Llyr Gruffydd: Thank you, Llywydd. I am pleased to speak in this debate today, on behalf, of course, of the Finance Committee. The committee had an opportunity to meet on 27 June to discuss the Welsh Government’s first supplementary budget for this year, 2019-20. We were delighted to be able to hold that evidence session in Aberystwyth, of course. I’m also pleased that the Minister was able to join us...
Llyr Gruffydd: Thank you, Llywydd. We know that visitors bring around £70 million into the local economy in the Snowdonia area annually, but with that there are problems in terms of the images we see of people queuing on the top of Snowdon, for example. There are paths that are being eroded, the car parks are overflowing, there are problems with other infrastructure such as litter and public toilets. There...
Llyr Gruffydd: 8. When is the Counsel General expecting to receive key information from the UK Government which will allow the Welsh Government to complete its plans for Brexit? OAQ54206
Llyr Gruffydd: You don’t know, we don’t know, nobody knows. We have no idea, do we, what’s going to happen after the end of October? Is that the message that you’ve conveyed to your agricultural Minister, because she has launched a consultation, of course, on transforming support for the agricultural sector in Wales, and the consultation finishes the day before Brexit? And after that day, of course,...
Llyr Gruffydd: Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I’m very pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate, to outline the Finance Committee’s recommendations in relation to the financial implications of the Bill. We’ve made 15 recommendations, and I hope that the Llywydd, as I’m sure she will, will take all of these on board as the legislation progresses. She has, of...
Llyr Gruffydd: Will the Minister make a statement on the support available for bus services in North Wales?
Llyr Gruffydd: Thank you very much, Llywydd. May I welcome the fact that the Government is now not going to bring forward an agriculture Bill for Wales before the next election? It’s certainly something that I and Plaid Cymru have been arguing for over the past few weeks and months. I do feel that we should wait to see what the post-Brexit trading landscape looks like—that is, what access will Welsh...
Llyr Gruffydd: I'm a bit confused in relation to the environmental principles and governance legislation. It was touched on earlier. I'm rather disappointed, I think—no, I am; I am disappointed—that the Welsh Government seems reticent or unlikely to pursue distinct legislation on environmental governance for Wales. You seem to suggest that maybe you were looking to the UK Government to do it for you,...
Llyr Gruffydd: I don't share Nick Ramsay's jovial outlook, at the moment, I have to say; I think austerity is causing all sorts of problems and untold damage to individuals and communities, and the erosion of support and services to people across Wales, and, of course, there's not much prospect of change in that respect. Only in May, Paul Johnson, the Institute for Fiscal Studies director wrote in a report,...
Llyr Gruffydd: Will the First Minister make a statement on the Welsh Government's commitment to animal welfare?
Llyr Gruffydd: Minister, you will be aware, of course, that there are a number of factors currently having a negative impact on the beef sector as it currently stands, with major concerns about prices and the impact of the stockpiling that happened in the expectation that Brexit would happen earlier, and that's now hitting the market and having an impact on the viability of what's being produced here in...
Llyr Gruffydd: I think people would have expected you to have been a little more proactive than saying that you're available to have discussions if people feel those discussions are necessary. In Ireland, they've gone out of their way to find this money, so I do think that that does perhaps suggest what the Government's attitude is to the situation as it currently exists. One other area where people feel...
Llyr Gruffydd: I have to say, in response to your first comment there about the take-up of the benchmarking, the question is—well, you're blaming the farmers again, aren't you? And that's the culture of this Government: it's blame the farmers, it's point the finger at the farmers. Okay, the take-up wasn't there, but are you not reflecting as to why that was the case? Maybe it wasn't presented properly,...
Llyr Gruffydd: Well, about time, too, because the last time this Government brought forward proposals to strengthen part L building regulations, Plaid Cymru, my colleagues and I, argued fervently that the Government should be much more ambitious. Despite consulting on a 40 per cent or a 25 per cent strengthening of energy efficiency, your Government plumped for a measly 9 per cent increase. Now, we argued...
Llyr Gruffydd: Last week, two Welsh men were crowned world champions in their field. In a competition between 35 nations and 300 competitors in France, the Welshman Richard Jones from Glyndyfrdwy in Denbighshire became a world shearing champion, the first from Wales ever to have won that championship. He had to shear 20 sheep, and he did that in 15 minutes and 30 seconds, and although two other...
Llyr Gruffydd: Thank you very much, Llywydd. I move the motion, jointly tabled by me, Lynne Neagle and John Griffiths. I’m very pleased to be opening today’s debate on a new cross-cutting approach to facing a challenge that we have faced many times as Assembly Members, namely assessing the impact of the Welsh Government’s budget decisions on the people of Wales.
Llyr Gruffydd: In addition to our respective committees' scrutiny of the draft budget for 2019-20, this year the Finance Committee, the Children, Young People and Education Committee and the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee felt the time had come to combine our efforts to examine the impact of the Welsh Government’s budget decisions, focusing on equalities, children and young people....
Llyr Gruffydd: Diolch yn fawr, Dirprwy Lywydd. Can I thank all those who've taken part in this discussion? Lynne Neagle, in her contribution, reminded us that what we wanted to do was to work together as three committees to shine the spotlight on this theme, and I think that the concurrent scrutiny session that we had, the report that we published, and now this debate are certainly helping to do that. I...
Llyr Gruffydd: Well, well, Neil Hamilton—Neil Hamilton lecturing us about people lining their pockets. What next?
Llyr Gruffydd: As you can imagine, I have spent the summer travelling around the agricultural shows and I've been listening to what people have to say, and I've heard a clear message from farmers and those living in rural areas, particularly many who had voted to leave three years ago: very many of those, having seen what that means, and particularly seeing what faces them through a 'no deal' Brexit, have...
