Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: May I make it clear to begin with that the Welsh Government condemns persecution and violence in all their forms, anywhere in the world, and we support efforts to promote reconciliation where there is discord? Now, turning to the motion before us today, I think it's important to recognise and celebrate the political, economic and cultural contribution made by people of Kurdish heritage to...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Diolch yn fawr. I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to discuss what is actually quite a complex Bill. It's quite difficult, I think—you're absolutely right—for the general public to be able to access this kind of debate. But you're absolutely right: these are important debates, and it is important that we get this right, because there are potential implications for us in the future....
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I think it's fair to say that when this Trade Bill was first introduced, we had a significant number of concerns. Some were within the scope of our legislative consent, and some were not. And as a result, we made clear in our first LCM that we would not at that time recommend legislative consent. Now, these concerns were echoed by the External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee and...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you very much. I move the motion. Thank you for the opportunity to explain further the background to this motion on legislative consent on the UK Trade Bill. The objective of the Trade Bill is to ensure that our trading relations can continue and that procurement markets remain available to us. It’s worth noting that the Bill will achieve four things. First, it will provide...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: The Welsh Government is committed to securing transparency in its relations with other Governments in the UK. We agree that providing the information noted in this agreement will assist the Assembly in its crucial role of scrutinising the work of Welsh Ministers with their counterparts across the UK. We welcome the fact that this agreement recognises and respects the need for confidential...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: So, the Welsh Government has been in the vanguard of the calls for reform, and our calls have been echoed by the committee reports, both here and in the UK Parliament. Now, we set out our position on these matters in ‘Brexit and Devolution’, which we published in the summer of 2017. ‘Brexit and Devolution’ argued for standing inter-governmental machinery capable of negotiating and...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you very much, Llywydd, and I'm pleased to confirm that the Welsh Government does support the motion and am pleased to report that we have worked very closely with the committee to develop this agreement before us. Now, before making any cormorants about the agreement itself, I want to set this in a broader context—the challenges that face us as a result of Brexit and to say, once...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. Well, this is a question that I was discussing with my officials earlier in the week. I think that part of the problem here is that the cost of putting on the Commonwealth Games for us would be huge, partly because we simply don't have the infrastructure in Wales, in Cardiff—let's be honest, that's the only place that we could hold it. We don't have the infrastructure even in...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, we're committed to building on Wales’s recent success in hosting major sporting events, and we're proactively working with partners in Wales, the UK and internationally—including numerous international sports federations and rights owners—in order to identify and pursue new opportunities for attracting major sporting events to all parts of Wales.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. I think that that relationship between the UK and US is crucial. I think we already have a huge amount in common. One of the things that I'm really keen to do is to leverage the Department of Trade and Investment much more than we do already. They have a vast network. So, whilst we have 20 different offices around the whole world, they literally have hundreds, with thousands of...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Diolch yn fawr. I will be producing a written statement on my visit in the next few days, but just to make it clear that one of the sectors that I was really targeting and looking at was the cyber security sector where we already have a great deal of expertise. One of the things, as a follow-up, that I'm very keen to do is to speak to our higher education establishments and further education...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. I'm sure that the Member will be aware that I've just returned from a successful visit to the United States where I was promoting the benefits of Wales as an inward investment destination for American companies, and I'm sure that you'll be pleased to hear that companies from the US have made about 168 investments into Wales in the past few years, and around 10 per cent of them are...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: So, I think these are slightly different markets. So, there are areas where, clearly, what we need to do is not lose the market share that we have in Europe at the moment. We have 60 per cent of our trade with the European Union, and we don't want to lose that. So, part of what we need to be doing over the next few weeks and months is to lock down that relationship, irrespective of what...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I think that's absolutely right, and I think, if we are going to make an impact globally now, we're going to have to learn to really specialise. That's the way that we're going to really make an impact globally, and I think your emphasis on digital is crucial. I think we probably need to go even more detailed—. I would like to see us specialising absolutely in cyber security, for...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, I think this is one of those old chestnuts that's been pushed by members of UKIP and other Brexiteers over the years. They want to hark back to this ideal of when Britain was great and we ruled the world and we had empires, and, actually, the world has moved on since then. What we have now is a globally interconnected world where we are totally dependent on each other. And you can see...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, since devolution, we've worked hard to develop relationships with countries around the world. Last year, as a part of the Brexit preparedness work, we opened two new offices—one in Qatar and another in Canada. We undertook 10 trade missions to non-EU countries and, of course, we maintain strong diplomatic links with non-EU consuls and embassies.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, I think it's a real tragedy that we're losing so many of our libraries around Wales and, of course, that is a consequence of the austerity that has been imposed on our country over the past 10 years. Of course, we all know that it's the non-statutory areas that are the first to be cut, and that's why libraries have really suffered in some of our local communities over the past few...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I do, but I think what's more significant and more important is for the national library to make sure that they digitalise their resources and that that is made accessible to the people of Wales. And I know that that has been a task that has been undertaken by the National Library of Wales over the past few years. There's been a huge task of work to undertake that, and that now, I think, is...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: The National Library of Wales has a new chief executive, and I'm sure that that new chief executive will be, in the next few months, setting out a programme of activities, and I do hope that a recognition of the role of women in Welsh life will be a part of that.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, I actually don't think you always need a trade agreement to be having very strong trade relationships. An example of that is the United States. So, we have more investment from the United States into Wales than any other country around the world. I'm not saying that we shouldn't trade with the United States; I'm just saying we don't necessarily think having a trade agreement is the...
