Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Local Government and Public Services – in the Senedd at 2:26 pm on 29 November 2017.

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Photo of Adam Price Adam Price Plaid Cymru 2:26, 29 November 2017

Diolch, Llywydd. I'd like to return, if I may, to the Valleys taskforce implementation plan. I think all of us would agree that it contains, at a high level, very, very laudable aims in terms of our communities, and we thank members of the taskforce, and, indeed, all those who took part in the various consultations that occurred across the Valleys areas.

But as the Cabinet Secretary, I'm sure, will concede, the key will be in the detail, of course, of how the plan is delivered. There are 68 action points in the plan as a whole, but you refer to specific targets. Maybe I can help him out here because, actually, the plan itself, on page 46, actually shows that there are only two specific targets. After going through all the well-being indicators, there are only two. And 7,000 additional jobs, 2,000 of which will be created as a result of entrepreneurship activity. Could he say, just for clarity, are those net additional jobs—in the jargon? Are those jobs created rather than jobs created, safeguarded and assisted? Seeing as this is the only target in the plan, what budget has been set aside to create those jobs? Even if we take the standard, the £30,000 or £40,000 per job, which the Welsh Government uses, you're talking of hundreds of millions of additional funds. If, actually, we only achieve the level of job creation that we've seen in the enterprise zones—£90 million-odd in Ebbw Vale and only 170 jobs created in that case—then you're talking of billions, and yet there's no additional money set aside that I can see in the Welsh Government's draft budget.