6. What additional funding does the Minister intend to allocate to the environment and rural affairs budget in the current financial year? OQ56111

The third supplementary budget is planned for publication on 9 February 2021. Any allocations in the current financial year for the environment, energy, and rural affairs portfolio will be included in that budget.

Well, we know, of course, that the Audit Wales report highlighted a problem with the way the Welsh Government has been allocating RDP funding. We heard earlier how you're now going to have to pay £3 million back to the European Union because of maladministration of that funding. Can I ask you, therefore, in your third supplementary budget, that you pay that from the central Government funds? Because you suggested earlier that that would have to come from the Minister's budget. Now, that would mean, of course, that there would be something else in that budget that couldn't be funded, because that money would have been spent there, and what you would be doing there would be penalising rural Wales because of the failings of your own Government.

Llywydd, as yet, I haven't had the opportunity to have a discussion with the Minister on this particular issue, but I clearly will intend to do so and will reflect, within the third supplementary budget, the outcome of those discussions. And, of course, I'd be happy to share that information with Llyr before that point.FootnoteLink

Information further to Plenary