Mick Antoniw: Thank you for the question. Of course, while you were in Wrexham marching, I was at a conference in Cardiff talking about Senedd reform, which will obviously be something that will take up a considerable amount of my time in the not too distant future. I think the point that the Member makes in terms of the future of Wales—. One of the reasons for setting up an independent commission is...
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for your question. Decisions on the constitutional future of Wales are a matter for the people of Wales to determine through this democratically elected Senedd. We established the Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales to engage with the Welsh public and consider options for future Wales governance.
Mick Antoniw: Well, listen, I agree with all the points that you've made. And I'd make this point as well: much of the legislation that has come into place, which is to do with facility time, is legislation that is agreed to be sound and purposeful across political parties. There have been many Conservative spokespersons who've recongised the importance of that. And if you think about it with an employer,...
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for the question, and part of it I certainly agree with. The legislation that we passed—the Trade Union (Wales) Act 2017—of course went through all the correct processes in this Chamber. And of course, once legislation is passed here, it has to be endorsed, or there is a time period within which the UK Government can challenge its competence. Now, the UK Government, we had a...
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for the question. The UK Government’s announcement of its intention to repeal the Trade Union (Wales) Act 2017 is yet another example of its contempt for the devolution settlement, its disrespect for this democratically elected Senedd, and its flagrant disregard for the rights of workers in Wales.
Mick Antoniw: Well, thank you for that very pejorative question, and I will give a perhaps less pejorative answer to it. The points you make about Brexit, I don't think there's any real dispute for fair-minded, fair-thinking people that Brexit has not been good for Wales, it has not been good for the United Kingdom, and it has not been good for Europe. The constitutional question is how do we actually...
Mick Antoniw: Well, the first thing, many of those changes are dependent on a change in Government. I suppose I can say that that is looking increasingly likely day by day, and I look forward to working with the next Labour Government sooner rather than later—perhaps imminently, I might even say—to actually talk about constitutional reform. As far as the leader of the Labour Party is concerned, well,...
Mick Antoniw: Of course, I met recently with the Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg in order to talk about the issue of retained EU law, which I think your question was beginning to identify. And of course, the Minister for Brexit opportunities, and if a book were written about that, it would be certainly a very short book indeed—. A number of the points that you raised, I think, really relate to other portfolios,...
Mick Antoniw: Well, the first bit of advice I'd give is to maintain the importance of international law and the rule of law. The second bit of advice I'd give is to oppose and not to support any bits of legislation that undermine those principles, one of them would be to, obviously, oppose the direction of the bill of rights, which, in fact, is transferring legal rights to citizens from UK courts to the...
Mick Antoniw: Well, thank you for the question. You do raise a very serious and a very important point, and again I'd say very constructively. We dealt with some of the issues arising from the reform of tribunals in, of course, our 'Delivering Justice for Wales' paper. Consideration is being given now to what the structure of a tribunals Bill might look like, what the legislation might look like, how we...
Mick Antoniw: Well, I can help the Member by saying that a referendum for independence is a matter that is clearly important to the Scottish Government and was raised by them during the last Scottish Parliament elections. The reference by the Lord Advocate was served on me as a fellow law officer on 28 June 2022. The Supreme Court issued an order on 29 June, providing details of when the law officers...
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for the question. None.
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for those supplementary points and question. Our view is that the whole justice system, and legal aid in particular, has been chronically underfunded for some time, and Wales is suffering, in fact, disproportionately. We have had, of course, the Bellamy review. I met with Lord Bellamy, and we discussed the improvements that he is proposing in respect of criminal legal aid. Some...
Mick Antoniw: Thank you for the question. Court closures in Wales, restrictions on sitting days, a dwindling supply of barristers willing to enter or remain working in a chronically underfunded profession, together with court backlogs, all contribute to making the criminal justice system perilously close to not being able to function effectively at all.
Mick Antoniw: The Welsh Government is committed to tackling rural crime and last year appointed the first all-Wales wildlife and rural crime co-ordinator to underline this commitment. The Welsh Government works very closely with the co-ordinator and with police services in Wales on all aspects of rural crime.
Mick Antoniw: I raised our concerns about the closure of Cardiff’s Support Through Court office with the new Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, Lord Bellamy, in June and highlighted that the closure of services that support litigants in person would undermine access to justice in Wales.
Mick Antoniw: The Foreign Secretary, the Rt Hon Liz Truss MP, introduced the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill in the House of Commons on 13 June, without any prior meaningful engagement by the UK Government with the Welsh Government. We are giving the Bill due consideration to understand the implications for Wales.
Mick Antoniw: Can I thank the Member for those very supportive comments? I certainly agree with all those comments about the excitement. In fact, I could see the excitement rippling through the Chamber as I stood up to speak and Members exited the room. It's in the very nature of some of these legislative processes that they in themselves do not create a natural excitement, but what they do is create a...
Mick Antoniw: I thank the Member for those comments, and I look forward to working with all Members, and particularly with the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee who will be scrutinising this particular piece of legislation. Of course, it will not have gone unnoticed that this is not a piece of legislation that is sort of amended in the normal way. That is, the main work will be for the...
Mick Antoniw: The consolidation brings in a number of pieces of legislation that go back well before devolution, but as you'll see from section 1 of the Bill, which provides an overview, it sets out, really, what the legislation contains, but also what the objective and what the purpose of the consolidation is and how that will operate. So, the Standing Orders that we work to allow us to restate the law;...
