Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:39 pm on 8 June 2022.
I just want to expand on the point that the Llywydd made on lack of capacity within the Senedd. You will know that I chair a committee in the Senedd, the Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee. The remit of that committee is very broad indeed, as the title suggests. We are talking about the environment, climate change— which is a key agenda for us as things stand—energy comes into it, retrofitting homes, the planning system, spatial planning on land and sea. Infrastructure—we're talking about transport in all its aspects. We're talking about rail, buses, roads. We're also talking about connectivity in terms of broadband and so on. You have a number of committees in Westminster and in other Parliaments around the world dealing with those issues, but they are all within the remit of one committee here, and there are just six Members on that committee. Six Members who have to have the depth of knowledge and understanding of all of those areas to work effectively. Add to that the fact that most members of that committee sit on other committees too. That's the kind of capacity issue that we have. I'm also my party's spokesperson on finance and local government. That's an additional responsibility again, never mind the work that we all do in our constituencies in case work, in representing our constituents and so on and so on. We know this, but it's important that people hear this too.
That's just a glimpse of the capacity issues that we have now, and that does have an impact on our ability to scrutinise with the depth and detail that we should be scrutinising in terms of policy, legislation and so on. So, when people talk about cost, well, yes, we can describe it as a cost, but we can also describe as an investment, an investment in capacity that would then mean that the policies, the regulation, the legislation that are scrutinised and passed in this Senedd would be more effective, more efficient and would have fewer unintended consequences, which would mean fewer additional costs ultimately. So, I see this as an investment rather than a cost. More than that, of course, it's an investment that brings other positives, such as expanding representation to ensure that there is more balance and more diversity among those who are representing in this Senedd.