I’m going to focus, if I may, on why I believe the Government’s amendment to our motion is a failure to understand and recognise what is at stake here. A document sent to Assembly Members yesterday—I’m sure many of you will have had an opportunity to see that document—notes that Carers Wales, Contact a Family Wales and Learning Disability Wales are very disappointed that the Government’s amendment to this debate fails to recognise or tackle the financial impact that this directly has on low-income families with disabled children in terms of cutting funds to the Family Fund by over £5.5 million over three years. That’s 2016-17 and 2018-19. It goes on to say that this is not a general issue of project funding for the third sector but one that directly affects low-income families with disabled children, with over 4,000 families per year in Wales now unable to access an annual grant of £500, on average—£500 that can make a huge impact on the annual budget of low-income families. And they remind us that the three other administrations in the UK have maintained their financial support for the Family Fund at the 2015-16 level. The Department for Education in England announced yesterday, by coincidence, that it will continue to fund this programme—a sum of £81 million over three years.

I would add that the Government amendment does suggest that Ministers haven’t been aware, or haven’t taken account of the fact that the shift in funding to the sustainable social services’ third sector grant scheme has had this impact on direct funding to families. There is no alternative. Noting other programmes available and the availability of welfare rights, for example, doesn’t make up for the fact that this is a direct loss to these families, particularly in a climate where other sources of support are disappearing. The stories of service users that we’ve heard have demonstrated this, and, again, I quote from the document from Carers Wales, Contact a Family Wales and Learning Disability Wales, which quotes a parent who can no longer access Family Fund support: ‘As the parent of a profoundly disabled child, I know how difficult and discouraging it is to try to carry on during a time of reduced budgets as well as hostility, on the part of the Westminster government, towards disability benefits. We carry on as best we can, but we live on the edge of not coping, financially as well as in other ways.’ The Family Fund grants are a lifeline to so many—that’s what that parent had to say.

We have presented this motion, having heard from organisations that are frustrated with the current situation—with the loss of the funds but also the absence of any recognition that there has been a cut, because there has been a cut. That is why we have worded this in a way that provides an alternative way forward for the Government. If there is an alternative approach using a different model to the Family Fund, well, fine, let’s consider that. But what’s important for us, and what’s important in the wording of this motion is that that direct support should be available in some way, and that it should be restored.