The next group of amendments is the group in relation to the report on operation and effect of the Act. Amendment 2 is the lead amendment in the group, and I call on Angela Burns to move and speak to this amendment and the other amendment in the group. Angela Burns. 

Amendment 2 (Angela Burns) moved.

Diolch, Madam Presiding Officer. I'd like to move amendment 2.

We have a responsibility here, and our responsibility is not just to make law, but to make good law. And if you're going to make law, especially groundbreaking law, law that is not common in other home nations and not usually common, in fact, in Europe, then the least you can do when you've made that law is to make sure that you have caught the data that you need to ensure that your law goes out there and actually does what it's supposed to do, that it affects the right people and that it achieves your policy objective. And so what our amendment 2 does is it specifies the characteristics that must be considered as part of the evaluation report and who the Welsh Ministers should consult with in preparing this report, because I remain conscious of the concerns that were raised at committee level and in the explanatory memorandum that increasing the price of alcohol products could eat into the budgets of families and individuals on low incomes or could lead to the substitution of alcohol for illicit substances. For example, recommendation 14 of the committee's Stage 1 report specifically stated these concerns to the Government. To continue to proceed without strengthening the Bill to put in place a system to regularly monitor these concerns would, in my view, make bad law, and I don't want to make bad law; I want to make good law that actually lies lightly upon the shoulders of the people and does what it is supposed to do.

To be fair, since Stage 2, the Cabinet Secretary has set out plans for evaluating the Act, which speaks to many of the specific concerns raised at committee and in my previous amendment. The letter from the Cabinet Secretary on 22 May back to the health committee talks of using a theory-based evaluation method known as contribution analysis to evaluate the Bill. Now, I have no problem with the suggested methodology per se. However, the Welsh Conservatives are seeking to place this amendment on the face of the Bill because it is vital that no matter which methodology is used it is important the criteria detailed in this amendment is gathered from the very earliest stages. To be frank, Cabinet Secretary, this level of information should be analysed no matter what methodology is used. This is not just our view, but the view of many witnesses and of the cross-party membership of the health committee.

Now, I'm not going to read through every single part of our amendment, but we do want to capture information about persons whose consumption of alcohol exceeds the current UK chief medical officer's guidance. We do want to capture the specific age groups of persons considered to be at higher risk of harm from alcohol, and we said to Welsh Government, 'You decide that, but we want to get that information.' We want to have the impact of alcohol consumption on income group. You know, Wales is not a wealthy nation for an awful lot of people and it is vital that we do not have unintended consequences that have a ripple effect in so many people's homes. We want to capture whether or not this alters the incidence of domestic abuse, whether or not alcohol-related hospital admissions do go down, and the impact, of course, on alcohol support services, which is absolutely vital, the impact on retailers, on the publicans of Wales, cross-border sales, and internet sales.

For me, one of my key areas is the switching from an alcoholic drink desire, drive and addiction to going to another substance: drugs. This is all vital. We capture that information, we can then know whether or not this minimum unit price Act is doing what we want it to do, is doing what it says on the tin. And if not, what we can then do is change it. We can tweak it, we can move it so that it actually does what we need it to do to achieve the policy objectives. And one of the great griefs that I find, having got more involved in the public sector, is that whenever we have policies that we do not monitor, we do not measure, therefore we cannot with clarity say how successful they are. 

Now, I have made the decision to alter my amendment slightly from Stage 2 in response to the Cabinet Secretary's comments regarding an evaluation after two years—I've taken on that point—and I have bent to accommodate your commentary on the definitions of harmful and hazardous drinkers. And this altered amendment is, in my view, reflective of the Cabinet Secretary's own plans for evaluation. The only other home nation to adopt minimum unit alcohol pricing is Scotland, and they have similar provisions, which I think shows the wisdom of capturing relevant data at a very early stage. I do urge the Welsh Government to accept this amendment, and we will also be supporting amendment 5.

We are going to be supporting the amendment that Angela Burns has been speaking to. Very simply, we believe that this amendment increases the post-legislative scrutiny that will need to take place before remaking this Act. That is a sensible step, and our amendment—amendment 5—is linked to that, but is specifically designed on our part to ensure that a National Assembly committee looks in full at the impact and the successes and the weaknesses of these measures as they're implemented. Because whilst we support the principles that we have here, it is also true to say that it is through the experiences of implementing these measures that we will be able to see their true impact. Scrutiny, and looking at and assessing this legislation as it is implemented practically, will be crucial. Therefore we would like a committee of the Assembly to look at this issue.

Now, the amendment itself, as you will see from reading it in detail, is more general than that. It talks about the Assembly taking the necessary steps in order to scrutinise. Now, my understanding from that, and indeed my hope, is that the Assembly, in those circumstances, would refer this to a committee. That is what would make sense, and I hope that we will hear from the Cabinet Secretary that he would consider that to be the practical effect of the amendment that we have brought forward. So, I do hope that we will be able to gain the support of the Government for this amendment. There have been discussions beforehand, and I do look forward to hearing a clarification from the Cabinet Secretary that he will see the true purpose of this amendment in the same light as I do.

I call on the Cabinet Secretary, Vaughan Gething.

Diolch, Llywydd. I'll first deal with amendment 2, as moved by Angela Burns. Again, we have discussed it during Stage 2. I recognise it is a different amendment from the one that was proposed, but it continues to be my view that it is neither necessary nor desirable. Of course, I have recognised the importance of evaluation and review. Indeed, the Bill requires Welsh Ministers to publish a report on the operation and effect of the legislation at the end of an initial five-year period, and the the Assembly must then positively endorse the continuation of a minimum unit pricing regime within a period thereafter. And indeed, that break and that sunset clause has been widely welcomed by external stakeholders. So, I agree with the principle, except that report should focus on the extent to which the legislation has contributed to delivering change across a range of outcomes, including things like the levels of consumption, hospital admissions and alcohol-related deaths—and, indeed, some of the work that has already been done on the impact of minimum unit price on specific groups.

I'm pleased about the recognition that Angela Burns has made on the plans for the evaluation that have been shared with the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, as I indicated they would be, and that is to demonstrate to Members we do want to have some openness in the conversation and the detailed consideration that we are giving to the proposed evaluation and review of what is, I accept, novel legislation. And those plans do discuss bespoke studies under consideration in addition to looking to learn lessons from the evaluation of the minimum unit price in Scotland, and how best we learn from other studies that are planned or under way in this policy area, including a range of interests from the university sector here on examining the impact of the legislation. And as we do more work over the coming months, I'll bring forward more information about our finalised plans, and I'll again be happy to share those with the committee for any comment that they wish to make. However, the level of detail in the amendment, to me, still appears to pre-empt the ability not just of the Government but of a future committee, or otherwise, of this Assembly to determine the greatest value and concern they would have for the evaluation, at some point, roughly, in the midterm of the next Assembly. We all know a week is a long time in politics. Forecasting in such detail what must be covered in five years after the introduction of minimum unit pricing does not seem to me to be proportionate. I believe it's important to recognise that we've outlined the broad terms for a formal evaluation review in the explanatory memorandum. We've provided more detail since then, so there is a real commitment to openness in the way in which you develop that evaluation and listening to the Assembly in doing so.

In terms of amendment 5, I'm happy to indicate that the Government will support this amendment. During Stage 2 proceedings at committee, I gave a commitment to work with Members, so that an amendment at Stage 3 could be brought forward to ensure there is appropriate and meaningful post-legislative scrutiny by the Assembly. I also indicated that it did not need to be a Government amendment. I do feel it's important that the amendment on this matter should complement existing procedures already in place for the Assembly, and I believe this amendment does that, because it requires Welsh Ministers to consult with the National Assembly for Wales in preparing that report on the operation and effect of the Act. So, that means the Assembly must be consulted before Welsh Ministers lay a report under section 21, and that will trigger the Assembly's ability to decide, under its own Standing Orders, whatever scrutiny it considers appropriate. I'm happy to confirm that I share Rhun ap Iorwerth's view that I would expect that to be the Assembly for itself determining to refer the matter to an appropriate committee for a formal report to be provided, to ensure there is meaningful scrutiny and the ability to take evidence at that time. In particular, the Assembly will be able to understand and seek any representations that the next Assembly feels would be relevant, ahead of making any decision on whether it should continue with the minimum pricing provisions. So, therefore, I'm happy to indicate the Government will not be supporting amendment 2, but to indicate, again, the Government is happy to support amendment 5.

I call on Angela Burns to reply to the debate.

Thank you, Madam Presiding Officer. Cabinet Secretary, I'm completely underwhelmed by your response. In the years that I have been here as an Assembly Member, I had the pleasure of chairing the Finance Committee for a term. I've also sat on some of the very heavy-duty policy committees, namely education and health. And time and time and time and time and time again, I have found policies where there has been precious poor monitoring, very little measurement, very little real analysis of the effectiveness of policy that's been undertaken.

Here we have before us a proposal for a piece of legislation. Whilst I recognise that your sunset clause is nicer than it was, and is and has been welcomed by a great many people, the reality is that legislation is very seldom repealed. In fact, I am struggling to think of a piece of legislation in the Welsh Assembly that's ever been repealed, but I'm open to any offers. So, I feel very, very strongly—very strongly—that we actually need to make sure that we collect the right data. As my colleague said to me, just a moment ago, why on earth wouldn't we want to capture this data? Why wouldn't we want to capture how many people are affected in their pockets by this, adversely, who never had a problem with drinking? Why wouldn't we want to capture how many people might switch from alcohol to drugs? Why wouldn't we want to capture domestic violence changes as a result of this? Why wouldn't we want to capture the effect it might have on alcohol and drug treatment centres and the more money that we need to put into it and the costs? So, I fail to understand why you wouldn't do that. So, I find your argument absolutely spurious. I'm really dismayed that we don't put on any of our legislation—but we're talking about this one, so I shall concentrate on this one—that we do not put in the Bill what we will measure and how we will measure. I accept measurements change, and I accept you're going to add in more things—and absolutely right—and that's why we have exactly this:

'such other characteristics or other matters as the Welsh Ministers consider appropriate.'

But I consider it's appropriate that we actually measure a number of these other ones. This is what we've heard in committees, it's what the cross-party committee actually all agreed and said we should do, and you don't want to do it, and I think that is really poor show.

The question is that amendment 2 be agreed to. Does any Member object? [Objection.] We'll proceed to an electronic vote on amendment 2 tabled in the name of Angela Burns. Open the vote. Close the vote. In favour 17, four abstentions, 29 against. Therefore, amendment 2 is not agreed.

Amendment 2: For: 17, Against: 29, Abstain: 4

Amendment has been rejected

Rhun ap Iorwerth, amendment 5.

Amendment 5 (Rhun ap Iorwerth) moved.

Formally.

The question is that amendment 5 be agreed to. Does any Member object? [Objection.] We'll proceed to an electronic vote, therefore, on amendment 5. Open the vote. Close the vote. In favour 45, four abstentions, one against. Therefore, amendment 5 is agreed.

Amendment 5: For: 45, Against: 1, Abstain: 4

Amendment has been agreed