, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Exactly right, Joyce; that's exactly the problem that we have and that we need to be able to mitigate. So, this is the whole purpose of putting a range of schemes that are interim schemes in between the leasing scheme and the roll-out of ORP, to make sure…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, that will be a mixture, won't it, of carrots, sticks, tambourines et cetera. So, we use Rent Smart Wales to get information out to the private landlords. I meet with the Residential Landlords Association a couple of times a year, generally speaking; I…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
And, Chair, I can't resist a plug for my leasing scheme. I plug it every time I go into public, so I'll plug it again: so, we currently offer landlords in Wales, who want to give their houses over to us for at least five years, incentives, then, to bring…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, what we're going to do is, in the 'able to pay for it' sector, we're going to bring this expert group together, and we're going to have something called a housing net-zero carbon performance hub—we might have to find a slightly snappier title—but…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, at the moment, we're just starting to bring together an expert group on how to get some of the financing models for this together, and the advisory models together, so that we can tap into the resource that's out there to do that. The UK Government is…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, we're obviously looking at the Scottish model, but we want to make sure that we have that right; it'll be interesting to see how it rolls out there. There are often unintended consequences with these things, so things like: can you get professional…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
I completely agree with that, Huw. So, one of the skills that we're needing to upskill is the assessors; one of the things that we need to consider very carefully is that something that you could run as a business yourself or would the Government have to…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
I would dearly love to be able to say, 'Absolutely, let's push the button and go now', but we would be doing things that came back to bite us if we did that. And we've already—. We want to learn the lessons. So, I just want to say this: we always concentrate…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes, absolutely.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes. So, you can insulate lofts and so on—unused lofts. Lofts used as offices are way more complicated. Many of you will have had constituents who've been given spray foam insulation that hasn't worked, it's inappropriate and so on. There's a lot of bad tech…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes, absolutely. So, the First Minister was very clear that what he was saying was that we couldn't do it as an emergency. So, we can't do it now, and that's absolutely right; we absolutely cannot. We do not have any of the supply chains, equipment, the…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes, so, as I said, Joyce, it's really important for us to get the infrastructure in place as much as possible. So, we've got a range of officials, particularly in Vaughan Gething's area, actually, working on the supply chain opportunities for that, and to…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes, so we're not going to renew the marine energy plan. It was published back in 2015, I think. What we've done is roll it into the net-zero planning, effectively. It's not about how many pieces of paper you've got on the table; it's about what you can…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, part of the conversation with the Crown Estate, because we have no power, as it's not devolved and we have no power over it at all, is to encourage them as much as we can—and I can't emphasise enough that it was a good meeting with the Crown Estate—to put…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, just to be clear, they're not buying up the seas, they're actually buying up the connections on land and the port facilities and various other things that mean that you can exploit the renewable opportunities. This is obviously of great concern to the UK…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
I'm sorry, I should say, just before Jenny comes in, that that applies to marine as well as land, so we're doing them both at the same time.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes. There's no point in having the biodiversity deep dive if we're not going to do what it recommends. So, obviously, we'll go through the process of responding to it and so on, as we have with my colleague Lee, who's already conducted two deep dives on very…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, the whole point of the 30x30 is to have 30 per cent—. And as I said to Janet, and yesterday in Plenary, 30 per cent is this lovely, nice 30x30, isn't it? What does it mean? So, 30 per cent of each community council, 30 per cent of the landmass of…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
So, we've got the first iteration out now. We're just getting to grips with the issues around the Crown Estate and the UK Government. So, I've had a really good meeting with Vaughan Gething—my time sense is absolutely terrible—quite recently—[Laughter.]—last…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Minister and Deputy Minister for Climate Change - session 1
Yes, Janet, I do absolutely think that marine planning helps us achieve net zero. We put the marine plan in place back in November 2019, obviously just before COVID, which is a bit unfortunate, really, but, you know, that's happened to a lot of things that we…
, Plenary
Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Gwent Levels / Nature Recovery Exemplar Areas
Thank you very much indeed, Jayne Bryant. That's a very important point, isn't it, because we need to do a number of things. I'm very happy to look again at whether we can strengthen the enforcement abilities of the various agencies around it, but actually…
, Plenary
Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Gwent Levels / Nature Recovery Exemplar Areas
Diolch, John. I know, John, you're very enthusiastic, and I'm very grateful for your chairing of the Living Levels partnership, which has certainly helped us move it on. We absolutely do need to improve the strategic planning guidance for the areas I…
, Plenary
Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Gwent Levels / Nature Recovery Exemplar Areas
Diolch, Delyth. I share your enthusiasm for it. I haven't been lucky enough to see one of the bees yet, but I've tried a couple of times. I've certainly seen pictures and videos, but not yet in person, so I'm looking forward to that. The reason for bringing…
, Plenary
Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Gwent Levels / Nature Recovery Exemplar Areas
Well, I don't know quite where to start with that, Janet. The level of cynicism shown in your remarks has quite staggered me, frankly, even for your good self. So, I'll try and address some of the things that you raised. So, first of all, the Living Levels…
, Plenary
Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Gwent Levels / Nature Recovery Exemplar Areas
Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. I am really pleased to be able to speak today about the progress being made across one of Wales's most important protected areas, the Gwent levels. As a Government, tackling the climate and nature emergencies is very much at the heart…
