Thank you, Minister, for bringing this statement to the Chamber today. Before I begin, I would like to refer Members and members of the public to my own register of interests as regards property ownership.

Now, yesterday, we all heard that the Welsh Government announced their coalition deal with Plaid Cymru. Many of us who've been here some time now believe that that was very heavy on rhetoric but light on detail. Just one day later, how surprising it is to find that the Welsh Government has now announced that it will grant £2 million in aid to Plaid Cymru-led Gwynedd Council for the purchase of empty homes for social rent. Minister, whilst it's really good that you're providing £1 million for other local authorities, Wales does have 22 local authorities, and I do think that, once again, this should not be party politically motivated.

I have many misgivings about the statement made today, as it is important that the Welsh Government does not intervene in the market in a manner that has too much of an impact. The Welsh Government needs to be supporting people to buy houses, rather than lowering house prices inadvertently. Therefore, increasing premiums is not the answer, neither is the possibility of enabling local planning authorities to switch on the need for planning permission to change from a primary home to a secondary home or short-term holiday let.