6. Debate on the Economy, Infrastructure and Skills Committee Report on long-term recovery from COVID-19

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:08 pm on 10 March 2021.

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Photo of Ken Skates Ken Skates Labour 4:08, 10 March 2021

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd, and can I start as I did at committee just this morning by thanking the current and past members of the committee for the incredibly constructive way in which it's worked with me and my officials over the past five years to get the best possible ideas and outcomes for the people of Wales? And to that end, I broadly warmly welcome the report and I thank the committee for their acknowledgement of the efforts of the teams who've responded at pace through challenging operational conditions to support businesses and transport operators.

And as you'll appreciate, I won't be able to comment on all 53 recommendations today, but what the number of recommendations most definitely does show is the diligence of the committee in undertaking and examining what might be needed for the economy in the years to come. As the Chair says in his foreword, reconstruction is going to be a long process, and it will be for the future Governments, not just potentially the next administration but several afterwards, to deal with the recommendations and to implement necessary change. But we have made huge strides in rolling out vaccines and the public health situation is improving, so optimism for economic rebound is most certainly growing.

And we, of course, made a start on that when we published our economic resilience and reconstruction mission last month, and the mission sets out what many people told me directly—that in Wales we have the talent, we have the energy and the ideas to rebuild our economy in a better and much fairer way. It offers, I think, grounded optimism against a backdrop of the most challenging circumstances that I think we've faced in our time, which have included Brexit and the climate emergency. 

Now, the outlook for the economy, whilst still hugely challenging, does look better than it did at the time of the last Office for Budget Responsibility forecast in November. Even so, by 2026 the level of gross domestic product is expected to be some 3 per cent smaller than the level expected pre pandemic, reflecting the long-term scarring effects of coronavirus on the economy. This will be particularly bad for disadvantaged groups and young people as they try to get a foothold in the labour market.