Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:32 pm on 16 June 2021.
I'd like to state very clearly that, when it comes to the climate and biodiversity emergency, there is no place for party politics, and I am committed to work cross-party to secure and support your work. And I'm pleased to hear the Deputy Minister reference the need to take a data and science-led approach to the climate emergency. However, this is at odds with your refusal to commit to an independent inquiry into the floods, an inquiry that would give us the answers, because, time and time again, people still don't know what happened and why. People trust Welsh Government due to COVID, because of that openness in terms of data, and yet, they do not have the answers they need and deserve in terms of what happened in 2020. Therefore, we can throw money reactively at flood management, and until we actually acknowledge that things like the section 19 report will not give those answers, we have a whole array of reports, but we need a way of bringing all of that data together, to understand also the impact on mental health and well-being. And I would like to ask, you've referenced the national flood strategy, and in that it references a need for a national conversation, and the NRW report states the same. When will those difficult conversations take place and we take forward those conversations, but actually listen to communities, who at the moment do not trust this Welsh Government to protect them from flooding?