David Rowlands: Britain has a proud tradition of welcoming refugees, from the Huguenots in the seventeenth century to the Ugandan Asians in the 1970s. We should—indeed, must—maintain that tradition. The problem we have today is that the distinction between true asylum seekers and economic migrants has become blurred. This is especially true for the general public. We therefore have an unfair backlash on...
David Rowlands: Thank you. Well, I hope, First Minister, you're not going to disillusion me now, because I've just heard from Plaid Cymru that the fact that the remainers lost the referendum lies squarely on the shoulders of the First Minister.
David Rowlands: Diolch, Llywydd. Leader of the house, last Tuesday, I attended the cross-party group on human trafficking. It was gratifying to note the progress being made in combating this evil trade. Whilst we may differ on the causes of these manifestations, we all find this scourge on our society, and its attendant human misery, an abhorrent one. Leader of the house, can you assure us that your...
David Rowlands: I thank the leader of the house for that comprehensive answer. For the year 2016-17, over 10,000 adult survivors and nearly 4,000 children and young people were provided with support by domestic abuse services in Wales, which include refuge and community-based advocacy. Figures show the national domestic abuse helpline received over 28,000 calls. It is therefore extremely disturbing to...
David Rowlands: I thank the leader of the house for that answer as well. In case you were having withdrawal symptoms, leader of the house, my last question concerns digital infrastructure. So, given that there are still a number of communities, such as Llangenny village in Powys, that are not able to benefit from the Superfast Cymru digital roll-out, is the leader of the house in a position to indicate how...
David Rowlands: Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Thank you for the opportunity to have this debate about the Petitions Committee's report on two petitions concerning opencast mining. Both petitions were submitted during the previous Assembly session and have been under discussion for a considerable length of time. Therefore, I would like to begin by acknowledging the work that has been done on these issues by...
David Rowlands: The second petition to the Assembly, P-04-575, calls for all opencast mining planning applications to be called in and determined by the Welsh Government. It was submitted by the United Valleys Action Group, led by Terry Evans, and collected 180 signatures. The Petitions Committee would like to acknowledge the conscientious, determined and patient way in which both sets of petitioners have...
David Rowlands: Diolch—I'm not sure if I should be saying 'Dirprwy Dirprwy Lywydd'. Can I thank all those who’ve made contributions to the debate? There are those, obviously, who have been involved in this for some period of time—both Bethan Sayed and Lynne Neagle have been very involved in these matters. Lynne Neagle mentioned the cost of appeals and the planning inspectorate flying in the face of...
David Rowlands: For over 40 years, ever since the then Minister, Geoffrey Rippon, deliberately misled the British public by promising that British fishing grounds would remain sacrosanct if we entered what was then the Common Market, our former sovereign fishing grounds have been plundered by foreign fishing fleets. Under the common fishing policy we lost almost all control over the fishing quotas, even...
David Rowlands: We're realists in this world, David. We won't follow—[Interruption.]
David Rowlands: As far as Wales—. Yes, David, of course.
David Rowlands: Yes, and quite frankly it was because he read very carefully many of the reports, which is what most of the other MEPs did not do, and that's why he came to many of the conclusions he came to, actually. As far as Wales is concerned, it suffered disproportionately from CFP policies because most of the Welsh fleet is under 10m in size. So we only have 1 per cent of the UK fishing quota or...
David Rowlands: Well, I think that's something we would all, actually, want, Mick, but that is not at the expense of the European Union telling us exactly what we have to do, and at the expense of unlimited access to us by any number of people, which is exactly what the people of the Valleys voted against. We will not sacrifice that in order to get free access to the European Union. The proponents of the...
David Rowlands: Diolch, Llywydd. Does the Cabinet Secretary think that the failure to reduce the number of local authorities in Wales will make it more difficult to implement your economic strategy, as outlined in your document 'Prosperity for All'?
David Rowlands: I thank the Cabinet Secretary for his answer, but does he not think that the multilayered approach to economic delivery has the very real potential of becoming a bureaucratic nightmare, and that the plethora of local government exacerbates this potential?
David Rowlands: Again, I thank the Cabinet Secretary for his answer, but if we look at the organisations now charged with delivering the strong regional-based economy—city deals, Valleys initiative, the remaining enterprise zones, the North Wales Economic Ambition Board and, of course, local authorities—surely, there is considerable blurring of demarcation between all these bodies. Is the Cabinet...
David Rowlands: Will the First Minister make a statement on how pay increases for local authority employees are divided amongst the workforce?
David Rowlands: One of the most interesting factors to come out of the committee's scrutiny of enterprise zones was the disparity between them. Deeside and Cardiff enterprise zones were already well developed in their respective sectors, whilst Anglesey, Snowdonia and Ebbw Vale were effectively starting from scratch, with Port Talbot coming late to the fray. We, therefore have to be very guarded in our...
David Rowlands: I thank the Cabinet Secretary and warmly welcome the statement, which could not have been more timely given the Office of Rail and Road's latest statistical release on passenger rail service complaints. This shows complaints to Arriva Trains Wales saw a year-on-year increase of 73 per cent, but to be fair to Arriva Trains, there is no doubt that part of the problem has been the unreliability...
David Rowlands: Diolch, Llywydd. Leader of the house, as a former magistrate, I have seen first-hand the sometimes horrific consequences of domestic abuse. Could the leader of the house please outline the latest interventions being instigated by the Welsh Government to combat these crimes?
