall in the average attendance to just under 91 per cent in 2025-26. What action is your Welsh Government taking to address these appalling figures—which seem to be on the slide, not getting any better—and why is it that we have such a persistent attendance problem when other parts of the UK seem to be getting their act together and getting kids back into school?
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I think we're all interested in the fact that you didn't answer the question that was put to you, which is: why have you changed your mind? I know we're talking about a road to Newport, but it's more like the road to Damascus—[Laughter.]—frankly, today, because you're saying extraordinarily different things than all of you were saying when you were a party in Government not that long ago.
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Diolch, Lywydd. Can I also put on record that our thoughts are also with those affected by the devastating events in Aberfan 60 years ago this week? First Minister, it's vitally important that every single penny of taxpayers' money is well spent, and that includes on our national health service here in Wales. Unfortunately, more than £600 million has been paid out by the Welsh NHS in clinical negligence and personal injury claims over the past five years, £145 million of which was just in the last financial year alone. These are eye-watering figures, but they provide further evidence of the crisis engulfing the NHS here in Wales. Every single payout, of course—. Behind those payouts are families and individuals who've suffered loss or harm as a result of some tragic situation and failings in care. Now, our priority, I believe, has to be preventing these tragedies from happening in the first place, because every pound paid in compensation is a pound that could have been invested in delivering better care, better facilities for patients and better outcomes for them across the country. What action are you and your Government taking to get to grips with this issue?
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I asked you for specific things about what you would do to try and tackle this, and I appreciate the words about your desire to get on and deliver some improved sustainability, but you didn't tell me any specifics in terms of action that you would take, and, unfortunately, the situation with compensation payments looks as though it's going to get a whole lot worse. The Royal College of Emergency Medicine has warned today that our emergency departments in Wales are in a precarious position and facing the prospects of a very, very difficult winter, largely due to a lack of hospital beds. And the latest Welsh Risk Pool talks about the financial forecasts in the future, and buried on page 733 of a 1,100-page pack of papers for the Velindre University NHS Trust board, it suggests that the annual cost in the year 2028-29 of negligence claims is expected to rise to more than £310 million per year. So, within three years, the Welsh NHS could be shelling out the equivalent of salaries for more than 8,000 nurses in clinical negligence claims. I'd rather see that money spent on preventing people from coming to harm and dying than on compensation. So, can I ask you today, First Minister, to declare a health emergency? Everybody knows that we need to do that. Surge hospital numbers, recruit more doctors, nurses and paramedics, and then get on and deliver the safer care that people across Wales need.
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The Aberfan disaster was one of the greatest tragedies ever to befall Wales, and it was made all the more heartbreaking because so many of those who died were children. As a parent, I can't imagine anything worse than losing a child, and for a small, close-knit community to lose 116 children and 28 adults is a tragedy that almost defies words. I associate myself wholeheartedly with the First Minister's words and those of representatives from other political parties in this Chamber today, and I send my deepest sympathies to the bereaved families, the survivors and everyone else whose life was forever marked on that dreadful day 60 years ago. Llywydd, last week at the royal opening of the Senedd, I had the enormous privilege of meeting Gareth Jones, a survivor of the Aberfan disaster. At a time when our headlines are dominated all too often by conflict and violence, Gareth reminded me of the extraordinary goodness that exists in the world, of unsung heroes and simple human decency. We've already heard about Nansi and Hettie, and Gareth told me about Stephen—Stephen Andrew, a caretaker who dragged him out of the window at Ysgol Pantglas, and he would not be alive to tell the tale had it not been for that brave man. He shouted at him then to run, and it was those actions that saved Gareth's life. Tragically, Stephen lost two of his own children in the disaster. Gareth did run that day, but he has never run away from Aberfan in the memory that he has of what happened to him and to his schoolmates and to his community on that day. Instead, he has spent much of his life since ensuring that future generations never forget. A plea has been made that we must ensure that people's stories are remembered and communicated to children in our day through the national curriculum. I second those calls, because people like Gareth have a story that is powerful to tell and that can remind people of the milk of human goodness and the tragedy that befalls communities when we as politicians and regulators don't act as we should. During one of the school visits that Gareth did, he met Noah, the great-grandson of Stephen Andrew, the caretaker that rescued him. And last week, both Gareth and Noah were present at the royal opening of this Senedd, where they met Their Majesties the King and Queen and, of course, Gareth told me about his experience of meeting the late Duke of Edinburgh in the days following the Aberfan disaster. Also present, of course, was Len Moss, an off-duty nurse who rushed to help after the disaster and spent two whole days washing the faces and the hands of children recovered from the rubble so that their grieving families could identify them. Those stories, to me, demonstrate the extraordinary acts of humanity in the most dreadful of circumstances. None of us who didn't experience Aberfan can really comprehend the suffering that that community has endured. I was very moved by the accounts of surviving children who felt unable to play normally in the years after the event for fear that their laughter would upset neighbours who'd lost their own children. But the stories, First Minister, of survivors like Gareth, are incredibly important, especially as the years pass, and it's more vital than ever now, I think, that we ensure that those voices are preserved, and I do ask what action the Welsh Government is going to take in order to ensure that that is the case. I did see that very powerful play this morning, which has already been referred to, and I wish that that would be a play that everyone in Wales could watch, so powerful was its message, and I think it's a message that can be heard by people of all generations and ages, actually. I think that these are the sorts of issues that we need to take forward, really, as a Senedd, as a nation, to ensure that we foster the memory of what happened that day and that we take positive action in the future to prevent similar tragedies. We've already talked about the cross-party work that has been done on the Disused Mine and Quarry Tips (Wales) Act. There's still work to do in terms of toxic land, contaminated land, which so recently has been in the news. We owe it to the people of Aberfan to make sure that we learn lessons from the past and that we do everything that we can to prevent a similar tragedy occurring in the future.
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Diolch, Lywydd. Look, Labour didn't fold, they collapsed. Isn't that the case? First Minister, people across Wales are facing a cost-of-living crisis, yet senior managers in the public sector and in publicly funded organisations are enjoying pay packets that people in our country could only dream of. And what's really galling is that the worse their organisations seem to perform, the better the pay packet seems to be. Let's take Transport for Wales, for example. Last year, it was one of the worst performing rail companies across the whole of the United Kingdom in terms of cancellations, yet its chief executive is earning nearly £0.25 million every single year. Then there's Cardiff Airport. It currently receives £20 million per year in annual subsidy from the Welsh Government just to stay afloat, yet its latest financial statements show that its highest paid director received a package of more than £275,000 per year. And in north Wales, Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board has the worst performing emergency departments and longest waiting times in the country, yet its chief executive is earning a salary of £262,500 per year. It's scandalous. So, do you agree with me, First Minister, that these salaries are now completely out of control, they bear no relationship to the performance of their organisations, and that no-one in the public sector or in a publicly funded organisation should be rewarded for failure?
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Look, we all know why you are not in favour of performance-related pay and that's because you'd all be skint, wouldn't you, frankly, if it was based on the performance of your Government so far. Let's look at a decision. You say that you want efficient and fair services for taxpayers, let's take a look at a decision that you took last week, as a Government, on your Government website. On 7 October, you approved a salary of more than £200,000 per year for a chief executive of Natural Resources Wales, and a package that would be worth more than that. That's another organisation that has faced serious criticism over its performance: failures to tackle illegal dumping; slow progress in delivering flood defences; and sewage discharges into Welsh waterways, which people have been protesting outside the Senedd about even today. Yet, your Government has decided to offer its next boss a salary that is much higher than even your own—
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These unacceptable salaries for public sector fat cats have gotten out of control and must stop. So, can I ask you today, First Minister: will you introduce a public sector pay restraint Bill to prevent excessive salaries for senior managers paid by the public purse, to make sure that there's fairness for taxpayers and to ensure that pay reflects performance and doesn't reward failure?
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Can I call for two statements today, please? Can I have a statement in relation to the noise assessment work that needs to be done on the A55 in the Llanddulas area from the Deputy Minister for Transport? This is a priority area for noise reduction. Residents in that community have lived with lots of noise from the A55 for many years. We've been told that a noise assessment is going to be done, but there's no indication as to the timeline for that work or when any follow-up work might be completed, in terms of capital investment for noise barriers. So, I think it is something that I would like an update from the Minister on. Secondly, can I call for a statement from the Cabinet Minister for Health and Care in relation to medical speciality training for next year? I've been contacted by a group of doctors who are internationally trained, who have many years of experience in the Welsh NHS and want to go on to further their careers, but their experience in the NHS is not currently recognised within the framework as giving them priority access to that training. I do think this is something that the Welsh Government could take action on to address some of the gaps in our workforce in the NHS, and I'd be grateful for a statement.
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Well, you have parked the national park. I want to welcome that announcement. It's absolutely necessary, because whilst I support the principle of a national park in north-east Wales, I was not impressed with the proposals that were put forward by Natural Resources Wales, which seem to have gone bonkers with the felt-tip pen, drawing a huge area into the new proposed national park. I did not believe that that represented the opportunity for north-east Wales that it ought to have done. I have always believed that, had a national park been able to be established, it should have been established along the borders of the existing area of outstanding natural beauty in the Clwydian range and the Dee valley. Nor was I supportive of the establishment of a new national park authority, because we all know the democratic deficit that exists in national park authorities, with people who are appointed to them rather than people who are directly accountable to members of the public in those national park areas. That is something that I would hope the Government could reflect on for other national parks in Wales, and whether there may be an opportunity to undertake a piece of work on reform for national parks. I have to say, I heard the bleating from the Labour Party about this. They had five years to deliver a national park. It was one of the key commitments that they say their party made in advance of the Senedd elections in 2021. We know that they failed to fulfil many of their promises; this was on that long list of promises that they failed to fulfil. And if it was so important to them, perhaps you could have asked for this as part of the budget deal that you've just given to the Plaid Cymru Government. Because you could have extracted a much higher price, frankly, than the peanuts that you seem to have accepted in return for your votes on the supplementary budget when it comes in a few weeks' time. You've identified the timetable, which is good, because I don't think the uncertainty helps anybody in north Wales, particularly those who were fearful about the implications of a national park. Can you tell me this, though, Minister? You mentioned the cost of the establishment of the national park, the £11.6 million. That money has been provided for, if you like, within the budget, I would assume, over the next few years, has it not? [Interruption.] No. Okay. So, it's not in your thinking, not in your psyche, which seems a bit odd. [Interruption.] The reason I'm asking is because I would still like that investment to flow into the existing AONB, because I do think that protecting our designated landscapes is important. We know that there are issues with the capacity of car parks, the maintenance of footpaths, the need for rangers, if you like, to make sure that our designated landscapes, including AONBs, are properly managed. I do think that there is a need for further resources to be invested in north-east Wales in the Clwydian range and Dee valley AONB. Of course, you would expect me to argue that, as a person who represents that neck of the woods. But I do urge you, in making your final determination on this: don't shy away from making a brave decision to abandon the project altogether if necessary, because we've got to do what's right for the people in those communities that are affected by this. I heard the comments about impact on the Welsh language, and impact on house prices as well, of course, which has been raised by many people in response to the consultation. But what we've really got to do is make sure that the beauty that we're all able to enjoy in north-east Wales is something that we can continue to offer to people, to visitors, to take advantage of the economic benefits that those visitors can bring to our communities, but in a way that is well managed, in a way that supports appropriate development, that doesn't hinder responsible landowners from continuing to be able to manage their land in a way that protects the environment, and also in a way that is efficient for the taxpayer. That's why I would urge you, please, to consider looking at the reform of national parks to see whether there's a different way forward, and whether designated landscapes can be managed in a different way—rather than by national park authorities, whether they can be managed by local authorities in those areas, in the same way that the AONB is successfully managed in north Wales. Because I do think that's a more efficient way for the taxpayer to still get the benefits that these designations bring.
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Can I put on record that the thoughts of my party are with the Jewish community in Wales and around the world as we mark the anniversary of the 7 October attacks this week? First Minister, Wales is in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. At a time when households are struggling with prices, last week the cost of alcohol in Wales went up, with a massive increase of 30 per cent in minimum alcohol pricing. And that doesn't affect just people who have alcohol problems, it affects everyone, including those people who are responsible drinkers, hitting them in their pockets too. What consideration has the Welsh Government given to the economic impact of the change in minimum alcohol pricing, especially on retailers close to the Welsh border, who are now seeing their customers nipping across into England in order to do their shopping to avoid these extra costs?
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Look, we all know that left-wing Governments make choices that drive people to drink. [Laughter.] But then, pushing the price of booze up isn't, I think, the right thing to do, particularly during a cost-of-living crisis. We've seen fuel prices go up, energy prices have just gone up and now the cost of booze in Wales is up. Now, people who enjoy a responsible tipple across Wales are absolutely furious by this decision. The evidence from the Welsh Government's own evaluation undertaken in January 2025 shows that, actually, this policy isn't working. Those people who are already alcohol dependent and problem drinkers are still alcohol dependent, still have problems with booze, and actually they're now even worse off because they're giving up food, they're not putting the heating on, in order to pay for more expensive alcohol. So, can I ask you, can I urge you, to look at that evidence? Instead of pushing up shopping bills, instead of punishing responsible drinkers, instead of retailers losing out because of this policy, why don't you scrap this policy altogether and get on instead with investing in support for problem drinkers, including better access to alcohol rehabilitation services in Wales?
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- on the clip
Thank you for that answer. Andy Burnham, the new Prime Minister, of course, has set out his ambition to rewire the state. It's quite clear to me and many people in Wales that we need to rewire Wales in order to make sure that people in their communities have a greater opportunity to shape the decisions that are made about those communities by politicians at all levels. One of the ways to do that is to make politicians more accountable to the citizens that they serve. What action is the Welsh Government going to take to address the accountability gap created by the new Senedd election system, which, I'm afraid, the way that it is at the moment, does not give an opportunity for individual members of the public to demonstrate their support for an individual candidate, rather than a political party?
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Can I call for two statements today, please? The first is from the Cabinet Secretary for Enterprise, Connectivity and Energy in relation to the mobile network. Action has been taken in Scotland and England, and they've announced this week in Scotland a consultation on changing permitted development rights in order to address mobile black spots. Given the essential nature of a decent mobile signal now, Wales is falling behind with this important digital infrastructure. We clearly need some action here, and I would be grateful if we could have an update on what action the Welsh Government is taking. Also, can I call for a statement from the Welsh Government Cabinet Secretary responsible for social justice and equality on the action being taken by the Welsh Government to address antisemitism in Wales? As we all know, tomorrow marks the third anniversary of those barbaric attacks by Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists against Israeli citizens. All of us have condemned those attacks, and what we need to make sure is that Wales is taking appropriate action to address the rise in antisemitism that we've seen in our country since. One positive action that the previous Welsh Government took, of course, was to recognise the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's definition of antisemitism, and I'd be grateful if the Welsh Government could reaffirm its commitment to that definition so that we can be sure that the same action will be taken by this new Welsh Government as the previous one in terms of providing some leadership on that issue.
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Will you accept an intervention?
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There's a thing called an opportunity cost: when you spend money on one thing, it means you're not spending money on another. If you accept that there are economic costs of the 20 mph default speed limit to the Welsh economy, and if you accept that the Welsh Government has spent £30 million-odd implementing the measure, and many millions more since reviewing the measure, how many lives could have been saved had that money been spent on our emergency departments, on beds in our hospitals, or on other matters like that? It's an interesting one to quantify, is it not?
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Diolch, Lywydd. I move the motion on the order paper in the name of my colleague, Paul Davies. Those of us who remember the cold war remember living under the shadow of a potential nuclear conflict. I can vividly remember being glued to the telly as we watched the spectacle in our house of the Berlin wall coming down back in 1989, followed by the ripping back of the iron curtain as the communist regimes across eastern Europe began to collapse, the declarations of independence in the Baltic states and then the dissolution of the Soviet Union. It gave us all a great sense of hope, optimism for the future. The arms race was over and we all felt that it would be an end to the threat of war, particularly on the continent of Europe. But, as we all know now, unfortunately, it has not been so. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has brought war back onto our doorstep in Europe, and we know that there are hostile states across the world who threaten our national security. Only this weekend, we saw counter-terrorism police scrambling to RAF Fairford and making those arrests on the suspicion of preparing a terrorist act. That investigation, of course, is ongoing. And I know that everybody in this Chamber will join me in condemning any attempt to attack an RAF base or any other military base in Britain, in spite, actually, of the history of some political parties in this Chamber. In a few weeks, we are going to remember those heroes who sacrificed so much for the freedoms we all enjoy in our country today. But bravery alone cannot stop a missile, it can't protect a ship and it can't keep a pilot alive when an aircraft fails. Our armed forces need and deserve the very best equipment that we can provide them. And those who make that equipment and the technology that it requires are also just as critical to our national security as those on our front lines in the military. We saw on Anglesey last week, didn't we, the fact that two RAF crewmen survived after ejecting from a Hawk aircraft near RAF Valley. And behind that moment of survival was a Welsh defence manufacturing company, because the pilots owe their lives to the parachutes made by Bridgend-based IrvinGQ that were attached to the ejector seats that catapulted them out of that aircraft just before it crashed. So, our defence sector is vitally important. It is critical to our nation and our national security, especially at times like this. Now the previous Welsh Government estimated that the aerospace and defence sector across Wales employed around 16,000 people. I see that there's been a revision upwards in that figure, which obviously I really do welcome.
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And my message and our message as a Senedd to those individuals, those workers, in those industries today should be very straightforward. It should be that we value what you do. We will champion your role in our defence and security as a nation, and we value your role in our economic security too. My party seeks to support opportunities to attract further defence-related investment to Wales, and I had hoped that all political parties in this Senedd could be united and agree on these particular issues. But I have to say, having seen some of the announcements and actions of the Welsh Government in recent weeks, and the unnecessary amendment to our debate today, I'm now not so sure as to where the Welsh Government stands on this issue, particularly that announcement on pausing investment in our defence industry in order that you can undertake this ethical defence review. I think that that is a recipe for disaster. It sends absolutely the wrong signal to those businesses that are getting ready to invest in different parts of the UK as the spending taps come on, because we need to make sure that we spend more on defence as a nation. And yet, at the very same time that those businesses are trying to make decisions about where to invest, the Welsh Government puts on the brakes and says, 'Stop. We're going to do a review.' It couldn't have come at a worse time. It couldn't have come at a worse time. You seem happy, Cabinet Minister, for that investment to go elsewhere, and I'm looking forward to your contribution to this debate today, because you need to put on record that Wales is open for this investment in order that we can secure those important jobs in our defence industry and create new, highly paid, well-skilled jobs in the future as well. And I think what you need to tell us is how long is this pause on investment going to be. How long are companies going to have to wait before they get a signal from you that Wales is still open for business? How many projects have been affected by that pause so far? How many millions have been set to one side as a result of this pause? What new tests are you expecting to apply to firms that are already operating under an ethical framework effectively within the UK, and legally operating and producing things, some of which are being exported? Are you going to be judging, as a Government, whether an ejector seat or a parachute that's going to be strapped to an RAF jet is an ethical choice or not? I think it's very bizarre. It's baffling, and I'm concerned about it. Investors need certainty. Workers need certainty. But you're creating uncertainty, and that's bad for business. It's not good for business at all. You say, or appear to say, that you value defence jobs, and yet you are deferring decisions that could be supporting those defence jobs and making sure that we attract them. Just last year, prior to the Senedd elections, I challenged the Development Bank of Wales on a restriction on arms manufacturing investment in this Chamber. It's only after I pressed them on that issue that the bank publicly clarified that that exclusion had been removed. Defence firms need plain answers. They don't need uncertainty. And I'm afraid that your amendment replaces our very clear call for a Welsh defence industrial strategy with just warm words about jobs and a request for us to endorse an ethical framework that hasn't even been published. We don't know who is undertaking the review. You haven't told us which individuals you're going to be listening to, and whether there's any involvement of the defence sector itself in that review or any engagement with them. These are important things, and I think we need to know as a Chamber—the nation needs to know—where you stand on this issue of defence. What are you going to do to help grow the industry here in Wales? In July, the economy and enterprise Minister, to be fair, went to the Farnborough airshow—very pleased to see you go there, and I know that you met with some defence companies while there. I commend you for doing that, but I was really disappointed that, when those businesses came to Newport, when they came to Newport, just down the road, you chose not to meet them. Even though you were down to be a speaker at that event, you didn't turn up. What sort of message does that send to these big multinational corporations that might want to invest in Wales? I'll tell you what message it sends. It sends the message, 'We don't want you here,' and I'm afraid that's absolutely the wrong message that you should be sending, especially given the value of the defence industry to our country and the value of it to our economic and, obviously, national security. So, businesses deserve an answer. We don't need more stalling. We don't need you holding up the creation of well-paid jobs and investment. Instead of sending out these mixed signals and these mixed messages to those businesses that are waiting to make decisions on where they invest, I think everybody in this Chamber should reflect, you should back our motion, you should demonstrate to those businesses and those workers in the defence industry across our country, who do so much to contribute to our national security, that you are on their side. You should make sure that we express, as a Senedd, a welcome for the increased defence spending by the UK Government, and every one of us in this Chamber should be fighting for Wales to get our fair share. You often talk about the fair share of investment in rail, right? And I'm all for that as well. But let's get our fair share of defence investment into Wales as well. That's why you need to get behind this motion. Let's develop that strategy to grow our defence sector. Let's try to boost the opportunities that that brings to our economy, our advanced manufacturing centre, our education providers, and the opportunities for research and development right at the cutting edge, which, of course, can help to transform other parts of our economy too. It's the duty of every single Government, including every single Government in the United Kingdom, to keep our citizens safe and secure. Wales should play its full part in ensuring that we have an armed forces that are equipped with the modern capabilities that they need to be able to do just that. So, let's back them, back our defence sector. I urge Members to support the motion.
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Will you take an intervention?
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Will you give way?
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I've sat here and obviously listened to your contribution for six and a half minutes. Can you just answer the questions about how long this pause in investment is going to take? If I accept what you're saying, and I do accept what you're saying, that you want to attract more of the MOD procurement to Wales so that we get our fair share, don't you accept that by pushing companies away with this pause, you're sending absolutely the wrong message in terms of trying to attract that money into Wales at this critical time, when businesses are making investment decisions? Don't you accept that that's a problem? And if you do, how long is this review going to take? How long is this pause? Who's undertaking the review? Which individuals are involved? Are you engaging the industry? Answer those questions.
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Diolch, Lywydd. First Minister, I hope you enjoyed your visit to Aberystwyth over the weekend. How do you feel to have recruited Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to your campaign to break up the United Kingdom? As you know, he's been gleefully speaking about the prospects of referendums on the future of the UK, especially following your meeting with Sinn Féin and the Scottish National Party two weeks ago, which I believe was all over Russian tv. Are you pleased to have Putin's Russia cheerleading on this independence mission that you've set yourself on, or do you finally realise the folly of focusing on that issue and the constitutional navel-gazing, rather than cracking on with improving our sliding educational standards, getting to grips with the crisis in our NHS and trying to fire up the Welsh economy?
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First Minister, before the last election to the Senedd, you told the people of Wales that the election was not going to be about independence. Yet since that election, you have done everything to make this Senedd about the issue of independence. You either clearly didn't get the memo that you wrote yourself, or you deliberately misled the people of Wales and tried to get them to vote for Plaid by seeking to dampen down your aspirations for an independent Wales. Prior to going to those polls in May, back in March, this Senedd—the previous Senedd rather, but the Welsh Parliament—passed legislation. We passed legislation to prevent people lying during election periods. I would remind you that you and your party voted in support of that legislation, and yet still went on to say, 'It's nothing to do with independence, this election', and bark on about it ever since you've arrived back in this place. When I looked at the scenes on the tv over the weekend, I saw YesCymru claiming that 8,000 people were in attendance at the rally in Aberystwyth—that's a figure, by the way, that I take with a large dose of Halen Môn salt; I'm not really sure it was true. But even if I were to accept that number, do you know the figures that are in my mind? The figures that are in my mind are the 709,000 on an NHS waiting list and the 1 million people in Wales who don't have an NHS dentist. When will you show the same passion and drive to get to grips with those issues as you do for this matter of independence?
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Can I call for two statements today, please, Trefnydd? The first is from the Cabinet Minister for Health and Care in relation to Martha's law. As you will know, following the tragic death of Martha Mills, a 13-year-old in England who died of sepsis in 2021, the English NHS is benefiting from the roll-out of Martha's law in emergency departments, in maternity settings, in all in-patient settings. We have a similar approach in Wales, but people are less familiar with it, because it isn't called Martha's law or Martha's rule. And I wonder to what extent the Welsh Government could look at just adopting it lock, stock and barrel to make sure that patients here have the benefit of being able to call for that immediate clinical review of their patients, if they're concerned about patient safety. Secondly, can I call on the Cabinet Minister for Enterprise, Connectivity and Energy on the rising costs of fuel, particularly in relation to home-to-school transport operators, many of whom now are really struggling to make ends meet with the viability of some of the routes that they are supporting, getting kids to and from school? Conwy, Denbighshire and Flintshire councils have all been approached for support by home-to-school operators in the constituency that I represent, but, unfortunately, they do need that national direction from either the Welsh Government or the UK Government in order that they can get the resources that they need to make sure that these routes are still viable.
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Diolch. Just a couple of questions, if I may. Can I thank you for your statement today? I fully appreciate the ambition that the Welsh Government's got to make sure that all of the centres that we have meet the Bliss standards. One of the challenges we have in north Wales is that we don't have a level 3 neonatal service; we have a sub-regional neonatal intensive care centre. It does some phenomenal work, but we're still having to transfer babies over the border, generally to Arrowe Park Hospital. What work will the Welsh Government do to review the status of that sub-regional neonatal intensive care centre, with a view to potentially raising the standard to make it a level 3 provision for north Wales and, indeed, get people transferred in from over the border rather than the opposite way out? And I would say that it's got some excellent accommodation on site as well at Dawn Elizabeth House, Tŷ Croeso at Glan Clwyd Hospital—a fantastic service. And secondly, Minister, one of the issues that you and I have visited many times in this Chamber in the past is this issue of baby loss certificates. We know the trauma that people face when they lose a baby and, sadly, at the moment, Wales is the only nation within the UK where these certificates are not available. That's causing a huge amount of unnecessary trauma, and Sands and Bliss and a whole host of other organisations are calling for us to get these things sorted as soon as we can. Can you give us an update?
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I'm a proud Conservative and I'm a proud unionist, because the United Kingdom is more than a political arrangement; we are a shared family of nations, which for centuries have had people in Wales living and working alongside and trading with other parts of the United Kingdom. We built industries together, we went through the industrial revolution together, we fought tyranny together, we created wealth, improved living standards and built communities together, and our history is Welsh and British. And those identities are not in conflict with one another; they strengthen who and what we are. The union means that someone born in Wales can study, work, establish a business, raise a family and retire anywhere they want in the whole of the United Kingdom. And, most importantly, it means that when adversity strikes, whether that's war, economic crisis, natural disaster, pandemics, or even attempted AI takeovers of the planet, the strength and resources of the whole of the United Kingdom stand behind every single citizen across Britain. As part of the UK, Wales is one of the world's six largest economies. We're protected by one of its finest armed forces. Llywydd, when people across Wales have been crying out for an NHS that works, for better education standards for our children, and for greater prosperity in our country, that's what this Government should be focused on. Prior to the election, that is what our First Minister—who can't even be bothered to turn up to this debate, by the way—promised the people of Wales. [Interruption.] Yes, I know it's embarrassing that he's missing. He's got his human shield here, Dafydd Trystan, to represent him, but he is missing from the debate, which I think is an important thing to note. The First Minister has very different priorities, because, instead of rolling his sleeves up and getting on with that day job, delivering on those issues, the First Minister's very first act after the summer recess and his holidays was to cosy up to Sinn Féin and the SNP to issue bold predictions, like Mystic Meg staring into the crystal ball, saying that Westminster is coming to an end and that Andy Burnham's going to be the last British Prime Minister. And then, of course, he signed a pact deliberately attempting to promote the break-up of the United Kingdom. That was his priority and it is shameful. But, in spite of the grandstanding, the First Minister, Plaid Cymru, and all those who support the break-up of the United Kingdom cannot even answer the most basic of questions about what would happen if Wales was ripped from the rest of the UK. What currency would an independent Wales use? There's no answer. Would it be the pound—would it be the currency of the UK they just left, or would it be a new Welsh currency that was practically worthless, or the euro? Would Welsh citizens—? I'll happily take an intervention.
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Let's get back to the questions, which you didn't answer, by the way, okay. So, what currency would we use? No answer. Would Welsh citizens retain the right, the automatic right that they currently have today, to live, work and study elsewhere in the UK? They can't tell us. Would Welsh businesses retain unfettered access to our most important market in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland? They have absolutely no idea. Would the so-called party of Wales seek to rejoin the European Union that was rejected—[Interruption.]—that was rejected by the people of Wales? And I know—[Interruption.] And I know it's an inconvenient truth for you to hear, but the people of Wales voted to leave the EU. Who would be our head of state? Who would be our head of state? They have no answer whatsoever. I know they want to abolish the monarchy, but who's going to be the president? No answer. Would taxes rise, spending fall, or borrowing go through the roof because you can't afford to pay for the unaffordable promises that you have made to the people of Wales because of that huge fiscal gap that would cost every single taxpayer, by the way, in the whole of our country, about £14,000 each and every single year? That's the reality. Would Wales have its own armed forces? Would you join NATO? Would you join NATO? You cannot answer these things. And they're not technicalities; these concern people's jobs, savings, mortgages, pensions, national security and our clout on the international stage. I'm not prepared to take that risk. I firmly believe that Wales is better off in the United Kingdom and that the United Kingdom is better off with Wales right at the very centre of everything that it does. I'm proud to be a member of the Welsh Conservatives and the Conservative and Unionist Party.
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Diolch, Llywydd. First Minister, last week, the UK Government published the inflation figures. They showed that inflation was up, with prices rising by 3.1 per cent in the year to August, and of course economists forecast that that increase in inflation will continue to rise to above 4 per cent around the end of this year, in the coming months. And that's going to be as a result of the energy price cap going up, the increase in fuel prices eventually coming through. Now, many households in Wales are facing the pinch in their pockets, and they desperately need help. One thing that your Government could do to help people here in Wales is to take action on council tax. Can I ask you, First Minister, instead of making yet more demands for more power, why don't you help people with their council tax demands? Why don't you initiate a cap on council tax and legislate, with the powers that you already have, so that people require a referendum in order to give local residents a say for any increase above that cap?
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You know, I was listening to the radio this morning and I heard one of the commentators talking about it being a bad week for NATS; I thought they were talking about the Welsh nats, but actually, they were talking about the National Air Traffic Services, as it happens, and the chaos at our airports. [Laughter.] One of the things that I want to see is fairness for council tax payers in Wales. You often talk about the need for fair funding between the England and Wales settlement—I get that, I completely get that and we support you on fair funding—but we need fair funding in Wales and we need fairness in council tax bills for people who have to struggle to pay them each and every year. The average band D council tax bill in Wales has risen by more than £600 over the past five years, and some residents have faced hikes of over 50 per cent over that period. It's totally unacceptable. We need urgent action to protect people from the sorts of excessive rises that some people have been having. So, can I urge you again: introduce a cap, legislate so that people have to have referendums for anything above that cap and do one more thing too—let's have a review, an independent review, truly independent of the local government funding formula, to make sure that there's fair funding to all parts of Wales, not just places favoured by the previous Labour Government.
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Trefnydd, can I call for a statement from the Cabinet Minister for Enterprise, Connectivity and Energy on access to banking services in Wales? I appreciate that banking is not a devolved matter, but banking services really do matter to people across the country, particularly in communities that don't have access to a bank. I've been blessed in my own constituency to have two banking hubs, which are serving the communities of Abergele and Prestatyn, but there are other communities, places like Llangollen that lost its last bank a couple of years ago, that don't have a bank present. At the moment, the FCA, the Financial Conduct Authority, simply do assessments of access to cash, rather than access to banking services. Shortly after the election, the UK Government did announce a review of access to banking services. That consultation finished over the summer. I wonder whether the Welsh Government has made a submission to that about the particular circumstances in Wales, particularly given our rurality, to make sure that people have access to these vital services. If it hasn't, is there any way we can work together to make sure that we make a call and a demand for legislation in this area, to ensure that banking services are available?
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It's always interesting watching a messy divorce—[Laughter.]—and, my goodness, has it been an untidy one. Can I thank you, First Minister, for advance notice of your statement, although not quite as in advance as the Western Mail's notice of your statement today, which seemed to have more detail than any Member of this Senedd prior to the release of it at 9.34 a.m. this morning? I'm afraid to say, again, a bit of a sense of déjà vu, a lot of recutting and rehashing of your manifesto, recutting and rehashing of your 100-day plan, and there's only so much rehashing that you can do with the same sorry document so many times to try and polish what many people would describe as something that I won't refer to. Because that, I'm afraid, is what many people will see it as. I have to say that I was listening carefully to the radio this morning, as you found out in First Minister's questions today, and Laura McAllister referred to your 100-day plan as a 'gimmick'—I agree with her, and it's not always that I agree with Laura McAllister, but I agree with her on that. And now, of course, the rubber needs to hit the road in terms of getting some delivery for the people of Wales. And it's not going very well so far, is it? Waiting times up, PISA scores down, your grandstanding on independence really not making much of a difference, no matter how loud you scream. Now, I will say that, look, there is a lot of ambition in this document that we on the Conservative benches share—we want to see a more prosperous Wales, we want to see a better educated Wales, we want to see a healthier Wales; we want to see all of those things—but I'm afraid that it's lighter on detail than I would like in terms of the availability to deliver on those things. Let me just turn to the NHS for a second, because I'm very concerned about the NHS, as are you, and I know that it's something that is close to your heart. You referenced the climate emergency and the nature emergency; you didn't seem to reference a crisis in the NHS, which I'm afraid it is, and many people perceive it as such. One thing that we do know is that that crisis is largely caused, according to the clinicians themselves, and according to the royal colleges, including the Royal College of Nursing, which was here last week in the Senedd, as a result of the beds situation in our NHS. There simply aren't enough beds. The Labour Party was disastrous in terms of its management of the NHS; I agree with you on that. They cut the number of beds too far, too fast, and people now are paying the consequences. Just over the last three years, I am told by the Royal College of Nursing, 21 per cent of acute surgical beds have gone in the Welsh NHS, a fifth of our capacity. Thirteen per cent of acute medical beds have gone. It's no wonder that our emergency departments can't find the beds in those hospitals when patients need them. You didn't reference that situation. I want to know what are you going to do to surge those beds in the short term to fix that issue. Because let me tell you: you create surgical hubs, you need beds for people to go into after they're recovering from surgery, particularly if something goes wrong. So, I want to know what are you doing on that front. You also suggested that there's going to be a switch in the way that the NHS is funded, with more going to primary care. Now, I want more money to go into our primary care services, but I don't want it to be to the detriment of hospital care. What assurances can you give me today, First Minister, and the people of Wales, that you won't be cutting funding to our hospitals in Wales in order to compensate for that extra investment in primary care? Because we need to know. You referenced the cost of living. I agree with you that we need action on that. That's why I raised the need to do something on council tax today in First Minister's questions. We need action to extend free childcare. We had a free childcare plan as well, and we'll support you to be able to try to deliver some more free childcare. Ours was slightly different; we wanted more parental choice so that grandparents could look after their children too, and that was better for the taxpayer in terms of cost. But I want to know what you're doing to cut taxes. Can you cut some taxes for us? A penny off income tax. Is it not possible to shave some money off the budget where we've got waste, where we've got largesse, so that we can put money back into people's pockets so that they can decide how to spend it in the economy themselves? You referenced in your document—. By the way, when the statement came through, I clicked on the well-being link. It didn't work. I hope that's not an omen for the future in terms of whether you'll be able to deliver things. I eventually got around to finding the right link. You talked in there about the desire to allow people to buy their own community assets. I support that; we'll support you with that. I want people to be able to buy their own home. I want stamp duty gone. I want the right to buy back. I want to bring empty homes back into use. There's insufficient detail on those things in your plan. I've got all sorts of other things that I'd like to discuss, but the clock's against me. Let me say this: if you're able to deliver on your ambitions, many of them which we support, we will try to work collaboratively with you. It might be difficult. There may be some stumbles along the way, but we're prepared to reach out on a cross-party basis, and it was good to hear the same message coming from Reform as well, to try to make Wales a better place. But be under no illusions: we want to see a Wales where there are lower taxes, where there's an end to wasteful spending, where there's less emphasis on the grandstanding and more emphasis on the day-to-day jobs and using those powers and resources that you already have in your armoury to deliver a better future for our country.
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Diolch, Lywydd. I welcome the motion that's been tabled today by Reform, and I move the amendment tabled in the name of my colleague Paul Davies. I want to thank Paul Marr for the measured way in which he opened this debate and spoke so powerfully about his daughter's personal experience of sexual abuse. This is an issue that should cut completely across party political barriers. We shouldn't shy away from discussing it, no matter how difficult it might be or how uncomfortable the subject matter is, because there should be no division amongst any of us in this Chamber when it comes to protecting children from rape and sexual exploitation. There shouldn't be any division when it comes to supporting victims who've been robbed of their innocence, and there should be no division on the need to investigate why authorities fail to protect some of the vulnerable children in our society from horrific abuse by paedophiles, no matter what the ethnicity of the perpetrators might be. Now, grooming gang activity has been a serious problem in the UK, and that includes here in Wales. As many people will know, I first raised this matter here in this Senedd Chamber back in January of 2025, and I called at that time for the then First Minister to support a UK inquiry into grooming gangs. She didn't support one. So, I then called on her, as the First Minister of the Welsh Government, to establish a Wales-wide inquiry. She didn't support one. In response, I was told by the then First Minister that there was no widespread evidence of grooming gang activity here in Wales, and that I should substantiate the serious claims that I had made about brave Welsh victims who'd spoken about their experiences—young girls who'd already spoken out publicly about what had happened to them and the failure of the authorities to protect them; individuals like Emily Vaughn, recruited by a grooming gang here in Wales, trafficked to other parts of the UK. She'd spoken out about being strangled, threatened with a knife, the perpetrators of those crimes then threatening to conduct an arson attack on her home to harm members of her family. She was raped over a thousand times. She lost count of the number of men who abused her and her body. And it's not just Emily, that brave individual who has spoken powerfully about her experiences. As has been said, there's been evidence of exploitation by grooming gangs of children in Swansea, and there's been the recent series of convictions in Rhyl, my own constituency, a case on my own doorstep. Absolutely appalling abuse. Teenagers, young children in our communities given drugs, enticed and abused by men. Now, the ongoing Operation Oak, of course, has led to some further arrests in Gwent, where there have been 34 offences that people have been charged with, including multiple counts of rapes. And let me tell you, it was speaking to Emily Vaughn and it was reading the accounts of victims that made me all the more determined to make sure that we do everything we can to ensure that these things are not happening in our communities. Every single one of us in this Chamber has a moral obligation to leave no stone unturned in trying to tackle these heinous crimes. That is why I fully support the motion before the Chamber today. It's also why we have tabled an amendment to that motion, calling for the Welsh Government to conduct its own inquiry, for there to be an inquiry commissioned into the areas of devolved competence too. Because I'm afraid that, just like the COVID inquiry that we've seen at a UK level, we don't want Wales to be a footnote. We want to make sure that young children here can be assured that the protections are in place as far as our social service departments are concerned, those family departments are concerned, the community safety aspects, some of which are completely devolved to Wales and the Welsh Government—that every single one of those services is acting in unison and sharing information properly, to ensure that we protect vulnerable young children. That's the motivation behind the amendment that we have tabled. And I would say this to the Deputy Minister today: I know that she shares our passion about wanting to protect children and particularly young girls from this horrific abuse. What I would urge you to do is to consider the response of your party to the UK COVID inquiry: you still called for a Wales-specific inquiry into COVID, to ensure that a proper spotlight was shone on the situation here in Wales. I would urge you as a Government to please do the same to protect these innocent victims in our country and to hold those perpetrators to account for their actions.
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I'm very grateful to you for taking the intervention. There's a direct parallel here, isn't there? Your party stood alongside my party calling for a Wales-specific COVID inquiry, because even though the UK COVID inquiry was charged with investigating matters in Wales, we did not believe that it was going to pay sufficient regard to the decision-making processes in Wales and those devolved areas of competence. Exactly the same applies here. You've already said that you've had communications with Baroness Longfield about the local inquiries. She has replied the same to me as she has to correspondence from others in this Chamber to say that there may be further future local inquiries where the evidence leads. We already know there have been problems in Wales, so the evidence is already there, and yet we've seen at the moment no local inquiries initiated. Surely you must see the challenge in the argument that you present now versus the argument you presented when the COVID inquiry decisions were being made, because we know that there are safeguarding issues in health, in social care, in housing, in all sorts of areas of devolved competence that we need to make sure are properly examined. That's why I would urge you—really seriously urge you—just to consider the position on this, and not give an outright 'No'. Even if you say, 'We'll keep an open mind on this', I'd be grateful.
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First Minister, yesterday, while you were plotting the break-up of the United Kingdom with your friends in Sinn Féin and the Scottish National Party, there were people waiting for ambulances for too long, people in our emergency departments for too long on trolleys and not getting the treatment that they need in time, because of a lack of hospital beds around the country. Just last week, Healthcare Inspectorate Wales published a damning report into the emergency department at the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board's Glan Clwyd Hospital. It cited patients being left in corridors without food or drink or pain relief, out-of-date medicines and equipment not working, and the paediatric area being left unattended while child patients were present. So, instead of hatching plans to break apart the UK, isn't it time that you focused on your day job and showed some urgency to fix our NHS instead?
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You say that it's your No. 1 priority, and you say that you want to co-operate with others in order to improve the NHS. I looked very carefully at the declaration that you signed yesterday alongside those other nationalist leaders, and let me tell you, there was no mention of the health service. There was no mention of the national health service in any way, shape or form whatsoever. There was no mention, either, of our education system, and as has already been pointed out, it's hardly surprising, given that we've got the worst education system in the whole of the United Kingdom, and that Scotland's education system is also tumbling down the PISA scores, as is Northern Ireland’s. Why don't you co-operate on the things for which you're absolutely already responsible instead of having these pie-in-the-sky discussions, grandstanding over the constitution of the United Kingdom rather than pulling your finger out and doing the job that the people of Wales elected you to do? Let me tell you this, First Minister: the honeymoon is well and truly over. While you were sunning yourself on a beach, presumably burying your head in the sand on it, on the 100-day anniversary of your Government, people in Wales were dying in our hospitals and young people were not getting the education they need. When will they see the change rather than the continuity Labour that we've seen so far?
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Thank you, First Minister, for your statement today. I think it's absolutely right that we're discussing this on the first day back in the Senedd after what was a devastating summer for many people affected by these wildfires. I also want to put on record my thanks to those firefighters, other emergency responders, and indeed the farming community, that stepped up when they were needed to try and get to grips with the situation, which was, at one point, looking like it was getting completely out of control because of the exceptionally dry weather and wind that we were experiencing. I took a moment to have a look at the Wales resilience framework earlier on, last updated in 2025. It mentions flooding 21 times, the word 'pandemic' 17 times, but there's only one reference to wildfires, and that's in a foreword at the start of that document. So, it's quite clear that we haven't paid sufficient attention to the risk posed by wildfires in Wales in the past, neither the previous Government, nor, probably, the whole of the Senedd, if we're honest; I don't recall many debates or discussions on wildfires in the past, and, clearly, we need to focus on this issue more in the future. It's something that clearly requires an update, and I hope you'll commit to updating that resilience framework in response to me today. I'm glad that you've just registered the fact that you will. I was interested to hear your point about the test that is required to be met before you're able to request the military support to come in, because many people had a perception that the military should have been called in earlier and that there was no real explanation afforded to people because of that. You've suggested that someone has a test in place. I don't know what the thresholds are in terms of that test. You said it's where the civilian efforts can't go any further and there's a need to call in extra support. But I would just like to know a little bit more about that test, who deems whether it's been met or not, so that we can better understand and scrutinise the decision-making process. Clearly, it does seem that you acted pretty rapidly once you were told that that test had been met. But I personally would have liked to have seen the military's intervention much sooner, and I think we would have perhaps been able to get things under control much sooner. It was very alarming to hear that the capacity for air support is very limited across the United Kingdom. That's clearly something that needs to be addressed on a UK-wide basis, so that those resources can be called in very quickly where they are needed. And I'd be interested to know what discussions you've had with the UK Government about addressing that gap in the resilience infrastructure around the country, so that we can make sure that we have access to that air support—the choppers coming in and tipping the water where necessary. And if I can just refer to a few other points, if I may. Obviously, reference has been made to the way that we manage land in the countryside these days, and it seems to me that there is an increased risk as a result of allowing some of the scrub, bracken and other vegetation to build up, because that in itself then creates the fuel for wildfires. We know that, historically, farmers and other landowners have tried to manage that in a sustainable way, by creating those barriers to stop fire spreading when it starts. And I do think that we need to review land management practices. It's good to see the Cabinet Secretary here responsible for rural affairs, and I know that he understands these things, but I do think that if we managed our land in a different way, then we could perhaps help to reduce some of these risks. We've also seen, of course, a big fall in livestock numbers in Wales, and we are probably going to see a further fall in livestock numbers in Wales in the future. I don't know. But, certainly, if the previous Government's policy was being pursued, that's what we would see. Now, clearly, if animals are grazing, then there's less risk of that land being full of fuel for a wildfire to be able to spread. So, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts, First Minister, on what we can do to make sure that we protect our livestock numbers to make sure that they can help to manage these things. In addition to that, the National Farmers Union Cymru and other people working in the farming industry have called for funds to help the establishment of small reservoirs on farms, in order that there's more readily accessible water close to places that might combust. And I wonder whether that's something that you and your Government will consider. And finally, I did hear earlier on the exchange about the need for bilingual alerts to go out at the same time when national emergency alerts go out. I appreciate that it's a UK Government responsibility, but, obviously, there needs to be joined-up thinking across the UK on these matters. That did cause a lot of confusion, and I'd be grateful to know what assurances you've received from the UK Government that, in future, those alerts will go out at the same time to make sure that people have the best opportunity of being able to respond quickly. Thank you.
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Diolch, Ddirprwy Lywydd. I think anybody watching this debate in this Chamber will be thinking to themselves, 'Look, I recycle already. This issue shouldn't really affect me.' But we all know, all of us here, that it will. It'll affect every single person who buys a drink in a glass bottle; it'll affect shops, supermarkets, convenience stores, online retailers, our high streets; and it will, of course, affect those independent businesses, like breweries, cider makers, and other food and drink manufacturers. But most importantly of all, this is going to affect people's pockets, and it's going to cause them inconvenience. I want to set out right now that the Welsh Conservatives support recycling. We want to thank the people of Wales for the efforts that they make to recycle. It's something pretty extraordinary that Wales is one of the best recycling nations in the world. That's something we can be really, really proud of. So, we don't object to recycling, but we do object to Wales going its own way on this particular issue because of the confusion, because of the extra cost, because of the unnecessary complexity that this might create. Our system at the moment isn't broken: 92 per cent of glass containers are currently recycled under the current arrangements, the kerbside arrangements. And this scheme makes recycling more complicated for the consumer and the household. Let's think about this, right? At the moment, you buy some bottles of beer or milkshake, or whatever your preferred beverage might be, or a bottle of HP sauce, and you consume it, and you generally pop that bottle into something that you leave at the end of your drive or outside your front door for the council to collect, very efficiently, in large, usually, very often, electric vehicles that they then take to a local recycling waste transfer centre. Under the new scheme, we're going to expect people to think about, first of all, where they bought that bottle of sauce, where they bought their milkshake—yes, because it's not going to work otherwise on a cross-border basis. You will get this issue of fraud that people have raised. So, they'll have to think, first of all, 'Where did I buy this bottle from? Which shop? Which side of the border do I need to return it to, or can I leave it at the kerbside for collection?' And then, if they bought it from a retailer in England and it's been delivered to Wales, they won't necessarily be able to get the credit for that return if they take it to a local shop. It's absolutely bonkers. And not only that, but they then, after they've worked out where they bought their product, have to jump into their car and drive, causing potential emissions into the environment, all the way to a shop, and that shopkeeper, then, has to find somewhere to store their bottle for another vehicle to come and pick it up, when it could have been picked up by the van passing the end of their road, or the end of their drive, sent by the local council. It's inefficient, it's not necessarily going to be good for the environment. So, it's bonkers. We don't need it. We need to change the approach. We need a consistent approach across the UK. And I have to say, you must listen to the voice of these retailers, you must listen to these consumers, and you must listen because we have made mistakes before by rushing in. We all remember the 20 mph fiasco in Wales. And I will say this, and it feels like a prophetic moment, you'll see a similar backlash across Wales as a result of introducing this system, Cabinet Minister, if you don't listen. Let these words ring in your ears over the next few months, as you contemplate these matters and decide on the future of a deposit-return scheme.
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