So, I now go to the questions by the leaders of the parties.

Leader of the Conservatives, Paul Davies.

Diolch, Llywydd. First Minister, key to tackling the spread and indeed the eradication of this awful virus is Wales's testing programme and its ability to reach as many people as possible in order to better inform people before they make decisions about socially interacting. We know that lab capacity in Wales is just over 15,000, which, as you know, is still a long way off the potential 20,000 tests per day that the Welsh Government proposed in the 'Test Trace Protect' document. Indeed, we know that the total number of tests in the last 24 hours was 3,054, which means that just a fifth of capacity has been used. And more worrying, according to official figures, no extra tests were carried out between 28 June and 5 July for healthcare workers across Wales. Clearly, this shows that more testing could and should be done. First Minister, can you tell us why the levels of testing in Wales are so low and can you also tell us what the Welsh Government is doing to increase the level of testing across the country?

Well, Llywydd, I think the Member might have acknowledged the fact that at 15,000 tests, that figure is the most we've ever had and has risen very steadily over recent weeks, and more capacity will be added to that as well.

I think the issue on testing, however—the number of tests that are used—is a good deal more complicated than he suggests, because underlying his question is the assumption that more is automatically better. The truth of the matter is that as prevalence of the disease falls in Wales, so there are fewer people with symptoms and fewer people who come forward for testing, and that is not a bad thing in itself, because it demonstrates to us that there is a great deal less of coronavirus around in Wales today than there was a week ago, or a month ago, or three months ago. So, it's not just a matter of saying, 'If you're doing more tests, you must be doing better.'

You need to use your tests for the right reason. You need to use them in the right place. All healthcare settings have direct access to testing, so where clinicians believe that tests need to be carried out, they are carried out, and we are carrying out more tests on patients in hospital than ever before, as more people return to other aspects of the health service. While the prevalence of the disease is falling, there will be fewer people with symptoms and fewer people will therefore come forward themselves, as everybody can, asking for a test. So, it's a bit more complicated, Llywydd, that's what I'm saying, than a simple assertion that if the number of tests are going down, it's a bad thing, and if the number of tests are going up, it's a good thing.

First Minister, last week, you made it clear that Welsh Ministers have the powers through regulations to take local action to reduce some of the freedoms in order to deal with local outbreaks. It's absolutely crucial that freedoms are not curtailed any further, so, if at any point the Welsh Government decides to take the decision to introduce localised lockdowns in the future, then it must be made absolutely clear to the people of Wales exactly why that decision has been made, along with providing the latest scientific and medical evidence to justify the Welsh Government's decision.

Therefore, First Minister, can you tell us what discussions you have already had with public health officials about the ability to create localised lockdowns, if the evidence was strong enough to suggest that the virus was prevalent in certain communities across Wales? Has the Welsh Government started undertaking any modelling in relation to introducing localised lockdowns in the future? And what assessment have you made of the impact that having different lockdown restrictions in different parts of Wales could have?

Well, Llywydd, let me begin by agreeing with the first point that the Member made. I don't think we should ever restrict people's freedoms unless the case for doing so is very clear and that we have the evidence to justify it. I'm quite sure that, when his political colleagues in London made that decision in relation to Leicester, those matters were very much in their minds at the time, and we would expect to follow exactly that approach.

In relation to evidence, I am very keen to see us reach a point where we are formally able to agree Welsh membership of a joint biosecurity centre. So, I discussed this matter with Michael Gove yesterday morning. This is the body that will draw together intelligence from all sorts, from all parts of the United Kingdom, and give us the very best evidence of local developments in relation to the disease, and that will be available in all parts of the United Kingdom, and they will be common standards and common approaches, too—the evidence that is used, the triggers that will be identified and, indeed, some of the approaches that will be taken as a result of that. I've always thought that a joint biosecurity centre would be something that would be helpful to us in Wales. I believe, from the advice that I have had from my officials, that we are close to a position where we can sign up to it formally, and I pressed Mr Gove yesterday to accelerate those discussions so that we can reach that position. When we have a joint centre—and the word 'joint' is very important; it cannot be a UK body to which devolved administrations are an appendage—it must be a genuinely joint centre and then I think the information that it provides will go a long way to answering many of the questions that Mr Davies has raised with me this morning. 

First Minister, as new cases continue to fall across Wales, the Welsh Government and local health boards must start looking at other NHS treatment and services, and, as you know, nearly 500,000 were waiting for treatment before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Now, the Royal College of Surgeons have warned that delays to surgery will already have resulted in an increased need for complex surgery, and the British Heart Foundation have also said that, as services remain unavailable, the urgency of these procedures is increasing, creating a significant cohort of patients who need urgent treatment. First Minister, this in turn will continue to stretch the capacity of the NHS. Now, in light of the very valid concerns raised by organisations like the Royal College of Surgeons and the British Heart Foundation, what strategic discussions is the Welsh Government having with local health boards to ensure that urgent and planned surgeries can take place and that the workforce can cope with the backlog of elective operations? What assurances can you offer to people across Wales who are waiting for treatment that they will be able to access NHS treatments and services, and how are you best supporting local health boards to accelerate the resumption of planned surgeries across Wales?

I thank the Member for that important question. On Friday, when I will be able to make public the results of the current three-week review period, I hope to be able to explain to people in Wales the extent to which we are using the headroom we hope we have to go on lifting the lockdown regime in Wales, and the extent to which we are using that headroom to go on reopening the NHS here in Wales, because that is an important part of the way in which lockdown restrictions are being eased, opening up more of our primary and secondary care services. I don't want to say to the Member or to anybody else that this is a straightforward process. An enormous amount of work is going on to create green zones, as they are called, inside our hospitals—coronavirus-free zones—so that operations can resume and people can be confident in returning to those settings that they won't run the risk of being infected by people who are already suffering from the disease. By itself, that will limit the number of operations, for example, that a theatre can carry out in any one day, because the levels of biosecurity that are necessary to prevent the spread of coronavirus are very real and will have a limiting effect in the best of circumstances on the extent to which activity can resume. At the same time, Llywydd, the NHS is having to prepare for the winter that lies ahead, the flu season that lies ahead, and the warnings we all hear of a resurgence of coronavirus in winter conditions. So, while our colleagues in the NHS are making enormous efforts, demonstrated in the second-quarter plans that they have submitted to the Welsh Government to reopen the health service, this will be a balancing act of many competing demands, and nobody should believe that there is an easy or straightforward path back to the levels of activity that the NHS in Wales and elsewhere in the United Kingdom were able to conduct in a pre-COVID world. 

The leader of Plaid Cymru, Adam Price. 

Thank you, Llywydd. May I at the outset endorse the comments on the appalling genocide in Srebrenica? They will not be forgotten.

First Minister, I've been contacted by the owner of a care home in my constituency. His employees, as he puts it, are hard working and undervalued, and he urgently wants the Welsh Government to honour the promise made in May that every worker in a care setting would receive £500. Waiting for Westminster has never served us well in Wales and, yes, the UK Treasury needs to find its moral compass by making the payment tax free. But there is something that the Welsh Government could do to ensure workers receive in full the amount of money they were promised, whatever Westminster decides. In December last year, doctors were promised that their tax bills would be covered by the NHS while working overtime. Will you, if necessary, offer the same tax cover to carers so they are not left out of pocket?

Llywydd, it's an important point that Adam Price makes, and we continue to discuss exactly that with the trade unions, in particular. But to make that decision today would be simply to allow the UK Government off the hook, because any suggestion that we will pay it will guarantee that they will not do the right thing and, as you say, rediscover their moral compass on this issue. So, we have continued to be in what we regard as constructive discussions from our point of view with the UK Treasury, outlining ways in which this payment could be made free of tax and national insurance. 

I am not at the point where I think those discussions can be drawn to an end and simply to allow the UK Government to be absolved of its responsibilities, and to spend more Welsh Government money on responsibilities that they themselves ought to discharge. We're not asking them for money, as I know Adam Price understands; we're simply asking them not to take away money that belongs to Welsh workers. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of the care sector and, I have to say, after reading the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee report today, also its neglect. The care sector has been characterised by zero-hours contracts and low pay for decades. PayScale research estimates the hourly rate on average, for example, to be £8.19. Valuing our care workers must surely start with a decent pay structure comparable with other professions. In February, your Government promised that the lowest paid NHS staff would receive the real living wage of £9.30 an hour. Should not that principle, as a first step to parity with the NHS, be applied now to workers in the care sector? First Minister, in truth, can we afford not to? 

Well, I agree with Adam Price, Llywydd, that the coronavirus crisis has shone a spotlight onto the sector and the way in which it has been undervalued over so many years. In the end, the challenge is not for Government; it is a challenge for the whole of our society as to the extent to which we are prepared to pay for decent levels of wages and proper working conditions for people in that sector. And Governments successively at the UK level have failed to come forward with proposals for paying for social care. We were very close to it at one point in 2015 as a result of the Dilnot review, and then necessary legislation fell because of a general election, and we've never been able to get back to that. 

The Welsh Government directly pays through health boards for NHS staff, and I was very pleased when I was the health Minister to be able to strike a deal that has guaranteed that the lowest paid people in the health service have always been paid, ever since, the real living wage. We are not the employer in relation to this sector. But I want to be positive in my reply to Adam Price's question because I agree with him that the result of coronavirus ought to be that, as a society, we have to be prepared to find the money to make this a sector that recognises the significance of the work that it does every single day. 

The Royal College of Nursing and 13 health unions have written to the English Prime Minister, as he's come to be known, asking for discussions on an early NHS pay rise. Will you show the way and also reward our NHS staff? If the current health crisis has taught us anything, it is that valuing those who look after us at the dawn of our lives, the twilight of our lives, and every point in between, should be the priority of any caring nation. During your leadership bid, First Minister, you said that you would not change tax rates unless compelled to do so. Do you now believe that the hard work of health and care workers is a compelling enough reason for you to change your mind?

Llywydd, we will continue in the way that we do, through the spirit of social partnership, to negotiate with the health unions and the local health boards in relation to pay and conditions in the health service. That's the way we do it, and that's the way we intend to carry on doing so. Those discussions are not always easy, nor should they be. Social partnership is not a cosy regime, but it is a place where we get together to try and find common solutions to common problems, and that's how we will approach the pay issue with our NHS staff. My party made a commitment, Llywydd, not to raise income tax rates during this Senedd term. That remains our policy position.

The leader of the Brexit Party, Mark Reckless.

First Minister, do you consider it satisfactory that this Senedd, operating under Welsh Government guidance, should just have two opportunities to question you in person over a period of six months? Do you prefer to have scrutiny through daily press conferences, broadcast live, with no opportunity for opposition reply? With many of those media outlets financially dependent on the Welsh Government, do you consider it to be in the public interest for the state broadcaster to subject us to a disquisition on what your favourite cheese is? And how is it consistent with the BBC charter, in all fairness, that, last night, just for example, on Ineos, we were treated by BBC Wales to the Labour Minister, the Labour council leader, the Labour MS and the Labour-funding union, with no opposition reply whatever? You say your urgent priority is to review every street name and every statue in Wales, to see whether it accords with the demands of an organisation that wants to de-fund the police. Isn't it time instead to de-fund the BBC?

Well, Llywydd, there's never a dog but the Member is prepared to whistle at it, and he's here doing it again today. I answer questions on the floor of the Senedd whenever the Senedd asks me to do so, and it's not my decision as to when that should be, nor should it be. I've answered questions throughout the coronavirus crisis every time the Senedd has asked me to, in committee or in Plenary, and that's my position.

I am not responsible for the BBC and neither should I be. It is not a state broadcaster in any sense, and the Member should know better than to imply that it is, or to imply that it is not right to have a broadcaster to interview those people who are elected to represent people in a particular area, whatever party that may be, in whichever part of Wales that might be.

So, the First Minister is content with that scrutiny—four Labour voices, no opposition voices? And it is far from the only example. If one depends on one's news on BBC Wales, and many of the organisations funded by Welsh Government to provide news, one would have the impression that, under our great helmsman, Mark Drakeford, there has been a great success in management of the COVID crisis in Wales. Is the reality not that infection rates in Wales have been higher than in England, and substantially higher than in Scotland and Northern Ireland, despite far less testing? Isn't it the case that 1,097 people were moved from hospitals into care homes without testing? And, talk about Westminster and waiting for them, it was two to three weeks after England and Scotland before we saw testing in care homes. Isn't the reality that the management both of the COVID crisis and of the economy has been worse in Wales, and the people of Wales will be paying for it for a very long time?

Llywydd, as I said to the Member, I will answer questions on the floor of this Senedd whenever the Senedd asks me to do so. So, it's a matter for him, not for me, how often that takes place. I entirely reject what he said. There are always people who happen to live in Wales that wish they didn't. The answer to that is in their own hands rather than mine.