Capital Funding

Part of 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance – in the Senedd at 1:31 pm on 24 January 2018.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 1:31, 24 January 2018

I thank the Member for that supplementary question. I'm very familiar with the University of South Wales's riverfront presence at the city-centre campus in Newport, which is highly successful, and I'm aware of the other plans to which the Member has made reference. The Welsh Government has a strong record of investing in education in Newport, alongside the city council. We are investing over £50 million in the twenty-first century schools programme in the Newport area, and the Welsh Government is funding £25.5 million of that. And all of that, as the Member will know, is against a background in which our capital budgets are £400 million lower in the coming financial year than they were in 2009-10, with all the impact that that has on our ability to fund important schemes. We are pressing ahead with the mutual investment model in Wales. That will make a contribution to the twenty-first century schools band B programme, and I've no doubt that, as the scheme that the Member refers to moves forward, we will look to see whether there is anything we can do, through conventional capital or through innovative ways of funding, should that scheme come to our attention.