1. Will the First Minister make a statement on unemployment rates in Mid and West Wales? OAQ51339

Yes. In 2017, the unemployment rate in Mid and West Wales was 4 per cent below the Welsh and UK averages. 

I thank the First Minister for that reply. He will know that the Swansea travel-to-work area includes large parts of Carmarthenshire and, therefore, the announcement by Amazon recently that they were creating 2,000 jobs for the Christmas trade will be very welcome. But less welcome is the fact that they're doing a lot of their recruitment through a company called the Central European Recruitment and Contract Services Ltd, and that's basically to bus in people from Hungary rather than from Carmarthenshire. One of my constituents has contacted me to say that she'd been contacted by this company, wanting to know if she had residential rooms for rent that could be hot-bedded in three shifts for these workers. Doesn't this tend to undermine the purpose of the grants that Amazon received from the Welsh Government for their warehousing facility in Swansea?

Well, those grants would have been given some years ago, certainly before my time as First Minister, but I am interested in looking further at what he has raised. If he could write to me with further details, I will, of course, investigate for him.

First Minister, unemployment in mid Wales is very low, but gross value added per head lags behind cities like Cardiff and Swansea, and there is a significant gap when it comes to the average salaries of those in rural mid Wales. Now, a potential growth deal for mid Wales is one of the ways to ensure that we foster the right skills and training for businesses to thrive. As part of a potential growth deal, do you agree with me that a university-status facility within Powys could provide the stimulus needed to ensure that mid Wales has the right mix of skills for the future in order to bring about higher salaries and deliver a more prosperous economy in mid Wales?

It's an interesting suggestion. There is a university in Aberystwyth, of course. It's not in Powys, I understand, which many of us will know, but he makes the point specifically about Powys. That will be a matter for discussion between, I suspect, Coleg Powys as the further education provider and any particular university. He's right to say that the way to drive GVA up is through investment in skills. We know productivity is a problem in the UK and in Wales. We know that the more skills people have, the more productive they become, the more they can put into their own pockets in terms of their income. So, if there were such a proposal to be made, it would be something, I think, which would be helpful to the local economy. 

Thank you, Llywydd. Well, one thing that would transform the economy of west Wales would be to see a tidal lagoon being allowed in Swansea bay, in terms of employment, skills and in transforming the way that we deal with energy in Wales, and also creating pathways for young people so that they can stay in west Wales and stay in our Welsh communities too. Wednesday is, realistically, perhaps the last opportunity for the Westminster Government to give the green light to this project. Have you contacted them recently? I know you have done so in the past, but are you still putting pressure on the Westminster Government to make this announcement on Wednesday in the budget that the tidal lagoon should proceed, and that there should be an agreement on the way that it’s going to be paid for and how it will benefit the Welsh economy?

We have, a number of times. I raised this personally with the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom—about three weeks ago, now, when I met her—telling her how vital the lagoon was and how important it was not only to the economy of the bay, but much more broadly than that. We have kept the pressure on. This is now a challenge for the Secretary of State, in order to reflect that he has sufficient influence to ensure that this project goes ahead for the benefit of the local economy and that of west Wales.