We have to make sure that we offer value for money to the taxpayer as an institution. In particular, many of the costs associated with Senedd reform, including the £100 million price tag on 36 more Members of the Senedd, are impossible to justify in the current economic environment. The expansion needed in office space, extra staffing and other associated costs can’t even begin to be imagined, and the actual wording of our budget leaves the door open to vast increases in new spending to cover any ensuing costs that we cannot support. As we face the strains of the cost-of-living crisis, it is only fair that the Senedd Commission should reflect this in its budgeting processes—and really good contributions all round from everybody who has spoken before me. We’re all aware of our rapid increases in energy bills, but for me, right from when I came to this place, I’ve always felt that it was incumbent upon the Commission to deliver the support for us as Members in the most efficient manner.

We know that there have been the increases in energy bills, we know there are different models of working now, in terms of a lot of Commission staff still working from home because of the pandemic, and one of the largest increases seen in this 2023-24 budget is in our utility costs. As Ken Skates has already documented in his letter to Peredur Owen Griffiths, the budget documents an increase from £582,000 in 2022-23 to an estimated £1.25 million cost in 2023-24. I note that the Finance Committee recommends that the Commission should fund in-year pressures on the budget, and it should have control by making in-year savings and efficiencies rather than through supplementary budgets, and in the name of fiscal responsibility, this is something that I too support. The Commission simply cannot expect a supplementary budget whenever difficult decisions about finance have to be made. The committee also notes in its recommendations that the Commission should not assume an increase in funding from one year to the next. At a time when the general public are having to find difficult savings, it's only right that, as a Commission, and as an institution, we lead by example.

Now, I’m reassured to see a commitment to support staff who may be struggling with higher bills through the hardship fund and other such schemes, but I was shocked to learn in the first instance that that would be for Commission staff, and that Senedd support staff may not—that was a decision for the remuneration board. I’ll come to the rem board in a minute. But in summary, therefore, the Commission budget has to make provision for the Senedd to carry out its essential work, making provision for the most vulnerable members of staff, and encompassing the whole length and breadth of Wales. Rising costs largely driven by the desire to impose a larger Senedd mean that we do not believe the Commission budget lives up to the current challenges of the moment. Instead, we are simply firefighting potential costs and burdens that I believe have been placed upon us by, obviously, this Welsh Labour Government, supported by Plaid Cymru. But the impact it’s having on our budgets, when one considers that the next electoral period starts in 2026, and here we are now, in 2022, being affected.

But to the rem board. A lot of Members have actually raised the kind of concerns, Mike, that you have: where’s the transparency? Where’s the accountability of the remuneration board? When I first became a Member here, I was aware the rem board was in place, and it’s all part and parcel of the make-up of the Senedd, but I do honestly believe that now is the time for us to have some difficult discussions about how well the rem board is supporting Members and how well its own processes—. Too often Members feel that decisions are taken without their input, without taking them along with them or explaining them, even, and too often Members feel that things are done at them rather than with them. I honestly think this is going to be a difficult discussion to have, but I think it’s one that needed raising because Members have raised quite a few concerns about the rem board. So, thank you. Diolch yn fawr.