I just wanted to take part in this debate to reflect on some of the challenges that are ahead. I have to say I did regret the rather self-congratulatory tone of the First Minister in his opening speech and I don't think it reflected many of the challenges that are still ahead. We know, for example, that the performance of our education system is lagging behind other parts of the UK. That's, of course, partly due to the significant spending gap per pupil between England and Wales, which we've debated and discussed many times. It doesn't matter which organisation you look to, everyone says that there's a funding gap and the outcomes are actually worse. 

We also, of course, don't have a service pupil premium for those children whose parents are in the armed forces here in Wales, which they do in other parts of the UK, and, as a result of that, there are challenges that service children have to face as a result of the difficulty, sometimes, of being posted to different places in the UK with their parents, which has an impact and we can't overcome that. 

Now, there has been some progress. This party has welcomed elements of the future generations Act, and I want to pay tribute, of course, as we have in the past, to the work of the former Cabinet Secretary Carl Sargeant in terms of his work on that front. We also, of course, welcome the childcare funding Bill that is currently making its way through the National Assembly. That's not to say that we won't be tabling some amendments to improve it, but we welcome what it's trying to achieve in terms of encouraging people back into work through the provision of free childcare. 

But what this party will always stand against is a smacking ban, a smacking ban that is not popular in the country at large, that no-one has been clamouring on the doorsteps to ask us to put through in terms of legislation. We've got many bigger things to do in terms of the challenges that our country has to face. So, I urge you, First Minister, to consider the growing evidence that there is out there about opposition to this sort of approach here in Wales.

A ComRes poll back in 2017 suggested that 76 per cent of people in Wales do not think that parental smacking of children should be a criminal offence. Yet, that's precisely, effectively what is going to happen as a result of the legislation that you are bringing forward. Seventy per cent of those questioned were concerned that a smacking ban might flood police and social workers with relatively trivial cases, which would mean that they would struggle to stop the serious abusers of children. Seventy-seven per cent think that it should be the role of parents and guardians to decide whether or not to smack their children, not the state. Sixty-eight per cent of those surveyed said that it's sometimes necessary to smack a naughty child. And, 85 per cent, of course, of adults across the country were smacked by their parents or guardians as a form of discipline. 

The current law is working. It safeguards against abuse, and the defence of reasonable chastisement isn't one that is being used in the courts system. The Crown Prosecution Service said that across England and Wales between 2009-17, there were just three cases reported to them where the defence of reasonable chastisement was actually used. All of those cases—all three of them—emanated from England, there wasn't a single one in Wales, and it suggests to me that the system is therefore proportionate and it is working. 

Now, as far as I'm concerned, there are many more important things that you ought to be focusing on in terms of opportunities for children and young people, in particular, the disgraceful state, I have to say, of the Welsh education system after being run by your party for the best part of 20 years. That's what you need to be getting to grips with, not legislating for something that most parents don't want you to legislate on, and that most members of the public don't want you to legislate on either. It will result in many decent, loving parents being criminalised by a system, and the system being absorbed all the time in focusing their energy on trivial things when the serious abuse that does take place in this country needs to be the focus of social workers, and needs to be the focus of the police and the Crown Prosecution Service.