Like Andrew R.T. Davies and, indeed, Simon Thomas, in relation to the autism Bill, UKIP supports that, so there is a true cross-party consensus in this Assembly on that at least. I can’t say the same for everything else in the statement that the First Minister has made this afternoon.

As regards the devolution of taxation, personally I’m not opposed to that; there is a difference of view within UKIP on this subject, but nevertheless I personally am in favour of tax competition between jurisdictions. And we can see the important beneficial effects that that’s had in the Republic of Ireland, where they had sensible corporation tax rates and that brought about a massive move of financial services to Dublin. On the other hand, we can see what happened when the socialist Government in France decided to impose a 75 per cent income tax rate, and that’s driven a huge number of professionals to the City of London. So, whatever happens ultimately—and we regret the fact that there will be no referendum on this issue, as was promised—but whatever happens ultimately about the form of devolution of taxation in Wales, it is very important, I think, that we see this in the context of the business environment in which the people who really create the jobs in this country have to work—in the private sector. And anything which helps to make Wales a less attractive location for investment and for people to come and live and work would be very counterproductive to the interests of Wales.

Similarly, with the form of regulation—and we’ve talked in general terms about what’s going to happen as a result of Britain leaving the EU—the business environment as created by the regulations that businesses have to observe gives us another opportunity, actually, to make Wales a much more attractive place in which to invest and to work. It will be a hugely complicated task to unravel, amend and indeed to decide what to keep from 43 years of regulations and directives. Some of it is delegated legislation and a lot of it is not—regulations are, of course, a direct application, and the language of those is the language of the EU. So, a lot of that will have to change, but it does give us the opportunity to reduce the regulatory burden. And in this context, I’m disappointed to see in the statement the description of the land transaction tax as long, technical and complex. And I have to ask, considering that stamp duty in the United Kingdom raises a relatively small part of the public revenue—there is a trade-off between the complexity of legislation and the benefit to the exchequer. The tax code in the United Kingdom has doubled in size since 1997, and yet very often it’s for no very great benefit, if any benefit at all, to the public at large. The point about avoidance is that clever lawyers will always seek to find a way around tax legislation, and the more complicated it becomes the more loopholes frequently are created. I speak as a tax lawyer myself, so I’m sure that the legal and accounting profession will be rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of more legislation of this kind. But we will certainly take a constructive but critical attitude towards all legislation of that kind.

It’s only to be expected, I suppose, that there should be legislation in the field of trade unions; after all, the trade unions overwhelmingly fund the Labour Party and one does have to deliver on whatever deals may have been done. But to describe it as ‘pernicious’ I think gives the clue to what the real purpose behind this is. The trade union reforms of the 1980s, which the Labour Party I thought had accepted, actually were an immensely important part in turning Britain away from the basket case economy that we had in the 1970s to the modern go-ahead economy that we’ve had in this country for 25 or 30 years, despite problems in recent years as a result of the financial crisis. I don’t suppose that we’re going to find much agreement on the trade union legislation.

But as regards the right to buy legislation, again, that’s something that we will oppose because it doesn’t actually help people who need social housing to tie up houses for generations—very often houses lived in by people who don’t have any social need. After all, we heard that Frank Dobson, who was a member of the Labour Cabinet, lived in a council flat in St Pancras on a minute rent. If that had been freed up for real social housing, then, of course, somebody who had a real need could have had it met. Bob Crow was another one who lived in a council house all his life and gloried in the fact, yet he was paid, as a trade union general secretary, well over £100,000 a year. These are not, by any stretch of the imagination, people who need social housing. They are in fact the equivalent of bedblockers, and they are denying people who are in real social housing need the chance to have a roof over their heads. As a result of the right-to-buy legislation, millions of people in this country were given the same freedom that everybody else has had for generations, and it freed them from the tutelage of Labour-controlled authorities that wanted the political control that the ownership of housing stock would give them. So, this is a step backwards in time, and UKIP will certainly oppose that.

But there are other Bills, in the field of public health and in the case of additional learning needs, which I’m sure will command the general approval and respect of all parts of this Assembly. I can give a warm welcome to parts of this proposed legislative programme. Others we will not be quite so accommodating towards. But as I started out by saying when we first came to this Assembly, we will play a constructive part in the debates and deliberations and help to make Wales a better place to live in as a result of the legislation that we put through.