We now move to questions from party spokespeople, and first of all this week the Welsh Conservative spokesperson, Mark Isherwood.

Diolch, Lywydd. In support of the ‘Let’s Keep on Supporting People’ campaign for 2017-18, which is now gathering speed, I visited a number of projects during the summer. In one, a recovering alcoholic told me that their Supporting People programme essentially saved their life: ‘with their support past and present I have the chance of a much better life’. The second—I won’t refer to any more—said: ‘it was on 12 March of this year I had my last drink. I was so consumed by negative thoughts, ill health and the desire to end everything, I was nothing but a strain on society, a drain on the NHS, police, doctors, nurses, psychiatrists, support workers in mental health, family friends and God knows what else. All these people and resources taken up by my alcoholic state. The cost of all this: incomprehensible. All this involvement and treatment now has given me an opportunity at life once again’.

Do you recognise, as I’m sure you do, that these projects save money for statutory services, and will you be making representations accordingly as we move towards the draft budget for next year?

Yes.

Thank you. You’ll be aware, alongside that, there are two other correlating budgets, particularly the homelessness prevention budget, which was cut by 8 per cent in the current year. A coalition of providers—Shelter Cymru, Llamau, GISDA, Digartref Ynys Môn and Dewis—have made the point that reducing the budget that supports key preventative services, which are integral to the outcome and success of services and provision supported by the other budgets—cutting this is self-defeating. They’re calling on the Welsh Government to protect the homelessness prevention grant, saying that it’s provided a platform for other sources of funds to be deployed into prevention work, that it saves money and that working with Supporting People ensures that as many people as possible are given support early on. How do you respond to that call alongside Supporting People?

I’m very grateful for the Member’s question. I don’t doubt his integrity in raising this with me today, but what I will tell the Member is that our investments have to be strategically managed on the basis of our reducing budgets year on year. What we have to do, and what we’ve done in Wales, is protect the Supporting People budget, whereas is England, under the UK administration, the Supporting People budget has disappeared. We’re very keen that we want to maintain that. I can’t guarantee that it’ll be at the same level, but I can tell you—and the Member raised this specifically on that question around homelessness—we have taken a very different approach here in Wales. The 63 per cent reduction in homelessness figures reported here in Wales is a significant drop for supporting of services. It’s a programme that is now being considered by the UK Government. In Wales, we should be celebrating the prevent work that we are doing. I do recognise the importance of funding to organisations; but can I guarantee that at this points in time? No, I can’t.

My question was, rather, what representations you would be making. Clearly, I appreciate how the budget round works and was not seeking to score party-political points. I fully supported the protection of that budget last year and I will continue to do so into the future, not just because of homelessness, but because of the related impact of early intervention on substance misuse, on domestic abuse and so many other things that lead to costly pressure on statutory services. I hope you will recognise that this is a way to save money and a way to cut budgets by holistic thinking within Welsh Government.

The final leg on the stool for this, alongside those two programmes, is the housing transition fund—supporting people on the edge of society, reducing demand on accident and emergency, encouraging people into employment, helping people reunite with their children and much more. Cymorth Cymru have made the point that—falling to £3 million, I believe, this year, from £5 million last year—that is due to end at the end of this year. But if this could be incorporated into Supporting People, the £130 million, which would be the combined amount, would enable us even further to tackle and prevent and intervene and reduce the costs of the statutory sector as part of a tight budget settlement. How do you respond to that?

I’m under no illusion about how positive the funding stream for Supporting People is and it has a great impact in delivering services in a ‘prevent’ method. My Cabinet colleagues recognise that too and that’s why we have done our best under the previous Minister also to protect as much Supporting People budget as possible. But we cannot continue in the same guise. We’re in a very different space in terms of our financial settlement. We have to have bold, respectful conversations with organisations that deliver services on how they can deliver them better.

UKIP spokesperson—Michelle Brown.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. I’m just going to cut straight to the questions. What is the Welsh Government doing to identify and protect girls at risk of female genital mutilation and what resources have been provided to the NHS, social services and schools to support those measures?

I thank the Member for her question. We legislated in Wales around violence against women and sexual exploitation. We have a programme working with the NHS regarding FGM—and other third sector organisations. It is a priority of my department to make sure that the safety of our communities and individuals should be maintained and I will continue to do so.

Many people from communities where FGM is or has been practised are working hard to prevent FGM in Wales and help its victims. What support is the Welsh Government giving to charities involved in this vital work?

I don’t have any figures for the Member today, but I will write to the Member in terms of further detail. As I said earlier on, this is a very complex area in terms of what is believed to be socially acceptable in some of these circles. It is clearly not. We don’t believe that is the case. And we are working with third sector organisations—sorry, the public sector, like the NHS, and also the police in regard to convictions of individuals who pursue this.

Cultural practices are transmitted down the generations, and FGM in particular is inflicted on girl children by adults, ultimately for the benefit of men in the patriarchal culture. What are you doing to challenge the cultural values that give rise to FGM, particularly amongst males belonging to cultures where FGM is practised?

We have a faith forum, which I chair, alongside the First Minister. We work on the ability to help cultures change from within, rather than them being told what people should be doing. We have to work with sympathetic organisations that can work and operate in that culture or faith. We are having some success, but there’s an awful lot more work to be done in this field.

The Plaid Cymru spokesperson, Bethan Jenkins.

Cabinet Secretary, the last time we had these questions was before the referendum on the EU, and many Members commented on how many anti-poverty schemes are funded by the EU. So, now we’re of course aware that those who campaigned to leave the EU, including some members of the Labour Party, like Gisela Stuart, made a promise that every penny received from the EU would be maintained. But what contingency plans have you made, with your officials, should some of these anti-poverty schemes not be safeguarded?

It’s a very important question the Member raises, and the First Minister has been very clear, in terms of negotiations with the UK Government, on how and when we expect to see funding coming forward. To date, we haven’t had much indication, or much luck on that indication, but he is pressing the UK very hard. We have done some assessments on impacts of Brexit, particularly around the skills, jobs and growth area, which we are particularly concerned about, but what we cannot promise is to mitigate the significant amounts of money that come from Europe through to Wales—that we can backfill that very easily. We have to prioritise our programmes in the future. We are still doing some work on that.

Thank you for your response. There’s been a great deal of concern/interest from much of the political establishment that many of the areas that benefitted the most from European money voted to leave. But in spite of all that funding going to the Valleys, poverty, poor housing and insecure employment remain a fact of life for many people living there. So, this vote could therefore be seen as a verdict of how the Welsh Government has administered billions of pounds of EU money, rather than the institution itself. Do you accept, therefore, that tackling poverty isn’t just about the number you put after the pound sign on the press release, but about how you spend existing budgets, and that if you aren’t giving communities what they really need, or aren’t consulting effectively with them, then warning them that the money is at risk may be seen as a bit of an empty threat to those types of people?

I think the Member raises a very interesting point. And the Member will be aware of her colleagues in Government too promoting and spending some of the European funding across Wales in many years previously.

The issue for me, which is the important point I think the Member was getting to, was the issue around that we shouldn’t scare people about what’s going to happen—we should be offering them hope and opportunity. And what I’m trying to do within this department, around two themes where I’m pushing very hard—. One is about economic resilience for a community, and the other one is about well-being—the community well-being, individual or the broader community. If we can get those two things right, I think we can start to lift people out of poverty. And I met with one of the foundations this morning, the Bevan Foundation, just to talk about some of those issues that we have in mind in terms of changing our poverty strategy as we move forward.

Thank you for that, but I think we do need to have a recognition as well that at least some of those billions have not achieved their intended aim, and I think we need to be open about that fact. It’s certainly the case that funding for anti-poverty programmes is at risk, and contingencies should be made, as you have indicated, to become more resilient.

But we also have to accept that the solutions may involve negligible costs to make savings long term. For example, we tried to legislate on outlawing zero-hours contracts in social care, your Government voted against attempts to phase out priority need, and the end of the Pereira test in the homelessness system so everyone was entitled to housing. So, you can see how we might be able to do this without having to, again, pump millions of pounds into that. How are you looking at new types of initiatives, as a result of this vote, and how then you will be trying to implement them as a Government?

I’ll be making a statement early next month regarding the communities division and our vision for the opportunities for communities across Wales, which will be more detailed in terms of how we see tackling poverty featured at the top of our agenda. The Member made a very general statement there about what hasn’t worked in European funding, but didn’t give me any detail of what hasn’t worked, but I’m more than happy to have a further discussion with the Member. What we should do is not be risk-averse in some of the impacts that we do. We sometimes have to test things in communities, just to see if they do work to make the change, and I think we should be very positive about the programmes we have done and have delivered and not talk Wales down all the time.