Rebecca Evans: High-quality, safe and affordable housing is the cornerstone to better health, better educational outcomes and better well-being. We know from housing need estimates that we will need an additional 7,400 homes per year for the next five years, and we are doing everything in our power to deliver the housing Wales needs. But, with new tax powers to incentivise developers to progress stalled...
Rebecca Evans: Diolch, Llywydd. We first debated the case for new taxes in 2017, beginning a national discussion about how new tax powers could provide opportunities to help us realise our ambitions for Wales. More than four years later, those opportunities are still not available to us. The Wales Act 2014 allows for the devolution of new and existing UK taxes, but gives scant detail on how that process...
Rebecca Evans: Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. It's so disheartening to hear the Welsh Conservatives state, week after week, that they think that Wales is somehow overfunded, or even sufficiently funded, and I would ask the Welsh Conservatives just to do their own research and to consider some of the facts, the figures, the responsibilities. Look at the historic underfunding of rail in Wales, for example. Ask...
Rebecca Evans: The legacy of our mining past, the benefits of which were shared across the whole of the UK, is the more than 2,100 disused coal tips across Wales. When these tips were created, the full impact of carbon emissions from coal, oil and gas in driving climate change was not yet known. Tip drainage systems were not designed to deal with the volumes of rain now predicted, and unless we address...
Rebecca Evans: Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Our climate is changing. The Met Office reported in July this year that we should expect a pattern of wetter weather, more frequent storms and heavier rainfall. There's no doubt that we are seeing destructive climate change unfold before us. The latest climate change impact assessment explains what this means for us here in Wales. It spells out, among wider impacts,...
Rebecca Evans: First of all, I'd like to begin by recognising the tremendous importance of the tourism sector to many parts of Wales. It's the absolute lifeblood of many communities and we want to be sure that we provide everybody with a warm welcome when they come to visit us in Wales, so that they want to come back, and do so year after year. I also think it's important that we see seek to have balanced...
Rebecca Evans: Yes, I agree that this is only part of the picture and that action is required urgently, because we know that there are communities in Wales really feeling the pressure in this regard. It's why we've taken some early action, such as the additional 1 per cent on the higher rate of land transaction tax, for example, but there's work going on at this point as well in terms of developing the...
Rebecca Evans: This consultation implements one of the actions set out in our three‑pronged approach to address the impact of second homes on communities in Wales. It seeks views on potential changes to local taxes, including local authorities' powers to apply council tax premiums and the criteria for defining self-catering accommodation as non-domestic property.
Rebecca Evans: Well, you're absolutely right to say that the raising of national insurance contributions does have a differential impact as compared to that which would have been achieved by raising rates of income tax, partly because of the way in which the thresholds sit. So, you start paying your national insurance contributions when you're earning at a lower threshold. And of course income tax does...
Rebecca Evans: We have committed not to take more in Welsh rates of income tax from Welsh families for at least as long as the economic impact of coronavirus lasts. All of our taxes are informed by our tax principles, which are set out in our tax policy framework and which include being clear, stable and simple and supporting delivery of Welsh Government policy objectives, and, in particular, supporting...
Rebecca Evans: I think that the situation that Mark Isherwood has described does show that there are many factors at play here in terms of people's motivations to buy properties. We've taken the deliberate decision to try and increase the higher rate of land transaction tax, because we're very interested in supporting individuals in communities to be able to buy their home to live in. That's our primary...
Rebecca Evans: Well, funding from land transaction tax already supports local authorities and others in terms of supporting our agenda for building more social homes. But I do have to say there are a couple of things that I do need to put on record. So, the additional rate at the moment stands 4 percentage points on top of the main rates for land transaction tax. So, the most recent announcement was an...
Rebecca Evans: As yet we haven't had those discussions with the UK Government, because they haven't yet responded to our letter from August seeking that urgent meeting. But I think it's fair to say that any kind of open-ended commitment by the Welsh Government to match the UK Government's offer in terms of non-domestic rates and stamp duty land tax, or land transaction tax as it is in Wales, would present a...
Rebecca Evans: Since April 2018, land transaction tax has raised over £800 million. The funds raised have been used to fund our valued public services, including investment in social housing.
Rebecca Evans: There's been no real progress since July, unfortunately. And, in frustration, in August, I wrote a joint letter with Ministers from the other devolved Governments to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury seeking an urgent meeting on free ports, and I'm very disappointed that we have yet to receive a response to that, and disappointed, really, with the general lack of engagement from the UK...
Rebecca Evans: Yes, we've been calling for multi-year settlements too, alongside local government in Wales, for many years. I think it was 2017 when we were last able to publish a budget for more than one financial year. We understand that the next one will be for three years, and absolutely it would be the intention to pass the certainty that we get on to public services here in Wales, in order to allow...
Rebecca Evans: Whilst we are willing to engage constructively with the UK Government on this issue, we still haven't received a formal proposal from the UK Government to establish a free port in Wales. Hence, in the absence of detail, we're unable to assess fully the tax implications of the policy.
Rebecca Evans: Thank you very much for raising that point and for recognising the incredible work of the Welsh public sector in terms of responding to the pandemic. You'll be familiar with the report that was published a little while back now that looked at the various footprints, in particular the regional partnership boards and the other public services boards and so forth, which are there to serve the...
Rebecca Evans: We are undertaking a full and comprehensive spending review for capital investment programmes across Wales. This will consider all costs associated with the planning of strategic and economic development and will feed into our new Wales infrastructure and investment strategy that I will publish alongside the budget in December.
Rebecca Evans: I will, and I'll inform the Member that Wales actually doesn't get more than its fair share; on a good day we get our fair share. I'm very interested that the Member seems to be opposed to the funding that Wales gets as a result of our unique social and economic position, and the negotiations that the First Minister previously did, to ensure that Wales had its fair share in terms of Barnett...
