The Innovate-to-Save Fund

Part of 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance – in the Senedd at 2:18 pm on 14 November 2018.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:18, 14 November 2018

Llywydd, can I thank Mike Hedges for his continued support for the innovate-to-save fund? He will know that partly in order to make sure that we promote the work that's done within it, the fund is run through a combination of the Welsh Government in partnership with Nesta, the Wales Council for Voluntary Action and Cardiff University, and we rely on the wider networks of those three other organisations to spread news of the fund and to make sure that its successes are widely advertised. There will be a workshop held next week, on 22 November, led by Nesta and the Welsh Government exactly to disseminate learning to date.

I've been encouraged by the fact that in the second round of bids for innovate-to-save funding, we've attracted bids from a wider range of organisations than in the first round—we've had bids from the health service, we've had bids from local authorities and we've had bids from the third sector. That does suggest that news of the fund, and what can be achieved through it, is beginning to make its way out there into the relevant organisations in Wales.