Questions Without Notice from the Party Leaders

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:58 pm on 5 July 2022.

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Photo of Adam Price Adam Price Plaid Cymru 1:58, 5 July 2022

With respect, we had this debate, didn't we, when we jointly presented the White Paper, where, yes, the phrase that we landed upon in the end was 'unfettered access to the single market'? That is not the position that Keir Starmer has now set out.

One example of how Wales loses out from being outside the single market, which is now Labour Party policy, is what's happened at the ports of Holyhead, Fishguard and Pembroke. As your Government predicted, the Welsh ports, subject to the full weight of the new barriers to trade, have lost business through direct-to-Europe sailings from the Republic and, also, through Northern Irish ports that currently are enjoying an indefinite grace period to export through Scotland. It's now more attractive to send goods from the Republic to Belfast and on to Scotland than it is to export them through Wales.

Now, the so-called 'landing zone' for the implementation of the Northern Ireland protocol, exempting them from most of the required checks, that your Labour Party leader set out yesterday will make that disadvantage for Welsh ports permanent, and it'll do the same for Welsh agriculture and for Welsh manufacturing. Did he consult you before his speech? If he did, did you warn of the clear risks to the future of Welsh ports that this represents?