9. Will the First Minister make a statement on recognition given to those who carried out their national service as Bevin Boys during and after the Second World War? OAQ(5)0418(FM)

I know the Member has a very firm interest in this issue, and we know that the Bevin boys, many of whom worked in dangerous conditions in the mines, played an integral part in helping to win the second world war. It is fitting that a memorial honouring them has been erected at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire.

I thank the First Minister for that, and I was recently contacted by my constituent Mr William Beer of Llanbradach, who turns 91 this year and was a Bevin boy during the second world war. When the Bevin boys programme was wound up in 1948, they didn’t receive any medals and their efforts went unrecognised until the VE Day fiftieth anniversary celebrations in May 1995. In June 2007, the UK Government announced that former Bevin boys would receive a veterans badge in recognition of their service. I feel it’s still not enough. I’m going to be writing to the Bevin Boys Association to ask them to contact my constituent, but, in the meantime, will the First Minister pay tribute to Mr Beer and people like him, and recognise his contribution to our country’s security during the second world war?

Indeed, I would, because, even though they were not combatants, of course, without them, there would not have been the ability to release those who went into the armed forces, there would not have been the ability to fuel so many of the engines that were needed in ships particularly, and we know that the economy would have ground to a halt. That would have been as debilitating as military reversal. War pensions, for example, are not devolved. They have not been applied to Bevin boys. They are the responsibility of the UK Government, but I would be happy to write to the responsible Minister in the UK Government to make him aware of the issues that you’ve raised today and, of course, the issue of the war pensions and what should be done now to honour all those who are still with us who contributed so much to the war effort.

I thank the First Minister.