Controlling the Use of Fireworks

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:18 pm on 10 November 2020.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:18, 10 November 2020

Llywydd, I agree with all the points that the Member has made. What we want to see is responsible use of fireworks. As it happens, I quite like a good firework display myself; I enjoy seeing one. But you want to do it in a way that doesn't cause the unintended harms that Darren Millar has referred to. 

We have worked with our local authorities and our police here in Wales on the enforcement powers that they have. I know that the Member will be interested that reports from the four Welsh police forces after last week suggest quite a difference between those forces that essentially police rural areas, who reported a quiet bonfire night with very little calls on their services, and some far, far more difficult moments in the South Wales Police and Gwent Police areas, with utterly unacceptable attacks on firefighters and on police officers when called to deal with untoward incidents.

We did work with the UK Government in the run-up to this bonfire night on a promotion campaign trying to persuade people to use fireworks properly and responsibly. I'm very happy to go on doing more of that, but I do think that there is a regulatory issue here. The 2003 Act was put on the statute book because of the aftermath of the millennium, when the widespread use of fireworks appeared to carry on in the years immediately after it in a not-very-acceptable way. So, the 2003 regulations did help to put some shape around that and to bear down on the worst excesses. If we're seeing that beginning to happen again, then looking again at the regulations and doing more to make sure that fireworks are responsibly sold and responsibly used, I think, would be a very good use of Government time.