Part of 1. 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:56 pm on 13 June 2017.
Well, first of all, in terms of the committee’s report, it’s not quite what it says, to my mind. It does make the quite valid point that there are many different organisations who all have a responsibility for flooding—some seven. The point that the report was trying to say was, ‘Well, if things go wrong, who then is responsible?’, and that’s a valid question that we will consider as part of the response to the committee’s report. It may need legislation to make sure that the situation is clear. For example, Members will know I was, a year and a half ago now, on the A55, where flooding had occurred. Ultimately it was a matter for Gwynedd Council, but it needed funding from Welsh Government, so we worked together to deliver that. But, clearly, there is an issue here that will need to be resolved in terms of: is the situation robust enough if we have that many organisations—and individuals, quite often—who are responsible for controlling flooding? And we’ll consider our response to that as part of our response to the committee’s report.