3. Will the First Minister make a statement on the level of support the Welsh Government gives to armed forces veterans? OAQ53587

Llywydd, the Welsh Government supports veterans across the range of our responsibilities, including employment, health and in education. 

Thank you for that answer, First Minister. There are 51,000 veterans in north Wales alone, and although we have Veterans' NHS Wales, there are only three psychologists to look after their mental health needs. That's clearly not viable, but that isn't really what I'm driving at here. But having said that, I don't think it's fair to expect Government and the NHS to do everything, and we should be encouraging self-help whenever possible. Tŷ Ryan was a project in Wrexham that involved veterans taking part in the building of one and two-bedroomed apartments for occupancy by veterans. Tŷ Ryan made a huge difference for those veterans involved. It improved their mental health, as well as providing much needed housing. For some time, my office has been in contact with Woody's Lodge, a charity concerned with the welfare of veterans. Like me, they see how self-build projects can benefit veterans, and that around north Wales there are plots of unused brownfield land that could be used for these projects, often owned by local authorities. So, would you agree to meet with myself and representatives of Woody's Lodge charity for veterans to see if we can develop a way to locate and release unused local authority land for future veterans' self-build projects? 

I thank the Member for her supplementary question. As it happens, Llywydd. my colleague Rhianon Passmore was talking to me about Woody's Lodge and the work that it does only very recently, so I'm aware of the work that it does and Project 360°, which is part of that initiative. And it is part of that self-help way of doing things that has been a very prominent part of the way the veterans community has organised amongst itself to make sure that it's able to share experiences and allow people to draw strength from one another. Now, my colleague Alun Davies nearly a year ago committed to a scoping exercise to identify any perceived gaps in service delivery for veterans and their families here in Wales. And the expert group that we have set up to carry out that scoping activity and other things will engage with service charities, including Woody's Lodge and Project 360°, to see if there is more that we can do to ensure a collaborative approach between what public services can provide for veterans, and those many ways in which veteran organisations mobilise themselves to help their own members.   

First Minister, can I welcome the work that the Welsh Government has put in with other partners to support our veteran community across Wales, and to embed the armed forces covenant in our public services? One of the issues that was recently discussed at the Cross-Party Group on the Armed Forces and Cadets was the difficulty sometimes that many veterans face in trying to access employment once they have left their time in the military. One of the things that was raised at our meeting as something that perhaps the Welsh Government could consider is that in the United States, there are guaranteed interviews with some public sector employers so that veterans have the opportunity to at least present themselves directly to an employer. Is this something that the First Minister might consider for the Welsh Government, and promote more widely within the public sector in the future? 

I thank Darren Millar for that idea. The Welsh Government has been working recently with key partners to develop an employment pathway, and we've been working with Business in the Community, because they've developed an employers' toolkit, and that toolkit is designed to help employers recognise the qualities that ex-service personnel can offer to them in the jobs that they have on offer. Now, the idea of a guaranteed interview, in which people can at least make sure that they make their pitch and get their voices heard, is one that we've used in other parts of the Welsh Government. We've used it, for example, for people with disabilities to make sure that they can get in front of employers and so on. So, I'm very happy to take that idea away and have it discussed within that work on employment pathways and the employers' toolkit that we are already doing.