Mark Isherwood: The results of the UK-based 2015 PROUD study, evaluating the effectiveness of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, amongst a high-risk group of gay and bisexual men, showed that daily use reduced the number of HIV infections by 86 per cent in this group, and that, when taken properly, the effectiveness was nearly 100 per cent. Noting that, how do you respond, given your comment about your...
Mark Isherwood: Four days ago I joined the Assembly outreach service on a visit to the youth pod in Holyhead, which I commend to you. I promised young people there who are trained as peer educators for Project Lydia—a young people’s sex and relationship education project—that I would raise their concerns here. They gave me a copy of the project co-ordinator’s end-of-year report, to April 2017,...
Mark Isherwood: Can I call for a single statement, a statement from the Cabinet Secretary for health, on vaginal mesh implants? The Minister will be aware that during the Easter recess this matter was covered extensively in the UK and Welsh press, after it was announced that 800 women across the UK were suing the NHS, stating that these had caused them pain and suffering. I was contacted by a constituent in...
Mark Isherwood: It’s many years since I first discussed the need for a Bangor medical school with its previous vice-chancellor, and I have continued to have those discussions since. It’s three years since the North Wales Local Medical Committee warned, at a meeting in the Assembly, that general practice in north Wales was, in their words, facing crisis, unable to fill vacancies, with GPs considering...
Mark Isherwood: Diolch, Llywydd. Strength-based development is about helping people and communities identify the strengths they already have in order to tackle the root problems preventing them from reaching their potential. Applying this approach, the co-pro revolutionaries in the Co-production Network for Wales are adopting international best practice, working for an approach that enables people and...
Mark Isherwood: Strength-based development is about helping people in—[Interruption.]
Mark Isherwood: Eagle House, yes. Thank you. I would emphasise that they’re a company, but they’re non-profit and are a community interest organisation. My final question relates to the National Citizen Service operating in England and Northern Ireland, benefiting the personal development of young people, their life experiences and the strengths that employers look for in young people. Three hundred...
Mark Isherwood: Okay. Well, one of the local organisations I’ve referred to you, which is delivering an internationally developed, world-class service, is the Eagle House Youth Development Community Interest Company, working in Snowdonia, based on Anglesey, and their young achievers programme, helping to tackle offending by supporting young people upfront. They’ve run two successful contracts with job...
Mark Isherwood: Diolch, Llywydd. I previously highlighted to you the Young Foundation’s ‘Valuing Places’ report, funded by Welsh Government, and based on research in three areas, including your own home town, and they said that establishing local networks should be a priority. In your foreword to the Welsh Government’s information advice action plan, you say that strong and well-integrated advice...
Mark Isherwood: I’ll just declare that close family members have received local authority funded adaptations to their homes, and it’s enabled independent living and it’s actually reduced costs on statutory services. In the context of the budget cuts to equipment for deaf people made by some local authorities, and some even indicating they’re moving away from funding equipment despite the fact it does...
Mark Isherwood: Thank you for that. It takes me back to a decade when we were convincing your previous colleagues in Welsh Government that a fuel poverty strategy includes energy efficiency but is a social justice issue. Age Cymru have said that many of the mechanisms and measures combined within the Welsh Government’s 2010 fuel poverty strategy are out of date and no longer applicable, saying that the...
Mark Isherwood: 3. How is the Welsh Government helping people in fuel poverty in North Wales? OAQ(5)0124(ERA)
Mark Isherwood: How is the Welsh Government supporting armed forces veterans in Wales?
Mark Isherwood: Diolch. Thank you. You might recall that in the last Assembly I brought forward a private Bill proposing a community care (direct payments) (Wales) Bill. The then Minister, your predecessor, Gwenda Thomas, said that, if I withdrew it, she would work with me, because there was much common ground. And reference to, for instance, the co-operative care she referred to, came from my Bill, which,...
Mark Isherwood: Will the First Minister give way?
Mark Isherwood: I do acknowledge your White Paper was before, but it was only one week before, and I suspect theirs was at more than final drafting stage by then. But, in terms of the border, that matter is addressed in the UK Government documents, and it’s also been acknowledged in the response from the European Council. So, whilst recognising the need for the border around the rest of the UK to be...
Mark Isherwood: No, I’m sorry. [Continues.]—wins if everyone ends up weaker from this process. So, let us condemn and reject any single-issue bandwagon-jumping enemy within who seeks to undermine the development of a new relationship with the EU in order to weaken and divide our islands and destroy our United Kingdom, whether they’re in Scotland or whether they’re simply mimicking their heroes from...
Mark Isherwood: Yes, of course.
Mark Isherwood: Unfortunately, the timing of the Welsh Government’s White Paper came after events, as you were following rather than leading. As I said in 7 February debate on this, although their White Paper ‘calls for full and unfettered access to the EU single market, and although EU rules make this impossible after border control is restored to the UK, this is not inconsistent with the UK...
Mark Isherwood: Last Wednesday, the Prime Minister formally notified the European Council of the United Kingdom’s intention to withdraw from the European Union. As her letter began, the decision of the people of the United Kingdom to leave the EU ‘was no rejection of the values we share as fellow Europeans.... the United Kingdom wants the European Union to succeed and prosper…. We are leaving the...
