Diolch. Well, I move amendments 1, 2, 4 and 5. The agility and flexibility of the universal credit system allowed a temporary uplift to be implemented at the start of the pandemic, in extraordinary times. In April 2020, as a one-year response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the universal credit standard allowance received a temporary uplift of £20 a week. In his March 2021 budget, the UK Chancellor announced an extension of this temporary uplift for a further six months. As with all the extra support provided by the UK Government in response to COVID-19, this was always time limited, although the core benefit remained protected. This extension plus a one-off payment of £500 to working tax credit claimants, also announced, were expected to cost £3 billion. The UK Chancellor also announced that universal credit advances would not need to be repaid for 24 months from April 2021—a 12-month extension—that the maximum universal credit reduction rate would fall to 25 per cent come April 2021, and that the higher surplus earnings threshold for universal credit would remain at £2,500 until April 2022.

As we faced one of the greatest economic and social challenges in our history, the UK Government delivered a £407 billion support package, including a £9 billion injection into our welfare system. But now, as we move to the next phase of our recovery, it is right to prioritise supporting more people in work and to progress in work. This builds on the 1.7 per cent increase in the working age benefits that came into effect in April 2020, benefiting around 2.5 million households, delivering one of the most comprehensive economic responses in the world during the pandemic.

The support for families, jobs and businesses provided by the UK Government over this year and last includes protecting around 14 million jobs through the furlough and self-employed schemes, and a £30 billion plan for jobs, boosting the national living wage by 2.2 per cent from April 2021, and an additional £740 million to the Welsh Government for 2021-22 through the Barnett formula, plus a further £1.4 billion the devolved Governments will receive outside the Barnett formula. With UK job vacancies reaching 1 million and payrolls rebounding to pre-pandemic levels, extending the uplift even by a further 12 months would be premature and cost the equivalent of adding 1p on the basic rate of income tax—