Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:05 pm on 14 May 2019.
The Government, as we've already heard today, of course, a fortnight ago declared a climate emergency, and this Assembly made a similar statement too. Now, I would expect that there would be a great deal of activity happening behind the scenes within the Welsh Government to respond to that statement and to clearly demonstrate that that statement is meaningful. I would assume, for example, that we would need to look again at the Government's legislative programme to ensure that that is fit for purpose in terms of meeting the challenge facing us, and that challenge has intensified now, of course, having recognised that it is an emergency. So, it would be good to have a statement from Government outlining any changes to its legislative programme as a result of that statement.
Also, could the Government make a statement to explain how the announcement of a climate emergency is going to impact upon the process of deciding on the M4 relief road in Newport, because, clearly, one would assume that the weighting given to the various factors would shift as a result of that statement?
May I also ask the Government and the Minister for Finance for an opportunity to have an update on the written statement released today? I understand that an error has emerged in terms of the work of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs on implementing devolved income tax in Wales, to the point where the coding for Welsh taxpayers has been incorrect, with many Welsh taxpayers being coded as being Scottish, and as a result have paid the Scottish tax level rather than the Welsh income tax level. Now, there isn't a great deal of detail in the Government's statement as to how many people have been affected, how this could have happened, and what HMRC is doing to solve this problem. So, some update on that situation, and perhaps an opportunity for us as Members to ask questions, would be something that I would appreciate.