Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:03 pm on 11 October 2022.
Llywydd, it is the emptiest of contributions to offer us further and further iterations of the problem, without a single sentence that helps us to find a solution. This Government pays the real living wage to social care workers; the first time that's ever been done in the history of devolution. But I just put to the leader of Plaid Cymru the points I made earlier this afternoon: our budget in Wales next year is already cut by over £1 billion. We know that, because the UK Government has said in terms that it will not increase funding for public services, and the impact of inflation on our budget is that it is worth over £1 billion less than it was when the Conservative Government set that budget in November of last year.
On top of that, we are going to face huge further reductions. Let him tell me where the money to do what he asks me this week, let alone the money to do what he asked me to do last week, and the money to do what he asked me the week before—where is all that money going to be found in a time when we don't have more money to invest in our public services, we have less money than at any time during the history of devolution.