3. Statement by the Minister for International Relations and Welsh Language: International Strategy

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:44 pm on 14 January 2020.

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Photo of Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan Labour 3:44, 14 January 2020

Thank you very much for all the work that the committee has done to feed into this document as well. I actually refute the fact that we don't know where we're going to be in five years. If you look at the executive summary, it's absolutely clear what we want to be doing in five years' time. And that's how you can measure us. You know, 500,000 connections in terms of the diaspora community; I think that's pretty clear in terms of where we would like to be.

On the EU programmes, I think we've made it clear, not just in this document but in this Chamber on several occasions and by several Ministers, that we are very keen to continue with our involvement in those EU programmes; in particular, I think, Erasmus, which we've discussed this afternoon. We're particularly concerned that it looks like the UK Government is going to walk away from the vocational part of that. They're not trying to push that in any way at all. The fact is that we've actually put some money into trying to develop vocational relationships and exchanges with Brittany, just to make sure that we can keep those relationships going during this difficult transition phase.

On Horizon 2020, it's crucial for the success of our scientists in this country and our researchers. And if you think about the fact that, at the moment, we pay about £5 billion into Horizon 2020, but we get £7 billion back, in any new relationship, you can only get back what you put in. That's the difference between being in and out. Israel is a part of the Horizon 2020 programme, so there's no reason why we couldn't be. So, this is a matter of political will, but let's be clear that we will not be getting as much out and we will not be there to frame and to shape the programmes in the way that we've been able to in the past. 

I think that it's very clear in the document that our focus is on the EU—that that's our main relationship, that's where we want to develop—but obviously we need to recognise that the world is changing as well, and that we have those important relationships, in particular with North America, and that we have that global responsibility, in particular to developing some of the poorer parts of the world, and we have chosen to focus on Africa, and on two particular parts of Africa. 

How do we assess the success of the offices? Well, they've all been given a very clear direction now in terms of what the expectation is. I get monthly reports on that, and your committee will now be receiving fairly regular reports. 

On the trade side of things, the UK Government, of course, is going to be working on many different fronts in relation to the trade negotiations. If you think about agriculture, it's going to be fundamental, and Lesley Griffiths is very much involved in that. At some point, as the Minister with responsibility for trade here, I will have to see how we balance the relationships and the priorities between consumers and producers, between different sectors of the economy, between the EU relationship and the rest of the world. All of those things are discussions that we will have to have across Government, and those are things, again, where we don't know what the UK Government negotiating mandate will look like. Once we have sight of that, we will be able to make a more intelligent assessment, I think. 

Let me make it absolutely clear that we are not just focusing on three sectors. Those three sectors are to just get the attention of people when we walk into the room. We did that when we went to Germany last year. We invited people to a tech meeting, we told them that we were going to talk about cyber and compound semiconductors; we finished up talking about insurance tech. So, it's about getting people through the door and how you pique their interest. And certainly, we are not closing off the discussions on investment in any of the sectors, it's simply to give a bit of direction to people, because you basically have a couple of minutes to make an impact, and you can't start talking about every sector. 

On soft power, we had a conference on this recently, organised by the Wales Centre for International Affairs, and that was a really useful setting for us to pick up how best to use soft power. I think an example of us using soft power well was Japan; we need to do more of that. But we also need to bounce off things, like the fact that there are two people nominated from Wales for Oscars now, and those kinds of things make a difference. That's the kind of thing that projects our image onto the global stage. So, I think there are real opportunities and I hope that we can work well together now as a department and with your committee. We'd be very willing to hear and to listen to some of your ideas.