Can I wish the Member a very happy new year, and say how pleased I am that my gift to him arrived safely and in time for him to read it over Christmas? [Laughter.] Look, let's just look at the facts concerning average full-time earnings. You're right, £484.40 a week is the average, but, between 2012 and 2017, that average increased by 10.1 per cent, compared to the average across the UK, which was just 8.8 per cent. And therefore the gap has been closing, as a consequence of interventions by this Government. 

It is true that, historically, the gap in wages between us and many other parts of the UK was smaller, but that was at a time when far more people were employed in higher paid jobs in, for example, the steel industry. Consequent to the de-industrialisation, without the safety net in the 1980s, those quality jobs—well-paid, secure jobs—were replaced by jobs that were often temporary and poorly paid. Unemployment rates rose through the roof. Employment today, the employment rate, has increased more quickly in Wales than in the UK throughout the period of devolution. It has increased by 6.5 per cent, compared to 3.1 per cent, and unemployment has decreased more quickly in Wales than in the UK as a whole as well during devolution.

So, I think, if you look at our recent record, if you look at the record of this and the previous Labour Government in Wales, you'll see that, in terms of earnings, we're heading in the right direction and in terms of employment, again, in the right direction. Unemployment is down and it's heading in the right direction, but the big challenge that our economy faces—. And I don't think that the Member would disagree with this, because the Secretary of State at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy I'm sure agrees that productivity is the big challenge that we face as a country. And, in order to improve productivity, we need to improve skills levels. Once we've improved skills levels, the availability of high-quality work, then we will see a significant increase in average earnings and we will see that gap continue to close.