Jenny Rathbone: 5. What assessment has the Welsh Government made of the risk of disruption to fresh food supplies if the UK Government fails to secure a trade deal with the EU before the end of the transition period? OQ55628
Jenny Rathbone: I'm most grateful to Guido Fawkes for revealing that the transition period planning assumptions of the UK Government—which will confirm the worst fears that I have been raising for the last several months—is that a 'no deal' on trade with the European Union would lead to a tightening of supply, an increase of demand for agri-food products, and the effect of this disruption, I quote, 'is...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much to Plaid for putting forward this debate. I think it's given us an opportunity to discuss some of the more subtle challenges of beating this pandemic. It seems to me that our arts and culture are so rich in Wales because so many of us care so much about our history, our storytelling and our music. But I want to start by thanking David Stacey, who has chaired the board of...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much. I share Janet Finch-Saunders's rant about wet wipes, which are a good example of how manufacturers simply invent something new that they think they can make money out of, and that's where extended producer responsibility comes in. So, it would be useful to know how well your conversations are going with the UK Government to try and get that sort of thing extended...
Jenny Rathbone: 3. What is the Welsh Government's strategy for expanding horticulture in Wales? OQ55695
Jenny Rathbone: Minister, you'll be aware that our food standards and our animal welfare standards, of which we are so proud, are under threat from multiple sources. I'm very concerned that a free trade agreement with the United States could lead to adulterated food from the United States flooding our shores. George Washington University has been undertaking research over the last five years on meat that is...
Jenny Rathbone: 5. What is the Welsh Government's strategy for decarbonising Wales's housing stock? OQ55702
Jenny Rathbone: Well, excellent work going on in social housing. Retrofitting existing homes is obviously a major challenge for us, as I see that 1,000 homes are to be retrofitted as part of the COVID recovery programme, but there must be hundreds of thousands of existing homes that need retrofitting to meet our zero carbon targets, as we have probably the oldest housing stock in Europe. So, I hope that our...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you, acting Presiding Officer. If men suffered from prostate in the way women suffer from endometriosis, we would not have waited this long to get this profoundly debilitating and invasive condition recognised and addressed. Now women have stopped suffering in silence, considerably more attention has been paid to endometriosis. There are now three 'endowalls' in Cardiff. I'm unable to...
Jenny Rathbone: 3. What action will be taken to prevent the UK internal market Bill from restricting the Welsh Government's efforts to transform the well-being of people in Wales? OQ55769
Jenny Rathbone: I heed the words of Baroness Ilora Finlay, a cross-party Member of the House of Lords and a very eminent clinician, that the internal market Bill would allow our country to be overrun by chlorinated chicken and other adulterated food manufactured in the United States, and that is a recipe for obesity and shortened lives. But, having been told we wouldn't get a penny less for Wales if we voted...
Jenny Rathbone: I just wanted to quickly address amendment 5, because I think it's very ambitious to want to eliminate COVID in the context of being part of the island of Britain. We're not like New Zealand, which is an island all on its own. We have a completely porous border with England, and, at the moment, we have a Government in England that is absolutely not on top of the situation. Unlike Neil...
Jenny Rathbone: The safety of the nuclear power industry is something that I am concerned about too, but I don't think that is what we are discussing here. I oppose the nuclear power industry because there is no safe method of disposal of nuclear waste, but I just want to emphasise that we are not talking about the disposal of nuclear waste, potentially, in the Cardiff sound. So, we really need to be clear...
Jenny Rathbone: I think this is an exercise in how not to write a motion, because it's so full of grandiose statements and hyperbole, but nothing about the complexity of the current situation that schools are facing, and also, I think, pre-empting the work of our colleagues on the children and young people's committee. So, as a set of proposals, it covers at least four different subjects—it's hard to know...
Jenny Rathbone: Okay.
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much for calling me. This is a very important subject and the use of words carries huge significance. In the English language, we talk about 'history' as if it was a male-dominated business. Obviously, 'herstory' is just as important, whether we're talking about the history of women's suffrage in Wales and the struggle we had to go through to get it or whether we're talking...
Jenny Rathbone: Thank you very much, Minister, for grasping the nettle, because I think it's really important for the well-being, not just of learners, but also of teachers to have some certainty about how we're going to move forward on this important matter, because otherwise the poor old teachers are absolutely agonising over how they're going to get their students through this when they may have to...
Jenny Rathbone: —a whole range of qualifications. So, I'd be grateful if you could tell us how you think universities are going to grasp this with enthusiasm, not just in Wales but in England.
Jenny Rathbone: 5. What is the Welsh Government's latest assessment of the chances of a trade deal with the EU? OQ55820
Jenny Rathbone: The election of Joe Biden makes it less likely the UK Government can count on the backing of Donald Trump for a go-it-alone strategy, but we saw in the past how difficult it was to negotiate with the United States with the failed transatlantic trade and investment partnership deal, which took over three years and was mainly around our concern that the United States wanted to be able to take...
