May I congratulate you, Mark Drakeford, on your recent appointment, and I look forward to working with you? Plaid Cymru and I welcome this report today. There are clear, robust recommendations made, and we congratulate Rhodri Glyn Thomas, who is a former Member of this place, on his excellent work, as well as his fellow members, on their work too.

I’m sure you would agree that bilingual, robust public services can make a huge contribution to the regeneration of the Welsh language. I think that there are three important points that we should bear in mind in this area. Strengthening the rights of service users in the public sector enhances people’s confidence in using the Welsh language, as well as strengthening their rights, of course. Allowing and strengthening Welsh-medium working as part of the daily pattern of work of Welsh speakers also enhances people’s confidence.

It’s also important to note that making the Welsh language a key skill does give an entirely practical purpose to the speaking of Welsh, to Welsh-medium education and provides a reason for learning Welsh. And I’m sure that you would agree with me that creating a Welsh labour market is extremely important in the process of regenerating the Welsh language.

Until very recently, I was a councillor on Gwynedd Council, and many of you will be aware of the enlightened policies of that particular council, and it’s no accident that some of the communities around the headquarters of that council have seen an increase in the number of Welsh speakers, which is contrary to what has happened in many other areas in Wales. Some communities have seen an increase in the number of Welsh speakers since the census. The village of Waunfawr, for example, had an increase from 73 per cent to 75 per cent in the number of Welsh speakers. Would you agree with me therefore that there are other local authorities now in Welsh-speaking heartlands that do want to move forward and further develop their policies, and that the leadership for that has to come from the Welsh Government, as the working group notes?

I do welcome the recommendations on workforce planning certainly, but there are two things that do cause concern. How can you implement the recommendations if responsibility for the Welsh language in the workforce isn’t going to sit with the National Centre for Learning Welsh in future? The likelihood is that the teaching of Welsh in the workplace will fall to another organisation. There’s a great deal of uncertainty surrounding that. So, I think it would be difficult to implement some of the recommendations in the report. And the other problem, of course, is the financial resources required. We have seen the departmental resources for the Welsh language cut. Do you therefore share my concern about the implementation of some of the recommendations in this report, albeit that they are very robust? We welcome them very much, but they now need to be implemented. Do you share my concern that it may not be possible for these to be implemented under current circumstances?