8. 8. Plaid Cymru Debate: Universal Credit

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 6:20 pm on 25 October 2017.

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Photo of Bethan Sayed Bethan Sayed Plaid Cymru 6:20, 25 October 2017

[Continues.]—between the UK Government and Scottish Government in 2016 states that the baseline Barnett formula—he’s not listening to me, even—will be adjusted to reflect the responsibility over welfare, including costs and administration—including costs and administration. It says in point 31, and I quote,

Both Governments have agreed that the UK government will provide £200m to the Scottish Government to support the implementation of new powers. This will represent a one-off (non-baselined) transfer, supplementing the block grant, to support the functions being transferred. The profile of this transfer is to be agreed by the JEC.’

So, it’s entirely possible, should the Welsh Government want it, to go to London and demand to have those types of conversations. The fact that you won’t even bother to go and ask is testament to your leadership, not to Leanne Wood’s leadership for making a speech, and you deciding you want to ask her a question. It’s testament to your leadership, as Cabinet Secretary in this regard. And it’s not just us who believe that, potentially, we should devolve some of those powers—Jeremy Miles said it today. And on the equalities committee recently, we had academics down from Scotland who told us that, where 15 per cent of disability benefits have been devolved to Scotland, they’ve done it in a humane, principled manner, and we will be actively looking at those proposals as a committee—[Interruption.] It’s phenomenal now that I’m not even being listened to, when we have—