Diolch, Llywydd. As a keen sportswoman myself for many years, I'm an avid watcher of all sports myself, but now it mainly comprises me running around after my kids trying to watch sport. But anyway, I'm trying my best. But I am a keen sport nut, as this Chamber knows. And previous Parliaments know how much I've always pushed how important sport and physical activity is—cross cutting, across all briefs, as we've heard today. May I just say thank you to everybody for your contributions today on behalf of the Welsh Conservatives? Because it has all been very positive contributions. You all clearly have a passion for sport and understand that we need to combat the issues that we face regarding sports and really make our nation a true nation of sport. 

As we've heard this afternoon, Llywydd, from Sam Rowlands—and, again, the Minister just reiterated it—we do, as a nation, as a small nation, punch well above our weight in terms of our sporting prowess. That is wonderful, and it's something I go goosebumpy talking about, because we are so proud of our nation and how well we do achieve. But unfortunately that's despite the lack of investment that has been needed for the last few decades. Just imagine, if we did work cross-party, as Heledd said, near the beginning, how much more successful that we'd be on that international stage, and within the United Kingdom. 

I'm delighted, as you know, to hear that you agree that we need 3G pitches, and 3G pitches of all levels, for our communities, but also for our elite sports clubs and professional sports clubs, and all the leagues coming down from that—not just for football, but for rugby and for netball and whoever else can use those pitches at whatever level. But it's also a way of communities being able to play sport all the year round, which, as we've seen during this pandemic, has been of utmost importance—that physical activity can resume and continue during those five months that normally all sports clubs shut down. As the secretary of a junior football club for many years now, I know how hard it is to maintain children's interest if their training is continually cancelled, if the matches are continually cancelled—to come back then, five months later, in March, and start playing again. Either they've lost interest, or physically and mentally they've been affected by the fact that they haven't played any sport in that time. So, it is something that we do need to concentrate on.

As we've heard today, we have our Welsh stars, and it's very important that we don't have that talent drain, which we do see on a regular basis, because of the poor facilities and the difference in facilities compared to what they can offer in England, across our porous borders, and, of course, in Scotland. We do see people going across there and preferring to play sport there, and we don't want that. We want to retain them here, we want to breed our sport stars and keep them in our local clubs. As Sam Kurtz said earlier, it's essential that we look to bring more major events here to Wales, and as the Minister also outlined in her contribution, it is important that we have these major events, because it does breed enthusiasm right down to our clubs and right down into every sport and, of course, within our communities and it brings communities together and countries together as we're seeing during the Euros now.

And, of course, part of the magic of these events is that we see competitors and teams and how they've got there and the basis of sporting merit and achievement and, as Hefin quite rightly pointed out and you, Minister, it's important—fairness is important when it comes to our football leagues. And we're seeing now that some of the women's teams are being relegated, as you've outlined already, not for what's happening on the pitch, but for administrative means and that's just not right. And I really, really thank you from the Welsh Conservatives, and I know from across parties, and I know that you're doing all that you can to make sure that that process is fair and that the conclusion they reach is fair and that's the main gist of that.

I won't reiterate, but I went on to talk to the education Minister earlier about the importance of school sports, so we've touched on that already, but also the cross-cutting benefits of mental health, as James outlined earlier. There are so many health benefits. Unfortunately, as was outlined by the previous health committee, the Welsh Government really did miss something when they didn't put the emphasis on and recognise the importance of physical activity and sport as preventative measures in improving the health of our nation. So, that's something that we need to really push. But I just want to thank you, Deputy Minister, for all that you are doing. And I'm very hopeful for the future because you are a sport lover, and I do see that in you because it's reflected in me, and I love that. Thank you very much and we look forward to hearing many positive stories about what you're going to do to make our nation a true sporting nation. And on that, I hope that the whole Senedd can get behind our motion today, because it is important. We've set out a plan that we need to ensure that we get Wales to where it needs to be and I hope that we can all support that. Thank you.