Our vision is to make Wales a full-employment, high-tech, high-wage economy.  We want more people joining or returning to the world of work. We want a more inclusive workforce, with greater numbers of disabled people in work, and a decrease in the gender pay gap, as well as the disability, and black, Asian, minority ethnic pay gaps. We need to prepare people for a changing world of work, ready to meet the opportunities of automation, digitalisation and decarbonisation. But we won’t shy away from the challenges that this change brings either. There are predictions of significant job losses and disruption in the labour market. So, we are preparing now, by making sure our skills and training provision is closely linked to market requirements, that lifelong career development becomes standard practice, and that the needs of business can be heard and responded to quickly. The Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Transport will convene a taskforce on automation to consider the challenges and opportunities in this area, and I look forward to working with him to ensure that our workforce is prepared for the future.

With this plan, we offer a national framework which sets a direction and standards. We've set a series of stretching and ambitious targets relating to unemployment, economic inactivity and skills levels, because we're determined to make real progress on these within the next decade. But I'm aware that this won't be easy: economic inactivity and generational worklessness affects many communities in Wales, but our individual, hand-holding support will help people to tackle their own personal barriers to employment.

Under this national framework, there is room for flexibility at a local and regional level. Communities across Wales have different strengths and needs. We will work with partners at a regional level to bring together business, education and training providers, local government and the third sector, and ensure that they're working in co-ordination to meet the needs of the area.