3. Statement by the Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs: Response to Coronavirus (COVID-19)

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:22 pm on 8 April 2020.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Lesley Griffiths Lesley Griffiths Labour 3:22, 8 April 2020

Thank you, David Rowlands, for those two questions. I'm not quite sure if you were talking of the 15 per cent modulation. If you were, as I said to Andrew R.T. Davies, we still haven't had assurance from the UK Treasury that we will be receiving that money, and I think I answered the questions around the economic resilience fund to both Andrew and Llyr. I absolutely agree with you that Welsh farmers are innovative and they certainly do need our support and we will be working on what we can do to help, having looked at the economic resilience fund and also a bespoke package. 

In relation to your second point, I'm certainly very happy to promote anything that protects the countryside in the way that you referred. Hannah Blythyn is the lead Minister on public footpaths and I know she has been doing a great deal of work with local authorities. Specifically about public footpaths on farmland, I think the public rights of network—as you say, we wouldn't want to see them closed. They're very important, particularly at this time when we are encouraging people to go out once a day to exercise et cetera. But I think we need to make sure that farmers are happy with the access on their lands. Certainly, again, I did discuss this with one of the farming unions last week, and they were at pains to tell me, really, that most public footpaths on farmland don't go close to their houses and have the infrastructure—so, if you think of stiles, for instance, or kissing gates—that farmers don't use. But, clearly, I'm very happy to look at things on a case-by-case basis. Llyr has actually spoken to me before about a particular incident, which he's just raised again. But at the current time there are certainly no plans to close footpaths across farmland, but, as I say, Hannah Blythyn is the lead Minister in relation to footpaths.