I am pleased to say that we have made available development funding for some of the local authorities in the strategic hub areas. This will commission the feasibility and design of new integrated transport hubs, replacing, where necessary, existing rail and bus interchange and improving infrastructure and connectivity, which will incorporate the key metro development sites. The designs will also take into account the wider regeneration ambitions for these areas.

Business support remains a key area for us. We want to encourage the facilitation of entrepreneurship and enterprise amongst individuals, businesses and communities in the Valleys. I have provided funding for a focused business support campaign that identifies and brings together success amongst Valleys communities. I have also allocated funding for a pilot project to support a peer-to-peer network for high-growth Valleys-based business founders or leaders.

Harnessing digital technologies plays an important role in this updated plan. We have included three pilot schemes for the Valleys, which the taskforce’s digital work stream will oversee. The taskforce will work with Transport for Wales to ensure its new integrated responsive transport programme gets people from all parts of the Valleys to and from their health appointments more effectively, and we will be developing an app to support this. 

We will also pilot the Wi-Fi i Fi programme–an exciting way opening up public sector broadband to create community Wi-Fi hotspots to be used by everyone in the local area. Again, an app will be created, which shows where these hotspots are in the Valleys. We are also investing in the Wales-wide mapping tool 'Lle'. We will develop its functionality and content to enable easy access to a host of useful data to inform and encourage investment in the Valleys.

Deputy Presiding Officer, last month I updated members about the creation of a Valleys regional park and our ambition to use the park to strengthen the national and international profile of the region. Last month I published a prospectus, inviting others to help shape the thinking behind this regional park. The prospectus has been well received here and across the Valleys. There was also a striking consensus that to succeed we need to work collaboratively with a focus on the Valleys as a whole. 

We have refreshed the 'My Community' section in the delivery plan to deliver the first phase of the Valleys regional park, focusing on the three themes of landscape: culture and identity; recreation and wellbeing; and then communities and enterprise. At the heart of our plans for the regional park are the gateway locations across the Valleys, which will help tell the stories of these Valleys. These gateway sites will encourage people to be more active and to explore the beautiful landscapes of the Valleys. I have said that I intend to announce the first location of these gateways by the end of the year and deliver phase 1 by spring 2019.

Deputy Presiding Officer, working closely with local authorities and other partners in the Valleys, I am pleased to be able to announce today that Dare Valley Country Park, Caerphilly castle, Cwmcarn forest, Blaenavon World Heritage Visitor Centre—[Interruption.]—I can't hear that—Cyfarthfa Park and Bryngarw Country Park will be amongst those gateway sites. I will announce further sites in the coming weeks. The £7 million of capital funding for the development of the Valleys regional park, which the Cabinet Secretary for Finance announced in the draft budget for 2019-20, will be invested in these gateways and the iconic trails that connect the Valleys. The detailed plans for utilising the whole of that allocation will be announced in due course.   

One of the defining features of the Valleys taskforce has been its ongoing engagement with people living and working in the Valleys. It's been really important for all of us to talk to and listen to people and local communities. That's how this plan was and has been developed and shaped. That engagement will continue to be at the heart of our approach. The taskforce will also continue to work across the whole of Welsh Government and with both city deals. We want to be a catalyst not just for change in the Valleys, but for a more joined-up Government working together to deliver for the people we represent. This delivery plan cuts across all the Welsh Government departments and all of my Cabinet colleagues’ portfolios. I’d like to thank all of my colleagues and their departments for their commitment to this agenda.

Deputy Presiding Officer, we want this plan to meet the needs and ambitions of people living and working in the Valleys and their expectations. The taskforce has already began to make a real and lasting difference to the south Wales Valleys, and it will continue to do so.