Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:36 pm on 28 September 2016.
Thank you. I don’t have much time, but I’d like to thank people for taking part in this important debate. I think it’s important that we do debate this particular issue.
You find in politics sometimes that you can’t win whatever you do. You support a Government programme and you’re accused of making politics with it. We are here to make sure, as the main opposition, that we hold you to account, Minister, and that we make sure that programmes like this are important for the future. So, I would say to your backbench Member Jeremy Miles: are you therefore patronising the people in the public gallery who are not saying that this is just a 30-minute political hit? They know of the importance of this debate because it was your Government who put forward the proposition to cut Supporting People, so we must keep this on the political agenda. If we do not, then it’s failing to hold you to account as the main opposition here. So, I accept that the Government Minister has been very liberal in his spirit to talk to us in the future, and I hope that he can hear the concerns of the people here today, but this is certainly not to try and play games. I don’t do that in politics, so I am a little bit offended by those comments, and also by the Conservatives. You know, a ‘delete all’ amendment—we came here in good faith. You could have helped improve our motion and enhance it. You said almost exactly the same thing that I said, Mark Isherwood.
So, let’s please try and get behind these schemes. They aid and support people in our communities.