The next item, therefore, is a statement by the First Minister on the coronavirus, and I call on the First Minister to make the statement—Mark Drakeford.

Thank you very much, Llywydd. Once again, I will report to the Senedd on the latest steps that we have taken in response to the coronavirus crisis.

Last week, we completed the third three-week period where we are required to review the restrictions that are in place. I will outline the decisions that came into force on Monday, 1 June. As we have done previously, we took account of the latest Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies evidence and the advice of the Chief Medical Officer for Wales and, on the basis of that evidence, we have taken cautious steps in relaxing some restrictions in order to enable people to meet each other in conditions where the risk is low. Although the figures are moving in the right direction, it is not safe yet for us to go further than that.

Llywydd, as in previous weeks, I will cover matters in this statement not dealt with in the statements that follow from the Minister for Health and Social Services, the Minister for Education and the Minister for Housing and Local Government.

In my previous statement on 20 May, I drew attention to the impact of coronavirus on the Welsh Government's budget. The Minister for Finance and Trefnydd has set out the changes in the first supplementary budget published last week. This includes £2.4 billion to support the coronavirus response, including £750 million to fund our NHS and public services. We have funded more than 55,000 grants to businesses in Wales, at a cost of £660 million. These businesses are also benefitting from rates relief through the £1.4 billion package announced in March.

Llywydd, the Welsh Government's response has gone far beyond the sums provided by the UK Government, but we remain constrained by Treasury rules that limit our ability to respond to the crisis. The finance Minister will continue to press the case for greater flexibility to enable us to direct resources where they are needed the most.

And, of course, the Welsh Government will continue to make new allocations in response to the crisis. Our initial funding of £10 million helped more than 800 homeless people into housing since the lockdown began. It was an important moment in devolution, Llywydd, when the Minister for Housing and Local Government was able to identify a further £20 million to help ensure that no-one has to return to the streets here in Wales, and she will have more to say on that, I know, later in proceedings.

Last week, the Minister for Economy, Transport and North Wales announced funding of £65 million to ensure train services continue to operate on the Wales and borders network. This follows funding of £40 million confirmed in March, taking the total support to a maximum of £105 million. We will continue to ensure that vital public transport links are maintained.

Llywydd, I am pleased that the guidance that we published last week on safety in the workplace was endorsed by both the Confederation of British Industry and the Trades Union Congress. Last week also saw a meeting of the extended social partnership council, attended by representatives of the third sector and commissioners, as part of our partnership response. 

Llywydd, I will turn now to the outcome of the three-week review concluded on Thursday, 28 May. The context is that coronavirus continues to present a cruel threat to health in Wales. Yesterday, the Office for National Statistics reported that, in all settings, up to 22 May, there were 2,122 deaths involving coronavirus in Wales. While these numbers are coming down, with patients in critical care beds, for example, reducing week by week, we remember the loss of each individual life, the families who are grieving them and the need for continued care and caution by us all.

Members will know that our coronavirus regulations must be reviewed every 21 days. The test we must apply is whether the restrictions on life in Wales are proportionate and necessary to protect public health. In applying this test, we must have regard to the advice of the chief medical officer and we also rely on the latest evidence from the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies.

This is the third review, Llywydd, and I will summarise the process we have followed. First, we draw together a list of the potential options for easing restrictions, drawn from ideas generated within and beyond the Welsh Government, including the many suggestions we continue to receive from people right across Wales. That list is reduced for discussion and examination to a short list of options, and those are evaluated in detail against the questions set out in the framework document we published in April, including the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 principles. Our aim is to identify measures that have a positive impact and the least risk to public health. We are always mindful of the harms caused by the restrictions, not just directly through coronavirus, but in other ways, to public health and to people's social and economic well-being.

We have held discussions with the other Governments in the United Kingdom and the mayor of London over that three-week period in order to share ideas and analysis, to understand one another's approach and the evidence in each of our jurisdictions. Coherence does not mean taking an identical approach to lifting or, indeed, imposing restrictions. Each Government must be accountable for the balance of measures we decide to adopt.

Finally, we have considered the latest evidence about the transmission of the virus, which determines how much headroom there is for any easement without putting at risk the progress achieved so far. We concluded in Wales that the conditions allowed for some adjustments to the restrictions, but the very clear advice from both SAGE and the World Health Organization is to make only one change at a time and to monitor its impact.

We decided to give priority to enabling people to meet others, as separation from family and friends has been so hard for people over the past two months. In doing so, we responded to the clear message from people in Wales that the lack of human contact was the issue that mattered to them most. The evidence said that the safest way to do this was outdoors, where the virus survives for a much shorter length of time than it does within doors. Accordingly, people can now meet others from one other household in the open air in their local areas, provided that social distancing is maintained. This will also be possible for people in the shielded group, provided they observe the social distancing, and that will be even more essential, of course, for them.

Llywydd, we made some other, minor adjustments to enable students to return to further education colleges for the assessments that are essential for some to complete their courses and to enable weddings to take place where one of the couple is terminally ill. I've also signalled that non-essential businesses that are able to comply with the physical distancing duty can start to make preparations over the coming three weeks so that they would be in a position to reopen after 18 June, provided—and always provided—that the evidence at that time supports them in doing so.

Llywydd, we are already halfway through the first week of the next review period. We are starting to consider options for any further easements that may be possible at the end of the period, supported by the contact tracing system that started in earnest on Monday. We will continue to take cautious steps towards reducing the restrictions, in a collaborative, four-nations approach, protecting public health and responding to the priorities of people here in Wales. Diolch yn fawr.

Leader of the opposition, Paul Davies.

Diolch, Llywydd. First Minister, last Friday, as you've just mentioned, you took the decision to start easing the lockdown restrictions in Wales, and introduced the rule to allow people to visit their loved ones within a 5-mile radius while socially distancing. That rule may have been some comfort to those living in some areas, but this has also been met by many with anger and frustration in other areas, many of whom felt that the Welsh Government simply doesn't care about those who live in the more remote parts of the country. You said yourself that unfairness was inevitable. First Minister, given that you're keen to tell us that your policies are based on the latest scientific and medical advice available, where is the scientific and medical advice that you have received regarding this particular policy, and will you now put that scientific and medical advice in the public domain so that the people of Wales can understand how the Welsh Government has arrived at this specific decision?

Llywydd, let me correct the leader of the opposition on something that he said, and I hope that neither he nor his colleagues will go on repeating something that is simply untrue: there is no rule about 5 miles in Wales. If there were a rule, that would have been in the regulations. There is guidance, a rule of thumb for people in Wales to understand what 'local' might mean, and I have repeatedly said that it is for people to, in a sensible way, interpret what 'local' means in their own individual geographies, because 'local' is inevitably different in a city like Cardiff, where 5 miles will take you to thousands of other households, and what it might mean in a rural part of Wales.

The scientific advice is about staying local, and we know that staying local is very important because it prevents the spread of the virus from one community to another. The 5-mile rule of thumb is there precisely to protect people in the further west and north of Wales from people from places where the virus has been in greater spread from travelling to those communities and bringing the virus with them. The leader of the opposition will know very well just how emphatic people in those localities have been about protecting them from visitors coming to those areas and putting them at risk. The 'stay local' message protects individuals and others, and the 5 mile guidance—and that's what it is; it is not a rule, it is guidance—is there to protect those communities in rural Wales from people otherwise believing that it was fine to travel in large numbers from outside those localities, and in order to avoid the distressing scenes that we have seen across our border where that sensible advice is not in place.

Clearly, First Minister, this is very confusing for people, because you've just said that now this is a rule of thumb, so people will now not know whether they can travel 5, 10, 15 miles. It's a fact that this policy has upset thousands of people across Wales who are watching others reunite with loved ones whilst they have no option but to remain at home.

Now, First Minister, yesterday the health Minister warned some lockdown measures may have to be reintroduced in the winter depending on the prevalence of COVID-19 at that time, and whilst I appreciate that no door can be closed on future restrictions, the comments have made for very grim reading for many people across Wales. Of course, strategic planning must be considered to ensure that Wales is prepared for future lockdown restrictions in the winter months, and allocations must be set aside should Wales be in the position where the Welsh Government needs to reintroduce further lockdown measures. Therefore, can you confirm what financial modelling is currently taking place to ensure that Wales has learnt from this pandemic? Could you also tell us what allocations of funding the Welsh Government is setting aside in the event that there need to be further restrictions in the winter? And what lessons have already been learnt about Wales's response to a pandemic from this period that will inform the direction of travel for any future pandemic spikes?

Llywydd, I thank Paul Davies for those questions. It's important to remind people in Wales that while we believe we have passed, in almost all parts of Wales, the first peak of coronavirus infections, and have done so thanks to the enormous efforts of people across Wales, have done so while avoiding our health service being overwhelmed, that is no guarantee at all that unless we go on doing all the sensible things that we are doing that we might not have a second peak later in the year. Conditions in the autumn will be more favourable to the virus, which doesn't like sunlight and doesn't like the outdoors, but likes the indoors, the dark and the damp, and we will be in that part of the year as we move into the second part of the autumn. So, I agree with what Paul Davies has said about the need to use this opportunity to prepare, should we find ourselves in more difficult conditions in the second part of the year. And he will know that in our framework document, one of the tests we've applied to lifting the lockdown is, 'Could any measure be re-imposed should it turn out to have unforeseen adverse impacts?'

So, we are doing further modelling both on the disease itself, making sure, for example, that in terms of PPE we use the relatively stable position we are currently in to replenish our stocks, so that we would have material ready if it was needed in the autumn. Financial modelling is far more challenging, because the needs of businesses, of local government, of people who have been without work in Wales in this first coronavirus phase have been so urgent and so necessary. We have passed on all the money, the consequentials that we have received from the UK Government, as fast as we have been able to do so. There is no great pot of money sitting idle in the Welsh Government waiting for things that can happen in the second half of the year. Of course, the finance Minister maintains a reserve, as we would need in normal times, and our budget—the one that was passed in the Assembly in March—is modelled over a 12-month period. But if there were to be a second peak and we were to find ourselves back in the difficulties we've avoided so far, then the financial consequences of that would have to be navigated with further help from the UK Government.

Plaid Cymru leader, Adam Price. 

First Minister, the criminal murder of George Floyd at the hands of police officers in the United States has re-ignited the debate around racism on both sides of the Atlantic. Do you agree that structural racism lies at the heart of this injustice, and if we truly believe that black lives matter that we have to acknowledge that and address it? And is that structural racism, in your view, one of the reasons we are seeing a much higher incidence of death from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities as a result of COVID-19? 

Llywydd, can I thank Adam Price for that question about one of the great issues of our day? Many Members will have seen that utterly distressing footage of the death of George Floyd; I think one of the most awful things that I remember ever having to look at. I was reminded in it—just to say one positive thing to begin with—of the very longstanding relationships that have existed between Wales and the black community in America, from the 1930s when Paul Robeson, that great singer and civil rights activist would visit Wales so regularly, speaking memorably in Mountain Ash in 1938 at an enormous gathering of people from south Wales in support of the Spanish civil war, and the people from Wales who went to fight there, right into the 1960s with the church in Birmingham, Alabama, which has a window paid for by people from Wales as part of our interest in the civil rights movement then. So, our interest in the black population and people from those communities in America goes back many, many decades, and I was forcefully reminded of that when I saw those awful pictures.

There is structural disadvantage for black people in America, but Adam Price is right for us not to simply think that it exists elsewhere. It exists in our own communities as well. And at the worst of it, it is straightforward racism, as the leader of Plaid Cymru has said—it is people deliberately behaving towards others on the basis of the colour of their skin. But there is disadvantage for people from those communities that is less overt than that—it is not racism in that deliberate sense, but it's embedded in the way that institutions operate and decisions get made. And the way that black people have clearly been adversely affected by the coronavirus crisis is, I think, just a vivid outcrop of those underlying structural disadvantages, and we've got to be able to grapple with them here in Wales, as they need to be grappled with elsewhere.

The Royal College of Nursing in Wales has said that the COVID work assessment tool introduced by NHS Wales, though welcomed, does not currently identify those workers from BAME backgrounds as being at a very high risk. Why is that, and will you work with them to get this right urgently? And will you also make sure that BAME voices are well represented in the work on building back better? In June of last year, the BBC reported that, of 170 recent appointments to public bodies by Welsh Ministers, fewer than six were from BAME backgrounds. Can you say how the situation has improved since then? And given that, according to the Wales Governance Centre, we in Wales have an incarceration rate that is more racially disproportionate than England, which itself is more racially disproportionate even than the United States, will you commit to a wide-ranging inquiry into the roots and remedies of structural racism and racial disadvantage here in Wales?

I thank Adam Price for all of those additional questions. The self-assessment tool that we have adopted for the NHS was led by the work of black clinicians in Wales. Professor Keshav Singhal—who I know Adam Price will have heard present the tool—was very clear when he did so that it was always going to be a work in progress, and that there would be more that could be learnt as it was implemented. And I know that he will be wanting to talk both with the RCN and with the British Medical Association and others who have developed other tools. But I am very comforted by the fact that, in Wales, our self-assessment tool was led by and actively informed by the direct front-line experience of black workers in the NHS here in Wales, looking at their everyday experience of being on the front line, and making sure that the self-assessment tool reflected all of that. I am very keen indeed that those voices go on being influential as we work our way beyond coronavirus, and the group that we have brought together under the chair of Judge Ray Singh will be an important part of that at this point, and there will be ways in which we can develop that further into the future.

Our record of appointing people from black and Asian minority communities to public appointments in Wales is not good enough. We had a root-and-branch review of our appointments process in the second half of last year, and we were on the point of introducing a radically different approach to those appointments when the coronavirus crisis struck. It's one of my ambitions to be able to bring that piece of work back to the front burner, from the back burner, as soon as we are able to in the crisis. Because we have to do better; we have to do better in relation to BAME populations, we have to do better in relation to people with disabilities. And we're by no means there, where we want to be, although we've done a little better in relation to gender equality in those areas too.

The work of the centre in looking at the experience of imprisonment in Wales is shocking on a whole range of fronts, and certainly shocking in relation to what it reveals about the treatment of black people in the criminal justice system. And there's wider evidence that with any system that has a choice between a helping and a controlling-type of response to behaviour, black people are more likely to find themselves clustered at the controlling end of things, whether that's in mental health or in the criminal justice system. I'll think about the point that Adam Price made at the end of his contribution, but I do want to agree with many of the important points that he's made this afternoon. 

Leader of the Brexit Party, Mark Reckless. 

First Minister, could you confirm that the data show that five out of the 10 council areas that have had the highest prevalence of coronavirus in the UK are in Wales? Inquiries and their apportionment of responsibility will come in due course, but for your current planning, why do you think this is? Do you believe that the greater centralisation of healthcare and integration with social care in Wales may have been a factor that led to more patients being discharged into care homes where testing in Wales was less prevalent than in England?

Many people tell me that they do not consider the regulations now restricting movement in Wales to be reasonable and proportionate. Would you confirm that, if they are correct in that assessment, then the regulations made for Wales would not be lawful? You mentioned just now in your statement a necessity test as well as a proportionality test when reviewing regulations, please could you reconcile that with having removed a necessity test from the regulations in your third set of amendment regulations? Do you think that people are clear on the difference between those regulations, which may be legally binding, and your guidance, which is not, particularly when both have previously been described as 'rules'?

We have spoken before about the confusion engendered by your insistence on making Welsh rules just a little bit different from the UK Government rules applicable in England, further confusion is surely engendered by your constantly chopping and changing Welsh rules. When you put in the third set of amendment regulations that exercise must be 'local', you then said, in the accompanying guidance, that it would be a mistake to attempt to define 'local', as this would necessarily be different in rural Wales to Cardiff, although you gave the example of Porthcawl at 30 miles as being too far for Cardiff. Why then have you now made a complete about turn and defined 'local' as five miles? That may be the view from Pontcanna, but with belated stirrings of opposition from Conservative Members, do you recognise that your view has failed to command a consensus, and that your rules, whether purported to be law or guidance, will thus become increasingly ineffective? 

Well, Llywydd, the first point in the Member's contribution is a reasonable one. Why are council areas in Wales amongst those most affected? I think there are a number of reasons that, at this stage, we might suggest for that. It's very important to remember that those figures are very much a fact of how much testing goes on. The more testing there is, the more you discover, and there will be some places where more testing has been carried out and therefore prevalence looks greater, whereas, in fact, it's just a product of different testing regimes.

But what we know about the virus is that it attacks places where people are older, sicker, poorer and live close together, and Wales is over represented in all of those factors. And when those things all come together, as they do in some of the most disadvantaged areas of Wales, then it's probably—. It may not be the whole of the explanation, and there'll be more that we will learn. But it is part of the explanation as to why you see some concentrations in communities in Wales that would be in other league tables, in the same sorts of places of disadvantage and bearing the burden of the period of austerity that the Member so cheerfully championed in another part of his political life.

Well, I completely disagree with him and I think it's dangerous for him to start suggesting to people in Wales that regulations are not proper law. They are proper law; they are the law of Wales. Don't be misled by what anybody suggests to you in thinking that they're not; they are. And there is a very easy distinction between regulations and guidance, and the Government has never confused people. There are people who have sought to confuse people by saying that the five-mile limit is a rule, whereas I have always, from the very beginning, been very clear that it is a rule of thumb, it is guidance for people to interpret in their local geographies as to what 'local' might mean for them. And, as I explained to Paul Davies, one of the primary considerations for it was to make sure that we didn't get a huge cascade of people from outside the more sparsely populated areas of Wales travelling to those places, where coronavirus has been, thank goodness, in very modest circulation, and that we didn't see a flaring up of coronavirus in those places because people had travelled from their own localities and brought the virus with them.

Llywydd, very far from constantly chopping and changing, what the Welsh Government has done is to introduce very modest changes at the end of each three-week period. We are taking the most careful and cautious approach. We are slowly building up a new repertoire of things that people can safely do in the coronavirus context.

I think that that absolutely chimes with what people in Wales want us to do, far from the sort of suggestion I think the Member is making that people in Wales are champing at the bit to be allowed to go further and do more. What we learn is that people in Wales understand that this virus is by no means beaten. Its impact is felt every day in the deaths that we have to announce every single day from it, and our approach of taking one step at a time, doing it carefully and cautiously, and building things up in a way that goes on providing confidence to people in Wales that it is their health and their well-being that is at the front of everything we do, not only is it the right thing to do, but it chimes very powerfully with the way that people in Wales would like to see their Government operate.

First Minister, one of the consequences of the pandemic is the impact on the aviation industry. All employers in this industry have constructively engaged with trade unions on behalf of their workforces to manage these very difficult circumstances, to protect jobs and to protect skills for the future.

However, sadly, there is one employer who has been described as a 'commercial predator', who has not engaged in this particular way, and that is British Airways. You'll be aware of this, First Minister, that they employ 42,000 people across the UK, and they are proposing in the region of at least 12,000 redundancies. But in attempting to achieve this, their intention is, effectively, to make the entire workforce redundant, to remove 12,000 jobs, and to have 30,000 people who will then be employed on terms and conditions that could result in them having 60 or 70 per cent less pay than they get at the moment.

Now, this seems to be an opportunity—. What British Airways are doing is trying to seize an economic advantage on the back of COVID. In my constituency, British Avionics will be closing and 130 of 186 jobs are proposed to go, there are 30 of 169 jobs in Islwyn, and at British Airways Maintenance Cardiff in Cardiff Airport, 239 out of 546. So, 400 jobs all together. Now, the company knows that it is impossible to negotiate and to consult over 40,000 potential redundancies with 40,000 members in 45 days. The union has insisted that the proper and the moral and the ethical thing to do is to withdraw those notices.

Now, this is going to be the subject of an emergency question in Westminster today, but can I ask that the Welsh Government will give its full support to Unite the Union and all those workers in south Wales who are dependent on these jobs, and all those in Cardiff Airport, because of the linked industries, to actually protect them and to get British Airways do the decent thing—to stand up and to negotiate with its workers in a proper and ethical way to save jobs and skills for the future? First Minister, will you give that support and press the UK Government to do everything it can to support the aviation sector?

Llywydd, can I begin by agreeing with Mick Antoniw about the importance of the aviation sector here in Wales? The sector has some of the best employers in Wales—employers like Airbus, with such a strong history of working co-operatively with trade unions in the joint enterprise, which is making a success of those companies. I know that my colleague, Ken Skates has written directly to the other company that Mick Antoniw has highlighted, urging them to withdraw the measures that they have proposed at present to work collaboratively with the trade union that represents workers in there. Sensible companies know that complying simply with the letter of the law is not the best way to shape a future for those companies that brings their workforce with them—their single most important asset. Those were the terms in which the Minister for the economy has written to the company and I urge the UK Government to use whatever powers of persuasion they have as well to make sure that not just the letter of the law but the spirit and the ethic of the law, as Mick Antoniw said, is complied with here as well as.

First Minister, I was pleased to hear you confirm again that the 5 miles referred to earlier is not a rule as such, because it is not just in rural areas that that is an issue, as you know; it is also an issue in many Valleys communities, including my own, where if that was rigorously adhered to, it would mean that someone couldn't go, for instance, from Cwmbran to Blaenavon to see their family, so I think that's a very important point. I wanted to ask about social distancing, because I am concerned that, as we go through this lockdown, there is a general erosion of people's response to the social distancing regulations generally. I'm seeing it in supermarkets, I'm hearing it from constituents in relation to employers, so I'd like to ask you what more we can do to re-emphasise to the public that we are nowhere near out of the woods on this pandemic yet, and that these matters, these rules, really, really matter, and people have to keep observing them. Thank you.

Thank you, Llywydd, and can I thank Lynne Neagle for making that point again? I believe that the vast majority of people in Wales still want to do the right thing and still do their best to do the right thing, and we mustn't see that fraying at the edges in a way that would lead to more people not complying with what we're asking them to, because we're not asking people to observe social distancing as some sort of penalty; we're asking people to do it because it genuinely protects them and protects other people. And this is a virulent disease; it lives for hours and hours on surfaces. You can be suffering from coronavirus yourself and not know that it's happening to you and you are infectious to other people, so you may feel fine and think, 'Well, what's the harm in me being closer to somebody?' Actually, you could be doing an enormous amount of harm unintentionally, but with really, really significant consequences.

So, we've all got a job to do, certainly I do and from the Government, but we all do, in reminding people that the simple things we ask people to do—keeping a 2m distance, observing hand hygiene, all those simple things. Collectively and cumulatively, these are the things that are making a difference. They really are saving lives and we need people to go on doing those things, because as I said in an earlier answer, every day, we have the sad, sad duty of having to announce the latest number of people who have died from this virus in different parts of Wales and we can all do more to help that not to happen.

Suzy Davies. The microphone is not working for Suzy. Can you try again, Suzy? Okay, I'll call Mohammad Asghar and we'll come back to you, Suzy. Mohammad Asghar.

Thank you, Presiding Officer, and thank you, First Minister, for your statement. I have been contacted by a number of dental practices in my region, who are concerned about the time frame proposed by the Chief Dental Officer for Wales to phase out in dentistry care. The proposal is to resume more face-to-face emergency care from 1 July, followed by routine check-ups in October and aerosol generating procedures, such as fillings and crowns, from January 2021. Private dentistry accounts for more than half of the dental services in Wales, and the number of practices that operate 100 per cent under the NHS is very low. Their financial viability depends either in part or entirely from payments received from patients undergoing AGPs. Other countries are allowing dentists to perform AGPs by using respiratory masks and other PPE. First Minister, will you look again at the timetable and what other countries are doing as a matter of urgency to ensure the financial viability of dentistry practices in Wales? And, secondly, you earlier mentioned BME casualties in Wales during this pandemic. I would like to know how many people, out of the 2,122 casualties you mentioned earlier, actually come from the BME community, which is, I understand, a pretty high number, and what measures you are going to take, at your Government level, to make sure that we stop it in future. Thank you.

Thank you, Llywydd. Shall I take the second of Mohammad Asghar's questions first? I don't have that figure in front of me, but we will have it, and I'm happy, of course, to share that with him. I know that he will have been taking an interest in the group chaired by Judge Ray Singh, and I know that he is personally acquainted with Professor Keshav Singhal and other leading clinicians who've contributed to the self-assessment tool that we are using in Wales. So, I want to give him an assurance that we are drawing on all the expertise we can find from within the community in Wales, as well as beyond, to try to make sure that we have measures in place to properly protect people from black and minority ethnic communities from the additional impact that this disease has on people from those important communities.

On the first point about dental practices, we will publish, Llywydd, the letter that the chief dental officer has provided to dental practices in Wales, setting out her three-stage plan for the reopening of dentistry in Wales. I know that she will remain in dialogue with the British Dental Association and other important interests in the dental profession in Wales. Of course we would like to see more dental activity being available—it's a very important part of what primary care provision in Wales offers to Welsh citizens. But there are some particular challenges in dental practice. You can't practice dentistry at a 2m distance, and aerosol procedures in particular carry a very high risk of the virus being carried from patients to dentists and from dentists to patients. So, the chief dental officer will continue to be in those discussions. We will publish her advice. We want more dentistry to happen in Wales, but we have to make sure that we do it in a way that protects the health and welfare of dental practitioners and their staff, as well as the people that they serve.

First Minister, your Government announced on Sunday that the guidelines for people who've been told to shield were changing the following day. I'm aware that there's a lot of concern from people who were told to shield to protect their lives that these changes were brought forward with little warning and when the R rate is still high. This morning you will have received a letter from 32 health charities active in Wales, outlining their deep concerns about these changes. They want an explanation about the rationale for the sudden departure from existing guidelines. They ask that shielders are told directly about changes rather than finding out through a press statement, and they want the sector to be informed of changes in advance in the future, so that they can prepare. They request that you meet them to discuss their concerns. First Minister, will you do that?

Llywydd, the chief medical officer will write to all people on the shielded list this week in Wales, setting out our advice to them for the coming period. Let's just be clear that what this is is advice. Nobody is instructing sheltered people to do anything that they do not feel comfortable in doing.

The medical advice from the four chief medical officers is that, at this time of year, when the virus is far, far less significant out of doors, we should have offered the opportunity to shielded people who wanted to go outside in carefully controlled conditions—to let them know that it is safe for them to do so if they choose to do so. But nobody is requiring any sheltered person to do anything that they do themselves not feel comfortable in doing.

The chief medical officer will set out his latest advice in a letter that will go to every shielded person in Wales. They remain very much at the top of our list of priorities, to make sure that we continue to offer them the best advice so that they stay safe and they stay well.

Let nobody forget that there is more than one harm from coronavirus, and being confined to your home with no prospect of being able to leave it comes with real harms as well to people's sense of well-being and other parts of their health. That is why the four chief medical officers came to the conclusion that they did, not because anybody wants to do anything that would harm sheltered people—of course not. But the advice to them is that if they feel confident and willing to do so, now they are able to take exercise out of doors and to meet one other household out of doors, in the right conditions, provided that is something that they themselves would choose to do.

First Minister, on 1 May you announced that the Welsh Government would fund an extra payment of £500 to social care workers in care homes and domiciliary care workers throughout Wales:

'This payment is designed to provide some further recognition of the value we attach to everything' that social care workers do to

'support both our NHS and our wider society.'

My questions are: when will it be paid? How will it be paid? Is it a one-off payment or will it be added to wages? Will it be treated as wages and taxed, or treated as a gift and not taxed?

Well, Llywydd, there will be answers to all of those questions, but those answers were contingent upon a reply from the UK Government to our plea to them to make this payment free of tax and free of national insurance contributions. It was deeply disappointing to receive a response from the Financial Secretary to the Treasury on Monday declining to do that. That, of course, now means we will have to think through a whole series of issues to try to minimise the impact of that Treasury decision. It's not possible to answer all of Mike Hedges's questions this morning, because we had hoped that there was a different and far better solution.

We wanted our £500 to go directly to the people who we have identified for the contribution they have made, because they are amongst the least well-paid people in our workforce. We weren't asking the Treasury for money, we were simply asking them not to rob those people of the money that the Welsh Government was providing to them. Now, a significant amount of the money that the Welsh Government is still going to provide to those social care workers will end up not in their pockets but in the pockets of the Treasury.

We will have to reconsider a whole number of the questions that Mike Hedges has quite properly raised to try and find ways of mitigating that decision, but the real answer is that this shouldn't be subject to tax and it shouldn't be subject to national insurance, and then we wouldn't have to worry about finding ways of trying to make that impact less significant. 

Just picking up on what you said earlier about dentistry, once we see the three-stage plan that the chief medical officer is going to be publishing, I hope we're going to be able to accelerate the timetable for resuming modern dentistry where we drill and fill tooth decay rather than, as at the moment, having to extract the tooth, which obviously can never be replaced. Obviously, this is very important to people's general health.

Otherwise, I would be wanting to look at small businesses that are completely reliant on being able to operate locally, and obviously the proceeds of their business stay locally as well—in particular, hairdressing. Nobody is going to die of not having a haircut, but for elderly people in particular, that social occasion of going to the hairdresser's can be a very, very important part of their engagement with the community. For example, the Headmistress salon, run by Alison Corria at the Maelfa in Llanedeyrn for over 40 years, has a very high number of elderly customers. She is very keen to restart as soon as she has permission to do so, and has been able to put in place all the restrictions that the NHBF guidance indicates, which I know the Government has been discussing with them. So—

You need to come to a question now, Jenny.

So, I wondered if you could just tell us, if we're only going to be able to make one change at a time, as recommended by the WHO and SAGE, can we really afford to only make any change at three-week periods?

Llywydd, thank you. The answer to the question at the end is that we don't have to wait for the end of a three-week period to make a change, and we've had examples during the crisis in which we've made changes between three-week intervals where there's been a compelling case to do so.

Llywydd, I want to agree and recognise what Jenny Rathbone has said about the wider importance of hairdressing. When I was the health Minister, I vividly remember a GP in a rural part of Wales saying to me that his best source of intelligence about people with the beginnings of dementia came from a local hairdresser in his community, because she was somebody who knew her clientele over 30 years. She spotted when people coming into her salon were not quite as on top of things as they once used to be, and she could make an informal, early sort of referral to the dementia service that he ran in his community. So, I absolutely understand what Jenny meant when she talked about the fact that it's more than just having a haircut. But we will consider hairdressing alongside everything else.

One of the real difficulties, Llywydd, that I have to try and explain to people is that there are so many aspects of life where individually you can make a case for reopening, and by themselves people make the case that this wouldn't materially add to the risk of coronavirus circulating—it'll only be a little marginal addition. The problem for the Government is you've got to add up all those marginal additions, and quite soon all those marginal additions turn out to be quite a significant risk. We have to weigh up, not simply dental practices or hairdressing or tennis playing or all the many things that people understandably have an interest in, and then come to a decision in the round.

We'll do that with dentistry as well. I know, as I said to Mohammad Asghar, that the chief dental officer in her discussions with the profession will want to bring things back on as quickly as possible, and of course her focus with the profession is on preventative dentistry. We want dentists not to have to drill or fill even, let alone extract. We want them working as the new contract rewards them: for making sure that young people grow up looking after their teeth in a way that means they don't need that sort of dentistry, other than in a minimum sort of way.

First Minister, you began this session by telling us a little bit about the methodology you used for introducing rules and regulations, and I'd like to raise the point that, as of 22 May, repeat breaches of coronavirus regulations can land you with a fine of £1,920. That came in under the fourth amendment to the coronavirus restriction regulations, through the made-affirmative procedure, which gives this Parliament 28 days to ratify that law or not. Now, these regulations were ready before the Whitsun break, before the legislation clock stopped. As you said earlier in this session, these are laws—laws made by the Executive, not the legislature—and they do impose a penalty. So, why aren't we debating them today instead of 17 June, just short of a month after they come into force as Government-made law?

Well, Llywydd, they'll be debated within the rules that are set out for those things. We're not breaching those limits. I'm not trying to trivialise the point that the Member makes; it's really important. I completely agree with her that it is the legislature's responsibility to approve or not approve the changes that the Government proposes, and it's very important that the legislature has that opportunity. But we are providing that opportunity.

We wanted to bring a package of measures together so that the Senedd could look at them in that rounded way, because there are choices that have to be made, and, just as I said to Jenny Rathbone that it's the cumulative impact of different changes you have to think of, in some ways, it's the cumulative impact of all the changes to the law that Assembly Members will be interested in as well. So, it's not with any intention of not complying with the necessary and important requirement for Assembly Members to have the final say in these things that we've offered the timetable that we have; it's to bring together a series of changes that we are proposing, allowing Assembly Members to see them altogether and make their minds up as to whether or not they wish to support them, based on the totality of what the Government proposes.

Alun Davies.

I'm grateful to you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, the overwhelming majority of people in Blaenau Gwent are fully supportive of the approach that you have taken and the Welsh Government have taken over the past few months, and they recognise the importance of continuing with a very cautious approach. I'm interested in understanding how you see this moving forward.

You said at a press conference that, with the trace and testing system now in place, there may be local lockdowns where there may be a local outbreak in terms of the disease moving forward. I wonder if you could explain how you see that working and whether you see the capacity for differential rules being applied in different parts of the country. I think that's something that will be of interest to a lot of people.

And, also, as we move forward over these few months, you've appointed Jeremy Miles to look at recovery from COVID and the impact of COVID. I very much agree with the point that Mick Antoniw made earlier in this session about the impact of job losses in the aviation sector, but we know that the overall economic impact will be most keenly felt in communities such as Blaenau Gwent. How do you see the work that Jeremy is undertaking in order to address those issues of the economic impact of COVID? We've had fantastic public support for keeping people safe through this infection. Now, how do we continue to keep people safe in terms of employment and jobs and the economy as we move forward into recovery?

Llywydd, can I thank Alun Davies for those really important questions? My colleague Vaughan Gething will provide further details of the roll-out of the test, trace and protect process over the first part of this week, and it does provide us—together with the Joint Biosecurity Centre that we hope to be members of, it will provide us with more fine-grained and local information about outbreaks of coronavirus. And it may well be that the best way in the future of trying to make sure that coronavirus doesn't spread again will be to have more local action. In normal public health infection controls, that is exactly what you would see. In much smaller outbreaks of measles or something like that, it would be a local action that would be put in place.

It isn't guaranteed to be like that. If there are measures being taken elsewhere that lead to a sudden and much more general surge in coronavirus, then we can't rule out the prospect that more significant measures on a wider scale might still be necessary. But we want to avoid that if we can in Wales, and one way will be to use the TTP and other sources of intelligence to try and hone our response in more local areas—

Nick Ramsay—oh, sorry, First Minister.

Very quickly, because Alun Davies raised really important questions about recovery and life beyond coronavirus. This is a public health emergency, but it's an economic emergency as well. We have to chart our way through the coming months and continue to do those things that respond to the immediate emergency, but, after that, we will have to think absolutely seriously as to how we fashion a future for people that will be disrupted by the impact of coronavirus not just for those months, but for well beyond that, and that's the work that Jeremy Miles is leading.

First Minister, if I can ask you about two areas, firstly, briefly, I've been contacted by a constituent who is concerned that, as businesses come out of lockdown, there could be a number of issues that have developed over a long period of businesses being closed down, such as legionnaire's disease, for instance, that could generate subsequent public health issues. So, I wonder if you could tell me what advice and guidance is being given to businesses, or will be given to businesses, as the lockdown is lessened and people do return to work and their businesses.

Secondly, could you update us on what support is being made available for mental health services at this time during the pandemic? We know that the ongoing lockdown is resulting in mental health issues for many people—many of those in families, but particularly those living alone. And, of course, in the worst case scenarios this can lead to very severe problems, and even, in some cases, suicide. I wonder what data is being collected to monitor the mental health situation of people and what's being done to support those mental health services, including suicide prevention.

Llywydd, I thank Nick Ramsay for that. So, we published advice and guidance for businesses at the end of last week, having had it approved by the shadow social partnership council, and, as I said, I was very pleased that that advice was jointly endorsed by the TUC and the CBI in Wales. 'Keep Wales safe at work', the guidance is called, and there will be further, more sectorally specific guidance published as well. I will make sure that the specific point that Nick Ramsay has raised about things that may have built up while a business is closed that businesses need to think about and attend to—I'll go away and make an enquiry to make sure that the advice is covering that important issue.

On mental health services, Llywydd, more generally, the NHS is resuming some of its more normal activity. The number of beds that are free in our health service has fallen from 3,500 at its peak down to 1,700 today, and that's because more people are being admitted to hospital for non-COVID-related reasons. We've kept our mental health services going through the whole of this crisis, but we're able to resume more ordinary mental health services as well at this time. I think, last week, my colleagues Vaughan Gething and Kirsty Williams jointly announced further funding support for young people, particularly in families. I can give an assurance to Nick Ramsay, and other Members who take a close interest in it, that mental health has always been close to the top of the things that we have asked the health service to continue to do during the crisis and we are very keen indeed to strengthen the response that we're able to offer to those who have had mental health conditions specifically exacerbated by the experience of this awful illness. 

First of all, First Minister, will you join with me in issuing a note of caution to those people tempted to cut their own hair during the course of coronavirus, as I am an example of that? I'd just explain that to Members.

But two serious points: first of all, tennis. I've been asked why tennis is not yet permitted. And, secondly, I have, within 5 miles of my constituency, no fewer than eight beaches, which are very popular. Five of them would normally have Royal National Lifeboat Institution lifeguard cover. Now, they're very grateful that they haven't seen the kind of mayhem that we've seen on some beaches in England—Durdle Door, of course, being one example. But the question I have is: what is the Welsh Government doing to make sure that people are aware of the fact that there's no lifeguard cover, when there normally would be at this time of year? And what information is being given to the public to make sure that they are safe, given the fact that that cover is not there?

I thank Carwyn Jones very much for his questions. Viewers to this will be, I think, believing that there was some collusion between him and Jenny Rathbone in her question urging the reopening of hairdressers in Wales.

But, to his serious points, on tennis, the point is this—I've answered it once already, Llywydd—that tennis can make a case for it by itself being capable of being reopened, being organised in a safe way. There are some challenges in tennis that people don't always think of in that. This virus can live on a tennis ball, and, when you play tennis, normally, certainly, a ball comes over the net and people pick it up and the person on the other side of the net picks the same ball up as well. So, it's not without its challenges to make tennis safe, but, even if it can be made safe, then, you know, gliding can be made safe, jet skiing can be made safe, bowling can be made safe. Many Members here will have received letters from different interests. What the Welsh Government has to do is to add up all those marginal extra risks and decide whether or not, in the round, that is a risk we are currently able to take. We decided last week that all the headroom that we have, more or less, was to be taken by allowing family and friends to see one another again, and we didn't feel that we could take the additional risk of opening up other parts of our normal life. We will continue to consider tennis alongside other outdoor sports as part of the current three-week review.

Llywydd, Carwyn Jones makes a very important point about lifeguard services and safety on beaches. Across the whole of the United Kingdom, the RNLI will only be operating 30 per cent of normal coverage this year because of the constraints that coronavirus has caused, and in Wales that means that there will only be 10 beaches in the whole of Wales that will have lifeguard cover, and that from 20 June to the beginning of September. So, it is very important to say to people, even people who live locally, even people who can get to the beach within 5 miles, that they will have to take particular extra care this year, because the help that would have been there normally, the supervision that would have been there normally to make sure that people can use the sea safely, will not be available in Wales in the way that it has been, and people will have to take very direct responsibility for making sure that they factor that into their plans, because safety will need to be their major consideration, and they won't have a fully operational RNLI service of the sort that we've all been so pleased to see in Wales over recent years.

I thank the First Minister.