6. Will the Minister make a statement on the effect of the UK Government's recent financial announcement on the Welsh Government's budget? OAQ54320

Based on the UK Government’s spending round, our budget for 2020-1 will be 2 per cent lower in real terms than it was in 2010-11, equivalent to £300 million lower in real terms than a decade ago. In my oral statement yesterday, I set out the impact of the UK Government’s spending review.

Thank you for that response. I’m not going to apologise for making a plea once again that you ensure that local authorities in Wales are given an improved settlement this year. We’ve already heard about the £6 million required for Anglesey to stand still. We’ve seen in the paper this morning that Flintshire council is at the edge of a financial precipice, and I wouldn’t like to imagine what the implications of that would be if things were to go terribly wrong there.

Now, previously, the Government has said that local authorities would be at the front of the queue if funding were to be available. I would ask you to at least repeat that commitment and to do that in the knowledge that fairer funding for local authorities, as we’ve already heard, could contribute substantially to health issues through funding social services properly, but it could also allow us to start to tackle the underfunding of schools too. So, what I want to hear from you and the Government is that local authorities will be at the front of the queue.

Thank you. All of these arguments in favour of improved settlements for local authorities are very well made and well heard, and you would have heard the First Minister previously say that were additional funding to be available then local authorities and local government would be at the front of that queue.

Lynne Neagle mentioned earlier the Children, Young People and Education Committee report, which in very strong terms criticised both Governments regarding school funding. The UK Government has responded and increased the Welsh block as a result of increasing its own UK schools budgets by £14 billion. So, we do now need to see action on this from Welsh Government, and I'm afraid, Minister, you can't just justify years of underfunding in our schools in Wales—this is a point made by unions, not just this side of the Chamber—by pointing at another Government that's taken immediate action to reverse the dangers that were affecting them.

Lynne Neagle asked about early years, but can you confirm that most if not all of the money will go to schools or local authorities for their school budgets? I appreciate you can't give details on that, but in principle. And, if that money does go to local authorities for their school budgets, will it be protected so that councils won't be tempted to divert that money into other areas of need and priority?

Well, I can't agree that the UK Government's taken immediate action to address funding in schools. They've been in power for a decade, so it has taken them some time to wake up to the importance of education and also they gave schools in England and the NHS the certainty of a three-year outlook for their spending. They didn't have the courtesy to do that here in Wales, where we had been promised a three-year spending review. So, in terms of making announcements today and pledges today, I'm not in a position to do that. We've only had our spending allocations for next year, with two years to do that. But I would just reassure people that we are listening to all the arguments that you made, which local authorities made, which different sectors are making, and all of that will be considered as we look to set the budgets in future.

Finally, Mick Antoniw.

Minister, within this austerity context, if could we have some clarity as to the financial situation, perhaps you could tell us how much money we've lost since 2010 when the Tories came into power, perhaps you could tell us what guarantees you've had in respect of European Union funding were we to leave the European Union, and, in respect of the additional money that's being promised, have we actually seen any of this money or is it still as imaginary—[Interruption.] Is it still as imaginary as the Prime Minister's Brexit deal?

I thank Mick Antoniw for raising that. In terms of, 'Have we seen any of the money of it yet?', well, the answer to that is 'no', and there's no cast-iron guarantee that we will, of course, because it has to be subject to a finance Bill going through Parliament, and Parliament, of course, is not sitting at the moment. So, that's obviously an area of concern to us. So, we won't see a single penny of that until the necessary parliamentary processes have completed.

In terms of EU funding, again, the Chancellor was absolutely silent on replacement EU funding and the proposed shared prosperity fund. I asked the Chief Secretary to the Treasury about the shared prosperity fund and, again, it was pushed down the road—'There'll be consultation in future'. We've been promised that consultation for about 18 months now and we are really keen to engage in that. It shouldn't be right that we're consultees anyway, because this is so fundamental, but we continue to make those points that we cannot have a situation where devolution is bypassed as a result of that fund.

I did raise the issue of the fact that Wales should not be a penny worse off with the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, and reminded him that it was a key pledge during the referendum, but he replied, of course, that that was a pledge by the 'leave' campaign, and they are the Conservative Government, but then we reminded him that the Prime Minister is actually one of the people who led that campaign, so we would expect him to stick to that promise to the people of Wales.

Mick Antoniw is completely right to raise the fact that we've seen a decade of cuts and that the funding that we have now additionally put before us doesn't even begin to take us back to the level at which we were 10 years ago.

Thank you, Minister.