Mike Hedges: Thank you, First Minister. I’m convinced of the benefits of Flying Start. It stops children starting formal schooling with a developmental age substantially below their actual age. We have seen in England the PM scrapping changes to the childcare system drawn up by his predecessor. In non-homogenous areas, lower super-output areas result in missed pockets of poverty. Does the Government...
Mike Hedges: 4. Will the First Minister provide an update on Welsh Government support for Flying Start? OQ58938
Mike Hedges: I'm very pleased we received this statement today. The biodiversity crisis is at long last getting the same attention as environmental change and global warming, both of which are obviously affecting the biodiversity. Along with the Minister, I'm very pleased that the Kunming-Montreal biodiversity framework was formally adopted. This is a significant and truly positive achievement, with...
Mike Hedges: I very warmly welcome the statement. This is what levelling up looks like. This is what technological clusters and what successful economies have. It will also help stimulate the economy by attracting highly skilled jobs and create a surrounding infrastructure. The UK has no domestic supply of many radioisotopes, relying on imports from European facilities. This is an opportunity to have such...
Mike Hedges: I thank the First Minister for that response. The published rail timetable for December 2022 didn't have the 15:12 service from Llansamlet— this was added after I raised concerns under business questions. An issue I've raised previously is that First Cymru terminated the 33 bus in Frederick Place, which is 300 yd from Llansamlet station, which, in Swansea, can be a long way in the rain....
Mike Hedges: 7. Will the First Minister provide an update on Welsh Government action to improve public transport connectivity from Swansea? OQ58897
Mike Hedges: Can I thank the Minister for that response? As I mentioned yesterday in a question to the First Minister, there have been a number of high-tech successes in SA1. Also, SA1 is a further development in Swansea that combines residential, high-skilled employment and commercial activity, with development being driven by, as the Minister said, the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. And I...
Mike Hedges: 3. Will the Minister provide an update on the SA1 development in Swansea? OQ58856
Mike Hedges: It's obvious that the UK Government has not provided Wales with adequate funding to meet the current pressures. I appreciate that Welsh Ministers have had to make some very difficult decisions during the budgetary process. There was initial funding for Wales of £1.2 billion over two years in the autumn statement. Over half of this came from a decision made about a non-domestic rates policy...
Mike Hedges: Will the Welsh Government make a statement on the effect of Airbnb on the rental housing market? Whilst there are some controls—I would argue not enough—on the development of houses in multiple occupation, there are no controls on Airbnb. What analysis of the effect of Airbnb on the housing market has been made, and is the Government considering curbs on the number of Airbnbs in any area,...
Mike Hedges: On 1 December, I, alongside the First Minister, was at Veeqo's official office opening at Technium 2, following their being taken over by Amazon—a success story of bringing highly paid employment into Swansea. This happened at least in part due to the graduates being produced and the support of the local universities. What further support can the Welsh Government give to the university...
Mike Hedges: 5. What action is the Welsh Government taking to develop the Swansea economy? OQ58857
Mike Hedges: Can I also thank Mabon for giving me a minute of this debate and for what he said previously? We have, since Calder Hall in 1956, gone through a large number of nuclear-reactor types—Magnox, pressurised water reactor, advanced gas-cooled reactors, and now the generation 3 plus nuclear reactor proposed at Sizewell C. When technologies develop, costs should reduce. They should reduce rapidly....
Mike Hedges: I will be supporting this legislative proposal today, and I urge all other Members to also support it. BSL is the first language of people in the deaf community. BSL is more like Chinese than English, where there is the use of hands as descriptors, rather than spelling words. Sign language interpreters are meant to be available in both health and other Government settings, but I have heard of...
Mike Hedges: I speak Welsh every day, but, as Members here know, not very well. I also know that children in primary schools across Swansea also speak Welsh every day at school. Two questions: are we asking the right question on the census? Should we ask how often people speak Welsh?
Mike Hedges: And, in English, what is the correlation between the number of pupils attending Welsh-medium schools between the ages of three and 18 and those who are showing as being able to speak and write Welsh?
Mike Hedges: What proposals does the Welsh Government have to improve access to public services for people with sight and hearing loss?
Mike Hedges: I thank the First Minister for that response, but there is still a shortage of houses for rent and there's a serious problem with homelessness, including people who are inadequately housed. The only time that we have had, since the second world war, housing that reached the scale that we needed was between 1945 and 1979, when we had large-scale council house building across Wales. This was...
Mike Hedges: [Inaudible.] [Laughter.]
Mike Hedges: 5. Will the First Minister provide an update on the provision of social housing in Wales? OQ58811
