Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am pleased to have the opportunity to set out again what we are already doing to improve survival from out-of-hospital cardiac arrests, which includes many of the aspects in Suzy Davies’s private Member’s Bill proposal. However, whilst I do support the ambitions in the proposal in principle, I can’t support the motion as I don’t believe that imposing a statutory duty is the right approach to take at this time in delivering improvements across Wales. In particular, the impact on the school curriculum is not one that the Government can support, and I’ll hopefully explain that in some helpful detail.

I set out in my written statement in December the excellent work that took place across schools last October, when approximately 17,000 children were trained with a variety of life-saving skills. That type of approach can work well in our school system using the existing platform of personal and social education. But, looking further ahead to when we do have a new curriculum following the Donaldson process, the best evidence has shown us that using legislation in the way the motion urges us to has led to an overloaded and complicated system. We should not dismiss that argument out of hand. Donaldson was very clear about this. We want to use legislation sparingly, and I do really understand the well-meant intent, that the motion is seeking to add life-saving skills as a mandatory part of the curriculum. On this, I don’t agree with Suzy Davies’s view that this would not undermine the approach we are taking that flows from the Donaldson review. I really do think that those of us who support this significant review, and the prospect of a coherent curriculum cannot then cut across that Donaldson approach by making discrete bids for mandatory additions to the new curriculum before it’s actually been completed and implemented.

Now, work has already commenced in developing an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest plan, which will look at ways to improve CPR and access to defibrillation—common themes in the debate today. We’re already starting to make progress in Wales, particularly in relation to access to defibrillators through the register, with over 2,000 registered since I launched ‘Be a defib hero’. That campaign started in February 2015. We should also make the most of the similarities between the emergency services and their shared commitment to keep people and communities safe. Almost all fire appliances now have defibrillators, and firefighters are trained in life-saving skills. I’ve agreed with the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children to a set of priorities to help focus fire and rescue service support for the NHS. The priorities that we’ll be working to deliver in 2017-18 include support for an emergency medical response.

It is, though, worth noting that, in Wales, following the changes that we made to our ambulance response model, the average ambulance response time to a cardiac arrest in Wales is now between four and five minutes. That’s a significant improvement because we’ve refocused our ability to get people to those really life critical calls. Now, for the out- of-hospital cardiac arrest plan to become embedded, I think that we do need to build on that momentum that we’re already making prior to taking a decision about introducing a mandatory requirement. That plan is being developed with partners across the NHS family, emergency services and the third sector. As with other Members, too, I want to recognise and welcome the work of the campaign in the third sector, with a wide range of volunteers and the training they provide. I know that every Member has the opportunity for them and their staff to receive first aid training from a number of different organisations, and I recognise the work they are already doing. They are very much part of producing our new plan and seeing it through to reality. We do recognise that life-saving skills and emergency aid procedures are clearly extremely important, and the Welsh Government fully supports the work of those organisations in raising awareness and helping people acquire those skills.

Last week, as Members have mentioned, the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust launched their latest defibrillator campaign, aimed at raising awareness of what a defibrillator is, where to find the nearest one, and what support is available to obtain one. I hope Members will take the opportunity to support that campaign and, in particular, to listen to the words of Dai Lloyd that, with modern defibrillators, they talk you through what you need to do and, if someone is in cardiac arrest—you’re absolutely right—you can only help. I hope that’s a message people do take on board and take seriously.

I do accept that it’s of the utmost importance that the population of Wales is given the opportunity—every opportunity—to survive cardiac arrest and are provided with knowledge and resources, like defibrillators, that will enable the efforts being made to save lives. We are committed to working with organisations across Wales to achieve this, but, at this point, I’m not persuaded that this requires legislation. Now, if this were a Stage 1 debate, then the Government would oppose the motion. However, the Government will abstain today and backbenchers in my party have a free vote. But, in abstaining, the Government wishes to signal its support for continuing to improve life-saving skills and our view that legislation is a potential future option where it is clear that it is either the best way forward or the only way to make further progress. But we will continue to make progress with our out-of-hospital cardiac arrest plan. We want to see what comes from that and then we’ll continue to work with stakeholders, including Members in this place, regardless of what party they’re in, to try and save lives and review what our next steps should be as we move forward in trying to improve lives and, of course, to save lives.