3. What assistance can the Welsh Government give to Carmarthenshire County Council to combat the problem of flies in Llanelli? OAQ52292

The council’s public protection department have located the likely source of the recent infestation and arranged treatment of the site. The council is working closely with the regulator of the site, Natural Resources Wales. The Welsh Government has not been asked for support at this point.

Thank you for the reply, Minister. Since I tabled the question, I'm pleased that the likely site of the infestation has been identified and now handed over to Natural Resources Wales. There's still a good deal of stress and distress, particularly in the Morfa and the seaside parts of town where the problem was most intense, and it was deeply unpleasant for many families. There's a great deal of concern that the problem could reoccur over the summer. The council officers have worked hard to find the source, but I think there are some lessons to learn about communicating with the community, and there are, no doubt, broader lessons to learn too. Would the Welsh Government support Carmarthenshire County Council to see what they can do to improve the local environmental quality, in what is one of the poorest parts of Llanelli, but also reflect with them on what lessons can be learned for them and other councils, should another outbreak occur again?

Can I thank the Member for his follow-up? I completely empathise with the distress that it must have caused to residents in Llanelli, and particularly the area closest to where it happened, and how awful that must've been for people at the time.

Absolutely, there are always lessons to be learned from these things and we can always improve what we've done. Like I said, the council has not approached the Welsh Government for assistance to date, but we're open to those discussions. I understand that they have had advice from Public Health Wales and officials have been in touch with council officers. We know that the council have now handed over responsibility and potential enforcement actions to NRW, and when the enforcement paperwork has been served, we will continue to work with NRW and the council and the local community to ensure that incidents like this do not happen again.