David Melding: Can I also thank you for the meeting you arranged last week with interested Members and NRW? It's important that we do advance in scientific and technical evidence. I think one of the things that may have assuaged the protesters would have been if we'd had an existing and more abundant tree canopy. It's a problem, then, when we do, unfortunately, have to see trees removed, either because...
David Melding: Minister, I'm sure you've probably heard the BBC Radio Wales report that indicated that firefighters were called to deal with 68 of the 123 recorded waste fires in the last few years, and that expended about 22,000 person hours to extinguish the flames, at a total cost of some £1.8 million. Mark Andrews, who leads on these matters in Wales and England for the National Fire Chiefs Council,...
David Melding: Cabinet Secretary, these boards are largely invisible, and they certainly need a sharper focus. I think they should be tasked with showing how they’re implementing the well-being of future generations Act. And the way they can do that is to actually demonstrate, perhaps in an annual report, what is changing, what services have been adapted, what services are being collaborated on in their...
David Melding: Will the Minister give way? I think you're being reassuring and really competent and diligent and thorough, but I think what I got from Lee Waters was just the pace of change. We had 10,000 years of the agricultural revolution, 200 years of the industrial revolution. This is all within a generation almost how we've been transformed by the revolution in computing, which started in the second...
David Melding: Will the First Minister make a statement on how the Welsh Government will mitigate the impact of Chinese restrictions on importing foreign waste?
David Melding: Minister, following on from Joyce Watson's question to you earlier, will the Project Helix be used to provide small and medium-sized food manufacturers with the wherewithal to change some of their processes? Because most of the examples people have talked about so far have been done by the likes of Coca-Cola, Waitrose, Wetherspoon's, Iceland, McDonald's—very large companies with the...
David Melding: 6. What was the major change in the 2018-19 budget round that was determined by the priorities set out in the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015? OAQ51613
David Melding: 8. How did the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 influence the Cabinet Secretary's budget allocations? OAQ51612
David Melding: Cabinet Secretary, I wonder if you realise that there's widespread feeling, I think, on all sides of the Assembly, that we should be more demanding of how this information is presented and therefore scrutinised and connected to the well-being goals. You'll be aware of what the future generations commissioner said to the Finance Committee—and I quote: 'Instead of feeling that the WFG...
David Melding: I also accept that it's work in progress, but I think we need to be more ambitious, really, for the future, and in doing that, send a signal to the whole public sector that this could be the breakthrough opportunity to at last see joint working and pooled budgets in operation. I've been a Member of the Assembly since 1999 and it's been a constant call that we need to multiply our effort by...
David Melding: She kept quiet about this when she was in our party.
David Melding: Says UKIP.
David Melding: Will the Member give way?
David Melding: I'm unsure whether you're arguing for the aid budget to be used in a different way or whether you want to cut the aid budget. Because your colleague sat next to you often tells us how you'd like that part of the UK's budget to be cut dramatically.
David Melding: No, we don't.
David Melding: 5. Will the First Minister make a statement on the support that is available for children and young people with additional learning needs in Wales? OAQ51687
David Melding: First Minister, you would probably have heard that Afasic Cymru, which is the charity that supports parents with children who have speech and language learning difficulties. The charity is closing its Cardiff office tomorrow and will close its north Wales office at the end of March. This is a charity that has very deep roots in south Wales, founded over 40 years ago. We'll continue to have a...
David Melding: There's much in this statement that I generally welcome. I realise that we've got a few months ahead of us before the legislation is brought into the Assembly, so I do hope the Cabinet Secretary is in listening mode. And, myself, I think extending the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds will allow us to spend more time on discussing education, particularly for the under-18s. I don't think we do...
David Melding: Cabinet Secretary, I have for many years been a member of the governing body of Meadowbank Special School, which is a school that delivers educational services for children with speech and language learning difficulties. It's been at its site in Gabalfa for over 40 years and was foremost in developing best practice in this area, not least with its parents and teachers doing so much to...
David Melding: Cabinet Secretary, such is the plentitude, if I can put it that way, of gambling opportunities that we hear today that 16 per cent of children aged 11 to 15 gambled in the past week. I do find that quite shocking. I should say that I do gamble occasionally. But we've got a real problem with gambling addiction, and now we hear from the chief medical officer that it is one of the major public...
