Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Climate Change – in the Senedd at 2:19 pm on 18 May 2022.
Yes, thank you, Peter Fox, for that series of questions, and, absolutely, we understand entirely that the phosphate issue is a really serious issue across Wales. It's affecting the delivery of our 20,000 social homes, it's affecting the delivery of a number of market housing that should have gone ahead for local development plan purposes and so on. It's also affecting a number of other developments across Wales. And, absolutely, there are a number of complexities. Each river catchment has a different set of players, who may or may not be contributing to the phosphate levels there. Phosphate is the headline issue, but we also have nitrates and ammonium, all kinds of other stuff that we've got going into our rivers for various reasons across Wales. We have a number of groups looking at the SAC rivers in particular, so, the Wye has a cross-border one, for example, that I know Peter's aware of.
But the reason for the summit at the Royal Welsh, chaired by the First Minister, is to bring the players together, because there's absolutely no doubt that everyone has to compromise here, because we just cannot have a situation where we can't have anything happening, but nor can we have a situation in which our rivers are visibly dying. What use is that to anyone, frankly? We allow the houses to be built, and then the river's an open sewer—that's clearly not acceptable either. So, this is all about reaching the best possible compromise for both the environment, the rivers and their catchments and the way they flow into the sea and affect our kelp and sea grass forests and all the rest of it, which is vital for climate and nature emergency action, but also the real problem that we have with insufficient housing, particularly in the social sector and so on.
There's a large number of pieces of work going on across the piece on this, it's a very, very difficult and complicated problem, and the reason for the summit is to bring those players together in the spirit of, 'How can we, together, reach the best possible compromise to take this forward in Wales?' Because, let there be no mistake, no-one who comes to that summit is going to go away with their agenda fulfilled 100 per cent and everybody else's put to one side. It's about compromise and reaching that best possible solution for everyone so that we can go forward together as a set of communities.