4. First Minister, what assessment has the Welsh Government made of the impact of the coronavirus in Wales? OAQ55255

I thank the Member for that question. As the global coronavirus pandemic unfolds, our priority is to keep people safe while minimising the social and economic impact of the disease, based on the scientific evidence. The health Minister has made regular written and oral statements on coronavirus, and will make a further statement to the Chamber this afternoon.

I thank the First Minister for that answer. The statement this morning from the Welsh Government was very welcome as far as business was concerned. If I were a business, First Minister, where would I go looking? Who would I speak to, in order to access the package of support that was announced this morning?

I thank Carwyn Jones for that, because it allows me to make that very important point that we have a single point of entry for that advice here in Wales, and that is to use the Business Wales service. That's the number to use, that's the place to go. Behind that number, of course, lies a whole plethora of different advice and different measures that can be taken to help businesses here in Wales.

In addition to all the meetings that my colleague Ken Skates is holding with representative bodies this week, I know that he has been working with the Development Bank of Wales to make sure that they respond flexibly to people who rely on loans and credit from them. We know that businesses in Wales will have access to the services of the British Business Bank and the new possibilities that have been outlined there by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

We are looking, Llywydd, very much to the UK Government and the statement that we are expecting later today for further support to businesses to allow them to survive through the difficult weeks and months ahead, so that they, and those people who rely on them for an income, emerge the other side of coronavirus and are able to pick up their lives again, and get on with making a success of them.

First Minister, one of the industries that is likely to be hit significantly as a result of falling visitor numbers is our tourism industry. It plays a huge role in the economy, particularly in north, mid and west Wales. And, of course, it's absolutely vital that we do what we can to protect those businesses that might be adversely affected, and indeed the many jobs in those businesses, on which so many families' livelihoods depend.

Some of the businesses in the tourism industry may be slightly larger than some of the exemptions that have already been announced in the business rates regime. For example, there are unique businesses like piers, whereby the business rate support that has thus far been announced, will not be eligible for them, even though there are many smaller businesses that, perhaps, are located on those piers. I wonder whether you will be able to accommodate what are sometimes unusual arrangements within the tourism industry, given the importance of it to the Welsh economy, in order that additional support can perhaps be made available to businesses with those sorts of unusual arrangements.

I thank the Member for those important points. He's quite right: the tourism industry is of particular significance in Wales, as part of our economy and as a sector that employs so many people. In my letter to the Chancellor earlier today, I urged him to take an approach to supporting businesses across the United Kingdom that recognised the concentration of particular sectors in particular places. As far as the point he makes about businesses that don't fit, necessarily, the normal profile of the sector, we provided local authorities with additional funds last year that they can use for discretionary rate relief purposes, because sometimes it's the local authority closest to those unusual businesses that is able to make those decisions. We will bear that in mind and the points that he has made this afternoon when we come to make decisions about the deployment of the £100 million that we are yet to determine from the sums that came to Wales from the budget last week.

As regards coronavirus, health demographics are very different here in Wales, compared to, well, even England, in terms of a far higher percentage of elderly population here in Wales, in terms of the far higher percentage of people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other chronic diseases here in Wales compared to England, and in terms of far fewer intensive care unit beds per head of population here, even compared to England. It also suffers adversely in comparison with other European countries, and in terms of far fewer intensive care doctors per head of population here, far fewer than England and far fewer than Italy, which is enduring an absolute armageddon at the moment of 400 deaths per day, and far fewer ventilators and a lack of protective clothing and masks in general practice as elsewhere. So, the reality is that we are on a war footing now. Wales faces huge challenge, with fewer resources than even England. We need dedicated isolation wards now. I can think of only one ward in Wales at the moment that we can use as COVID isolation. I see exhausted medical and nursing staff now who will be asked to make horrendous decisions very shortly as regards who gets ventilated and who does not get ventilated because we haven't got the ventilators.

So, we are three weeks behind Italy. Can I ask how the First Minister is leading the charge here to specifically equip our NHS and our front-line staff to meet this greatest peacetime challenge facing Wales?

Well, I agree with Dr Lloyd about the human toll that coronavirus will take and the pressures already faced by people working in the sector, but I think it's very important that we say to them, and to people who will be anxious about what the coming weeks will bring, that the efforts that are being made across the United Kingdom are designed to affect the progress of the disease, so that the demand on the health service is smoothed as much as we can to make the demand on our health services, both the physical equipment but also the human resources of the health service—to be able to make that as manageable as it can be. We have huge pluses here in Wales, as well as challenges, in the dedication and the determination of our staff, of the willingness of our population to take those collective actions that will make the greatest difference. So, in the difficult days that are ahead, we have to find ways of making the most of the assets that we have, to take the right decisions that individually as well as collectively we can all take, because in that way, together, we will make the biggest difference and make the impact of this disease as capable of being managed as possible.