I welcome the opportunity to take part in today’s debate, albeit about half an hour ago I wasn’t taking part in the debate, but now I am. So, if the Chamber can bear with me, I’ll be grateful. But it is a really important issue, and the motion that is before us today touches on—as the Member for Neath highlighted—regeneration of the high street and the importance of that regeneration being underpinned by viable businesses that have cash going through their businesses. Business rates is one of the simpler systems that take money out of those small businesses that desperately need to retain cash to create jobs and create opportunities for investment.

This isn’t the Conservative Party coming here and demanding of the Minister to do things and just putting a wish list before him, as very often might happen here on a Wednesday afternoon, because the Conservatives, in fairness, have a strong record, whether it might be on business rates or high-street regeneration. David Melding, when he was the business and economy spokesman, back in 2009 I think it was—in the third Assembly—actually brought forward our business rates policy of bringing forward business rate relief for businesses up to £12,500, tapered up to £15,000. During debate after debate in this Chamber, the then economy Minister, Ieuan Wyn Jones, rubbished those claims and said that it was completely unreasonable to request that for businesses, and ultimately the Welsh Government, time and time again, turned a deaf ear to those pleas—pleas that were underpinned by representations made by the Federation of Small Businesses, the Institute of Directors, the Confederation of British Industry and many businesses and chambers of commerce around Wales. And yet here we are, in 2016, with a revaluation that has just been undertaken that is placing a huge question mark over the viability of many, many small and medium-sized businesses on high streets the length and breadth of Wales.

I appreciate, from what the First Minister said yesterday when he was touching on this point, that he seems to think that representations are only coming from Cowbridge and the Vale of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire via Nick Ramsay and other representations from Monmouthshire. I have to say that the representations that I’ve received in the meetings that I’ve attended seem to have this issue across the whole of Wales, and it is an issue that the Welsh Government does need to respond to. That, surely, is what our role is: to come here and actually make the Government of the day aware of our postbags and aware of the representations we are receiving.

So, I do hope that the Minister will use this opportunity of the debate today. Obviously, the Government have put an amendment down—a ‘delete all’ amendment—but I do hope that the Minister, in his address to the Chamber this afternoon, will use that positively to outline the measures that the Welsh Government will take. I understand that he will draw on the £10 million transitional fund that has been put forward by the Government to date, but businesses and business leaders are clearly saying that that just clearly isn’t meeting the need of businesses with the valuation exercise that has been undertaken, and the bills that small businesses on the high street, in particular, are facing and will have to be paying as of 1 April next year.

It was, in some respects, encouraging to see the First Minister yesterday actually allude to the fact that there might be—there might be—a little bit of movement in this area. Again, I would hope that the finance Minister will use his response to the debate today to maybe give some light in this tunnel. We can argue whether the English system is better or the Welsh system is better. The fact of the matter is there are many thousands of businesses the length and breadth of Wales that, if they do not receive a bigger helping hand, will not be around this time next year. That, surely, should be the pre-requisite of the Government to address these concerns.

I would also like to spend a little bit of time of my address, irrespective of the merits of the scheme that has been put forward to date from the Welsh Labour Government here, on the Valuation Office Agency appeal process, which is another area that has been pointed out to me as a cause for concern, and in particular the length of time that the valuation office is taking to respond to requests from businesses and the time it is taking for businesses to get on to the valuation office’s website to actually see what their new valuation is, and actually see the documentary evidence as to how that valuation has been arrived at. I draw as reference—and, as I said, if I’d realised I was speaking, I certainly would have brought the letter down that I received yesterday from the Hare and Hounds in Aberthin, which is a public house that some people in this Chamber may or may not know, on the substantial increase that they are facing in their business rates. The writer to me highlighted the length of time of the process that they would have to go through in the appeals mechanism, to understand in the first place the way they could appeal and then the way, the methodology, in which the valuation office had arrived at their substantial increase in business rates. This is a business that is facing that demand having to be met in little over four months’ time, and so, I would hope again that the Cabinet Secretary will be able to give us some assurances in his response today as to what level of support and understanding he has, that the valuation office is able to give to businesses in the appeals process, and also to give confidence to Members that businesses will not be penalised if they find obstacles put in their way in progressing those appeals. And I do urge the Chamber today to support the motion that’s before us that does seek to put that plank of support on the floor for small businesses to walk across and, ultimately, be there this time next year.