Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:01 pm on 18 January 2022.
It's a very powerful charge list that the leader of Plaid Cymru sets out there, and anybody seeing them put together in that way will certainly see that what lies behind it is a Government that is utterly reckless about a rules-based approach to public services, but also to the future of our democracy. And nobody should be surprised at that, Llywydd, with the disgraceful revelations of the way in which, at a time when the whole country was being urged to abide to some of the most significant reductions in their ability to make choices in their own lives, at the very heart of the UK Government, there was an utter disregard for that in their own lives. In some ways, I think that lies at the heart of that long list that Adam Price put together—that sense that there is one rule for the rest of us, and a different rule for those who regard themselves as above and beyond the rules that other people are expected to observe. And I think you can see that running through that long list of things that Adam Price put together. If you don't like the way that judges operate, then you attack judges. If you don't like the way that democracy operates, you try and change the rules for voting. If you don't like the way that human rights are observed in this country, you try and undermine the basis of that, too. Broadcasting is this week's example in a far longer list, a deliberate culture war that this Government has embarked upon. They think it plays well with a minority of people in this country, that shrinking minority who support them, and they're prepared to sacrifice things that have been built up over, in some cases, centuries, and in public broadcasting, for 100 years this year.