Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much, Minister, for your statement. I note that you say that you have had assurances from the supermarkets that they will prioritise online home delivery orders to those who are shielded. I have today had two e-mails from shielded families who are not getting that service from the supermarkets and are being told that they're still waiting for a list of those who are shielded...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much. I hear the hostility there is from the opposition, but I just want to remind us all that when we did a cross-party inquiry into prisoners voting, it was notable not just for the support it attracted from prisoners, but also from prison governors, including one of the most senior governors in this country. So it's always possible to whip up hostility to prisoners voting....
Jenny Rathbone: First, I'd just like to say that this was made by a couple of asylum seekers for me. It's obviously not suitable for healthcare workers, but it's beautifully made, and it's the sort of thing that we could get, for example, our design technology students making. So, perhaps you could pass that idea on to the education Minister. A couple of questions: one is around PPE. There is clearly a...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much for your statement, Eluned. I'm particularly concerned to hear that there's so much suffering going on in Africa because of the spike in food prices, but hopefully we can help do our bit to mitigate that. Three things. One is, I had a meeting with university vice-chancellors just before Plenary, along with David Rees and others. And I was interested to hear that there is...
Jenny Rathbone: Okay. Separately, I wanted to ask you about the international discussions—the free trade discussions that are going on with the United States, because I'm somewhat alarmed that we might be rushing into an agreement with the United States that could have horrendous implications for Welsh farming and Welsh food. The way in which the US food industry has failed to manage coronavirus, which has...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much. Thank you, Jeremy, for your statement. I admire your ambition to continue to have agile government going forward, and I, obviously, hope that we will continue to have the appetite to make bold decisions for doing things differently to better meet people's needs. Just turning to the state of the economy, and the deliberations you've been having with these round-tables,...
Jenny Rathbone: I very much welcome the £500 that we've given to care workers, because they are very much in the front line of risk, looking after the most vulnerable people living in very close circumstances. I also very much welcome the mobile testing units that have been launched to enable residents and staff in care homes to get tested, to see whether they've got the virus. But I'm sure you'll...
Jenny Rathbone: So I wondered what the Government's strategy for involving a whole army of new people, including volunteers, in the mass testing campaign required to take control of the spread of COVID-19 might be.
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you so much, Minister, for emphasising the need to produce food to the highest quality and play our part in tackling climate change. Thank you also for reopening garden centres, which, obviously, safeguards the businesses of what are mainly small businesses. But I want to just remind us that whatever amateur gardeners are able to produce in the way of fruit and vegetables, it is not...
Jenny Rathbone: Just picking up on what you said earlier about dentistry, once we see the three-stage plan that the chief medical officer is going to be publishing, I hope we're going to be able to accelerate the timetable for resuming modern dentistry where we drill and fill tooth decay rather than, as at the moment, having to extract the tooth, which obviously can never be replaced. Obviously, this is very...
Jenny Rathbone: So, I wondered if you could just tell us, if we're only going to be able to make one change at a time, as recommended by the WHO and SAGE, can we really afford to only make any change at three-week periods?
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much, Minister, for your excellent statement. I'm really, really pleased that we are going to be offering all students some opportunity to be in school some of the time for at least four weeks before the August break. I absolutely agree with you that vulnerable and disadvantaged students are very unlikely to turn up at anything other than their very own local school, and so...
Jenny Rathbone: I'm very pleased to receive your statement, particularly the point you're making that the work we do in the future must be grounded on the science, and also, that people's safety must be at the forefront of every decision we take. You'll be aware of the initial findings and research flagging up the possible link between air pollution and increased levels of COVID-19 transmission, for example...
Jenny Rathbone: I'm disappointed the Welsh Government hasn't managed to find the capital needed to increase Welsh horticulture production—
Jenny Rathbone: Yes, sorry—apologies. Apologies to all. I just wanted to say that, whilst I'm disappointed that the Welsh Government hasn't found the money to increase horticulture production at this important growing season, given that food security in fruit and veg in Wales is dangerously low at 1 per cent, and we don't know what's going to happen in the future as a result of coronavirus in terms of...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. This is certainly not the time to be untying the links with the UK Government, because there's no way the Welsh Government could have afforded the coronavirus job retention fund, or indeed the self-employed fund, to which Janet Finch-Saunders has referred. So, I won't be supporting the Plaid proposals. But I think it's important that we...
Jenny Rathbone: Counsel General, you'll be aware that one of the groups most affected by the lockdown has been children, and in light of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, articles 28 and 29, I just wondered what advice you're giving on how we're going to ensure that all children are going to be able to get an education going forward in September.
Jenny Rathbone: Sticking with housing then, for the time being, that's absolutely right, and the social housing that's being built is of a much better standard than most of the private sector that's on offer. And that's why, it seems to me, that having consulted on Part L, I would urge the Government to get on with actually implementing a much higher standard of Part L so that we only have homes built to...
Jenny Rathbone: —a food system that is much more localised, so that people can buy local food from local producers and there are far fewer food miles. So, I wonder if you could tell us how we're going to do that. Thank you.
Jenny Rathbone: I'll be supporting amendment 2, because I think it more eloquently captures the task ahead of us: to make our education system more relevant to today's young people and the challenges they will have to grapple with in the troubled worlds they will inherit from us. I'm grateful to Show Racism the Red Card, not only for the work they've been doing with schools over the last decade, but also for...
