It’s a pleasure to support this motion and I’m glad that the individual Members debates continue to bring really interesting ideas to the Assembly, and ideas that generally have cross-party support.

I think we’re all very much aware of the close links between high levels of congestion and air pollution, and I think that electric vehicles will offer a way to alleviate this issue. But, as Jenny has already outlined, the lack of infrastructure at the moment is really quite frustrating, though, I would say that, in the last election, I think, for the first time, I saw several charging points built in, naturally, to the infrastructure of new houses. Rather than a long cable leading to the back somewhere or through the garage, there are now obviously properly designed charging points at the front of some houses.

So, the world is changing and we need to see this progress very quickly. I think the public sector can take the lead, especially in terms of public transport, and I’d include in that encouraging taxis to move to electric vehicles. Now, that, obviously, will require the availability of charging points around the city, and also perhaps some other incentives. Also, I think, as urban areas restrict the use of private vehicles, especially if there’s just single occupancy, then we can see much more of the inner urban travel being conducted on electric vehicles. So, I think that’s an important area as well. But, unless you get the infrastructure right, you simply won’t be able to see this transformation. They’ve tried very hard—it was interesting to note—in Hong Kong. They’ve been really trying to have a shift there, with their green transport fund, but they’ve concluded that high production costs, limited service life, long charging times and low-energy density of e-vehicle batteries are the key constraints for electric vehicles to take up commercial transportation duties. So, it is quite obvious that we’ve got to have a holistic approach to sorting out the infrastructure and then providing whatever incentives are needed on top of that to see this modal shift, or at least the shift in the manner of the running of these vehicles. I think, if you look at Cardiff, Swansea and Newport in particular, the air quality is often poor, and if we want clean air zones in these cities, and I’m sure that that is something we need to demand, then we’re going to have to see this sort of shift.

Can I just talk a little bit about the integration of transport modes? Because, again, I think this is very important. Now, usually we hear that you need to get off a train and onto a bus or vice versa, and that’s very important, but I think the facilities for people who are perhaps driving part of their journey, perhaps to a satellite car park at the edge of a city, and then transferring to a bus or to a train, indeed, but also, perhaps, walking or cycling, and to have these various networks then connected to these satellite points—I think that is very, very important, especially if you’re making a slightly longer journey, perhaps from the Heads of the Valleys, and are driving into the edge of Newport of Cardiff or, indeed, Swansea, if you take the western Valleys. I think this offers a lot of opportunity as well, and I think we need to look at our infrastructure that is currently there and think about how that can be used more effectively.

I notice that the mayor of London’s draft transport strategy earlier this year did suggest that Oxford Street could be closed to domestic vehicles and made into a cycling and walking street only, and that’s the type of thinking we need. There are a lot of routes there currently; we don’t necessarily need to build new ones. I think a focus on walking, cycling and public transport in a more integrated way has a lot to offer, and then the private use of cars in areas that are likely to get less congested, so the periphery of the town and such—but being in a partnership with motorists so that we don’t just beat them down with lots of restrictions.

Can I finally say that the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015, I think, is an ideal piece of legislation to try and co-ordinate these approaches? So, I think that will be a key test of the Act in the future. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer.