I'll start my remarks where Tom Giffard left off. I want to thank the committee Chair and the committee secretariat for all the work that they've done in producing this report. It was one of those really enjoyable, actually, committee investigations, because you're always learning things on committees, and listening to the lived experience of different people is always an important part of learning about the impact, or lack of impact sometimes, of policy and what the Government is seeking to do. And in holding the Government to account, it's always useful to listen to what people have to say, and I don't think there's any need for us to debate this afternoon the place of sport in our lives. I only had to listen to my 12-year-old son talking about how he was wearing his football shirt to school last Friday to know how important that was to him. And standing in the stadium watching Wales walking out of the tunnel, for the first time in a world cup since 1958, still—I can still barely explain how it felt—and to sing our national anthem amongst all the different fans from right across the world, and to watch our players standing there taking the pitch is something that will stay with me for the rest of my life, and it's something that's been an ambition of mine all of my life. And it's important, therefore, that we share the ability to enjoy sport and enjoy physical activity with people across all of our communities.

And there are certainly some issues identified in the report, and I hope the Minister will respond to those in her remarks. But what I want to focus on, in this short time, are two elements of the barriers that perhaps can hold people back and stop people participating in sport and physical activity. The first is geography, and the second is socioeconomics. All too often in this Chamber, we will talk about geography in very black-and-white terms—the rural versus urban, north versus south, and the rest of it—but if you live in the Heads of the Valleys, you don't easily fit into either of those particular categories, and the barriers can still be insurmountable. If you don't have the cash or there isn't a bus, then it doesn't matter if there are sporting facilities available in Cardiff or somewhere else, because you can't get there, and if you get there, you can't get home. If you can't afford to pay the heating bill, and your parents are worried at the moment about Christmas coming up, they are not going to be able to pay to go swimming or to pay the subs for a football team and the rest of it. So, those barriers are real barriers and exist in the communities that we represent today, and it isn't a stark contrast between one part of Wales and another part of Wales, because if you're poor in Butetown, then you still have the same barriers to overcome in seeking to access sporting facilities.

But, my concern, in representing Blaenau Gwent, is that we have the same opportunities to produce the next Gareth Bale as Whitchurch does in the centre of Cardiff. I want my children—. My son lives in Hay-on-Wye; I want him to have the same opportunity as a child would if they were growing up in Jenny's constituency in the centre of Cardiff. All too often, they don't, and that's the reality of it. All too often, our poorest communities do not have the facilities that they need to enable people to participate in sport as the communities in the cities and in wealthier suburbs. That's the reality of Wales today, and it needs to change.

I welcome the funding that the Government has announced—I think it's £24 million, isn't it—for enabling schools to develop as community hubs. But, I stood on that manifesto in 2016—in 2016 we needed to be delivering that. We need to look and have the ambition to match the best spending plans in the world. I also took my son—I don't think he'll ever forgive me—to watch the rugby earlier in the autumn, and I took my daughter to watch New Zealand score six tries against us in the best part of half an hour. Now, look, we can't compete with those teams unless our people, our children, our young people, have the same opportunities as their young people have on the other side of the world. That means investing in places, facilities, and investing in our young people.

I'll conclude on this: one of the things—I'm getting too old for all of this nowadays, of course—but one of the great pleasures of my life—. One of my great pleasures of recent years has been the development of female team sports. Because we always remember—. I still remember Mary Peters winning a medal in the Olympics when I was growing up, and she made that impression on me. We've always enjoyed watching female tennis, golf and the rest of it. But, watching the development of women's football and rugby particularly in my life, I think, has been one of the real pleasures in the last few years, and watching my daughter begin to identify, take me to watch Welsh women playing rugby, I think it's been one of the great pleasures. I remember talking to Laura McAllister many, many years ago when she was going off to play football for Cardiff City, and I remember how important that was to her. So, to see now women's sport beginning to have the opportunities and the equalities that it's always deserved and required, I think, is one of the great achievements of recent years, and I very much welcome that. But let's make sure—