Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:40 pm on 12 March 2019.
Well, Llywydd, it's an important question. I think it's important to say to the Member that life expectancy amongst some people who are alive today is falling in some parts of the United Kingdom for the very first time since those figures were collected in the way that they are collected. And that is the impact of austerity that is being seen in our society. And personally I believe that obesity amongst very small children is a product of austerity as well. It is the ways in which families who have the very least available to spend are obliged to buy food that fills children up quickly, gives them an immediate boost. And if you don't have the choices that money allows you to make, then you end up making the sorts of choices that lead to the figures that Mohammad Asghar has pointed to. So, this is how those issues of health justice are equally linked to economic justice. And of course we need to make a difference in the lives of those children, because that start in life, arriving at school already overweight and obese, is going to have an impact on that child's long-term well-being. But, fundamentally, that is an economic issue—it's about making sure that those families have genuine opportunities to prosper and to thrive, and tackling it in isolation from those formative conditions I don't think gets to the root of the problem.