Part of 2. Questions to the Counsel General and Brexit Minister (in respect of his Brexit Minister responsibilities) – in the Senedd at 2:36 pm on 26 February 2020.
Well, the political declaration, as the Member may recall, was clear that both parties—both the United Kingdom Government, at that point, and the European Union—were committing to maintaining standards, in terms of workplace rights and so on, which were in place at the end of the transition period. That was a feature of the political declaration.
He will, I'm sure, share with me the concern at reading speculation requests and in speeches, in fact, given by the Prime Minister and others, about the potential upside, as they would describe it—and he and I would describe it as the downside—of weakening labour regulation as a consequence of leaving the European Union. Those sorts of ambitions and aims are not ones that we share in this Government and would not be widely shared across this Chamber. We believe that the kind of relationship that people in Wales will expect into the future is one that enables those labour standards to be maintained, both in Wales and the UK, and for there to be a commitment to do that so that we can take advantage of that level of alignment to support our economy into the future.