Questions now from the party leaders. The leader of Plaid Cymru, Leanne Wood.

Diolch, Llywydd. It’s almost 20 years to the day since the vote in 1997 to establish this institution, and with a new term must come a new chapter in the Welsh story. First Minister, I personally won’t forget the triumph, where so many of us in this Chamber, and outside, helped to deliver a victory for our nation on that night. Governing ourselves is a victory in itself. No other country has governed another well.

But the Welsh Government is a different institution to the National Assembly. I agree with Ron Davies when he says that Ministers need to ask themselves some difficult questions about delivery. First Minister, do you agree with him?

No. Ron, of course, had the opportunity to shape the direction of the National Assembly, but we know, of course, his unfortunate story. I’m proud of what we’ve achieved over the past 20 years. When I look back at what Wales was like in the 1990s: a country lacking confidence, where young people wanted to leave, a country that really had no strong profile abroad—that wasn’t happening. And the one thing that strikes me is that it was accepted as normal that unemployment should be substantially higher in Wales than in the rest of the UK. That was seen as something that was inevitable. That’s no longer the case; unemployment’s either at the UK average, or below the UK average. I could go on, of course, and she might expect me to do that, but I pick out certain comparisons there with the 1990s, in the way that Wales has changed for the better in the 20 years since the referendum.

Well, people are still leaving, First Minister, as you well know. And, last year, you said that Labour is halfway through a decade of delivery. But, for many people, the current performance of devolved Government is mediocre to say the least, and has been seen as making no difference to their lives or the quality of public services. And those aren’t my words, but the findings of research on attitudes to devolution, which you will have read yesterday. If we are halfway through a decade of delivery, why is it that our health and education outcomes are consistently worse than those in Scotland? Why is our GCSE pass rate this year worse than the Scottish equivalent? Why are waiting lists longer on average? And that’s without even mentioning comparisons to England or to other western European countries. What is the explanation for your Government not delivering on the outcomes that people both expect and deserve?

Well, far from it—I don’t think Scotland is the Shangri-La that is portrayed. There have been real problems in the Scottish education system. There are still issues over the attainment gap, which we have closed and they have not. If we look at health, and we look at the 1990s, it was normal in the 1990s, in the days of a Tory Government, for people to wait two years for an operation. That was normal. People accept that no more—no more. We know that waiting times have been reduced substantially despite having an enormous cut in our budget in that time. We’ve just seen the best GCSE results ever. Scotland has its own education system. You can’t compare their qualification system with ours because it’s so different. We are building schools across the whole of Wales; in England, nothing is being built. We’re proud of that fact. If we look at the economy, our unemployment rate is 4.3 per cent. That would have been undreamt of in the 1990s. We are still attracting excellent investment into Wales—the best foreign direct investment figures for the past 30 years—and that’s because we have a Government that is able to go out and sell Wales. Whatever the politics of that Government, the profile that Ministers have is far, far greater than was the case in the 1990s, and that’s why we’ve been so successful in bringing jobs into Wales.

You sound complacent, First Minister, and your answers here this afternoon seem to suggest that things are already going so well, that this is as good as it gets. Not so much a decade of delivery, but it’s a decade of complacency. We need, First Minister, a country where there is a premium on self-Government. Making our own decisions is an essential first step, and Plaid Cymru is proud that this country has taken that step. But the next step is realising that premium. Being a Welsh citizen should mean that there’s a public service bonus: a devolution dividend, then, if you like. So, I’ll make one challenge to you today, as we mark 20 years since that ‘yes’ vote: by the end of this Assembly term, will the Labour Government have closed the gap with Scotland on health, education and the economy? And if we approach the end of this term and there seems to be no sign of a closing of that gap, will you then accept and admit that Wales needs a new Government?

Well, it’s not me she wants to convince; it’s the electorate, and she’s not convinced them of that. There’s no point complaining to me about the lack of success of her own party. I do not accept there’s a gap between us and Scotland. I don’t accept that there’s a gap between us and Scotland in education. Scotland’s unemployment rate is regularly higher than ours. It’s not as if Scotland, economically, is doing fantastically well, and from our perspective I’m proud of what we’ve achieved over the past 20 years. The electors of Wales have recognised that. They’ve seen that in election after election, and there will be no sign of complacency from us. We know that it gets harder and harder to convince people to vote for us the longer that we are in Government, and we will work harder and harder to ensure that people continue to give us their support.

The leader of the opposition, Andrew R.T. Davies.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, in August, the report about Kris Wade was published from the Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Local Health Board. This was a desktop review into the employment by that health board of Kris Wade, a man who is currently serving a 21-year sentence for the sexually motivated killing of 65-year-old Christine James. In the years leading up to Ms James’s murder, Kris Wade was the subject of no fewer than three separate allegations of sexual abuse amongst vulnerable patients. At the time of the desktop review publication, my party criticised the report for its lack of independence. It is our belief it can never be acceptable for a health board to investigate serious concerns about itself. Following several calls from my party, and indeed the BMA and others in this Chamber, your Government announced Healthcare Inspectorate Wales’s role in reviewing the desktop report that the health board undertook. How on earth can it be acceptable for a health board to investigate such serious accusations of its own failing?

It’s a complicated picture, and I understand the grief that the family has faced. There were three allegations; that’s correct. No action was taken by the police with regard to those allegations, and so no criminal proceedings were taken. That said, it is highly important that there is an investigation by Healthcare Inspectorate Wales into not just the lessons that can be learned, but the lessons that can be learned in order that we can be assured as a Government that any failings that may have been in the system at that time are corrected, and that the family then can be assured that the health board did all that it could have done to deal with the situation. We won’t know the answer to that question until of course we get the findings of the health inspectorate’s report.

First Minister, it’s my understanding that not one patient, not one medical professional and not one member of staff was asked to give a formal interview in the course of the review. That, surely, is unacceptable. Can you confirm that Healthcare Inspectorate Wales will take evidence from clinicians, from patients and, above all, anyone associated with the investigation that allowed the tragedy to unfold and ultimately ended up in this gentleman being sentenced to 21 years in prison?

It is absolutely crucial that the investigation is independent. It’s not for me then to tell Healthcare Inspectorate Wales what they should and shouldn’t do, but I think it’s proper for me to say that I would expect them to gain as much evidence as broadly as possible in order for their final findings to be as robust as possible.

I think most people would say it would be fair for you or your Government, in the shape of the Cabinet Secretary, to set the terms of reference for the Healthcare Inspectorate Wales inquiry report, investigation, call it what you will, because obviously he has asked them to do that. When I found out that not one medical person had been asked, not one patient had been asked, to give evidence to this investigation, that is unbelievable, I have to say. And I do call upon you to make very strict terms of reference for this investigation from Healthcare Inspectorate Wales so that the report that they present to your Government can enjoy the confidence of the Members here, of the wider public, that they are being protected against people like Kris Wade working within our health service. Will you give that commitment that the terms of reference are robust enough from the Healthcare Inspectorate Wales inquiry into this inquiry so that we can have confidence that patients and members of the public are protected from the likes of Kris Wade ever working within the health service here in Wales?

The answer to the question is ‘yes’, of course. We want to make sure that the investigation itself is (a) independent and (b) robust. I’m not sure whether he is saying that, in the past, not enough people were interviewed, or whether that’s happening now, but whichever way, I’ll make sure that that is looked at to make sure that that issue is dealt with. But it is obviously important that the findings are seen to be robust and can be supported by all in this Chamber.

Leader of the UKIP group, Neil Hamilton.

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. In the Government’s document, ‘Brexit and Fair Movement of People’, it acknowledges that, in the British social attitudes survey in 2013, 86 per cent of the UK population wanted to see immigration reduced, and yet the policy of the Government here in Cardiff, in this document, is to oppose the introduction of any form of target for a reduction of immigration. The latest figures show a significant reduction on what we’ve seen in recent years, but even at 0.25 million a year net migration, which we currently have, that would add, if sustained, 8 million to our population by 2032, 21 million by 2064, when the population of the UK would be 85 million. That is just not sustainable. Before the First Minister says that, well, immigration is absolutely vital for economic growth, in 2014, the Office for Budget Responsibility did a study of the effects of immigration at current levels, 0.25 million net a year. That adds 0.4 per cent to GDP but also 0.4 per cent to population, so that GDP per capita wouldn’t improve; it’s neither here nor there. Isn’t it time that the Welsh Government woke up to the realities of life in modern Britain?

Immigration should be tailored according to the needs of the UK. Targets—. It is artificial. What is the point of targets? Let’s examine that situation. Let’s say, for example, we wished to recruit more doctors to the Welsh NHS but were told, ‘Sorry, we’ve reached the quota for this year’. That’s nonsensical. Why on earth would that be a sensible policy for any Government to adopt? So, we have offered a view on migration. We don’t know what the UK Government’s view is yet. This is our offer in terms of what we think the system should look like, but it’s absolutely crucial, of course, that policy is tailored to what the UK actually needs, not an artificial target.

The First Minister knows that that is not the only way in which targets can work. In particular, the problems that we have for the levels of immigration that we currently suffer are not in the field of professionals, like doctors and nurses, where they will always be able to qualify for whatever the skills needs of the country are. But at the bottom end of the income scale, in particular, for those who are on low skills or unskilled, there are very significant factors at work that push down the levels of income that people are likely to get. Given that Wales is a low-wage economy, and we’re at the bottom of the income scale for the nations and regions of the UK, shouldn’t we be more concerned to reduce the inflow of unskilled and low-skilled migration in order to protect those who are most vulnerable in Welsh society?

I think the game was given away by the leader of UKIP when he said that immigration is something that we suffer. I have to say to him that the proportion of EU citizens in Wales is very, very low—well below 5 per cent of the population. It is the case that people work in Wales; that’s true. But he needs to speak to businesses, who will tell him that they need to be able to recruit people in many, many different jobs, some of them highly skilled, some of them not so skilled, but those people are needed. What I say to him is that we should suffer immigration, as he would put it, on the level that is appropriate to the needs of our economy. I have to say to him: he talks about a low-wage economy; he is complicit in driving down wages. Did he support the minimum wage? No, he didn’t support the minimum wage. Of course he didn’t. Is he supportive of ways of enforcing the minimum wage to stop anybody being exploited, regardless of where they are from? No, I doubt that is the case. He cannot, on the one hand, complain about the driving down of wages when his own record shows that he was against the minimum wage and therefore happy to see wages driven down when he was in another place.

The First Minister knows that the policy of my party was in favour of the minimum wage. In the days when I was a member of the Conservative Party, the Conservative Party was against the introduction of a minimum wage, but UKIP has always supported the introduction of a minimum wage, and, of course, there hasn’t been a single prosecution in Wales for breach of minimum wage legislation, even though we know that this is occurring. So, the Welsh Government, for all the protestations of the First Minister, does absolutely nothing to make its own policy work. When I used the word ‘suffer’ in terms of immigration policy, what I meant there was that the scale and speed of this immigration is imposing massive strains and stresses upon not just public services, but also on the incomes of those who are at the bottom end of the income scale. At the moment, we are in a period of economic growth, but of course the problems really become apparent when the economic cycle is on a downswing. There’s a wealth of academic studies, some of which are referred to in this document, which shows—. Such as the study of the Bank of England, for example—it showed that a 10 per cent increase in the proportion of migrants working in particular jobs in particular regions leads to a 2 per cent fall in wages. This is a serious matter in an economy where the average earnings in Wales are only 75 per cent of the UK’s.

First of all, I am surprised to hear him say that he did not stand as a Conservative candidate in 1997 on a manifesto commitment not to oppose a minimum wage. I seem to remember that that was the case at that time, conveniently forgotten now. Secondly, as he knows full well—or is being mischievous—the Welsh Government is not the prosecuting authority when it comes to minimum wage legislation. It’s not devolved. It’s a matter for the UK Government to target resources towards the appropriate authority in order for those prosecutions to take place. He talks of evidence that shows that wages are being driven down. Where is that evidence? I see no evidence that that is the case. I see evidence of wages being driven down by some employers who are unscrupulous. I see wages being driven down by people who are working on casual contracts in the private sector. I see wages being driven down by the policies of the UK Government removing things such as tax credits that help the low paid while, of course, putting in place tax cuts for the highest paid. None of use wants to see low pay; I understand that. But can I suggest that he targets his guns at the true problem here, which is the policy that was put in place by the current UK Government?