Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, and thank you to the Deputy Minister for your statement this afternoon.

It's deeply disappointing that fair pay for social care workers is such a long way off. I'd have thought, Deputy Minister, with my party pledging to pay staff in social care at least £10 per hour, and Plaid Cymru pledging to increase the pay in real terms, that introducing the real living wage would have been the bare minimum you would have done. Instead, Welsh Government have kicked it into the long grass and asked a committee to come up with recommendations—not that we should be surprised, given how the Welsh Government have treated the social care workforce during the past 15 months. Social care staff are some of the lowest paid workers, but they were expected to go above and beyond during the pandemic. We all remember only too well the £500 promised to care staff last year, which was dogged by dither and delay because the Welsh Government failed to discuss the matter with the Treasury before winging out their press release. Deputy Minister, we are grateful that you remedied this with an additional payment, but now will you apologise publicly to all those who missed out on the initial payment, and will you task the social care fair work forum with looking beyond the real living wage? Will you be asking them to look at the issue of sick pay, which was highlighted over the course of this pandemic?

A House of Lords inquiry found that care homes that relied upon those who funded their own care were able to pay staff almost double that of those homes funded by local authorities. Do you agree, Deputy Minister, that to properly fund social care staff we have to ensure that local authorities are properly funded? Will you reassure this Chamber that future local government settlements will allow our councils to pay social care staff a fair wage?

Of course, how we value our staff is not just in the amount we pay them; how we treat them and how we train them is almost as important as paying a fair wage. Unfortunately, Wales has a social care workforce that has been demotivated and demoralised for far too long. As a result, we have seen record staff turnover rates and sky-high job vacancies.

Deputy Minister, the previous Welsh Government set a target of employing 20,000 more social care staff by the end of this decade. Is it still your intention to do so and, if so, will you outline the steps you'll be taking to achieve this target? According to the latest available figures, we have 9 per cent of posts in adult social care unfilled and a staff turnover rate of 13 per cent. In domiciliary care, the turnover rate is an astronomical 30 per cent a year. Deputy Minister, do you agree that unless we tackle the demoralisation of staff, the issue of pay becomes secondary? Aside from the issue of a fair wage, how will the Welsh Government make the profession more attractive to both existing staff and those thinking of pursuing a caring profession?

I look forward to working with you, Deputy Minister, to improve the pay and conditions of staff working in social care, to ensuring care work becomes a more desirable profession, and a fair reflection of the value we place upon the amazing staff working in care. Diolch yn fawr iawn.