Rebecca Evans: Welsh Government issues thousands of award letters every year to a wide range of stakeholders, such as local authorities, the third sector and private sector organisations for a really wide range of purposes, and they are intended to help us drive forward our policy objectives. Monitoring our grant funding is an integral method to ensuring that those projects deliver what is intended, but it...
Rebecca Evans: Monitoring is a key part of Welsh Government's grant processes. Grant managers have flexibility to tailor monitoring requirements according to the size, value and risk of projects. Monitoring requirements are set out in the grant award letter terms and conditions, which form the legally binding agreement between Welsh Government and recipients.
Rebecca Evans: Well, I have to say that the cheque must be still in the post if we’re expecting £18 billion additional to our budget this year, because Wales is actually £1 billion worse off as a result of the UK Government’s approach to replacement EU funding. The Finance Committee has the opportunity to question UK Government Ministers tomorrow and I’m going to be paying even more interest than I...
Rebecca Evans: The UK Government’s economic and fiscal policies are responsible for the relatively poor growth of the UK economy. If the Welsh Government’s budget since 2010 had kept pace with long-run growth in the economy before 2010, it would be over £4.5 billion higher than it is.
Rebecca Evans: I absolutely agree that those family engagement officers do excellent work in terms of being that bridge between the school and the family, and, as such, in the 2022-23 budget, we'll be investing £3.84 million in increasing the number of those family engagement officers that are employed by schools. The funding has been provided to local authorities, and that, then, allows them to target...
Rebecca Evans: I think that this is another one of those areas of pressure on local government that your colleague Sam Rowlands was discussing earlier on in the session today, in the sense that their budget, like ours, is worth less than originally envisaged. The prices of food have increased by 8.7 per cent in the year to May 2022 and obviously there is still a lot of global uncertainty, and we can't be...
Rebecca Evans: I'm very grateful for the question and absolutely share the enthusiasm for this policy. I don't think it could have been a policy that could have come at a better time, really, because I know that when discussions started about this particular policy, we weren't in a place where we understood the level of the cost-of-living crisis that was before us, so it's absolutely the right policy, I...
Rebecca Evans: As a result of the co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru, we anticipate feeding nearly an additional 60,000 primary age pupils in our first year of roll-out. We will implement the scheme as quickly as possible to ensure that every primary school pupil receives a free school meal by 2024.
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for raising this issue. We've shared as much detail as we can in the regulatory impact assessment, which was published alongside the legislation. We've been keen to provide operators with the largest amount of time possible to adapt their business model to address some of their concerns. They've had at least 12 months' notice before these matters come into effect. We will be...
Rebecca Evans: Absolutely. This strand of our policy, in terms of addressing the impact that large numbers of second homes and holiday lets can have on some communities in Wales, is about doing exactly that which Ken Skates has described, and that’s creating sustainable communities where people can live year round and where, in winter, you don’t go into those villages and find that lights are off in the...
Rebecca Evans: Our changes, which form part of our three-pronged approach, will help strike the right balance between capacity within the self-catering tourism sector, and the economic benefits that brings, and supporting viable communities of local residents to live and work in these areas.
Rebecca Evans: Well, I think that your question sets out why it is so important that we have these amendments to the UK Government's Bill, both in terms of the governance of the bank—so, at the moment, it's only UK Treasury Ministers who are allowed to nominate people to those positions on the board; obviously, we would see a role for devolved Governments in this space, and I made that case clearly to the...
Rebecca Evans: This is a really important issue, and, of course, the UK Infrastructure Bank is supposed to be the successor to the European Investment Bank, but I think that, if you look at the sums available to it to invest, it really just pales compared to what we would have been able to access through the EIB. So, I would encourage the UK Government to reflect on the amount of support that's available to...
Rebecca Evans: I thought I might have been going on too long.
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for raising these issues. I'll begin with your question in relation to where might local government feel particular pressure. I've already had opportunities to meet collectively with all of the leaders of local government, including our new cohort of leaders, and I think they're very keen to stress the importance of looking at their capital settlement, because of course our capital...
Rebecca Evans: I would absolutely recognise that local government did experience real difficulties during the pandemic, both in terms of lost income and those opportunities lost in terms of making up income, and, of course, the additional pressures that they had on a range of services, which is why I think it's been well recognised that Welsh Government worked very carefully to provide support in terms of...
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for the question. As you say, we have a three-year spending outlook now as a result of the UK Government's three-year spending review, which in itself was welcome. But, one of the challenges that we've all recognised is that it was very much frontloaded into year one of the settlement. So, we had an uplift in this financial year, which we were able to pass on very well, I think, to...
Rebecca Evans: I'd certainly encourage the Picton Castle Trust in the first instance to engage with the Deputy Minister for culture in order to explore whether there are opportunities for support. As a first step, I would encourage them to write to the Deputy Minister to seek further dialogue, potentially with officials, on the matter.
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for the question. The mid Wales growth deal final deal agreement was, of course, signed by all parties in January of this year, and that does set out how the Welsh Government will work with the UK Government and the Growing Mid Wales board framework on how the deal would be delivered. And that does include those critical underpinning arrangements such as the governance, assurance,...
Rebecca Evans: Well, I am aware that women, including those with caring responsibilities, and retirees in fact, are well represented amongst operators of self-catering properties. But it's not, however, clear that such operators would be less able than other people to let their properties for more of the year, given the fact that they're operating businesses. There is very little evidence available in this...
