Part of 1. 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government – in the Senedd at 1:54 pm on 7 June 2017.
Thank you. I appreciate fully that it’s the initial responsibility of the Member in charge, but you do, Cabinet Secretary, have an overall responsibility for the financial robustness of the Welsh Government—no easy task, I appreciate. And I do appreciate that the whole process with the regulatory impact assessments is a developing process, and I’m sure that the review being carried out by the Finance Committee under the stewardship of the Chair will deliver you some strong recommendations in that regard.
Cabinet Secretary, we know that this Assembly is passing an increasing amount of legislation, and that will increase further in future. The pressure on officials who provide the financial data and the regulatory impact assessments will also increase inevitably, inexorably, so it’s important that we get this right. This whole process relies on accurate costings and transparency. Will you agree to work ever more closely with departments and Members in charge, working on legislation, to ensure that costings are accurate and that we as Assembly Members and, indeed, ultimately, the public can have confidence that we are keeping—all of us, and the Welsh Government and yourself in particular—a tight grip on finances as legislation is developed, so that the public finances in Wales in respect of the legislation that this place passes can be as robust as possible?