I’d like to echo the previous speakers in thanking all those who gave evidence, and to put on record my thanks to the Chair as well for the way that he has conducted this inquiry in particular. I think all Members are going to be echoing the same point—that one of the disappointing parts of our inquiry was to see that there was almost a hope for business as usual among those that we took evidence from, rather than a hope that this very difficult situation we find ourselves in might yield different ideas that yield better results for our citizens.

But I think having this inquiry on regional policy was of course wholly appropriate for a committee of the National Assembly for Wales. One of the central promises during the referendum campaign was that Wales would not be one penny worse off, and structural funds were one of those areas cited by the ‘leave’ campaign repeatedly. It may not have been emblazoned on a big red bus, but it was a promise that was repeated to the people of this country. I think, in looking at the evidence that we received, we were all, I think, in agreement that the Welsh Government/Plaid Cymru position in the joint White Paper ‘Securing Wales’ Future’ was the right premise, i.e. that the Treasury should replace funding that Wales would rightly have expected to receive from the EU had we remained a member, but that the Welsh Assembly and the Welsh Government should have full autonomy in implementing its own regional policy. I’m pleased that, in the Government’s response, it has reaffirmed that position.

This is really important in terms of regional policy, for a variety of reasons, because it was notable when we were taking evidence on regional policy from a variety of sources that defining regions meant different things to almost every single person and organisation we had evidence from. So, some referred to west Wales and the Valleys and east Wales, the EU regions, some referred to the city regions, others to distinct geographic locations that most people might identify with, such as north Wales or the Valleys, and others saw Wales itself as the region in a wider context of UK regional policy. This inconsistency is understandable because we haven’t had a substantial clarification from Welsh Government yet about what exactly it sees as Wales’s future in terms of regional policy, notwithstanding that we’re anticipating a paper this autumn to set out some principles. So, we support the principle, here on the Plaid Cymru benches, that Wales should decide, but what we need now from Welsh Government is a vision for regional policy that goes beyond the transition period. What will regional policy look like? What will the Welsh regions be? What will the funding mechanisms be? What will the thresholds for qualifications be? What would be the balance between skills and economic development on the one hand and then on the other hand microcommunity projects and regenerations?

Just as a proponent of economic spatial planning myself, I would implore the Cabinet Secretary to think very carefully about the boundaries of those regions. I know he’s had boundaries on his mind for a while since taking his current portfolio, but I have a great fear that if the city deal regions form the basis for regional policy, there will be consequences for the poorest in our communities. You can imagine—at the moment, the Gwent Valleys are in west Wales and the Valleys, one of the poorest regions, sadly, in the whole of Europe, and then if we all of a sudden have as the model for a new regional policy the Cardiff capital region, without a single penny being added to the value of the economy or an uplift in wages or anything, we’ll be in the most prosperous region in Wales. I think that will have a knock-on effect. Then we have, of course, legitimate questions about those parts of Wales that are not covered by city regions at all, particularly rural communities who have very real challenges when it comes to overcoming deep-rooted poverty. So, there needs to be a local buy-in—that was clear in the evidence that we received—and I think, partly, getting local buy-in is down to people being able to identify with the regions. I’ll just make the point again, in terms of how we define those regions: the Government published its ‘Our Valleys, Our Future’ publication in the summer, and I was there waiting with baited anticipation for this master economic plan that was going to overturn the fortunes of the south Wales Valleys—only three mentions to the European Union or Brexit, in an area that is absolutely among those that is most dependent upon European funding. So, I’d ask the Cabinet Secretary, not just in his paper on future regional policy but actively in Cabinet meetings from now on, to implore colleagues about the need to prepare every department and every community in our country for post-transition Wales, and that means getting every community Brexit prepared. Diolch yn fawr.