Part of 2. 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children – in the Senedd at 2:32 pm on 18 October 2017.
The point is, though, that it was changed, and it made it more viable, therefore, for this prison to be able to be built. In the past, it wasn’t as viable for industries to go and seek out that land, and I’m trying to understand why that was and when that decision was made, and I’m not hearing that from you here today. With regard to the covenant, and it’s my understanding, as is yours, as we’ve heard, that there is a covenant in place, I’ve received legal advice, which states, and I quote, ‘Assuming the covenant is legally valid, it means that the site is affected by an obligation in favour of a third party limiting its use to an industrial park only. In those circumstances, building a prison on the site could be a breach of the covenant.’
How do you plan to get around this, assuming you are still going to co-operate with the UK Government and continue to offer this land for the prison? The bottom line, of course, is that we understand that, potentially, things will change in relation to the flooding and the categorisation, and the covenant now ensures it should be for industrial usage. Will you, therefore, go back to the MOJ and say, ‘Well, actually, now we are not co-operating with this piece of land, and we will not therefore be providing Baglan Moors for a prison site’?