Questions now from the party leaders, and I first of all call the leader of the Welsh Conservatives, Andrew R.T. Davies.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, I ask these series of questions as a supporter of alleviating the traffic congestion around Newport. But, last week’s announcement was bitterly disappointing, in connection to the potential delay of finding a solution around the traffic problems in that part of Wales. There was a clear letter issued last week to a Member in the Assembly here, which highlighted how the Welsh Government had interacted at various workshops, consultations, and, indeed, the change in methodology had been highlighted as early as 2014 and confirmed in workshops in March 2015, and then brought forward in July 2016. Why did it come as such a shock to the Welsh Government that this methodology was changing and, ultimately, could potentially delay the advancement of the project?

This is a curious tale, Llywydd, which, I think, with your permission, I’d like to elaborate on. First of all, the letter received by Mohammad Asghar was dated 6 October. It apologised for the delay in responding—remarkable, given the fact the announcement was made on 3 October. I do wonder when that letter originally was sent, then, because, normally, we don’t get a response within three days from the Department for Transport apologising for the delay. That is curious, is it not?

Secondly, of course, it is not right to say that the information, the planning data, was before the Welsh Government at any time before July of this year. No indication was given by the Department for Transport as to what that planning data would look like. In fact, they said, after the referendum, that they believed that there would be a delay in the publication of that data—that is what our officials were told. It is not the case either that officials had the information before the end of July. What actually happened was that our officials discovered that Highways England had received the information two weeks beforehand. It had not been shared with us as a Government. The information was requested; it was not provided until 28 July.

Even more curious is that the data that was provided is normally, I understand—normally—provided in draft, where a nine to 12-month consultation period is allowed in order for the data to be examined and questioned. On this occasion, it hasn’t been published in draft; it’s been published in final form, which disturbs us because the data is so badly flawed. For example, it uses planning data for Wales that is not included in the local delivery plan and has no apparent basis in fact. We’ve not been provided with any information as to where the DfT got this information from.

Once the data is provided, it takes a long time to work out what the effect of that data is on any particular road scheme, which is why, normally, there is the nine to 12-month period for it to happen. On this occasion, nothing. It was made final straight away. Curious, then, that Highways England were told before us, and, of course, we know, having analysed the data, that what this set of data does is, in fact, benefit schemes in London, the south-east of England and the east of England at the expense of everywhere else. Even more curious, isn’t it?

So, we’re calling on the DfT to re-examine these figures, to work with us to re-examine these figures, to tell us where they found the planning data from, and to work with us in order to provide figures that are far more accurate for the Welsh context. So, there are many curious issues that have been raised there, to which we have not yet received an answer.

Thank you for that very detailed answer, First Minister. I don’t think there’s very much curiosity around any of this. We have been highlighting for the last 12 months that the methodology did need to be revisited so that the blue and black route could be evaluated on the same methodology, so that, ultimately, the two routes could be compared favourably, and that you could take forward either the blue or the black route. The Welsh Government solution to the traffic crisis around south-east Wales—because it is a crisis; the logjam on the M4 at certain times of the day can stretch back over 12 miles—is to favour the black route. So, can you commit to having a traffic solution in place by 2021 so that people can have confidence that your manifesto commitment to deliver that solution will be met by 2021?

Yes, that is the aim, but it is not helpful when we have Government departments in Whitehall that are acting in this way. They knew that there was a public inquiry that would begin in the autumn of this year, and yet this data was—we had to ask for it, we had to ask for it; it wasn’t even provided, and we were not notified that it even existed. And then, of course, officials worked very hard through August to look at the data, to see what it would mean for Welsh road schemes. It’s not just Wales that’s affected; it’s everywhere outside the south-east of England that is adversely affected by this data. So, as far as the Department for Transport are concerned, I would urge them to revisit this data, to have a proper process, where data is published in draft and then opportunity is given to examine that data, to examine its robustness, rather than adopt the strange and unusual approach that they’ve adopted so far.

Well, I disagree with you about the strange and unusual process. I mean, as I’ve highlighted, this process has been going on for two years, clearly identified that, in 2016, this change would be coming down the road at you and, obviously, your Government didn’t respond. Traffic Scotland were involved in the negotiations and the Northern Ireland Department for Infrastructure were negotiating with the Department for Transport. They’re all on this letter and identified as participants in the workshops and the consultation. But what is important is that we do find a solution to the traffic gridlock that exists in south-east Wales. Your Government has put its colours firmly on the mast of the black route, and you’re actually on record as saying that if you did support the blue route you could

‘kiss goodbye to winning elections in Newport for a generation.’

So, is it winning elections that’s driving the decisions around the traffic gridlock and the solutions to solve that gridlock or are you actually looking at what the best solution is both financially and in terms of dealing with traffic projections going forward, First Minister?

It is a fact that the blue route goes past many, many homes and would affect, we think, up to 4,000 people. That’s the reality of it. It would pass very, very close to their houses and, in fact, some buildings will have to be demolished, both commercial and residential. There’s no avoiding that, and I doubt very much whether any Government would be looked upon favourably if it were to move ahead with the blue route without proper consultation. We’ve said in the public inquiry that the public inquiry will look at both the black and blue routes. We want the inquiry to be as wide-ranging as possible and to be as open as possible so that people can see that the process is one that they can have faith in. But I have to say once again: any suggestion that the Welsh Government was involved or knew of the data that was provided on 25 July is wrong—wholly wrong and wholly untrue. I don’t accuse him of saying that, but I’m saying that the information he has received is simply wrong. What happens is that they work on this and they inform people of what they’re doing. On this occasion they did not even tell us when the figures were going to be published. They shared them with Highways England first. They didn’t even tell us they’d done that. We had to ask for them and, when they were shared with us, they were shared with us on the basis that is abnormal. Normally, the data is shared and nine to 12 months is available for the data to be examined carefully. That was not done at this time, and here we have a set of data that at the moment would benefit London and the south-east of England at everyone’s expense, and that we cannot accept.

Leader of the opposition, Leanne Wood.

Diolch, Lywydd. First Minister, the UK Home Secretary last week announced plans to force companies to publish lists of their foreign workers—a regressive step, I’m sure you’ll agree with me. It’s not clear exactly how this information was intended to be used, but I’m concerned that it could have led us down a very dark path indeed. Since then, the UK Government has rowed back on that position, after a public outcry, but the data are still going to be gathered and there remain questions to be asked about what will happen to that data. Can you prevent any of these measures taking place in Wales?

Well, I think the word that’s now being used is ‘nudge’. They want to nudge companies in that direction. What I can say is that as far as we are concerned as a Government, we’re not going to do that, nor are any of the bodies that we sponsor. At the end of the day, it’s a matter for companies who they employ. I don’t think it’s helpful to have lists of people that would be used against those businesses for many, many reasons: firstly, because of what I think is the sinister side of it, which is to suggest that if people are not UK passport holders then they are in some way imposters in the jobs that they hold, which is the message that it would actually convey; and secondly, I can think of no more powerful disincentive to an investor than an investor being told, ‘If you come to Wales or come to the UK, you’ll have to tell us how many workers from outside the UK that you will employ’. They don’t have to do that in other countries, and that’s another barrier to investment as far as Wales is concerned. Like me, I know that she shared the same view very quickly and very publicly when the announcement was made. I do not think that creating lists of people from outside the UK with a view to using those people against the companies who employ them is the right way forward for Wales or Britain.

Thank you for answer, First Minister. I very much welcome the sentiment that you’ve conveyed there. Many of our problems in Wales don’t stem from certain people moving in to the country but they stem from the fact that many of our young people move out and don’t return, and this is especially true of graduates, where we have a lower retention rate than any other UK nation. There’s been a lot of focus on immigration, particularly around the debate on Brexit, yet very little attention has been given to out-migration. Plaid Cymru believes that graduates should be able to live and work where they choose, but we should also be able to incentivise some of them to come back so that we can see a return on our public investment, if you like, in their education. We are the only party to have proposed a mechanism, through higher education, to incentivise students to return to work, and you’ll be aware that we put forward those proposals ahead of May’s election. In that election, you had no policy on this and you claimed that Plaid Cymru would charge students fees. If you implement the Diamond review, fees are likely to be charged by your Government. Will you now accept that we do need to incentivise graduates to return to Wales after study? If you do agree with me, what do you intend to do about it?

Well—[Interruption.]—the reality of the situation is that, if I recall, the—I think the Minister has intervened there, but I will answer the question. If I remember, the policies that she was pursuing in May would have meant that students would have been incentivised to stay in Wales, in the sense that their fees would have been paid if they’d studied in Wales but not elsewhere. That’s not a position that I would share. [Interruption.] From my perspective, what I want to do is to make sure that we attract students into Wales, not just those who are from Wales, but outside Wales as well, and make sure that there are skilled jobs there for them.

For me, it’s not a question of whether they leave, it’s a question of enabling them to return. Because I see no reason why young people wouldn’t want to leave, gain experience elsewhere, and come back and bring that experience back with them, in the same way as I know that there are people who will come to Cardiff in their 20s and then go back to rural Wales when they’re older. I think they take their experience back with them. For us, it’s all about ensuring that the jobs are there. It’s why unemployment is at 4.1 per cent—lower than Scotland, lower than England, lower than Northern Ireland—and it’s why we are seeing Wales as a good place to invest, to bring skilled jobs, on behalf of so many international companies.

First Minister, you completely misunderstood what we were proposing ahead of that election. What you just said we should be doing is exactly what we were saying should be done, and what you were attacking us for in that election. I suggest you need to get better briefed next time.

I’d now like to turn to a serious issue that’s been raised with me by a Welsh volunteer in the Calais refugee camp. Only yesterday, the UK Government agreed to house the 378 children from the camp in Calais who’ve got connections here in the UK. The woman who has contacted me told me that she’s encountered an unaccompanied child in Calais who is being horrifically exploited by traffickers. She relayed a story to me of how this young boy of 12 has been given heroin by traffickers, promising him that it will help him get to the UK easier and it will make his journey easier. And on his addiction to heroin, he was passed by the traffickers to predatory men outside the camp, not other refuges, who paid those traffickers, with violence being the price of refusal along with the withdrawal of heroin, on which, of course, he is now completely dependent.

Now, I’m sure that you’ll agree with me, First Minister, that this is a completely abhorrent situation, and I’m sure that you will, like me, want to do what you can to help children in vulnerable situations like this. During the second world war, we did what we could, of course, to help the Kindertransport children. To help these children today, we need to ensure that our child protection systems are ready and prepared to accommodate what will be incredibly vulnerable children who may be sent to Wales. If we are to remove those children from a very vulnerable situation, we can’t risk putting them into another vulnerable situation. So, how can you ensure that local authority social services departments in Wales are ready to step up and help these children now?

Who can disagree with the powerful testimony that the leader of the opposition has given us? I’ve no reason to disbelieve what has been said. In an atmosphere of desperation, predators will thrive, and it seems that that is the case in Calais.

Last week, I met with the Welsh Local Government Association’s responsible elected member for refugees, Dyfed Edwards, the leader of Gwynedd, and we did work through some of these issues, including unaccompanied children. It’s true to say that few refugees have come to Wales thus far, but the two of us did talk about how we can help local authorities to resettle adult refugees as well as unaccompanied children. Of course, we agreed to work together as well in order to make sure that, where we feel that funds should come from a non-devolved source, those funds do come from Whitehall. But, certainly, it was a good meeting and it emphasised, once again, that ourselves and the WLGA very much want to ensure that children have a safe haven in Wales and are able to move away permanently from the sort of exploitation that she’s relayed to us.

Leader of the UKIP group, Neil Hamilton.

First Minister, in the year 2000, Wales was second from bottom in the league tables amongst the nations and English regions in the UK for gross weekly earnings. In the interim period, earnings have gone up by 55 per cent in Scotland, 51 per cent in Northern Ireland, but only 46 per cent in Wales. So, we now have the dismal accolade of being bottom of those league tables. We’ve had Labour Governments either in Cardiff or Westminster for either all or most of that time. Do you and your party accept any responsibility for this record of failure?

Well, he was a member of the Conservative Party once, in the 1980s, and if you look at the statistics—and I can provide him with the graphs on this—inequality increased markedly—markedly—in the 1980s compared to any other decade. That was when people started to lose confidence in politics, when they saw inequality rise. I can say to him that, if we look at the level of employment in Wales, that’s at a record high, far higher than it was when he was in Government. Unemployment is 4.1 per cent, far lower than it was when he was in Government. Youth unemployment in Wales is 13.7 per cent; the UK rate is 14.1 per cent. The fall in Wales was nearly 5 per cent over a year. That’s Jobs Growth Wales for you, and the way that it actually operates. So, as far as numbers are concerned, we know that the economy is moving in the right direction.

It is right to say that the challenge is to make sure that we raise people’s incomes. The way to do that is to make sure they have the skills that are required in order to bring in well-paid jobs from investors who are coming in from abroad, but also that they have the ability and confidence to set themselves up in business and succeed in the future. None of these things were in place when he was a member of the Conservative Party. No party did more to wreck our economy, raise unemployment and create more inequality than the party he was once a member of.

I don’t intend, Llywydd, to rehearse the arguments about the winter of discontent in 1979, which led to all the cuts that took place in the 1980s; we’re here to talk about the twenty-first century, not the twentieth. But, looking forward to the future, although the First Minister won’t accept his responsibility for this record of failure, isn’t it clear that we now need to create in Wales an enterprise economy, a low-tax jurisdiction, relatively speaking, and one where we have proportionate regulation? The opportunity that Brexit provides gives us the tools with which to achieve what both he and I want, which is greater prosperity for the Welsh people?

I’m not surprised he doesn’t want to discuss his record in the 1980s, but there was one phrase there that I picked up on—the creation of a low-tax economy. Now, I thought his party’s line was that they didn’t want to see any tax devolution to this place. So, he must make his mind up as to what he means by that. I think there is merit in looking, for example, at the way corporation tax operates, particularly in terms of tax breaks, and I think the Treasury needs to be far more flexible in terms of the powers that it gives in that regard. Why not, for example, have a system of tax breaks for research and development in Wales? These are the sorts of powers that I think will be practical, without carrying too much danger in terms of any potential loss of income through the Barnett formula. So, I think it’s quite correct to say that we want to make sure that Wales is a good place to invest. We see it—we’ve seen a number of big investors coming in to Wales over the past year and beyond. There is the challenge of Brexit, of reassuring investors in the future that they’ll have access to the European market, bigger than America and Russia combined, and we intend to make sure that they see Wales as a natural place to invest to access that market in the future.

My party is not against the devolution of income taxes per se, what we’re against is the devolution of income tax without a referendum, as we were promised before 2011. But, moving to the future and the opportunities that Brexit provides, isn’t it rather disappointing that the European advisory group that the First Minister has appointed, of 20 members, has lots of politicians and academics on it, but very few people with practical business experience? As far as I can divine from looking at the names, very few of these worthy people were actually in favour of leaving the European Union. In fact, the only one I can positively identify is my honourable friend for North Wales, Nathan Gill. Would it not be sensible, therefore, to have more people who actually see Brexit as an opportunity rather than something to be feared on this group?

The purpose of the group is not to re-fight the referendum; the result is clear. The purpose of the group is to advise Government—not take decisions, but advise Government—on potential ways forward. For example, looking at models like Norway—can that be adapted? Are there other models? These are the things we need to look at. Nathan Gill is a member of that group. He is an MEP, that’s why he is on the group, and he is someone who has contributed greatly to the work of the group thus far, and is somebody who can bring his experience in Europe and use it to good effect on our group.