Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:00 pm on 2 November 2021.
Well, Llywydd, can I just say that we are confident that we will achieve the 2020 target? We measure these things over five years because the target is very vulnerable to single-year distortions. The leader of Plaid Cymru is right that there was rapid progress in the first part of the first five-year programme, less so in the second half. But that is just in the nature, I think, of the way that this particular subject operates. We are on track, we believe, to hit and exceed the second carbon budget—the budget that will be declared after the end of this Senedd term. But as I said in an earlier answer, there is more we have to do in these five years to make sure that the people who sit in the Senedd after this five-year period can be equally confident of reaching a target we have set for 2030. Unless we’re prepared to do more in this Senedd term, we won’t be on track to do that, and that’s why our plan commits us to those practical actions.
And as I said in an earlier answer, Llywydd, these things are challenging, and they’re challenging for every Member of the Senedd, because while we can agree, in principle and in prospect, that we must do more to persuade people, for example, not to use their cars, when it comes to specific examples in particular constituencies, Members will be under pressure to take a different view of that. We’re, all of us, going to have to be prepared to grapple with those challenging decisions in every aspect of our lives, and together, to do the things that will make that difference. Our plan, we believe, sets us on that track. But without that determination, not just in Government, but across the political spectrum and beyond that as well, then that journey will be very difficult indeed to accomplish.