<p>Group 8: Improving and Protecting the Health and Well-being of Young Persons (Amendments 33, 34)</p>

Part of 6. 6. Debate on Stage 3 of the Public Health (Wales) Bill – in the Senedd at 4:50 pm on 9 May 2017.

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Photo of Angela Burns Angela Burns Conservative 4:50, 9 May 2017

Thank you very much indeed. I’m very disappointed to have your response, Minister. I do not believe that the fragmented approach that you’re having of looking at the various outcomes for child health will have the desired effect of these amendments. Time and time and time again this Assembly sits and talks about public health issues. We all bang on about how much smoking people are doing, how overweight people are, how unhealthy we are, and what a time bomb it is to the future of our NHS and how we’re going to have to deal, in five, 10, 15 and 20 years’ time with an increase in chronic conditions that will—to be frank—cripple the NHS if we’re not careful. [Interruption.] Sorry, I have a real frog in my throat today. I wish it would go. Yet, this simple amendment is actually targeted at our young people—the future of Wales. This simple amendment asks that, every year, the Welsh Government should bring forward to this Chamber, for all of these Assembly Members who talk on this issue week after week, month after month, year after year, the ability to actually look at whether or not we are delivering true public health measures to young people, to make a difference, to alleviate that time bomb that may be going off in five or 10 years’ time.

There are varying pieces of legislation out there at the moment. You know, we can run through them all: the well-being of future generations Act, the imminent additional learning needs Bill, this Bill. Let me just take one: the healthy eating Measure. I remember being an Assembly Member and sitting on the committee that brought that forward. Has it actually made a significant difference to the food quality in schools in Wales? No. My children have just left primary school, and for the years that they were there, as they were in a school that didn’t have its own kitchen and had to have everything shipped in, they never saw a green vegetable. Thankfully, they had a parent who would make them eat broccoli in the evenings, but if I didn’t do that, they wouldn’t know what a green vegetable is. So, we’re not—despite all of our intent and our bits of legislation squirrelled away here and squirrelled away there, we are losing that focus. So, this amendment was purely to bring that focus.

I am very sad that you’ve decided that you can’t accept it, because the Welsh Government has never had a problem with the fragmentation of policy intent in numerous Bills, and you’ve never had a problem before with repetition. So, why you’ve got a problem on this issue, I think, is really sad, and I believe you’re missing a trick, and we are going to lose focus on really making that change to the lives of young people in Wales.