1. Will the First Minister make a statement on the future of the Tech Valleys programme? OQ57800

Llywydd, the Tech Valleys programme is a 10-year Welsh Government programme for government commitment up to 2028, with Blaenau Gwent at its heart. I look forward to being with the Member at the opening of the new resilient works at Thales, one of the largest current investments within the programme. 

I'm grateful to the First Minister, and I, too, look forward to welcoming him back to Blaenau Gwent. The commitment to the Tech Valleys project in Blaenau Gwent, in our manifesto, and in the programme for government, is more, First Minister, than simply an investment in the borough; it is a commitment to the people and the communities in the Heads of the Valleys. As the Welsh Government continues to invest in this £100 million programme, do you agree with me that it needs to be delivered as part of a wider investment in an economic development strategy for the whole of the Heads of the Valleys region, and one which seeks to maximise the value of the investment in dualling the A465? First Minister, we've already seen some good news in the labour market survey recently, which is as a direct consequence of this Government's approach to investing in an activist economic policy. I hope that we will be able to continue to do this in the Heads of the Valleys. 

Well, Llywydd, I thank Alun Davies for that. As I said in my original answer, Blaenau Gwent and the Member's constituency is at the heart of the Tech Valleys programme, but it isn't a programme that stops at Blaenau Gwent. The Heads of the Valleys road, as Alun Davies has often said on the floor of the Chamber here, is the single largest investment in a road infrastructure scheme undertaken during the whole of the devolution era. The continuos dual carriageway it will create will connect the midlands to south west Wales and the M4. It will reduce journey times. It will improve road safety. It will add resilience to the network, and sections 5 and 6 alone will generate £400 million-worth of expenditure in Wales, but particularly in those communities to which Alun Davies referred in his supplementary question. 

And the Member's right, Llywydd, to draw attention to today's figures—the employment and unemployment figures published today—showing once again that the employment rate in Wales has risen faster than the employment rate across the United Kingdom, that our unemployment rate is now lower than the unemployment rate across the United Kingdom, and fell faster than the United Kingdom, and that economic inactivity rates in Wales improved at a faster rate than they improved across the United Kingdom as a whole. We need to make sure that those benefits being felt across Wales are felt as well in the northern Valleys. That's why my colleague Vaughan Gething has brought together the leaders of the five local authorities that span the Heads of the Valleys road, and with them identified five key priorities. The Welsh Government has put hundreds of thousands of pounds on the table to support the development of the first priority—strategic sites and premises—and I'm very pleased to say to the Member that, yesterday, the cabinet of the Cardiff capital city deal agreed £1 million to support the other four priorities, over and above the £30 million that they have earmarked in their budget as a ring-fenced fund for northern Valleys developments. All of that, I hope, Llywydd, gives residents in the Member's constituency confidence that the Tech Valleys programme and its investment will go on bringing prosperity to Blaenau Gwent, but to the wider northern Valleys communities as well.

Good afternoon, First Minister. I just would be grateful if you could enlighten the Chamber today on how many jobs have been created since the project has launched, how many of those jobs have gone to the local area, and outline also what assessment you've made of the rates of pay offered to those local people, to support the alleviation of poverty in Blaenau Gwent. Thank you.

Let me help the Member as best I can. Between 2011 and 2021, the employment rate in Blaenau Gwent increased by 8.1 percentage points, and that exceeded the increase in employment across Wales, and the increase at the United Kingdom level as well. Over the same decade, the unemployment rate in Blaenau Gwent fell from 16 per cent to 5.3 per cent, a larger fall than you would find in other communities across Wales. All of that demonstrates, Llywydd, the success of Welsh Government investments in bringing jobs not simply to those parts of Wales that already enjoy prosperity, but to those parts of Wales where those jobs are particularly necessary to support the development of local communities and local economies.