2. Will the Counsel General make a statement on the distribution of financial support to community-based enterprises through the Wales European Funding Office? OAQ53819

Over £80 million of EU funding has been committed to community enterprises and third sector organisations through the Welsh European Funding Office as part of the current EU structural funds programmes.

The Senghenydd Youth Drop In Centre in my constituency has applied for a piece of that funding. I’ve made the Minister aware of it through written communication. SYDIC is a community-based enterprise that runs a drop-in for young people in the Senghenydd area and is incredibly valuable in my constituency. They’ve currently got land for a green energy project and have planning permission to develop a wind turbine on the land. They found it difficult to proceed, and were denied the ability to proceed, with a WEFO funding grant for that community wind turbine because of the rather rigid criteria that we have for those kinds of applications. I know the Minister, and I fully appreciate that the Minister, can’t make any specific comments about individual applications, but, with this experience in mind, would he commit to considering how we can learn from the SYDIC experience in order to make community-based green applications more successful with WEFO in future?

Well, I thank the Member for that supplementary. Obviously, I am aware of the project in his constituency based on the correspondence that we have had. He's acknowledged I can't make specific comment on that, and in fact that those decisions are made by WEFO, not by Welsh Ministers. There has been a large number of successful projects that have gone to community and third sector organisations, and including capacity-building initiatives in order to encourage further successful applications from the third sector. I met recently with the Wales Council for Voluntary Action, for example, to talk about their interest and their role as an intermediary body in supporting WEFO in administering EU funds.

In relation to the particular point that he makes about further enhancing the role of community organisations as beneficiaries of EU funds, certainly that is something we would wish to see, and, in relation to the particular project in his constituency, I would encourage the organisation to make contact with officials to discuss the particular project.

Minister—Counsel General, I should say—Hefin David, the Member for Caerphilly, has made an important point, I think, about the potential in future—whilst recognising that WEFO fund has been incredibly important to community-based projects in the past, there is the potential now to make the new structure more suited to both your area, Hefin, and my area, to better support environmental projects. We know that we are, as Welsh Government has said, in a climate change emergency, so what discussions have you had with the Minister responsible for energy to make sure that, in the future, whatever structure—I know we're in early days yet—does replace the existing funding that Wales has had for these types of projects, that environmental projects and renewable energy are at the heart of that, so that Wales can really take a lead within the UK and make sure we are the most environmentally beneficial part of the UK?

Well, both the Member's question and that of Hefin David has at its heart that question of ensuring that the Welsh Government priority to ensure community involvement in local renewable projects is enhanced, and that remains a priority for the Welsh Government, needless to say. In relation to future schemes, we obviously wish to ensure that we have access to the same level of funding, and that decisions can continue to be made by the Welsh Government in relation to regional funding here in Wales. The reason that's important is because they can then reflect the priorities of the Welsh Government going forward into the future, including the priority that he and Hefin David mentioned in your questions. But, in order for that to happen, we do need to see clear action on the part of the UK Government to live up to the commitments made by the Prime Minister to ensure that we do not suffer a loss of funding and that the devolution settlement is respected. That has not yet come to pass, and I very much hope that he will join me in calling on the UK Government to make good their promises in that area.