, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, I thank the Member for that final point. It's often difficult to disentangle where money that comes to Wales through a budget is derived, because money arrives through one funding line and disappears through cuts in another line. In the end, Llywydd, as…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Llywydd, funding for swimming pools and leisure centres is provided to local authorities through the local government settlement. Despite the challenging financial situation, we have agreed significant additional investment for local government for the next…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, I thank the Member, of course, for her supplementary question. I think she'll find, actually, that, in the latest statistics, house completions in Wales in the last quarter were above pre-pandemic levels—[Interruption.] Well, actually, they were. No…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
I thank the Member for the question. The Welsh Government continues to make record levels of capital investment available to support house building. The industry faces significant headwinds in construction cost inflation, labour shortages and global supply…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Let me repeat something that Huw Irranca-Davies said in his supplementary questions—that independent analysis of the budget says that it will lead to the highest fall in living standards since records began. Is that what the Member means by ambition? Is that…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
One way or another, I have been involved in 23 years of UK Government budgets, and I agree with Huw Irranca-Davies—I have never seen a worse deal for Wales than we saw last week. It is absolutely unfathomable to me that a UK Government, looking at the…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
The budget provided no extra funding for health, social services or public sector pay, and offered bare-minimum additional support for people and businesses. It prioritised petrol and potholes over people and pay. The dismal decade of Tory Government ends as…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
First of all, Llywydd, I definitely agree with Gareth Davies about the rich history of the North Wales Hospital site. A former colleague of mine who worked at Bangor University, Pamela Michael, published a really excellent book looking at the care and the…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
The long-term future of this site is the responsibility of Denbighshire County Council and their appointed developer. The council, as the owner of the site, along with their contractors, are making progress with significant help from the north Wales growth…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
I think the Member will find that the report was actually published on 7 March, rather than last week. The health board, under the rules that are agreed with HIW, have four weeks in which to provide assurance to HIW that the concerning issues, and I agree…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
I thank the Member for that question, Llywydd. Significant and sustained funding by the Welsh Government supports mental health services in South Wales West, from the expansion of direct access tier 0 and tier 1 interventions to specialist services, for…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
As far as the first question is concerned, we continue to review the views of the coroner and to take advice from those who provide the Welsh Government with advice on those matters. As to long COVID, I think the evidence is still emerging. I think it's too…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, Llywydd, I think that Judge Hallett herself has repeatedly said that the reason that she wishes to conduct her inquiry in the way that she does—of which the leader of Plaid Cymru was critical in his first question—is precisely because she wants to make…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
I'm sorry, I didn't hear the question in what the leader of Plaid Cymru asked me, but I have many times set out the reasons why I believe that the answers that families here in Wales quite rightly wish to receive are best pursued through an inquiry that is…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, the leader of the opposition can sloganise as much as he likes. I've given him the facts; the facts that here in Wales, we have a far more generous childcare offer and a plan to be even more generous, which we will deliver, because we have already found…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Here's a simple answer for the leader of the opposition: we will invest £70 million in capital investment in this sector, so that it can grow and take more children into childcare. There is not a penny piece, not a single penny piece, in the Chancellor's…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
I'm quite sure that in those conversations, the leader of the opposition has been able to explain to those people that what we see is an attempt in England to catch up with services that are already available here in Wales. It's quite certainly not the other…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, I thank Russell George for those further questions. I was able to discuss recruitment in Powys with the chief executive of the Powys university health board yesterday. She said to me that Powys has only one managed practice and that there is a realistic…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Llywydd, we work with partners to retain existing workers, recruit locally and bring new clinicians to the area. While challenges remain, and are real, mid Wales continues to be an attractive place to work, live and train. The workforce of the Powys local…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, Llywydd, the record of the Welsh Government speaks for itself: over £800 million already invested in metro developments across Wales, a further £800 million invested in new train fleets across Wales—trains made here, now, in Wales. What a contrast with…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Wel, Llywydd, first of all, the Member points to what is the fundamental difficulty at the root of what we have seen with HS2, and now, indeed, maybe with the Northern Powerhouse as well: it is the arbitrary ability of the UK Treasury to make classifications…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Wow. You couldn't make it up, Llywydd, but no doubt somebody did for the Member, because she read it out for us. Look, what we've heard, even with the thinnest of material, wasn't worth the time of the Senedd. The notion that the UK Government is serious…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Well, Llywydd, I thank Rhys ab Owen for what he has said. And he will understand that I have to take care not to confuse the responsibilities I have as the Senedd Member for Cardiff West. In that capacity, I'm very familiar with all the arguments Rhys ab Owen…
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
Llywydd, the decision to delay aspects of the HS2 line was taken without reference of any sort to the Welsh Government or Transport for Wales. This further explodes the myth that this is an England-and-Wales project.
, Plenary
Questions to the First Minister
One of the ways in which constituents in the Member's constituency will get that service is when dentists in a thoroughgoing way deliver NICE guidance. The NICE requirement since 2004 is that people should never be called back twice a year for a check-up when…
