Diolch, Llywydd. I want to speak to both amendments in this group. Amendments 103 and 104 both serve to remove the power for the commission to dissolve higher education corporations in Wales. It's simply unacceptable, in my view, for the commission to have the ability and it very clearly goes against my guiding principle of this Bill, which is maintaining a true arm's-length approach. As I said to the Minister at an earlier stage, this power threatens the independence of higher education corporations without a royal charter, which would have a particularly negative impact in Wales, as it covers half of our universities. Cardiff Metropolitan University has said that it would weaken rather than strengthen the sector should these universities be given less autonomy. Wrexham Glyndŵr University pointed out that this would put HECs in Wales in the weakest position across the entire UK.

In England, such provisions were removed from legislation in 2017. The Minister has still failed to justify why it is necessary to retain these powers when they have been removed elsewhere in the UK, forcing Wales into the position of a bizarre and unjustified outlier. Diolch.