Helen Mary Jones: Of course, on this side of the Chamber, we're very pleased indeed that the company has put its application at this point on hold, but I think it's important to emphasise that our understanding is that it's on hold, not abandoned altogether. None of us, I think, want to see this testing in Cardigan bay. Now, the First Minister says that he and his Government wholeheartedly oppose any proposals...
Helen Mary Jones: I'd also like to begin, as the Minister has done, by welcoming Angela Burns back to the Chamber. We have certainly missed her contribution here and on the Health and Social Care Committee. It's good to see you looking so well. I begin by associating myself with much of what Angela has said in her introductory remarks; there's no need for me to repeat them. But I am a little bit surprised...
Helen Mary Jones: I'm going to structure my questions as briefly as I can, Dirprwy Lywydd, because I'm aware that we've had a long afternoon already, around the five aims, the five issue, that brought Betsi Cadwaladr into special measures in the first place, and the first of those is governance and leadership. I wonder if the Minister shares my concern that, this far in, financial issues are still in such a...
Helen Mary Jones: I'd like to thank the Minister very much for his statement. It is good to see some positive progress being made, and I'm sure we'd all like to congratulate the staff who've worked really hard to deliver this. It's quite demanding what the Minister is expecting of them, and I think we can all be really pleased that there is definitely some positive progress. A few specific questions. The...
Helen Mary Jones: I wholly endorse what the Minister has said about exclusions needing to be an absolute last resort. Sadly they are sometimes necessary, and as well as children then perhaps being educated at home, in academic terms, for a short time, those children lose out on a whole range of social opportunities that are associated with being in school, and all kinds of other learning and access to sport....
Helen Mary Jones: I'm sure the Minister will agree with me that staff can suffer considerably from stress at times of service change, even if that service change will eventually deliver, potentially, improvements in their own working terms and conditions. The health committee this morning heard from the Velindre University NHS Trust who seem to have a very positive and proactive approach to managing their...
Helen Mary Jones: 6. Will the Minister make a statement regarding the provision of care services in the Hywel Dda Health Board region? OAQ53966
Helen Mary Jones: I'm grateful to the Deputy Minister for her answer. The health Minister himself will be aware of a very distressing individual case that's been brought to me from a family in my region. The gentleman had very complex care needs and an agreed package for him to be able to released from hospital to go home under continuing healthcare. The collapse of Allied Healthcare Ltd led to a situation...
Helen Mary Jones: May I express my gratitude to the Conservatives for bringing this motion forward today? This is not, as Angela Burns has said, a situation that any of us would wish to find ourselves in, and this impacts, of course, very directly on a great many of my constituents in the west of the Betsi Cadwaladr area. I'm really concerned that we get from this Minister a lot of complacency, a lot of...
Helen Mary Jones: Well, of course, I was one of those who campaigned to remain, but, when we had lost, I accepted the result. I, at the time, was working for a youth work charity and I experienced directly the distress and anger of many, many young people at the result. At that time, we worked with them, advocating acceptance, trying to deal with their emotional distress and attempting to work to influence the...
Helen Mary Jones: I will, indeed.
Helen Mary Jones: That is established academic research. Mark Reckless is quite right to say that over-30s—people between the age of 30 and the age of 75—tended to vote to leave. That very elderly group of people who had actually lived through the war as adults voted to remain—
Helen Mary Jones: —and I will happily send him the academic link.
Helen Mary Jones: It was not in that group, and I will, if he wishes—though he doesn't often want to have information that doesn't agree with his perspective—happily share it with him. So, Members here have talked a lot about democracy and they are, of course, quite right to do so. The campaign group For our Future's Sake estimate that over 92,000 young people have reached the age of majority—have...
Helen Mary Jones: I'm grateful to the Member for taking an intervention. I actually have a lot of sympathy with your point about referendums generally. It is very difficult to put complex issues that way. But in the situation that we're in at the moment, we're not in a position where Parliament can resolve this. Parliament has had three years to try and resolve it, and because of the big gaps between the...
Helen Mary Jones: I'd like to ask the Trefnydd to arrange with the health Minister to bring forward an oral statement to the Assembly on the new performance measures for eye care in Wales. The performance measures, of course, are welcome in themselves, but there are a number of issues in the Government's press release—I'm not aware that there was actually even a written statement—on which I believe this...
Helen Mary Jones: Minister, last month I raised with you the issue of frequency of services stopping at request stops like Kidwelly station. I wonder if you've had an opportunity yet to raise some of those questions with the provider. There's also an issue about, where request stops are available, how easy it is for passengers to make that request and how aware passengers are of how to do that. So, can I press...
Helen Mary Jones: I'd like to extend my thanks, as others have already said, to everybody who participated in this very important piece of work by our committee. I came, of course, to this work towards the end—I joined the committee towards the end of the process—and it has been quite a revelation to look back and read through some of the evidence in preparing for responding to the draft committee report....
Helen Mary Jones: I'd like to ask the Trefnydd for two statements. Firstly, following up on your response to Joyce Watson with regard to the situation of the community in Solfa's attempted purchase of Trecadwgan farm, I'm very interested in the points that Joyce made about the well-being of future generations Act; I think those were very well made. I wonder if it would be possible, in the context of the...
Helen Mary Jones: I'm grateful to the Minister for his statement and for the documents that he's made available to us. Our party will not be able to support the legislation as it stands, but we do appreciate some of the principles behind it, and will look through the scrutiny process to strengthen it where we can because that would of course be our preference, rather than to oppose. A brief comment to begin...
