Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:03 pm on 9 July 2019.
May I thank the Minister for her statement? I welcome it—and that's not something I've said very often over the past few months—but legislation of this kind was a manifesto commitment for Plaid Cymru in 2016, so we certainly support the principle of legislating in this area.
It's disappointing, or perhaps frustrating, that it's taken so long for us to reach this point where the Bill is to be introduced this week. I know that we lost some time waiting for the UK Government to take action in this area, and there may be a lesson for us there: if we truly feel that we need to act in any particular area, then we need to look to do so ourselves, I would say, in future.
May I ask—? You make reference to implementing this legislation from 1 December 2020 onwards. That would mean that there is a possibility that there'll be another summer next year where travelling circuses will be possible and that wild animals will be used in their visits to Wales. It's a plea to the Minister to see if there's any possibility that we can hasten this process, because I would love to see legislation being passed before that point, so that we can be in the situation where this is the last summer where we would see these travelling circuses in Wales.
I have referred to the fact that, in principle, we are supportive of what the Government is doing. It's possible, as we've already heard, that there may be a discussion required around definitions in terms of various terminology in the legislation, and perhaps the powers or the extent to which powers are handed to Ministers to interpret and to outline those. I'm relatively relaxed on that at the moment, but I do assume that that’s where much of the debate will centre.