Adam Price: The decision you're referring to is a planning decision. I was asking you simply whether you think it's right that we are saddling future generations in Wales not just with a huge massive negative legacy in terms of the environment, but whether we should actually be using our own money to give a competitive advantage to the nation next door. Now, leader of the house, can I suggest a rather...
Adam Price: I'm grateful to the Cabinet Secretary. I understand that the Cabinet Secretary's favoured means out of the current impasse would be a vote of no confidence passing and a general election following. If that general election happens, will the Labour Party be committing to offering a people's vote?
Adam Price: Will the Cabinet Secretary—?
Adam Price: Will the Member give way?
Adam Price: I'm very grateful to him. Is it his view that Wales will be better off, compared to the current position, remaining in the European Union if the Government's deal carries the day?
Adam Price: You know, I'm quite amazed by the way in which the leader of the Conservative Party is now dressing the clothes of his party up in the banners of the people, you know. This party that at almost every stage since the reform Act of the nineteenth century voted against the extension of the vote is now apparently—. They voted against the extension of suffrage to women, and indeed to adult men...
Adam Price: I'm asking for the opposite of that. I’m asking for the people to cast their judgment on a policy that was never put before them, because there wasn’t even a scintilla of information put in front of them in terms of what you’re actually proposing. And what about those 16 and 17-year-olds then that didn’t have the vote, upon whom this decision will cast a greater future, because it’s...
Adam Price: Well, look, you know, I’ve always been of the view that this should have been a two-stage process. I called, within, I think, 36 hours, for a second referendum. So, I have been consistent about this, because it always should have been a two-stage process, because it was always going to be the case that the actual realities—not the unicorns of an impossible, undeliverable Brexit of...
Adam Price: Will the Member give way?
Adam Price: I respect the seriousness with which the Member is approaching this issue, but would he not accept that the reason we're having this debate is that we want to send the message to that other Parliament, which, in a matter of days, will be voting on a series of subject-specific amendments? The amendment that will be laid down will not say 'either/or'—either a general election or a people's...
Adam Price: Thank you, Llywydd. First Minister, in the manifesto published during your leadership election campaign in 2009, ‘Time to lead’, you said quite accurately, and I quote, that we need a culture of investment not a culture of grants in terms of our economic policy. However, some days ago, you said that the economic achievement that you’re proudest of was helping to save Tata Steel in Port...
Adam Price: Nine years ago, in your manifesto you also said that child poverty continues to be a plague on too many of our communities. Do you regret, therefore, that child poverty under your tenure has increased, now affecting more than one in three children in Wales? And if so, how do you justify the fact that during your tenure as First Minister you dropped your own target for reducing child poverty...
Adam Price: Yes, but, First Minister, it's not enough, is it, to blame Westminster for all our woes? The Equality and Human Rights Commission report, recently, on poverty in Wales pointed out that poverty rates in Wales have risen faster in Wales than across the UK, and the United Nations rapporteur on poverty pointed out the measures that are being taken by the Scottish Government that could have been...
Adam Price: First Minister, I'm sure you'd be the first to agree that we haven't always seen eye to eye over the years. But, I have no doubt that at every point during the period that you have held high office you've had the interests of our country foremost in your thoughts. When you took the reins, you were just the second First Minister in our history, and that particular honour will be yours forever,...
Adam Price: During this time, closer to home, of course, at the dispatch box in this Chamber, as you've already alluded to, you've generally sustained—our Amman valley passion notwithstanding—a quiet dignity, if I may say, in your dealings with colleagues. You have overseen a very wide brief with masterly composure. I, for one, have found you a tough opponent to disrupt. Shall we just say it's hard...
Adam Price: May I wish you sincerely all the best for you and your family for the future, and thank you from the bottom of my heart, on behalf of the people of Wales, for your years of service? [Applause.]
Adam Price: Adam Price.
Adam Price: Diolch, Llywydd. First Minister, your Government announced last week that it has engaged the OECD in conducting a review of Welsh economic strategy. You've used the OECD, of course, through its PISA programme, to benchmark Wales in the educational rankings worldwide. Can you say where Wales ranks in terms of GDP per head against the other member countries of the OECD? And do you think we'd be...
Adam Price: So, in terms of the rankings, maybe I can help the First Minister. According to the World Bank, we'd be currently twenty-third in the 36 countries that are members of the OECD—that's between South Korea and Spain. So, I guess you could say we're just below the promotion zone in the second division of the world's advanced economies. Ireland, which is a similar-sized country in a similar part...
Adam Price: I look forward to hearing the First Minister making those arguments when he welcomes the Irish in opening their consulate here in June. It's also true, isn't it, that economic success feeds through to other things as well? Because, actually, what we see in Ireland is that child poverty is lower than in Wales and life expectancy is higher in the Republic of Ireland, so economic success feeds...
