Julie James: Diolch, Llywydd. I move the motion to approve the Senedd Cymru (Representation of the People) (Amendment) Order 2021. The Order makes technical changes to the process for nominating candidates for the Senedd elections scheduled for 6 May. The changes set the deadline for nominations as 4 p.m. on 8 April, so that nominations can be processed and published in a timely fashion, and enable...
Julie James: Diolch, Llywydd. Today I am presenting to the Senedd for its approval a technical revision of the local government and police settlements for 2020-21. That is for the financial year about to end. The revised local government finance reports reflect the adjustments made in the third supplementary budget that provided for the increase in revenue support grant. As we all know, the local...
Julie James: Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. The Allocation of Housing and Homelessness (Eligibility) (Wales) Regulations 2014, or the 2014 regulations, make it possible for persons who are subject to immigration control to be able to apply for housing accommodation and for housing assistance. We have made the draft Allocation of Housing and Homelessness (Eligibility) (Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2021 to add a...
Julie James: Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm grateful to the Chair and members of the legislation and justice committee for the points that they have made, and the Chair's quite right in summarising the Welsh Government's response to those points—I have nothing further to add to those two. Both Laura and Delyth, I'm afraid, have sought to rerun the conversation that occurred in the Senedd...
Julie James: Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. I move the motions. Part 5 of the Local Government and Elections (Wales) Act 2021, which was passed by the Senedd last year, provides for the establishment through regulations of corporate joint committees. Corporate joint committees, or CJCs, will be an important tool for local government to use to support collaboration, transformation, and the longer term...
Julie James: Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm just grateful to the Chair of the LJC committee for their consideration this morning and their swift consideration of the response by the Government. I call on Members to approve the regulations.
Julie James: Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I move the motion. As Members may recall, we made emergency regulations last year to allow local government bodies to meet remotely and publish meeting documents electronically. These bodies would not otherwise have been able to meet legally or safely, or continue their business during the pandemic. Warmly welcomed by stakeholders, these regulations have...
Julie James: Thank you for that, Russell. I'm aware that my colleague, the environment Minister, has announced a moratorium on future energy-from-waste plants, or incinerators as they're colloquially known. I'm afraid, because it's not in my portfolio, I'm not aware of whether it's immediate or not. If you want to write to me asking what the status of the planning application is in the face of that...
Julie James: Yes. Thank you, Russell George. On 24 February, I published a new edition of 'Planning Policy Wales' and our first national development framework, 'Future Wales: the national plan 2040'. Taken together, they provide a comprehensive suite of up-to-date national land use planning policies for Wales.
Julie James: Yes. Thank you, Paul. I entirely agree with that. I think community land trusts are a very important part of the landscape of development of community-led housing solutions in Wales. Co-operative housing and community land trusts are pivotal in that. I really welcome the creative use by some local authorities of powers to stimulate the better use of stock in areas and utilise additional...
Julie James: Yes. Thank you very much, Paul. Affordable housing—and, more specifically, social housing—remains mine and this Government’s top priority for the whole of Wales. Our aim is to build them better, build more of them, and build them more quickly. This is recognised by our record £2 billion-worth of investment in affordable housing in this Senedd term.
Julie James: Thank you, Jack. It was a pleasure to meet with you and the community council alongside Hannah Blythyn. It was a very useful and lively conversation, I'm sure you remember, about how local people—and community councils in particular—can have their voices effectively heard in the planning process. So, I was delighted to take on board much of what they said, and I'm also very pleased to say...
Julie James: Thank you, Jack. National planning policy, 'Future Wales' and local development plans collectively create a framework to ensure that communities are able to effectively and meaningfully engage in proposals that impact on their areas. LDPs have several statutory and informal stages where communities can directly shape and influence the future of their locality.
Julie James: Well, Caroline, I'm a little bit astonished that you can make such a dismal fist of something that we're really proud of here in Wales, and I have to say that I don't agree with virtually anything you said, apart from the two sentences right there at the end. We're incredibly proud of our record of having made our 20,000 affordable homes. Of course, we were only able to up our council house...
Julie James: Yes. I absolutely agree with that, David Melding. We have been very keen to extend, for example, the Help to Buy schemes. We're very keen not only to help younger people, from my perspective, who are in their 30s and so on, just with their families, to access good-quality homes, but we're very keen to help our building industry build them in circumstances where they occasionally need...
Julie James: Thank you, Vikki. Yes, we're very proud of the juxtaposition of various Government policies. So, our Transforming Towns agenda goes alongside, of course, our social housing policy agenda, and we're very keen to make sure that we have good social housing, good, affordable housing, built close to, adjacent to, our town centres, and preferably, as you say, in derelict buildings or on derelict...
Julie James: Thank you, Vikki. We have made a record investment in affordable housing this Senedd term. The 2019-20 statistics have confirmed that, as a direct result of our investment, we will exceed our ambitious target of 20,000 affordable homes this Government term.
Julie James: I do indeed agree with Alun Davies on that point. I was very pleased in the settlement yesterday to have prioritised funding for front-line public services. The budget overall that my colleague Rebecca Evans presented just before I presented the local government settlement prioritised funding for health and local government very much in that budget, and local government in Wales indeed has...
Julie James: Yes. Welsh Government provides financial support to Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council through core unhypothecated funding, as well as by specific grants to the authority for a range of shared priorities.
Julie James: Yes, I certainly agree with some of those propositions and I agree with the thrust of them certainly. So, there are some real issues with the past performance points. I understand entirely what you're trying to achieve with that, but, of course, there's absolutely nothing to stop people setting up individual single-vehicle companies to build particular buildings and so on. You get a real...
