Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:15 pm on 16 January 2018.
Leader of the house, I'm delighted to announce to the Chamber that the Freshwater Habitats Trust have appointed me as the Assembly's new species champion for the freshwater pearl mussel as part of their #ShowTheLove campaign, a role that I am going to relish, I'm sure. I'll be raising many questions on protecting that species with the Cabinet Secretary when I bed into the role—on the sea bed. [Laughter.]
In the meantime, on the broader issue of the marine environment, in the news at the moment is, of course, the problem of plastic pollution. We know that the UK Government and the Scottish Government as well—. Supermarkets such as Iceland, in particular, have said that they plan to eliminate plastic packaging from all of their brands by 2023, I think it is. I wonder if we could have a statement from the Welsh Government, or a debate even, on how you intend to support moves such as this.
I think that supermarkets such as Iceland, in making these bold moves, do deserve support. I think it would be good if we could encourage behaviour like this across the board so that our marine environment can be cleaned up from this awful plastic pollution as soon as possible, so that wider species than the freshwater pearl mussel can appreciate the clean oceans and clean seas and aquatic environment they deserve.