Mark Isherwood: Diolch. I move amendments 1, 2 and 3. As the Bevan Foundation's report 'Debt in the pandemic' states, 'Thousands of people across Wales were living in problem debt long before the pandemic.' Although 'Home working and reduced opportunities to spend due to COVID-19 restrictions have enabled some households to pay down debt....The economic impact of Covid-19 has seen the financial position of...
Mark Isherwood: The 2021 theme of the International Day of Disabled People on 3 December is 'fighting for rights in the post-COVID era', celebrating the challenges, barriers and opportunities for disabled people. As you know, I've chaired the cross-party group on disability over a number of Senedd terms, and our purpose is to address key pan-impairment disability equality issues including implementation of...
Mark Isherwood: I actually had my Pfizer booster on Sunday. But in your written statement last night, 'COVID-19 Vaccination—JCVI further advice on boosters', you stated that you have accepted the recommendations of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation in line with the other nations of the UK. What assurance can you therefore provide for the constituent who stated this morning, 'I'm trying to...
Mark Isherwood: I call for a Welsh Government statement on music education in Wales. Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of visiting Denbighshire Music Co-operative, a not-for-profit organisation providing quality music tuition in the Denbighshire and Wrexham areas, and winner of the Tech for Good award in the Social Business Wales awards 2021. The co-operative is run by teachers for the benefit of...
Mark Isherwood: How is the Welsh Government supporting music education in Wales?
Mark Isherwood: Time and again, we've heard that not enough has been done to achieve this and bring about the shift to sustainable development across public services that the Act seeks to deliver. We can all appreciate that raising awareness and understanding and changing culture take time. However, the Act was passed nearly six years ago. Although public bodies have had adequate time and the opportunity to...
Mark Isherwood: Well, I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak in this joint committee debate as Chair of the Public Accounts and Public Administration Committee. Joint committee debates are uncommon and this debate highlights the importance of the Senedd taking a collaborative, non-partisan approach to scrutinising the well-being of future generations Act 2015. This aspirational flagship legislation cuts...
Mark Isherwood: Okay. Thank you. My final question, a slight change of tack, but the latest Special Educational Needs Tribunal for Wales's annual report shows that of the 149 applications not still pending at the time of the publication, only 21 were dismissed, suggesting that the SEN system's operation was broken. Concluding my response to you in yesterday's debate on the president of the Welsh Tribunals'...
Mark Isherwood: Thank you. Three years ago, I attended the event held in Wrexham by Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service in Wales to discuss the 'Strengthening probation, building confidence' paper, under which all offender management services in Wales sit within the National Probation Service from last year. The HM Prison and Probation Service in Wales would explore options for the commissioning of...
Mark Isherwood: Diolch, Llywydd. In your 30 September written statement—update on the development of the justice system and the legal sector in Wales—you said that, although the UK Government had rejected the Thomas commission report's central recommendation regarding the devolution of justice and policing, 'a large number of other recommendations...are achievable under the current devolution...
Mark Isherwood: I was pleased to sponsor and speak at the second Sanctuary in the Senedd event with the Wales refugee coalition five years ago now, but as I said here in January 2019, integration is key to making Wales a nation of sanctuary, noting that unless we can break down barriers of understanding at home, then no matter how well we seek to integrate our new neighbours, those barriers will persist, so...
Mark Isherwood: As the president of Welsh Tribunals states, a substantial part of his report focuses upon how the Welsh tribunals have dealt with the disruption brought about by coronavirus. As the report states, tribunal members and the staff of the Welsh Tribunals unit deserve a great deal of credit for their determination to ensure that the work of the Welsh tribunals has run as smoothly as possible. The...
Mark Isherwood: Thank you.
Mark Isherwood: Perhaps I should start, given the Minister's comments, by declaring that, in my previous employment working for a building society, I worked with Tai Cymru to introduce a number of low-cost home ownership schemes in Wales. But last Friday, I visited Penmachno in Conwy with the rural futures programme funded by the National Lottery Community Fund. Whilst there, local residents showed me the...
Mark Isherwood: Diolch. Thank you very much indeed. What hope can you give to the constituents who have contacted me saying that they have had one vaccination in England and one in Wales, and, despite being passed from pillar to post for weeks, they still can't get their COVID pass because they can't show that they've had both vaccinations? And what hope can you give to the growing number of constituents who...
Mark Isherwood: I call for a debate in Welsh Government time on the Holden report. Ahead of last Thursday’s publication of this report, exposing serious and extensive problems with patient safety on the Hergest mental health unit in Bangor, a health expert involved in the appeal sent me his observations on the report and its appendix, stating, up until now, the health board was protesting that the main...
Mark Isherwood: How is the Welsh Government supporting mental health services in North Wales?
Mark Isherwood: Fortunately, the Wrexham gateway bid is going to the levelling-up fund round 2, and of course the Clwyd South bid was successful in round 1. Earlier this year I visited the site of the landslide between Newbridge and Cefn Mawr, caused by storm Christoph, with the B5605 there closed. When I wrote to the Welsh Government about this damage to key infrastructure, the Deputy Minister for Climate...
Mark Isherwood: In addition to continued cold weather payments and winter fuel payments across the UK, and to the £0.5 billion to support people into jobs announced by the UK Government last month, with £25 million of this going to the Welsh Government, the UK Government announced a new £0.5 billion household support fund for vulnerable households over the winter to be distributed by councils in England,...
Mark Isherwood: En route to decarbonisation, the global energy price crisis has highlighted the current importance of gas as back-up when the energy contribution from intermittent wind and solar energy renewables is low. This fragile system faces further challenges with most of the UK's nuclear power plants, currently supplying around 20 per cent of our electricity, to close by the end of the decade....
