As Chair of the Finance Committee, it’s not often that I am lobbied on issues of animal welfare, but that’s what happened to me when I and the Finance Committee visited Anglesey. The petitioner, Linda Joyce Jones, ensured that she crossed the Menai strait in order to speak directly with the Finance Committee on these very issues.

But I’m speaking today as the Plaid Cymru spokesperson on animal welfare issues, stating that we too support this petition fully and believe that action should be taken immediately to ban the use of wild animals in circuses, and to do that without clouding the waters, as has been done to date, with the valuable but different consideration of licensing animals in other contexts. Can we focus, therefore, on the matter that we’re considering today, this important petition to ban the use of wild animals in circuses?

Plaid Cymru has campaigned on this for some years. Siân Gwenllian has raised the issue, and Bethan has done so too on a number of occasions and has done so consistently. Because of that, it was in our manifesto for the last Assembly elections. As well as hearing from the petitioner, we have personally received a number of e-mails from constituents who are very concerned about this, and there’s also been strong campaigning by the RSPCA.

I will take advantage of the opportunity not to rehearse what’s already been said, but to say that there’s a broader question of zoos, which we need to consider given recent events in Borth in Ceredigion, and the licensing by local authorities not just of circuses but of zoos. The fact is that the legislation that we’re talking about here is very old—it’s ancient, if truth be told—and is not fit for purpose.

I understand that the Government does have to carefully consider how we can tackle this issue and ban the use of wild animals in circuses, so I’m in a position today to tell the Cabinet Secretary that if you use the approach that I’m going to suggest to do this—to ban the use of wild animals in circuses—then Plaid Cymru, and I make this pledge on behalf of Plaid Cymru, will support this so that we can move ahead immediately with a ban.