Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. I'd like to begin by adding my thanks to the transport workers, from airport workers allowing vital PPE to be delivered to Cardiff Airport, bus and train staff, who've helped key workers to deliver services, bike shop staff who've helped to encourage an uptake in cycling, to highway workers who've helped carry out vital repairs. Their hard work throughout the crisis has been invaluable.

These are serious times, Dirprwy Lywydd, and they demand serious responses, and this motion by the Conservative Party in Wales is not a serious response. And I say 'the Conservative Party in Wales', Dirprwy Lywydd, because I'm afraid that the honourable project to create the Welsh Conservatives seems to be dead—abandoned in the face of the coronavirus to follow the reckless path set by the Conservative Party in England.

Week after week, the Welsh Government has faced calls by the Conservative Party in Wales to copy the latest back-of-the-envelope announcement from Downing Street. Public health policy driven by press conference is not the approach of this Government. And unthinkingly copying the folly of their counterparts in London should not be the approach of the Tories here if they want the brand of the Welsh Conservative Party to have any remaining credibility. 

The motion regrets the failure of the Welsh Government to provide adequate support for Welsh bus operators during the coronavirus pandemic. It's simply not true, Dirprwy Lywydd. These are commercial companies, as they often remind us, and 95 per cent of their customers have stopped using their service, but while passengers have, understandably, stepped away from public transport, the Welsh Government has not. Darren Millar claimed that the 95 per cent drop was due to his favourite slogan—the 'cruel five-mile rule'. But the drop's been the same in England, Darren, so what's the logic of that? I think the word you used in your contribution was 'barmy'—well, if the cap fits.

We've been subsidising every bus passenger to the tune of £30 per head. Pre-COVID, public sector funding in Wales was around half of bus operators' revenue. The amount operators in Wales received from the taxpayers has not reduced. The UK Government has also provided additional funding to bus operators to also bring the amount of public funding they receive to just under half of their pre-COVID revenues, replicating our level of support. And yet, I don't hear the English Conservative Party in Wales pointing that out. Our emergency funding will continue to guarantee backing for the industry. Our own support now stands at over £45 million for the first six months of this financial year, and yet today's motion regrets our failure to provide adequate support. These are serious times—this is not a serious response.

We'll continue to support public transport, because even though passengers are staying away for now, we want to ensure that there's a network there to serve them when this is over. Of course, these are very difficult times, and there's huge demand on public funding, and a pound spent on running a mostly empty bus is a pound not spent on care homes, not spent on supporting struggling town centres, and not spent helping young people back to work. So, when we do commit Welsh taxpayers' money to help distressed bus companies, we make a choice, and it's our policy to get something in return for that—a commitment to keep down fares, a commitment to keep the services passengers want, and a commitment from companies to open up their books so that we can see that our funding is going where it should be.

Now, a number of contributors have discussed face masks in today's debate, Dirprwy Lywydd: Lynne Neagle, Caroline Jones and Huw Irranca-Davies. And as the First Minister said earlier to the Senedd, we are looking at the position on masks to see if we can allow more people to travel on public transport, and discussing with the chief medical officer his advice. It is not as simple as it's being presented. There are trade-offs here. We are concerned about equalities issues—many people aren't able to wear a mask. Many disabilities are hidden, and there is a danger that passengers feel the wrath of the worry of their fellow passengers for not wearing a mask. So, we need to tread carefully. And the evidence of masks impacting people's behaviour to become more reckless is something we're bearing in mind as well. But, as I say, we're reviewing it. We're not in a position today to change our position, but we are discussing this at the moment with the chief medical officer.

We will make additional funding available to support a gradual increase of services, but at a time that's right for passengers and the economy, not simply for bus company shareholders, who have been lobbying the Welsh Conservatives today, evidently. It may be that they want us to hand over more of our money to billionaire owners or foreign Governments, but we'll continue to insist on value for Welsh passengers and we make no apology for that. 

Let me turn to Cardiff Airport, where the motion criticises us for discouraging airlines from flying. An airport the Conservatives wanted us to let fail in private ownership, an airport the Welsh Government ownership rescued and revived and up until this pandemic hit was being turned around—numbers up by 70 per cent since the Welsh Government stepped in—and each step of the way, in the face of opposition from the Conservative Party in Wales—each step—and our calls for the UK Government to help regional airports, like Cardiff, ignored. And that's where the Welsh Conservatives should be putting some of their firepower, such as it is, to try and persuade the UK Government to develop a coherent regional airport strategy. 

And now we're criticised for wanting to enforce the travel restrictions that the Conservatives voted for. The Conservatives supported the law passed by this Senedd to ask people to stay local. And as soon as a corporation comes along, we see the true colours of the Tories—on the side of another private company that wants to put short-term profit before public health. And, again, we make no apologies for wanting to keep people safe.