Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 7:01 pm on 23 March 2021.
Diolch, Llywydd. In relation to the response from the Chair of the LJC committee, I will just confirm again that the necessary changes will be made to deal with the single remaining technical point at the next suitable opportunity.
I'd like to thank Llyr Huws Griffiths for his very kind words. He's quite right, we haven't always seen eye to eye, but we've always dealt with each other, as he said, in a friendly manner, and I've always been very interested in his views and respected the comments he's come forward with.
Just in relation to the funding issue, I still have not given up on the UK Government funding us properly. Just yesterday, I discussed it with the Secretary of State for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in our latest DEFRA inter-ministerial group meeting, and explained again how the UK Government had broken its promise that Wales would not lose a penny if we left the European Union. Those discussions are still going on, and I can see my colleague the Minister for Finance in Plenary today, and I know she is continuing to fight that also.
It will be for the next Government, obviously, to look at how that funding can be identified, but, clearly, £137 million is a huge amount of money to find, but we will continue to press the UK Government to keep their promise, going forward. Diolch.