2. What action is the Welsh Government taking to support the local economy of Aberavon? OQ56511

I thank the Member for that question. Llywydd, the Welsh Government continues to support local economies across Wales, including that of Aberavon, with our packages of funding available to businesses in response to the pandemic as well as through our Transforming Towns programme.

Can I thank the First Minister for that answer, and can I welcome the support given to the thousands of small businesses across Aberavon during the pandemic to ensure that, as the First Minister said, those in business in 2019 can stay in business when we come out of this pandemic? Now, there are still some who may need that support for a little bit longer because of the sectors they work in, such as Sonalyst in my consistency. But most of our small businesses actually depend on our major employer in Port Talbot, and that's steel, and the need for Government to continue its support for steel is critical, particularly in the face of the Tory denial over the future of the steel sector in Wales. It appears that cronyism is rife in the Tory Party, because we're seeing David Cameron lobbying Rishi Sunak for support for an investment company directly, but not for these businesses that the investment currently supports. Therefore, can the First Minister give steelworkers in my constituency, and in the wider region, assurances that this Welsh Labour Government will continue to stand up for our steel sector and support the industry as it moves towards decarbonisation in order to build a strong, sustainable steel industry for the future and for generations to come?

Llywydd, I thank David Rees for that supplementary question. Of course, this is an anxious time for steelworkers. My colleague Ken Skates attended a meeting of the UK Steel Council—long delayed, but finally meeting on 5 March. He also met with Liberty Steel on 18 March and raised all these issues again at a quadrilateral meeting, involving the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy of the UK Government, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, on the same day. And the point that the Welsh Government always make, Llywydd, is the strategic significance of a steel industry—you cannot hope to be a modern economy, let alone a manufacturing economy, without having an indigenous steel industry. That is the significance of the work that goes on in the Member's own constituency. Now, there, the Welsh Government continues directly to support efforts at Port Talbot to secure the sort of decarbonised future for the steel industry that David Rees has long supported. The Steel and Metals Institute at Swansea University, which my predecessor in this job opened in February 2018, focuses on reducing carbon emissions in the steel industry. The ASTUTE Institute, again at Swansea University, using £23 million of European funding, focuses on advanced sustainable manufacturing technologies that can help to secure a sustainable future for the steel industry. Here in Wales, the Welsh Government does everything we can to support that industry directly, but also to make the case that only the UK Government can deliver a sector deal of the sort that the steel industry requires, and we make that case to them whenever we have the opportunity.

Thank you, First Minister, for a sensible reply there, rather than a party political broadcast. As you know, the Welsh Conservatives themselves are deeply committed to the future of the steel industry in Wales. There's still a considerable amount of publicly owned land and property in my region, not least in Aberavon. As the Economy, Infrastructure and Skills Committee has advised that youth unemployment will be set back as a result of COVID, and in light of ongoing concerns about the constituency's anchor employer, as you've just referred to, how can publicly owned assets be best used to help create investment and jobs that benefit young people in Aberavon?

I thank the Member for that question. The Welsh Government invests considerable sums of money in trying to bring back into beneficial use ground that, left to the market, would never come forward. Often, as in the sorts of areas that Suzy Davies has identified, that is because it is industrial land where contamination has happened in previous years, and, if you bring the land for sale, then nobody is able to buy it because they can't deal with the sunk costs that would have to be mopped up before the land could become usable. So, our stalled sites fund, for example, is designed to carry out that investment on publicly owned land so that it can then be used, for example, for housing, with all the jobs that that itself brings forward. And I agree with the Member—there is a real challenge for Wales, whichever political parties are involved in it, in making sure that our young people do not bear the brunt of the economic crisis that coronavirus has created. And finding ways in which we can create opportunities for them in education, in employment, in training so that they come through the pandemic, ready to take advantages of job opportunities when the economy recovers, I think, is absolutely at the top of the list of challenges that the next Senedd term will need to face.  

First Minister, Aberavon continues to have one of the lowest employment rates in Wales, with a quarter of the residents economically inactive. Do you accept that your economic policies have failed the people of Aberavon and the entire South Wales West region? So, what the people in my region need is greater support for domestic businesses, particularly those pursuing green technologies, as well as hoping to attract overseas companies. First Minister, how will your Government encourage entrepreneurial spirit in Aberavon? Thank you. 

Well, Llywydd, there's a lot in what the Member said in the second half of her contribution with which I can agree. Her analysis is deeply flawed, however. It is one of the most remarkable features of the Welsh economy over the last 20 years that we moved from having one of the highest proportions of our population economically inactive, and a growing proportion as well, in 1999, at the start of devolution, to having reduced that figure to at or occasionally below the UK average, and if you'd said that 20 years ago, that that could be achieved, you really would have been thought of as being out on a limb in terms of economic possibilities at that time. So, I think her analysis is deeply mistaken, but her positive suggestions for what is needed for the economy of Aberavon and the wider economy of south-west Wales has lots of sensible things in it.

Of course, we want to encourage indigenous enterprises. We have put money, during this pandemic, directly into supporting young people in particular who have ideas for self-employment, making sure that they have the mentoring that they need, the support that they need and some of the start-up capital they may need in order to turn those ideas into viable businesses of the future. And, while this Government has had a particular focus on the foundational economy, those jobs that can't be moved around the globe, we go on helping to bring investment to Wales from elsewhere as well. There's no one answer to the future of the Welsh economy. It needs to draw on a wide range of different ways in which we can support businesses that are here already, support the talents and enthusiasms of young people who have ideas for the jobs of the future, and, where opportunities arise, welcome inward investment to Wales as well.