I now call on the party leaders to question the First Minister and, first of all, the leader of the Welsh Conservatives, Andrew R.T. Davies.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, in the agreement that you reached to form the Lib-Lab coalition that we have as the Government here in Wales today, part of the Lib-Dem manifesto was taken into your programme of Government about reducing class sizes. The cost of that was some £42 million, or the estimation was £42 million. In your own manifesto, you said that the Labour Government, if elected, would be making available £100 million for education over the lifetime of the Assembly. Will this £42 million be additional money that will have to be found to be put into the education budget, or is it part of your overall commitment of £100 million?

We are proud to pledge the £100 million as a main pledge in our election manifesto. That money is earmarked for educational improvement. It’s a matter now, of course, for the Government and for the Secretary to examine how the issue of class sizes can be taken forward.

I notice you didn’t answer the question there, because I think it’s important to understand: will you be making money available over and above your own manifesto’s commitment to meet this new commitment that you’ve taken into your programme for government? It’s a perfectly legitimate question, because I would hope that, before you agreed to this, you did put it through the civil service machine, as it were, and see what the liability would be, because £42 million is not a small sum of money. So, it’s a simple answer: will there be an additional £42 million made available for the education budget to meet this commitment, or has it got to come out of your existing priorities that you’ve identified in your own budget?

No, the commitment can be met outside the £100 million pot.

So, there will be new money coming in to the education budget to meet this commitment. I think that’s the point that you were making. But your education adviser, David Reynolds, has identified that it maybe isn’t the best use of money to increase education attainment levels. But, if you are a school, a headteacher, and a governing body, to meet this requirement, would it mean that you will have to create additional classrooms, have new teachers, or will it mean just sub-dividing classes to meet the requirement that has been taken on board by your Government? I think it’s important to understand exactly how this is going to be implemented, so that governors and headteachers know that (a) the money will be coming to meet the commitment, but, secondly, they will be able to accommodate it within the existing school estates they have. Or will you be making additional capital money available for any building work that might be required?

These are issues that are being examined as we seek to move the policy forward. One of the things that we are proud of is the fact that we have built so many new schools across Wales, that we’ve refurbished so many schools across Wales and that the twenty-first century schools programme will continue. Increasingly across Wales we see more and more children, and more and more teachers, who are being taught in facilities that are appropriate to the twenty-first century, after so many years in the 1980s and 1990s of disinvestment and underinvestment in our schools.

The leader of the UKIP group, Neil Hamilton.

Thank you very much, Presiding Officer.

Bron i dair blynedd yn ôl, disgrifiodd y Prif Weinidog, David Cameron, y tagfeydd ar goridor yr M4 fel troed ar bibell wynt economi Cymru. Mae hynny, ynghyd â’r tollau ar bont Hafren, sy’n gweithredu fel rhyw fath o dreth ar swyddi a ffyniant yn ne Cymru, yn ei gwneud yn ofynnol i ni weithredu ar unwaith neu’n gyflym iawn beth bynnag, i ddatrys y ddwy broblem hon. O ganlyniad i’r cytundeb y mae Llywodraeth Cymru bellach wedi’i gyrraedd gyda Phlaid Cymru, mae’n ymddangos ein bod wedi rhoi’r ateb i broblemau’r M4 i’r naill ochr. Tybed a allai’r Prif Weinidog roi rhyw fath o amserlen efallai ar gyfer dod o hyd i ateb.

Well, I don’t agree that it’s been kicked into the long grass. There is a general recognition that there needs to be a solution to the problems around the Brynglas tunnels. The process in terms of the black route continues, but that needs a proper inquiry—that needs proper examination. I am keen that other options are examined as well, as part of that public process. I’m in favour of the transparency that that would provide.

In terms of the Severn tolls, we don’t control them. We think we should control them and, if we did control them, we’d abolish the tolls.

I fully accept the second point that the First Minister made and he will certainly have the full support of my own party in attempting to get rid of this major constriction on economic development in south Wales.

But, as regards the M4 project, my party went into the last election on the basis of supporting the blue route rather than the black route. Our view is that the black route would be better than no route and we don’t want to find ourselves in a situation, such as we’ve had for many years now in relation to the expansion of Heathrow Airport, where there’s endless talk and no action. So, it seems to me that the proposal for this further public inquiry imposition is likely to produce interminable delays so that problems will only get worse and worse and worse. So, the answer to the steel industry’s problems is partly constricted by this difficulty as well.

No, this is a legal requirement; it’s not something that we can escape without the threat of judicial review and nor would we want to escape it. It is part of the process of moving forward with a solution to the issue of the Brynglas tunnels. I don’t think it affects the steel industry in any way, shape or form, but it is right to say that, for many businesses, and, indeed, when we’ve looked at bringing major events into Cardiff, the issue is raised of congestion in the Brynglas tunnels.

The other issue, of course, is that if the tolls disappear on the Severn bridge, the natural brake on traffic that exists there would simply be piled onto the Brynglas tunnels, making the situation worse. So, there is no easy solution other than to look at ways to bypass those tunnels.

I fully accept the logic of that. I just want to say to the First Minister that we came to this place to be constructive in opposition and we want to play the kind of role that Plaid Cymru claims now to be playing in relation to the development of Government policy, and so I just want to say that in relation to the black route or the blue route, my party is prepared to enter into discussions and negotiations with the Government. As I said earlier on, we think that the black route is better than no route and so, if this is necessary to unblock the logjam, then we’re prepared to play our part in it.

I hear what the leader of UKIP has said. It’s important that the process now moves forward. It’s important that the process is as transparent as possible. It’s important that the Government obeys the law, which is why we have the process that we do. I’ve looked at this in some detail and the conclusion that I’ve drawn is that it’s difficult to see an alternative to the black route. Others take a different view, and it’s important then that the process that is followed is transparent and takes the appropriate amount of time in order for an inspector to report and give findings that are transparent for all to see.

The leader of the opposition, Leanne Wood.

Diolch, Lywydd. Well, it looks like you might be able to strike a deal with UKIP, First Minister, on the future of the black route. How very interesting. [Laughter.]

Last night, there was a TV debate about the EU referendum, and the voter registration system crashed just before the deadline of midnight. Will you join with me and others calling for an extension to the online voter registration so that we can maximise the number of people who want to participate in this referendum on what will be one of the most important questions facing the future of our country?

Can I say that I entirely agree with what the leader of the opposition has said? It’s not acceptable that people should be denied the right to vote because of a technological problem. I am in the process of writing to the Prime Minister about this, although it seems that, earlier on this afternoon, he gave an indication that the deadline would be extended. It’s important now, of course, to make sure (a) that that happens, and (b) that we understand how that can happen.

Thank you, First Minister. You’ll recall how the former ASW workers from here in Cardiff lost their pensions when their company collapsed a few years ago. It was the existence of a 1980 EU directive that was found by my colleague Adam Price, when he was a Plaid Cymru MP, which forced the Government—at the time, it was a Labour Government—to create the financial assistance scheme and the pension protection fund. While that didn’t go as far as we would have liked—it only guaranteed 90 per cent of the pension and it wasn’t index linked—would you agree with me that, given the current question marks over the future of the steelworkers’ pensions, without these vital protections from the European Union, many workers in Wales would today be worse off than they are now?

Yes, that’s correct. I think it was under article 8 of the convention that the action was taken, if I remember rightly, in court in 2007. And, yes, it is right to say that, as a result of the court’s interpretation of European law, further protection was put in place for those pensioners. It is indeed an example of how the European Union, in this one way amongst many, has protected and enhanced the rights of workers in Wales.

Diolch, First Minister. Now, a lot of the debate so far has been less about providing accurate information that people are able to make an informed choice upon, and more about scaremongering. Will you join me in condemning the dog-whistle politics from the far right that seeks to invoke racist imagery and exploit people’s fears with statements that infer that a vote to remain within the European Union will increase the risk of women getting raped?

I was astounded and appalled by that comment. I’m not surprised by it, but the leader of the opposition is absolutely right, it’s an astounding comment. It would sit very well in the 1930s, actually—the politics of the 1930s, frankly, and some of the parties that existed then. The reality is, I’m afraid, that the debate on our membership of the European referendum—and I say this: I think it’s true on both sides in London—has become overheated. It’s beginning to look like a spat between public schoolboys on both sides, and I think that ordinary people and their views are being ignored. Well, can I say, as somebody, like her, who went to a comprehensive school, who represents a former mining community, at least in part for me, and who represents ordinary working people, that I would not want to see us leave and see those people voted out of a job?