Bethan Sayed: Thank you for your statement. We in Plaid Cymru are happy to say that we are on the side of the park home owners and not the landlords in this instance. The 10 per cent commission is unfair. I don’t think there can be any other conclusion. An arbitrary 10 per cent commission fee to the landlord on top of any other fee a seller may have to pay during a process is something that we don’t...
Bethan Sayed: First Minister, as has already been mentioned, Shelter are gravely concerned about the lack of data available to monitor what is happening in Wales. I believe with many of your other programmes such as Communities First and Communities for Work, the data and the lack of data is an emerging theme for your Government. With such an important issue in the fact that we do have such strong...
Bethan Sayed: Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this afternoon’s debate. Clearly, I’m going to support Dai Lloyd’s attempts in bringing this Bill forward, which is important in terms of our heritage and history as a nation. As has been mentioned by a number of Members this afternoon, there was a thorough debate in the last Assembly, and amendments were tabled by us as a party and by...
Bethan Sayed: I’d like to say that we support this Bill and the policy intent behind it. It’s been a long-standing position of Plaid Cymru and we’re looking forward to the scrutiny process. I will say in reaction to the Conservatives that many people cannot simply afford to buy their own homes, and we always need social housing for that purpose. I wouldn’t want to seek to try and play working class...
Bethan Sayed: I’m just raising the issue with regard to Juhel Miah in my constituency, my region, again. I know that other AMs have. I’ve had communication with him this week, you see, stating that he hasn’t had any response from the First Minister. The First Minister obviously wrote to the US authorities with regard to the fact he was taken off the train to America—. Train? Plane. That would be...
Bethan Sayed: I think from hearing the questions so far they exemplify the point made by Lee Waters as to why we do need to have pre-hearings within the parliamentary structures. The UK Parliament does have that condition when they are putting forward names and I think that’s something that we should be able to do. But I didn’t hear you answer the question with regard to whether you think that that is...
Bethan Sayed: First, I think I need to say that the response of Miller Argent to this report is insulting and undermines the severity of the situation. Describing this as ‘fake news’—a report from a UN rapporteur—is frankly disgusting and is outrageous considering that the local community have been raising these concerns for some time. I’m also very concerned that Merthyr county council responded...
Bethan Sayed: I think many people have made the point quite clearly about the importance of the Family Fund, so I want to put the debate in the wider context of disability and the fact that cuts to other benefits have, of course, frequently affected disabled people in a disproportionate manner. We’ve heard about some of the higher profile Government cuts in this area, but there have been over 100 changes...
Bethan Sayed: Thank you very much for that answer. As part of your financial inclusion strategy, credit unions are required to provide outreach services and education, such as school savers clubs. But when I introduced the Financial Education and Inclusion (Wales) Bill, one of the key things we identified after consultation was the availability of these services throughout Wales. There would be some...
Bethan Sayed: One of those projects was Communities for Work, and I’ve raised this many times with you, not only here, but in committee also. So, I think that’s one example that you could, potentially, look at and get back to me on. But, with regard to the future of your anti-poverty strategies more generally, I have had it also put to me that the problem with many schemes in the past is that they...
Bethan Sayed: I appreciate what you say in relation to that, but, of course, we’ve still got many schemes that are based on current data and past data. And I’ve been speaking recently to a range of organisations, which have told me that they were unable to find data on outcomes for 29 out of 35 European social fund community funded programmes since 2007, despite funding being recently extended to 2020....
Bethan Sayed: Cabinet Secretary, last summer, the very first question I asked you was about the data collection and publishing in relation to anti-poverty schemes, which was a key recommendation of the Communities, Equality and Local Government Committee in the previous Assembly. Can you tell me what progress is being made on this, and when we can expect to see better data collection and measurement?
Bethan Sayed: I, too, would like to wish all the women in the Chamber a happy International Women’s Day. In response to previous calls to ban letting fees at the start of a tenancy, your Government has claimed that renters would end up paying more in the longer term in regard to increased rent. However, since laws surrounding agency fees have been enforced in Scotland, the charity Shelter has stated that...
Bethan Sayed: 3. Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on progress in implementing the financial inclusion action plan? OAQ(5)0123(CC)
Bethan Sayed: On the wider issue of animal cruelty, obviously, it’s widely established that cruelty to animals is considered a gateway behaviour to violence against people. Many of those perpetrators, I’m sure, as with other things, would deny their responsibility in these acts of violence, but what are you doing to consider this as part of wider animal abuse legislation? And would you support the call...
Bethan Sayed: Will the First Minister make a statement on inward investment into South Wales West?
Bethan Sayed: I don’t, actually, because we obviously put forward the agricultural wages Bill and that was challenged in the Supreme Court, and I think if you’re going to be setting the agenda, politically and principally, we need to be doing that with the trade union Bill. I would concur that the Welsh Government is doing the right thing by taking that forward, and I would have thought that, on issues...
Bethan Sayed: Llywydd, I’m pleased to be taking part in this debate, because in Plaid Cymru we have absolutely nothing to hide or be ashamed of when it comes to this important issue of supporting working people. We have consistently championed an end to exploitative and unstable zero-hours contracts, and we’ve used our votes in this Chamber to prove it. It’s ironic that UKIP has presented to this...
Bethan Sayed: Well, Cabinet Secretary, you may have talked to two Assembly Members, but I don’t think you’ve talked to all Assembly Members who represent the area and I think, with respect to democracy here in Wales, it would be good if you could include all Assembly Members who represent the Bridgend region as part of any future discussions. Look, you may say that Ford have investment in the area and...
Bethan Sayed: The majority of park home residents in Wales, as has been mentioned, are over the age of 55 and the most recent report suggests that they are, on average, 71 years old. The vast majority of these residents don’t envisage leaving or selling their homes in the foreseeable future. Will you therefore agree with me that increases in pitch fees to cover losses incurred by park owners that would...
