Part of 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Local Government and Public Services – in the Senedd at 3:10 pm on 13 June 2018.
I see that the role has delivered accountability. I do see that and I think that is important, but we've just been discussing the future of local government as well, and I regret very much the loss of a direct input from local government into policing in Wales. All too often, we talk about the devolution of powers to this place. We're in different places here; I've spent the whole of my adult life campaigning for devolution and the devolution of powers to Wales. But what I don't want to do is to sit here and be responsible for building a unitary state in Wales either. What I want to be able to do is to deliver devolution within Wales, and that means looking creatively at how we can involve local government in exactly some of the decisions that the Member for South Wales East might be referring to. Certainly, in my constituency experience, I know that the police rely very heavily on the work of local councillors and the ability of local councillors to actually deliver some strong messages to the police. So, I hope that when policing is devolved to Wales, we'll be able to have a very good and rich conversation about how we ensure accountability, and I am clear in my own mind that whatever function or structure we deliver, the accountability cannot start and end in this place; it has to be accountability locally as well as accountability nationally.