I’m sure it is appropriate that, as we discuss marine issues, tides come and go twice a day—I don’t know whether it’s ebb or flow today, but I just want to highlight the fact that I’m not going to repeat what I said yesterday on the marine plan. So, if people are more interested in Plaid Cymru’s marine policy, then they should read both transcripts together. I just want to focus in this debate on three issues that have emerged from the committee report. One is about funding and resources, one is about data, which has just been mentioned by David Melding, and one is about the future direction of travel.

It became clear from the evidence gathered by the committee that most people involved in safeguarding biodiversity and marine conservation don’t believe that the Welsh Government is allocating sufficient resources to tackle these issues. And that varied, not in criticism of staff, but criticism of a lack of ideas and a lack of resources provided, and that is clearly demonstrated in the fact that the committee has recommended very clearly a way forward for the Welsh Government in this area, namely to designate six clear areas of marine conservation under different systems and levels, as David Melding referred to, in terms of designation, conservation and biodiversitybut to designate six clear areas and to ensure that sufficient funding is available for each of those areas, using local partners and placing the Welsh Government at the centre of that web, as the people who lead and manage this. In looking at the way the Government has responded to those recommendations, essentially, the Welsh Government isn’t going to do that. Essentially, nothing will change as a result of the publication of this report in terms of the way the Government has responded to it. And I do think that that is a significant failing by Government, particularly in the context that the Government published its marine plan yesterday, and we discussed that, and the response to the various MPAs is very important in delivering the marine plan.

The second reason I’m concerned is that we do have a lack of data—there is a lack of data collection, and there is a lack of data in order to compare one period with another, which leads us to the conclusion that we heard in committee on a number of occasions, namely that the MPA designation—the marine protected area, and that covers all of the designations, if you like—in and of itself didn’t lead to an improvement in what was happening in that specific area. And we have similar experiences in the SSSIs on the mainland, of course; every time there’s a designation, it doesn’t necessarily lead to an improvement in biodiversity, or the status of the area, or improved conservation. But we need to highlight that, and one of the reasons that we found that is a lack of data underpinning it. There’s no way to prove that the system works—it’s as simple as that—and therefore it’s difficult to justify spending public money on it, one has to be honest. But what you have here is an interesting question as to which comes first. You have to invest in order to gather data in order to demonstrate that the public funding is being spent in a way that improves biodiversity and improves the quality of our seas and leads to more robust defences in the long term.