I'd like to thank Jenny Rathbone for co-submitting this motion, and my colleagues across the Chamber who have supported it. Period poverty is when women and girls struggle to pay for essential sanitary products on a monthly basis with significant impacts on their hygiene, health and well-being.

Findings from the charity Plan International UK indicate that one in 10 girls has been unable to afford sanitary products. One in seven girls has had to ask to borrow sanitary wear from a friend due to affordability issues, and more than one in 10 girls have had to improvise sanitary wear due to affordability issues. The growing public and political interest in this issue has revealed the shocking fact that for too many women and girls, basic feminine hygiene products are now unaffordable.

We have anecdotal evidence of mothers going without sanitary items in order to buy them for their daughters instead; of women who are homeless being forced to improvise with dirty rags, socks and even newspaper; of girls from low-income families missing school when they have their periods because of the challenge of managing them away from home without adequate sanitary protection.

We've also heard from the Trussell Trust that revealed last week that it saw a record increase in food bank figures for 2017-18, and that more and more women are struggling to afford basic sanitary products and are relying on donations, with some choosing to sacrifice sanitary products for themselves in order to put food on the table.

But there are serious physical and mental health impacts for women who are not able to manage their periods hygienically every month. From infections that can be caused by being forced to survive on just one or two tampons to feeling trapped indoors in order to be near a toilet, and of feeling too embarrassed and ashamed to ask for help.

Period poverty is a very private struggle and a hidden consequence of austerity that has only recently hit public consciousness. We must expose it as a health, hygiene and inequality issue too. But I also want this debate to acknowledge that we have a clear responsibility to women and girls in Wales to develop period dignity as part of our commitment to gender equality.

Unfortunately, there is stigma attached to menstruation, despite it being a natural and important process. It's unbelievable that periods have been, and remain, a taboo issue. Indeed, older generations often referred to menstruation as 'the curse'. Even today, we euphemise and belittle periods; we talk about 'being on' so that as well as not being able to afford sanitary items, women and girls can feel too embarrassed or ashamed to say they're menstruating.

This is extremely difficult for girls and young women, and it starts in primary school and through to secondary school. So, I think it is important that as well as talking about period poverty, we also talk and use the opportunity to talk about and address period dignity. The enlightening report from Rhondda Cynon Taf council's scrutiny working group, which was established to deal with free sanitary provision in schools, highlighted some of the concerns raised by schoolgirls about period dignity and stigma, with some of them saying, and I quote:

'Boys make fun of us if they see us going to the toilet with our bags—it’s embarrassing'.

'I would rather go home' than ask a teacher for a sanitary product, especially a male teacher. 'Boys mature later', menstruation needs

'to be put into perspective as they are going to be future partners, fathers, employers and the stigma needs to be taken out. They need to realise that it’s a normal bodily function and the impact it can have on females'.

This is why the motion today asks the Welsh Government to consider calls to improve public awareness and education on menstrual health and wellbeing, addressing the stigma that's still attached to menstruation and opening up a natural and national conversation about periods.

I do, however, very much welcome the Welsh Government's recent response to period poverty, with the announcement that local authorities will receive £440,000 over the next two years to tackle period poverty in their communities by providing feminine hygiene products to those women and girls most in need, and this can be through community groups, schools or food banks. And, most importantly, £700,000 of capital funding will be available to improve facilities and equipment in schools. It's particularly encouraging to note that this funding will be used in primary schools as well as secondary schools. This is in acknowledgement of research that shows that more girls are starting their periods at a younger age, and some primary schools can lack the facilities that they need.

At this point, I would like to praise the efforts of the local Labour women's forum and councillors in the Vale of Glamorgan, who've been working hard since last year to raise awareness of period poverty and make sure the issue of free sanitary provision in primary and secondary schools in the Vale of Glamorgan has been on the council's agenda. Councillor Margaret Wilkinson said: 

'This is a poverty issue. This is a hidden, quiet problem. Girls don't want to talk about it.'

Councillor Jayne Norman from Llantwit First said: 

'Menstruation affects every woman. We have no choice in the matter.... For too many young women and girls, admitting that they are even having their period is embarrassing enough, without having to confess that their family cannot afford to buy them the sanitary protection they need. The protection which allows them the right of dignity and wellbeing.'

I would also like to praise the excellent work of Welsh organisations such as Periods in Poverty, Wings Cymru, The Red Box Project, the Trussell Trust and many others, which I'm sure we'll hear about this afternoon, to raise awareness of and help tackle this issue.

Silence prevents progress and I'm so glad that we're breaking the taboo and it's good to see so many staying in the Chamber this afternoon to share and take on board this issue, to tackle the invisible scandal of period poverty and lack of period dignity by being part of this debate in the Assembly today, and I look forward to hearing Members' contributions. Thank you.