Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for International Relations and Welsh Language – in the Senedd at 2:19 pm on 18 March 2020.
Thank you. Certainly, we are extremely aware that the people who are significantly under threat here are the SMEs, and they may be averse to borrowing. There are opportunities for them to borrow through the Development Bank of Wales, but obviously some of those are averse to taking that out. So, what we do know now is that we will have consequential funding as a result of the Chancellor's announcement of £1.16 billion, and we are hoping that some of that will specifically be directed towards the retail, hospitality, leisure and tourism sector.
We feel like the Chancellor perhaps should have gone a little bit further than he did do in terms of underwriting the wages of employees who are laid off. So, some of them have already been contracted. I understand your point that some of them would have perhaps just been about to be taken on, but I think, at the moment, we do feel like the Chancellor has got to go a lot further in terms of protecting and underwriting those wages of the employees who are likely to be laid off unless something changes significantly.