7. Will the First Minister make a statement on European regulations relating to air pollution post-Brexit? OAQ(5)0100(FM)

It’s right to say that EU directives have driven much of our air-quality legislation and we will look at these on a case-by-case basis once we have agreed the negotiating position for withdrawal, but local air-quality management is driven by the Environment Act 1995.

Thank you, First Minister. European environmental protections must not be sacrificed. There is no doubt that we cannot afford a future UK Government to weaken these limits. While the regulations remain outside the EU, we will lose the vital enforcement that EU law provided. Air pollution and climate change are serious issues, not just for this generation, but for future generations. Following the referendum result, will the Welsh Government do all that it can to enshrine these environmental protections and ensure that these rules are enforced?

As I said earlier on, what is already transposed into Welsh law will remain in Welsh law. It’s a matter then for the Welsh Government and, of course, the Assembly to decide which laws should then remain. But, it’s worth pointing out that it’s been European incentives that have enabled the UK to clean up its act. The UK had a bad reputation, environmentally, as a source of acid rain. I grew up in Bridgend, where the River Ogmore literally ran different colours, according to what had been thrown into it upriver from some of the factories and, of course, the mines that existed upriver. So, it ran red, green, black—name any colour. It doesn’t happen now; it’s a river you can see the bottom of, now. The Taff, as we know, has a salmon run that goes up it, which would have been unthinkable 30 years ago as the river was so polluted. Much of that drive has actually come from Europe, in order to make sure that the UK caught up with the rest. What I want to make sure is that we don’t lose the drive that has existed for the past 30 years.

Both Conservative and Labour Governments have recognised the need to legislate to improve air quality by introducing measures to control and reduce pollution. Many of these measures were passed before we joined the European Union, for example, the Clean Air Acts of 1956 and 1968. Does the First Minister agree that it is inconceivable that any future UK Government will take action to reverse any current EU regulation in place to regulate air quality in Wales?

I don’t think it’s inconceivable, given what I’ve heard about fracking and opencast mining; I don’t believe it is inconceivable. The Clean Air Act came in because people were literally dropping dead in London because of toxic fogs in that city. There wasn’t much choice other than to introduce legislation at that stage. But, certainly, in the 1980s, our rivers were still—. There was a river in Yorkshire that would catch fire, if you threw a match into it; we had rivers in Wales that were hugely polluted; our beaches weren’t clean; our air quality was very, very poor. All that has improved hugely over the past 30 years, and we have been driven in that direction, actually, by the European Union; otherwise, we wouldn’t have done it ourselves. I intend to make sure that the environment the people of Wales have come to enjoy, the environment that people have come to deserve, will remain that way in the future, and will not go back to the days when I was a young lad, when the rivers were polluted, when there were tips everywhere, until they were cleared away, and people expected things would remain that way. That’s not so; we are a country now where we can be proud of our environment.

First Minister, given that the pollution created by shipping is 260 times that produced by all the world’s cars and that action is required on a global level instead of a continental one, what discussions has the First Minister had with the International Maritime Organization and others in an effort to seriously address the global air pollution problem?

The reality is, of course, that international trade is such that it means that goods will move around the world. We are hugely reliant in Wales on exports. The last thing we would want to do is to restrict our ability to export. Of course, we want to source as locally as possible, where that can be done, and our procurement strategy reflects that.