'For instance, Wales has a higher share of retail, leisure and hospitality properties (43%) compared to England (38%)—though this is likely to be offset by their lower average rateable values. Their lower rateable values meant that a relatively larger share of Welsh premises (75%) qualify for the £10,000 grant compared to England (70%). This is despite the fact that the grant is only made available to businesses with a rateable value of less than £12,000 in Wales, whereas businesses with a rateable value of between £12,000 and £15,000 are also eligible for this support in England.'

I think that the paper was right. On the publication of that report, Plaid Cymru argued that there should have been, at the very least, temporary reforms made to the formula, for example including a specific coronavirus needs-based factor. But ultimately, I think the pandemic has shown that we need that sort of longer term reform of Barnett, and we need it urgently.

The second issue is the inflexibilities placed on the Welsh Government in terms of the ability to borrow and draw down from the Wales reserve. I certainly—as did the Finance Committee—welcome the fact that there has been some budging by the Treasury on this, in reference to their agreement to allow £650 million to be carried over to the 2021-22 budget. But, we are still in no better position in terms of the Government's actual fiscal powers than we were at the beginning of the pandemic. The Minister has repeatedly said that the Welsh Government are in talks with the UK Government on addressing these inflexibilities. We are none the wiser really as to how those talks have gone, or are going, which suggests to me that things aren't going well; little surprise, given the fact that Government hasn't been willing to do things that it has been able to do—for example, borrow. I will quote Gerry Holtham here:

'Failing to borrow in two successive financial years'— that's 2019-20 and 2020-21—

'seems unambitious.' I agree with him. So, Dirprwy Lywydd, these are unprecedented times. There's a lot in this supplementary budget—the third one, remarkably—to welcome here. But, what this financial year has shown is that the Government cannot afford to bury collective heads in the sand on the need to move forward on Wales's fiscal autonomy.