3. Will the Minister provide an update on the Welsh Government’s support for veterans in Wales? OQ56685

Our third armed forces covenant annual report details the wide range of support for veterans across Wales. This year we have seen excellent progress including increased investment in veterans mental health services, funding for veterans to access further and higher education and continued funding of our armed forces liaison officers.

Thank you for that response, Deputy Minister. Last week to mark Armed Forces Week, I took a visit to Adferiad Recovery's headquarters in Colwyn Bay in my constituency. Adferiad Recovery is a service provider to veterans through its Change Step programme, which has operated now for over a decade. Over 3,000 individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder have been supported by that particular programme, and they have provided 57,000 hours of one-to-one peer mentoring support. The cost of that service over the decade has been around £5 million, yet only £40,000 of that has come from the Welsh Government, and yet that is in spite of the fact that for every £1 invested in the service, academic research has shown that it saves the public purse £7 in return. Can I ask the Welsh Government whether it will look at the resources that it makes available to support veterans in Wales, and to see whether there's an opportunity here to invest to provide more sustainable funding to the Change Step programme, which of course operates across Wales and has benefited so many of my constituents and those of the Deputy Minister and others in this Chamber?

Can I thank Darren Millar for his question? I know this is an area that you're very committed to and very passionate about in the work you do with the cross-party group on armed forces as well, and also attend the expert group on armed forces as a guest on that.

The work you pointed out is quite rightly to be applauded, particularly on the back of Armed Forces Week, where many of us in this Chamber paused to pay tribute to those who've served, and those who continue to serve, the veterans and the contribution they make not only to our country, but to our communities right across Wales. The role of the third sector and those charities, we know they're the ones and we've only been able to provide that support to veterans and their families because we've worked collaboratively in partnership. You'll be very familiar with our armed forces scoping exercise, pointing out the progress we've made, but also the work that still needs to be done and where those gaps were. So, I'll most certainly be happy to look at the points he's raised today and come back to the Member, if he'd like to get in touch about that as well.