4. Will the First Minister make a statement on what the Welsh Government intends to do to encourage more engagement in local democracy? OAQ53858

I thank the Member for that question. The local government and elections Bill will include measures to encourage engagement with local democracy in Wales by extending the franchise, promoting transparency, diversity and wider engagement.    

Thank you for that answer. First Minister, we are currently celebrating 20 years of this institution with a clarion call for more Assembly Members. I see that Scotland, with its population of nearly 5.5 million, has fewer councillors than Wales, with our population of just over 3 million. In my view, we are overrepresented in Wales. First Minister, how can you square the call for more AMs with the taxpaying public when literally nothing—[Interruption.]

Ignore noises off and just carry on with your question.

I do come to the committee.

First Minister, how can you square the call for more AMs with the taxpaying public when literally nothing is being done to reduce the number of councillors and local authorities?

Well, Llywydd, I don’t think the basic premise of the supplementary question is true, because, in fact, the number of councillors in Wales has gone down as a result of changes brought about by the independent organisation that reviews these matters on our behalf. But I don’t accept myself the basic premise of what the Member said. I don’t think Wales is overrepresented. In fact, there are many studies that demonstrate that, compared to other and very successful parts of Europe, we have less of a representative democracy here in Wales, and it’s my view—it isn’t shared by all Members, I understand—that, 20 years into devolution, the responsibilities that this body now discharges on behalf of people in Wales mean that going on trying to do that successfully with 60 Members, the number we started with when the responsibilities, the range and depth of responsibilities, was so different that it no longer measures up to the responsibilities that are carried out on behalf of people here in Wales, and that the case made in the McAllister review for an increase in Assembly Members was well made and doesn’t depend, I believe, on reducing other forms of representation in Wales in order to achieve that.

Welsh Government has proved averse to implementing the Localism Act 2011's community rights agenda, which would help community engagement. In 2012 the Welsh Government rejected the Wales Council for Voluntary Action's 'Communities First—A Way Forward' report, which found that community involvement in co-designing and co-delivering local services should be central to any successor tackling poverty programme, and, although the well-being objectives in the 2015 Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act include people contributing to their community being informed, included and listened to, too often this hasn't happened either because people in power don't want to share it, or because of a failure to understand that delivering services this way will create more efficient and effective services. So, what action do you and your Government propose to encourage more engagement in local democracy by turning the ambition in the well-being of future generations Act in these areas into understanding and delivering?

Well, Llywydd, I am completely committed to the notion that public services in Wales should be co-designed and co-delivered with those people who use them alongside people who provide them. The Member makes a fair point, that, at the heart of these things, often, are power relationships and that sometimes we have to work hard to persuade professional workers that they can share some of the power and the authority that they have at their disposal with people who use those services and that that doesn't represent a threat to them and is very, very likely to lead to better outcomes for the people who they are there to serve. I don't think that that requires specific pieces of legislation to bring it about, because I think it is a cultural shift in the way that people who provide services think of the relationship between what they do and the people who come through their door, regarding those people as assets, as people who have strengths, as people who have something to contribute to the way that services are provided, and this Government is committed to that as a principle throughout everything that we do in the services for which we are responsible in Wales.