5. Statement by the Minister for Social Justice: Period Dignity

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:26 pm on 1 March 2022.

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Photo of Jane Hutt Jane Hutt Labour 4:26, 1 March 2022

Diolch, Sioned Williams, clearly a campaigner all your life from that time as a very powerful school student. You had that protest in your school and made a difference, showing the courage of your convictions and also bringing people together so that they could feel empowered by your statement. And, of course, we know that that has been reflected by many campaigners that have been mentioned this afternoon, and we need those voices. The young people I met today from Radnor Primary School and Fitzalan were certainly all of the same ilk as well, and really wanting to address many of the issues that you have reflected on.

I do see this very much as part of my role as Minister for Social Justice, so, yes, we had a very powerful round-table summit on tackling the cost-of-living crisis only on 17 February. We focused very much on fuel poverty, not enough on food poverty, and we're going to follow that up, so this statement today and your comments will feed directly into how we take forward our period dignity action plan. I think, in many ways, the sad thing is that we were talking about period poverty, we moved it into period dignity, but, actually, it is back so harshly: it is period poverty, except for the fact that we are reaching out and providing this grant.

Over the coming years—well, coming year—we're looking to widen provision, which was your question, for example, to include sexual health clinics, other local services. We've got to recognise at every age, it's not just school, it's young and older—all-age women until they reach the menopause. I didn't mention the fact that it was very important that we got FE colleges, that they're part of it as well as schools, but also they're available to all in-patients in hospitals.

A very strong message came over today from young people that they'd like this to be universal. The stigma, partly, is around periods, but also, they didn't want some people to have to just have this free product, they wanted everyone. I think you mentioned that, Laura Anne. This should be universal provision.

We even talked today about ways in which we could reach out to other young girls and women who perhaps, for example, we wouldn't necessarily—. How do we support the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities? Reaching out to them. And we actually did have a lot of sessions with Children in Wales, with Women Connect First, looking at the experiences of different people with different protected characteristics. We want to really ensure that we get through to those under-served communities.

We're constantly searching for new locations, not just in foodbanks. Yes, foodbanks are now, clearly, a place where period products are made available, but there was one suggestion today that perhaps we could look at, and I could imagine it's going to be something we'd have to pilot or trial to actually have period products delivered, like we did during the lockdown, directly to young people's homes, so that this is just something that happens: you get your period products. And also the fact that it's very important that you talked about the effectiveness of what we're doing at the moment. The evaluation will be important as we take this forward, but at this point in time we have to maintain that funding element, we have to ensure that we get it right and reach out to all of the other venues and places where it can be provided. It's something where I again think—and I'm glad that the Minister for education has joined us as well—that it's a learning thing. It's really great when you saw these young boys and girls today actually saying, 'Yes, we want to think about it, because we want to think about it in terms of our mothers as well as our sisters and our fellow pupils in school.'