Public bodies and the civil service

Derek Walker

9 February 2026, Equality and Social Justice Committee

Annual scrutiny of the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales

Prevention, as you say, was one of our big themes and was the auditor general's big theme. We're not spending enough time on prevention, and despite always advocating for prevention and it being one of the five ways of working, it clearly wasn't leading to as much impact as we've wanted over the…

Tagged for: “auditor general”, “public bodies”Official Record

Jenny RathboneLabour

9 February 2026, Equality and Social Justice Committee

Annual scrutiny of the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales

Thank you for that. The most disturbing aspect of your report and that of the auditor general was the fact that health services hadn't really grasped the importance of prevention. I just wondered if they were some of the outliers who have yet to respond to your report—

Tagged for: “auditor general”Official Record

Derek Walker

9 February 2026, Equality and Social Justice Committee

Annual scrutiny of the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales

…that the fact that we've given so much attention as an office to food is leading to action by our public bodies to think about the long-term implications of the food system. Just in the last year, we've had three public bodies now commit to putting in place local food strategies, which was one of…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Derek Walker

9 February 2026, Equality and Social Justice Committee

Annual scrutiny of the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales

…us, what the data was telling us were the most important issues that we should be focusing on. We asked public bodies to respond to the report by the end of October, and we've had nearly all of them respond. We would expect all of them to respond, but I think we've had all but four or five now…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Jenny RathboneLabour

9 February 2026, Equality and Social Justice Committee

Annual scrutiny of the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales

Excellent. Thank you very much indeed. It's nearly 10 months since you published your five-year report, on the same day that the Auditor General for Wales also published a similar one. How well do you think you've made progress on this report in the last 10 months?

Tagged for: “Auditor General”Official Record

Mike HedgesLabour

9 February 2026, Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee

Papers to note

…been consulted by the Welsh Government as part of its work considering how the Bill will affect Welsh public bodies, and how the concerns of Welsh public bodies have been fed back to the UK Government to inform policy development. The Welsh Government also provides some additional justification for…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Rhys ab OwenIndependent

5 February 2026, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee

Group 2: Development of Tourism (Amendments 64, 65, 66, 67)

…authentic marketing. Ultimately, he believed that the current structure left Visit Wales staffed by civil servants who don't have the operational independence to push back on ministerial instruction. VisitBritain, of course, is independent from government. VisitScotland was established by the…

Tagged for: “civil servants”Official Record

Lynne NeagleLabour

4 February 2026, Children, Young People, and Education Committee

General scrutiny session with the Welsh Government - Education

…on revenue. A significant chunk of that, £4.038 million, went to provide FE colleges, sixth forms and arm's-length bodies et cetera with a pay uplift, and the balance of that the Welsh Government has retained—£4.227 million—for ALN, which is obviously a key Government priority. We were then also…

Tagged for: “arm's-length bodies”Official Record

Dominic Houlihan

4 February 2026, Public Accounts and Public Administration Committee

Scrutiny of Accounts - Welsh Government 2024-25: evidence session with Dr Andrew Goodall, Permanent Secretary - Welsh Government

I'll answer it very quickly. The public bodies unit has remained within the people and places directorate throughout. We changed line management arrangements previously, following a short internal review, and after the committee's reflections, we determined to bring it back together again in order…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Tom GiffardConservative

4 February 2026, Public Accounts and Public Administration Committee

Scrutiny of Accounts - Welsh Government 2024-25: evidence session with Dr Andrew Goodall, Permanent Secretary - Welsh Government

…if you can answer them quickly, that'd be appreciated. In June 2025, you told us you'd disbanded the public bodies unit, which we identified as being at the heart of the failings in the Welsh Government administration on public appointments. But then, in December, you said that you'd reinstated it…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Dominic Houlihan

4 February 2026, Public Accounts and Public Administration Committee

Scrutiny of Accounts - Welsh Government 2024-25: evidence session with Dr Andrew Goodall, Permanent Secretary - Welsh Government

…staff from across 23 public sector organisations across the totality of our estate, and we have more public bodies that we are looking to onboard. This is forecast this year to generate income of around about £1.8 million to help offset some of the deficit that we have across the central services…

Tagged for: “public bodies”Official Record

Dr Andrew Goodall

4 February 2026, Public Accounts and Public Administration Committee

Scrutiny of Accounts - Welsh Government 2024-25: evidence session with Dr Andrew Goodall, Permanent Secretary - Welsh Government

…within the resources that are allocated, so Welsh Ministers provide money for the operations of the civil service and we have a statutory responsibility to work within those parameters, obviously, to ensure that the wider Welsh Government budget is delivered, and we do that to the best of our…

Tagged for: “civil service”Official Record