Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:40 pm on 14 June 2022.
Well, I thank Alun Davies for that question, Llywydd. It was a pleasure to visit with him, back in April, the Star Centre at the old Sirhowy infants school in Tredegar and to see the fantastic work that was being done as a distribution centre for food in the pandemic generally and now to focus upon those whose needs are the greatest. But the Member is right, Llywydd, that it was a visit to Ebbw Vale by my colleague Jane Hutt, back on 13 May, that has led, within four weeks, to the Welsh Government being able to fund and organise a national fuel bank scheme, and I congratulate those people in Ebbw Vale who have been pioneers in this. And, as a result of their work, we'll now be in a position to provide that help right across our nation. That extra help will be targeted towards people with prepayment meters and households not connected to mains gas.
Standing charges, Llywydd, I think are one of the scandals of the energy industry, and particularly so for people on prepayment meters. When you run out of credit and you're unable to heat your home, that standing charge continues to rack up day after day. So, when you are able to find money to top up the meter again, you find that a significant part of what you've been able to draw together has already been spent. And we know that standing charges in north Wales are the highest in the whole of the United Kingdom, and are at the top end of that distribution in south Wales as well. That's why the scheme, unveiled by my colleague Jane Hutt, with nearly £4 million-worth of investment, and now working with the Fuel Bank Foundation, will allow us to provide emergency help for people who are at the very sharpest end of the fuel crisis, and is a very practical demonstration of the point that Alun Davies made—that here in Wales there is a Government determined to go on looking all the time for those practical ways in which we can make a difference in those people's lives.