Diolch, Llywydd. These regulations were considered as proposed negative regulations by the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee on 12 February, and we recommended uplift to the affirmative procedure because of the significant extent to which they amend primary legislation, mainly the Regulation and Inspection of Social Care (Wales) Act 2016. We therefore welcome the Welsh Government's acceptance of that recommendation.

We then considered these regulations at our meeting on 18 March and reported a technical point to the Assembly under Standing Order 20.21. We suggested that regulations appear to remove a reciprocal arrangement of a kind mentioned in section 8(2) of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, and if that was the case, paragraph 4 of Schedule 2 to that 2018 Act said that Welsh Ministers have no power to make the regulations unless they have consulted with the Secretary of State. Now, there was no indication at that stage that any consultation had taken place in either the preamble to the regulations or in the explanatory memorandum. That is why we questioned whether the Welsh Ministers could make the regulations.

In its response, Welsh Government confirmed that the regulations themselves do not remove a reciprocal arrangement of the kind mentioned in section 8(2) of the 2018 Act. They explained to us that it is the fact of the UK leaving the European Union on exit day that causes the reciprocal arrangements under EU law to cease to apply in Wales, and that the references to the reciprocal arrangements in these regulations therefore needed to be removed from the Regulation and Inspection of Social Care (Wales) Act 2016. As such, the Welsh Government explained that the regulations therefore only correct deficiencies in the 2016 Act arising as a result of the UK leaving the European Union, and they do not in themselves remove the reciprocal arrangements. Thank you, Llywydd.