The Ford Bridgend Taskforce

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:17 pm on 28 January 2020.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:17, 28 January 2020

Can I thank Huw Irranca-Davies for that, Llywydd, and agree with him entirely that the closure of a plant like Bridgend has a regional as well as a local impact? There will be many Assembly Members here, to the east and to the west of Bridgend, who have constituents who are working, have been working, in Ford, and the impact of the closure will not simply be felt in the immediate locality, but right across the region. That is why the taskforce agreed at its last meeting on a regional focus for the next phase of its work.

Certainly, it will want to work with Bridgend County Borough Council to make sure that some of their wider ambitions can be supported by the work of the taskforce. It's why, when Ineos, for example, was brought to Bridgend itself, the Welsh Government has had a real emphasis on supply chain opportunities, because the companies that Ineos will contract with will have a regional impact beyond Bridgend as well, and the taskforce, I know, is going, in its next phase of work, to have a particular focus on that wider impact—the things that we can do beyond Bridgend as a town—to make sure that the impact of the closure is attended to in all its different dimensions.