Adam Price: On the wider question of the Barnett formula, could I ask the Cabinet Secretary about something that I find very curious in the Labour manifesto? It sets out the creation of a national investment bank—I absolutely support that principle—a national investment bank with £250 billion of investment, of which £10 billion is to be apportioned to Wales and the development bank that’s being...
Adam Price: Surely the leader of the house will understand that it’s absolutely the wrong thing to do to talk about a special relationship with this state. She referenced LGBT rights; she knows what would happen to me in that country. We should never be in a position of saying that we want to build—and not my words, but the First Minister’s—a special relationship with a country with this kind of...
Adam Price: Diolch, Llywydd. It’s a pleasure to rise to move the motion in the name of my colleague Rhun ap Iorwerth. It certainly is the case that we have a cloud of confusion—a kind of inchoate mess—when it comes to the policy positions of the two main parties in terms of the shape of the Brexit deal that—[Interruption.] Well, if you don’t want to listen, you can leave the Chamber. You are;...
Adam Price: We’re in Boris Johnson having-our-cake-and-eating-it territory there, I’m afraid, aren’t we? The White Paper, actually, is clear and honest about this. If you want the benefits, then there are certain things that flow from that, and unfortunately, that isn’t reflected in the rather muddy thinking from the UK Labour Party. But I want to talk about Plaid Cymru’s ideas and our...
Adam Price: Diolch, Llywydd, and I thank Members for their response to the ideas that we’ve set out, albeit in outline terms, for the reasons of brevity that have been referred to. I admire Mark Isherwood’s spirit of optimism, and indeed his global ambition, not least for Wales; though we may differ on some of the detail, I think that certainly we need to grasp new export opportunities. We are by our...
Adam Price: Leader of the house, I was wondering if you could say whether Government colleagues have indicated to you yet when we can expect the statement on the Circuit of Wales that we’ve been promised by the First Minister before the end of the month—[Interruption.] Would the honourable Member for Blaenau Gwent—? If he has anything to say, he can get up and say it—
Adam Price: Thank you, Llywydd. If the leader of the house could update us on when we can expect that announcement. And, in that context, is it possible for the Government to correct the record in relation to a number of written answers that I’ve received from the Government that, it has subsequently emerged, are inaccurate? In one instance, I asked about when the Government was informed by the auditor...
Adam Price: This is my ‘Mastermind’ specialist question, Dirprwy Lywydd, but I’ll be as brief as I can. I welcome the framework and the general principles. I recognised from my GCSE—or O-level economics, actually, let’s be honest—Adam Smith’s canons of equity and certainty there. So, two out of the four canons—not bad at all. I will just focus very briefly if I may on the tax policy work...
Adam Price: In Finland, they have no school inspection, no league tables, no tests or exams up until the age of 16, homework per child is limited to half an hour as a maximum, and they have the most successful education system in the world. That was the model that we were meant to be adopting and yet we start testing at seven and we’ve imported wholesale the overregulated, overworked, overstressed...
Adam Price: EU state aid rules are currently a reserved matter. But domestic, or UK, state aid—which is defined as any other grant or form of subsidy that doesn’t involve a distortion to trade across EU borders—is devolved. So, in removing the EU state aid framework, what’s the position of the Welsh Government? Should domestic UK state aid remain a devolved matter?
Adam Price: That’s absolute rubbish.
Adam Price: Two reports have been in Ministers’ hands for almost a year now, from Professor Kevin Morgan and others suggesting the creation of a national innovation body for Wales, similar to what the Scandinavian nations have. I understand that the suggestion being made now is that innovation should be given as a responsibility to the new tertiary education body. The risk with that is that the higher...
Adam Price: Only in Wales could the answer to the exam question ‘How we as a nation become a world leader of innovation’ be the establishment of not just a committee—not even a committee—but a sub-committee, which is what Research and Innovation Wales is in relation to this new body. Can the Cabinet Secretary confirm that this is diametrically opposed to the advice to the Government’s own...
Adam Price: Could the Cabinet Secretary update us on where we are in terms of a decision on the Circuit of Wales? The First Minister said, on 6 June, that he expected a decision to be made by the Cabinet within two weeks—therefore, by yesterday. If it hasn’t proven possible already, could he give us a date for when that Cabinet discussion will happen, and can we still expect an announcement of that...
Adam Price: I’m grateful for that answer. Could the Cabinet Secretary set out the criteria by which he will arrive at his final recommendation to the Cabinet? I understand his demand of a 50 per cent or less Government guarantee and named investor term sheets has already been met. The external due diligence they referred to has covered a wide range of areas: economic impact, fit-and-proper-person test...
Adam Price: If we could move, finally, to another major project, could the Cabinet Secretary update us on the compound semiconductor foundry and cluster project announced as part of the Cardiff city region city deal? I understand that the city region team are in negotiation with your own property team over the acquisition of the packaging and testing building on the old LG site, which has been empty...
Adam Price: Of course, following on from that point, the paving legislation in the Queen’s Speech today, which referred to the trade deals—they created an entire department, of course, for this very purpose, so the UK Government is clearly still wedded to this path. The point about the customs union is well made. It isn’t true, of course, that single market membership and trade deals are...
Adam Price: Yes, I will give way.
Adam Price: I don’t want to detain people on this point, because I think Steffan Lewis set it out very admirably. I almost feel as if I am in an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ moment here, you know, when I hear mature politicians actually refusing to accept the term that everyone else in the world uses, including European Union officials and including the Institute for Fiscal Studies. Actually, Full Fact,...
Adam Price: I’m genuinely interested in his reply. The 30 per cent income per capita gap between Wales and the rest of the UK—how much of that does he think is caused by immigration?
