Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:59 pm on 17 November 2020.
Do you agree, First Minister, that the only secure and sustainable future for Port Talbot and the other Welsh plants in the long run is to return the ownership of the Welsh steel industry to Welsh hands—to nationalise as a first step, and then to recapitalise with the kind of green bond advocated recently by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in their report to you, and then finally to mutualise and create a Welsh steel co-operative? Dŵr Cymru has been a success despite the scepticism at the outset, so why not Dur Cymru?
The Basque co-operative, Mondragon, which the Welsh Government is already working with, as you confirmed last week, has previously indicated its willingness to provide advice and support in establishing an employee-owned business at Port Talbot. Why not take them up on that offer? A worker-owned integrated steel plant is by no means unprecedented internationally.
At the height of the last crisis, which was only four years ago, the Welsh Government funded the Excalibur management buy-out at Port Talbot to the tune of £0.75 million. Is the Welsh Government prepared to put similar resources and energy, now, behind the idea of a Welsh-owned steel co-operative?