7. 7. UKIP Wales Debate: Brexit and the Economy

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:41 pm on 14 September 2016.

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Photo of David Rowlands David Rowlands UKIP 5:41, 14 September 2016

Well, it amazes me—the negativity that so often comes from the other side of this house. We’ve heard many things lauded in this Assembly with regard to the European Union. One of the AMs this morning alluded to the protection for workers within the European Union, and the legislation of the European Union that gave protection to those. You did in fact allude to that. Well, I would like to ask what protection that has given to migrant workers in this country. Over the last 10 years, we have seen a proliferation of such things as the car wash facilities in Wales, so that they are now almost a ubiquitous part of almost every town and village. Well, I can tell you that the legislation of Europe hasn’t protected those people in any way. Most of those people work 10 hours a day, seven days a week, for as little as £3 an hour. They don’t have contracts—not even that appalling zero-hours contract. Not only that, but they have no protective clothing in their work. So, all of this, which you say is coming out of the European Union to protect workers, certainly doesn’t protect that section of the working population.

To add to that, you keep saying as well about the protection of the environment. Actually, each and every one of these car washes actually washes down the effluent that they are using to wash the cars into our water streams. What sort of protection do we have from that? You are very selective about how you deal with protection for people—