Therefore, I ask the Minister for Health and Social Services to propose the motions on both sets of regulations—Vaughan Gething. 

Motion NDM7322 Rebecca Evans

To propose that the Senedd, in accordance with Standing Order 27.5:

1. Approves The Health Protection (Coronavirus  Restrictions) (Wales) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2020 laid in the Table Office on 24 April 2020.

Motion NDM7323 Rebecca Evans

To propose that the Senedd, in accordance with Standing Order 27.5:

1. Approves The Health Protection (Coronavirus  Restrictions) (Wales) (Amendment) (No. 3) Regulations 2020 laid in the Table Office on 11 May 2020.

Motions moved.

Thank you, Llywydd. I formally move the two sets of regulations before us today, and I ask Members to support the regulations before us. I will refer to them as the 'No. 2' and 'No. 3' regulations, rather than repeating their full long title. 

Members will recall the debate that we held on 29 April on the two preceding sets of regulations to those being debated today. These were the Health Protection (Coronavirus Restrictions) (Wales) Regulations 2020, that were made and came into force on 26 March. These are the principal regulations that placed restrictions on our movements and required the closure of certain businesses. Their main purpose was to minimise the extent to which people leave their homes during this emergency period to help contain coronavirus, to minimise the burden on the health service and, of course, to save lives. 

Further amendments were made in the amendment regulations that came into force on 7 April. These introduced the requirement for social distancing measures in all work places and made important changes in relation to burials and cremations.

As the lockdown has continued, the Welsh Government has continually reviewed the requirements, and we are very aware of the effect that these constraints are having upon the people of Wales. Our continual review is in addition to the 21-day review cycle, which requires Welsh Ministers to review the need for restrictions and requirements every 21 days.

As with the sets of regulations that precede them, the two sets of regulations that we're debating today were introduced under the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984 through emergency procedures to support our approach to tackling coronavirus in Wales.

In the No. 2 regulations, which came into force on 25 April, we made a number of revisions. We made provision to permit exercise more than once a day, if needed, because of a particular health condition or disability, and made it clear that visiting a cemetery or other burial ground or garden of remembrance to pay respects to a deceased person is a reasonable excuse for leaving the place where you live. We also widen the definition of a 'vulnerable person' to include other specific groups or conditions where people could benefit from assistance, and providing supplies for them is a reasonable excuse for another person to leave home, for example to assist people with dementia. These changes supplemented the rules already in force but were made to respond to some of the challenges that we know were being faced by families throughout Wales, whilst at the same time ensuring the aim of controlling the spread of coronavirus has been maintained. 

The No. 2 regulations also ensure the 2m physical distancing requirements are in place for click-and-collect style services, and extended the physical distancing duty to cafes accessible by the public in hospitals, and to those responsible for canteens in schools and prisons and for use by the armed forces to ensure that all reasonable measures are put in place.

In the No. 3 regulations, we've taken steps, in line with public health and scientific evidence, to improve well-being and support economic activity. We've lifted the limit on exercising no more than once a day, and permitted the opening of libraries, provided distancing requirements are followed. A 'stay at home' message in Wales remains in place, and our regulations specifically state that exercise must be taken within an area local to the place where a person is living. These regulations also provide that garden centres and plant nurseries may open subject to the social distancing requirements.

So, we've changed what constitutes a reasonable excuse for the purposes of section 8(1) so that it is explicit that a person may make use of a recycling or waste disposal facility or collect goods ordered from a shop on a click-and-collect basis if they need to. I'm pleased to see that recycling centres are now reopening on a planned basis across Wales.

Importantly, the No. 3 regulations increase democratic oversight by removing provisions about terminating requirements or restrictions by ministerial direction. This means that all changes to the principal regulations must be brought before the Senedd. Llywydd, these restrictions are in place to protect people's health and control the spread of coronavirus. The law is, however, clear that these restrictions can only be kept in place for as long as they are necessary and proportionate, and I am very aware of the extraordinary efforts that have been made by so many people across Wales to help all of us to slow the spread of the disease.

Our road map, published on 15 May and just debated, lays out specific steps that we are considering as we move out of lockdown. As part of our cautious and coherent approach to easing the restrictions, we will consider if and how we bring forward further regulatory changes in the coming weeks. For today though, our message to the people of Wales is to stick to the advice to stay home, and, if you need to leave home for one of the permitted reasons, to stay local. In doing that, you'll protect our NHS and help all of us to save more lives. Thank you, Llywydd.

Chair of the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee—Mick Antoniw.

Thank you, Llywydd. Members will be aware that these two sets of regulations amend the principal regulations on the coronavirus restrictions, and they're made, as has been indicated by the Minister, under the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984. Now, for context, I'd like to briefly outline the purpose of the principal regulations, which came into force on 26 March and were subsequently approved by the Senedd on 29 April.

Those regulations put restrictions on the movement of individuals, setting out circumstances in which they may leave the place where they live, and prevent gatherings of groups of more than two people, except in certain circumstances, and again, as has already been commented on, require the closure of certain businesses and impose requirements on other businesses, as well as duties to close certain public footpaths and land. The No. 2 amending regulations came into force on 25 April, and the No. 3 amending regulations came into force on 11 May.

Our reports on these regulations are provided with the agenda, so they are before Members. There are no technical reporting points that we wish to raise in either case, but I do want to make absolutely clear that we have paid very close attention to these regulations. We do all fully understand the reasoning behind these powers. The Minister himself has explained this reasoning as well, but, nevertheless, it is important to recognise that they are probably the greatest restriction on fundamental liberties and rights that have been put in place across the whole of the UK since the second world war. It is therefore fundamental that the implementation and operation of these extraordinary powers are kept under regular scrutiny by committee and by this Parliament, as we are the custodians of the liberties they restrict, and ensure that they are only in place for as long as public safety requires it and they are a proportionate restriction to the risk.

Now, our human rights obligations are also fundamental, so it is important that these are highlighted, and what I'd like to do is to focus on the human right aspects of the amending regulations, which we highlight in the merits section of our report. So, we noted that the following articles are engaged in relation to the No. 2 regulations: article 8, which is the right to respect for private and family life; article 9, which is with regard to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; article 11, freedom of assembly and association; and article 1 of the first protocol, protection of property. Now, all of these are qualified rights, which, as the Minister has already indicated, can be interfered with provided the interference is justified.

Now, the Welsh Government's explanatory memorandum originally did not identify the specific articles that it considers are engaged in respect of these regulations, so we noted that the Government set out a limited commentary on the justification for interfering with the exercise of human rights as a result of the regulations, mainly to prevent the spreading of infectious diseases and protect public health, and in a manner that is proportionate. However, it should make its justification by reference to the specific articles of the Human Rights Act 1998 that are engaged, and such an approach allows the Welsh Government to explain more clearly the balancing exercise it undertook as it required under human rights law when a private right collides with a public interest. I do not, of course, say that there has been any breach of human rights; I only emphasise that, even in times of emergency, human rights must not be forgotten.

Furthermore, we must at all times resist the temptation to allow the restriction of liberties and rights to become in any way normalised. So, I therefore welcome the Welsh Government's response to our report. It identifies that, in addition to the articles referred to in our report, article 5, that is the right to liberty, and article 14, the prohibition of discrimination, are also engaged. It also provides a more detailed commentary justifying and explaining the interference with the exercise of human rights.

Turning now to the No. 3 regulations, these regulations do a number of important things, again, as the Minister has outlined: permitting libraries, garden centres and plant nurseries to open subject to requirements to take all reasonable measures to ensure a distance of 2m is maintained by persons on the premises and persons waiting to enter the premises; specifying that leaving the place where you live to collect goods ordered from a shop operating on an order-and-collect basis constitutes a reasonable excuse for the purpose of regulation 8(1) of the principal regulations; and removing the limitation on exercising no more than once a day.

Now, as regards human rights, the explanatory memorandum explains that the regulations engage articles 8 and 11 as well as article 1 of the first protocol. Again, some commentary on justification for interference with these rights is provided. Of particular note, the regulations add the proportionality of requirements and restrictions as a consideration when the Welsh Ministers review the principal coronavirus regulations. In our report, we note that proportionality is a fundamental consideration when assessing the justification for interfering with certain individual rights under the Human Rights Act 1998 and it goes to the root of the lawfulness of the decision to interfere with those rights. So, as such, we welcome this amendment because it recognises not only the Welsh Ministers' overarching duty of proportionality, as the Minister has confirmed, under the 1984 public health Act, but also their overarching responsibility to ensure compliance with the Human Rights Act, which we are satisfied there is. Diolch, Llywydd. 

I would like to put on record that I believe that the Chair of the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee has articulated in a very clear and passionate way the necessary regard we must pay to our fundamental liberties and rights despite the difficult time we're currently in, and, therefore, he very clearly enunciated my concerns about these ongoing regulations and the way that they're being handled and brought forward. These principal regulations are subject to constant amendment in a number of areas, because the Welsh Government put them on the face of the legislation rather than in the guidance, and that, I think, is acceptable. But it does mean that we, the Welsh Parliament, are always discussing the amendments after the event, and that is not in my view a wholly satisfactory situation. Properly scrutinising these regulations is vital, and although there is a need for Parliament to approve them in order for the regulations to be enforced for more than 28 days, it cannot be acceptable, for example, that these regulations were only brought before the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee on 18 May. In my view, this denies a clear scrutiny process, and whilst we're living in difficult times I would urge the Welsh Government to submit and allow themselves to submit to due scrutiny, and they must ensure that they do not allow the circumstances we're in to subvert that scrutiny.

We need more clarity on both regulations and the guidance that accompanies them, because the current regulations are confusing and in many cases apparently contradictory. People don't know what they mean. I know that my inbox has a multitude of e-mails from constituents who are unclear as to the meaning behind the regulations. And I noted in today's answer by the First Minister to Carwyn Jones, who was trying to bring further clarity to the regulations, and he had to give that further clarity. Alun Davies also said that his constituents were seeking clarity, so I am not alone.

I am pleased that the regulations place a requirement for a proportionality of restrictions, but I want to draw the Senedd's attention just to a couple of areas, so, for example to regulation 8, which is amended to allow reasonable exercise more than once a day. Now, here's an example of how unclear these regulations are: what is local? I note Welsh Government state there is no desire to define 'local', as there will be different meanings whether you're in Cardiff or in mid Wales. So, we have a situation where you can drive to your nearest golf course, which may be 30 minutes away, but you can only go fishing if you can walk or cycle there. And if you drive 10 minutes to a beach to surf on your own, socially distancing, you're reprimanded and possibly fined by the police. You can exercise from your own house in a crowded street with difficulty to get social distancing, but you can't drive for a couple of minutes to go to a common just up the mountain from where you live. You can now eat during a walk, but local authorities have blocked picnic spots, so again, a contradiction. All this is based on the science, we are told. 'It's the science' is Welsh Government's mantra, and rightly so, but how come, then, it is so vague and contradictory, and, as the police tell me, very hard to enforce?

There are many other anomalies, other examples within these regulations of a lack of clarity, other areas that appear contradictory, and I don't have the time to go through them all. But suffice to say that the Welsh Conservatives will support amendment 2 to the health protection coronavirus restrictions regulations. We will, however, be abstaining on amendment 3 of the aforementioned regulations. And, Minister, I want to give you and the Welsh Government notice that we will not hesitate to vote against future amendments if the Welsh Government is unable, unwilling or incapable of improving the clarity of further amendments, and explaining the science and the social rationale behind these further changes to us and to our constituents, because we are indeed in difficult times, but we must always, always pay real heedance to people's rights to life, to liberty, to freedom of movement, and you've got to explain to us very clearly, because people are confused; they are worried; they are fearful they're breaking the law.

Obviously, in Plaid Cymru, we do support these regulations, though as has already been noted, this vote is retrospective as the regulations are in place, and as a member of the legislation committee, I support, naturally, the excellent comments from our Chair, Mick Antoniw. The fact is, though, the R rate remains too high to risk a further wave of cases, and we were too slow to enter lockdown, it's cost lives and it means we have to stay in lockdown longer. And that's why we need a more cautious approach in easing restrictions; in the long run it means not having to re-impose them again. But, we do have several concerns.

First, the Welsh Government's communications have been all over the place here. People are allowed now out to exercise more than once a day, as we have heard, provided they don't drive, but some people are still very unclear about all of this, and I have a filling inbox as well to that effect. Obviously this hasn't been helped by the contempt the UK Government has shown Wales with no consideration that its changes to allow driving would inevitably lead to people driving to tourist spots here in Wales. We're also concerned by the failure to properly prevent an exodus to second homes. We note new COVID cases are on the rise in Betsi Cadwaladr.

Now, moving on, I realise the Welsh Government has published its exit strategy with its traffic lights; there's a distinct lack of detail in it though, and many people will be none the wiser about basic questions relevant to their lives now, like when can they take their children to see their grandparents. Key to being able to answer all of this of course is suppressing the virus, in our view, but instead, what we have from both Governments is managerial intonations about mitigating and managing the R rate to prevent a second wave. The maths of it is simple: a few more weeks of relentless efforts to keep R below 0.5 will yield far greater results than months of attempting to keep slightly below 1. Testing and contact tracing will be key.

Now, this country used to have a superb public health and communicable disease control system, with a system of notifiable disease notification and personal contact tracing reaching back over decades. That excellent public and environmental health infrastructure has been decimated by austerity and Government complacency about the possibility of pandemics in general. Now, Welsh Government are on the charge to install a new layer of private testing and app-based tech as though we've never thought of contact tracing ever before in our lives. Local public health teams need to take back control. Contact tracing and testing, case finding, isolation and quarantine are classic public health measures that have always been used for controlling communicable diseases since Victorian times, since Dr John Snow, in fact, isolated the Broad Street water pump in Soho in London in 1854 as the source of a cholera epidemic.

In closing, huge personal sacrifices have been made in lockdown to suppress the virus. We are not there yet. Cases of COVID infection are still on the rise in parts of Wales. Voting against any of these regulations today though makes no sense, because it'll be like turning the clock back to not allow visits to garden centres, and not allow more exercise—things that have already kicked in. That's due to the retrospective nature of both the debate we're having and the voting that we will shortly undergo. So, we shall be supporting the regulations. Diolch yn fawr.

It's a pleasure to follow Dai Lloyd, and I thank him for his comments there. I know the John Snow story well as, 25 years ago, I lived in a flat above the John Snow pub, looking over that pump that has been preserved in now Broadwick Street.

We all emphasise the public health issues, we all have concern for the other health issues, and my colleague Mandy Jones spoke very ably about those in the debate earlier. I think we also need to have a degree of consideration for the economy, not least because if we don't have the resources, we won't be able to fund the health.

We are voting against both sets of regulations today. The amendment 2 regulations—quite minor amendments in them; I find it extraordinary the Minister can sign them off as being urgent, at least in some of the cases. We have moot changes to the once-a-day requirement to allow certain groups to be exempt from that, but that once-a-day requirement, which should never have been there in the first place, has already been removed by the No. 3 regulations that came into force before we had a chance to consider them. The No. 2 regulations, I mean it's an extraordinary minor point: apparently a requirement

'to resolve the tautology of having a "need to obtain basic necessities"'. 

I mean, has Welsh Government got nothing better to do? How on earth can that have been urgent, Minister? And it's not just pedantic, but it's wrong. Whether or not you have a need to basic necessities will depend in part on whether you have them or not already.

The third area of these where there's—I hesitate to say significant, but it does extend them, is the 2m requirement for social distancing put into legislation, which I find absolutely extraordinary. What is the scientific evidence of Welsh Government that they have, that apparently others don't, that 2m is the key determinant? Why do they think that key determinant would be the same inside as it is outside? Why do they think the countries in Europe such as Germany, which has 1.5m, or France and Italy, which I believe have 1m—? Even the World Health Organization, which I certainly don't accept as gospel, says 1m. Why do we in Wales know better?

Has this 2m actually just been carried over from an English template used by UK Government? But of course they haven't put that in law. They're working sensibly with businesses, industries and sectors to think how best to get them back to work in a way that minimises spread of risk in a sensible way while getting the economy going. It's much harder to do that in Wales, because legislation specifies that 2m and it refers to 'persons responsible for businesses'. That requires a business to determine who in that business is legally responsible. And it may be that the person who is responsible and usually does things doesn't want to be named as the person who is responsible and maybe guilty of this offence set up by Welsh Government, and therefore that business may not reopen when it otherwise could.

Many, many large businesses operating across the UK, in many cases beyond, reopening many of their places of business in England, will look at this and think, 'Well, actually, there's going to be an offence if we do it in Wales, and we have to be certain we're not committing that offence, and actually, to date, we haven't got any Wales law specialists on our staff, and it's difficult to go out and get external advice, and we don't want the risk of potentially falling foul of that regulatory requirement', so they don't reopen. I just do not think this is a sensible approach. 

The amendment 3 regulations: I thought actually much of what Angela said about that. I think she spoke very well, and many of the points about the exercise regime I won't make as she's already made them. I welcome that the Conservatives will actually be abstaining on these amendment 3 regulations. It's about time we saw at least a degree of opposition from them to what Welsh Government is doing and their determination to have difference for difference's sake from what is going on in England. 

For the first time, we actually see in law that requirement in terms of local for exercise. Of course, the First Minister says things that are very different. He keeps on going on about exercise having to start and finish at home, but that isn't in law and, at least when I last checked, I couldn't find it in the Welsh Government guidance anyhow. It did however say that local, if you lived in Cardiff, wouldn't be as far as Porthcawl, so I hope some people find that helpful, that if they do drive to exercise but they don't drive that far at least they're being consistent with that element of the guidance. I think it's very difficult to judge what people can do. We've heard, I think, Dai Lloyd say you couldn't drive, but I've heard some other people say you can in some circumstances. And the legislative requirement that we—or, at least, I fear others—are going to agree to is that it should be local, which is undefined.

But our strongest reason for voting against these regulations is that they remove the requirement for Welsh Ministers to get rid of restrictions if they're unnecessary. I find it absolutely extraordinary that you can have these restrictions on people's lives, as extreme as they are, consider that they're no longer necessary, but change the law so you can keep them anyhow for up to six months. And the health Minister has the cheek to tell us that that's increasing democratic oversight. What it's doing is it's giving it a ratchet. It is entrenching these restrictions. Ministers can willy-nilly bring them in when they like, claim they're urgent and make them law, without the Assembly having agreed them—as, belatedly, we have the opportunity to do here—but when they become unnecessary they can keep them. I think that is wrong. 'Reasonable', 'proportionate', those are all in the UK law. It is outrageous that Welsh Government is changing the law so it can keep restrictions when they are unnecessary. So, instead, they can put them through their continuity-Corbyn equality tests and sieve them on that basis. It's not a proper basis for retaining these types of restrictions, and we'll be voting against both sets of regulations.

The Minister for Health and Social Services to reply to the debate—Vaughan Gething.

Thank you, Llywydd. It's important to recognise that these regulations are just part of a comprehensive response to effectively managing the coronavirus outbreak that continues here Wales, and that we're doing everything that we can to tackle the pandemic and to protect public health. It is thanks to the efforts made by people across Wales that we have helped to slow the spread of the disease, to protect our NHS and to save lives.

We know that the continued lockdown is impacting upon people's health and well-being as well as our economy. We are now, though, entering a critical stage. We will continue to be guided by scientific evidence, direction and the advice we receive from the chief medical officer in how we move forwards in defining how the restrictions currently in place, in different areas of Welsh life, can begin to be eased.

There is now a regular publication of the summary of that scientific advice that is going to take place each Tuesday, so the charge made by Mr Reckless in particular, that there's no evidence of what the advice is—we're providing a regular update on what that looks like. It underscores the choices Ministers make. It's also important to underscore the purpose and the requirement for the regulations and to help inform the continuing public debate.

We of course take seriously the points made by a number of speakers about the clarity, and the point and the purpose of the regulations, what that means is within the regulations and not, and we aim to provide that within our guidance. We will of course take that forward as part of the next review. We'll need to look again at the point and purpose of the regulations. I disagree; I don't particularly agree with Mr Reckless's quasi-legal attempt to define what's happening with the powers. We still have to have regulations that are necessary and proportionate. We still have to have the check of the advice from the chief medical officer that these are regulations that should be in place to tackle the public emergency, the once-in-a-century event, that we're all living through.

We know that we cannot tackle the virus without a collective approach, so we want to encourage that continued conversation with all of our partners, the most important of whom remain the people of Wales. The conversation about how, with the limited headroom that we have, we make choices that we need to make to ease the current regulatory restrictions, and we don't put at risk the lives and well-being of people across Wales. These are difficult choices to make and they will remain difficult choices. The balance of what we choose to do in the regulations will need to reflect the reality—that those choices in themselves are difficult—and we then need to consider their cumulative impact, and then to be able to explain those in a way that is genuinely persuasive to the people of Wales. But I recognise, in the previous debate, there still is widespread support for the cautious approach that we're taking, and that remains the Government's approach.

The amendments to the regulations that we've debated today were made in response to stakeholder views, to help promote further economic activity and to support families across Wales. For today, the regulations, in our view, must stay in place as they are proportionate to the threat that we face, and they will only be in place for as long as required.

I do therefore ask that the Senedd support these regulations and agree that they're necessary measures to respond to the pandemic and to protect public health here in Wales.

The first proposal, therefore, is to agree the the Health Protection (Coronavirus Restrictions) (Wales) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2020. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Yes, I see an objection and therefore we will defer the voting under this item until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.

The second proposal is to agree the Health Protection (Coronavirus Restrictions) (Wales) (Amendment) (No. 3) Regulations 2020. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Yes, again, there are objections and therefore we will defer voting on those regulations until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.