Orb Steelworks in Newport

Part of 4. Topical Questions – in the Senedd at 3:24 pm on 18 September 2019.

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Photo of Delyth Jewell Delyth Jewell Plaid Cymru 3:24, 18 September 2019

Deputy Minister, I've been an Assembly Member for less than a year and I've lost count of how many times we've had to discuss the loss of jobs in our communities in this Chamber. Schaeffler in Llanelli, Ford in Bridgend, Rehau in Ynys Môn, Quinn Radiators in Newport and now Orb in Newport again—in total, it's more than 3,000 jobs in the space of months. So, Deputy Minister, I'd like to ask what is going wrong with the Government's industrial strategy and what's your analysis of the reasons behind all of these closures in such a short space of time.

In relation to the Orb announcement, I'd like to ask what steps your Government will be taking to support the workers who are facing redundancy and if you'll offer assistance to them in acquiring redundancy payments in the case of involuntary redundancies. How will you help them to get new jobs, particularly if that requires retraining? And, finally, how do you intend to hold Tata to account for the broken promise that they made to workers of job security in exchange for pension cuts? One worker told Newyddion 9 that he felt he'd been lied to. So, have you held a meeting with Tata to reiterate this justified anger? I think everyone in this Chamber would appreciate answers to these questions and an explanation of how you're going to make sure that more of these job cuts aren't seen in the near future.