Rebecca Evans: Huw Irranca-Davies, obviously, is right that we are many steps ahead of the UK Government in terms of the thinking that we’ve done on this issue and, of course, Huw was the original chair of that inter-ministerial group which pulled together interests from across Government to ensure that we were considering this in a very holistic way, not just, as I said previously, looking at how we...
Rebecca Evans: Funding for health and social care has always been a priority in Wales, highlighted by the additional £550 million provided in August to support recovery. We acknowledge the additional funding resulting from UK Government decisions, however the outcome of the comprehensive spending review will be the basis for our budgetary allocations.
Rebecca Evans: Well, you’ll be very aware of the work which was undertaken by the committee in the last Senedd which recommended the devolution of various aspects of the administration of the welfare and benefits system here in Wales. This is absolutely something that we can be looking at. I think we need to understand better the nature of the workforce here in Wales to understand the impacts of any...
Rebecca Evans: I think there are two things that we need to do here. The first is to address the immediate pressures that we see within the social care sector here in Wales, which are quite acute now, and you will have heard my colleague, the Minister for health, talking about the impact that has on people being discharged from hospital and so on. So, there's an immediate issue in terms of the social care...
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for raising this important issue this afternoon. I think there's a great deal to be concerned about in terms of the UK Government's approach to the future funding of health and social care, not least because the measures will disproportionately impact and burden working-age people. Most pensioners, of course, will pay nothing. And this, of course, is contrary to the principle of...
Rebecca Evans: I'm aware of the letter to which you refer and the concerns around the Rhondda issue in particular, which is why I'm reluctant to go into too much more detail in terms of a response to that particular issue this afternoon. But I will endeavour to have some discussions further with the Minister for Climate Change in terms of the points that you've raised this afternoon and those concerns that...
Rebecca Evans: Well, we've always said that we will look to devolve powers to the correct level of governance, and there are certainly areas where we could look to devolve further powers from Welsh Government to local authorities. But, again, if this is a particular area where there are ideas that come from the WLGA, in partnership with Natural Resources Wales, then I'd be interested in hearing those shared...
Rebecca Evans: Well, I think that the current relationship that councils have with Natural Resources Wales is very useful because they both have shared concerns in terms of ensuring that our environment and our approach to climate change is very much at the heart of both agendas—there are shared agendas there. But if my colleague has any particular concerns, I'd be happy to take them up with NRW or the...
Rebecca Evans: I thank the Member for those points, and I do think that they are well made in terms of the importance of giving local authorities adequate notice of funding that will be available to support various programmes. I share his enthusiasm, though, for what he saw in terms of the activities that took place this year in terms of the Summer of Fun. I think local authorities did a great job,...
Rebecca Evans: Thank you very much for raising this important issue, and it was an issue that was actually raised with me on my grand summer tour of local authorities and it's certainly something that is of significant concern to some of those authorities. And our programme for government does commit us to ensuring that we fund regional residential services to bring children with complex needs back home...
Rebecca Evans: Support for the provision of children’s services is a priority in our budget preparations. Most recently, the 2021-22 supplementary budget allocated £98.7 million to the health and social services portfolio to support children.
Rebecca Evans: Thank you for the question. The Member is absolutely right that there are some FPNs that don't have the requirement to reinvest the money in terms of the cost of the service. But traffic and parking offences sit outside that, of course, being exceptions to that rule. We did issue guidance to environmental health officers on the use of FPNs in January 2020, and that does advise then that the...
Rebecca Evans: It is for each authority to determine its policy and approach to the use of fixed-penalty notices locally. Fixed-penalty notices are a key tool in tackling a number of offences and we support their use as a response to low-level environmental and other crimes. In 2019-20, local authorities issued 11,091 FPNs in relation to local environmental protection issues.
Rebecca Evans: Decisions have been made in respect of 12 of the 22 reviews, and the Orders required to implement these decisions are currently being finalised. I will be making further decisions in the coming weeks.
Rebecca Evans: Each principal council is required to have a constitution which sets out how decisions are made and the procedures to be followed, including the circumstances where officers are able to make decisions. Failure to comply with standing orders is an internal disciplinary matter.
Rebecca Evans: I regularly discuss finance matters, including the settlement, with local government through the partnership council and its finance sub group. More information on council funding for future years will be made available when we published the draft Welsh budget in December.
Rebecca Evans: Rwyf yn cael trafodaethau rheolaidd gydag ystod o sefydliadau ac unigolion am drefniadau etholiadol. Mae’r gwaith hwn yn cynnwys adolygu’r lefelau o aelodau etholedig ledled Cymru, trefniadau pleidleisio, ffyrdd o gefnogi ymgeiswyr i sefyll mewn etholiad, a meithrin mwy o ddealltwriaeth o wleidyddiaeth a dinasyddiaeth o oedran cynnar.
Rebecca Evans: Diolch, Llywydd. I'd like to thank all colleagues for what's been a really wide-ranging debate and thank you for the representations that you've been putting forward today. I do agree that, in future years, it would be excellent for this debate to be held by the Finance Committee. Clearly, for practical reasons, it wasn't possible this year, but I'm really heartened to hear that the committee...
Rebecca Evans: It's working okay for me.
Rebecca Evans: Diolch, Llywydd. Continuing the tradition of the previous administration, I am pleased to outline the preparations for the Welsh Government's budget for 2022-23. This annual debate has become an important fixture in the Senedd calendar, providing an early opportunity to look ahead to next year's spending priorities, and, importantly, to give Members the opportunity to shape those...
