4. How is the Minister working with the Minister for Climate Change to ensure that local authorities have the funding required to meet their climate change commitments? OQ58967

Climate change is a cross-government priority and I work closely with the Minister for Climate Change and with my other Cabinet colleagues to support delivery of Net Zero Wales, and to support local authorities in delivering their commitments.

Thank you, Minister, for that answer and we've had many discussions in this Chamber about making sure there's enough capital to decarbonise, for local government to decarbonise and invest in their green projects. But it's not all about money, either. There is also a need to make sure that there is sufficient human capital with the right skills and knowledge that they need to fulfil those roles, and I know that the Welsh Local Government Association, in their evidence on the Government's draft budget, have shared their concerns about the shortage of staff with green skills, as well as the difficulties experienced by public bodies in retaining staff with the required skills due to wage differentials with the private sector.

I'm just wondering, Minister, what discussions you've had with local government colleagues about developing and funding a recruitment, retention and upskilling strategy, so that staff have the required knowledge and skills in green issues. And what consideration have you given to, perhaps, enhancing the role of corporate joint committees, so that pooled budgets and pooled efforts can achieve some of these commitments?

I'm very grateful for that question this afternoon, and I'm really pleased with the work that the decarbonisation panel for Wales is undertaking in terms of ensuring that all local authorities have plans in place in order to help move them towards that goal of net zero in the public sector by 2030.

I think one of the areas where we need to put a great deal of focus, of course, is on procurement, because over 60 per cent of councils' emissions arise through the procurement of goods and services. I mention that because that's one of the areas where the Welsh Government is investing in skills for that particular sector. So, we've been investing in the professional qualifications, and supporting people to achieve those professional qualifications within the public sector, so that they have that skills base and the knowledge that they need, but particularly so with a focus now on decarbonisation. Just yesterday, I had the opportunity to meet the individuals through Curshaw who were driving forward our alpha phase on the centre for excellence for procurement. That was a really interesting meeting, talking to them about what they'd heard from talking to procurement professionals within the public sector, and also, particularly, in local government. I think skills and recognition are part of that, a concern that there must be that continuous opportunity to develop those skills within the very modern context and within the context of that journey towards net zero by 2030. So, that is a field of work where there's a lot of work going on at the moment, but particularly with that eye on procurement.

Of course, the best way to achieve this, as we all know, on every side of the Chamber, would be to go back to the old eight counties where you've got local government with sufficient capacity and clout to be able to deliver those schemes. You know that, they all know that, but there we go. I won't go after it this afternoon, everybody will be pleased to hear. But what I would like to—[Interruption.]

What I would like to challenge the Minister on is this: local government can act as a catalyst within its particular area to enable far more community-based renewable energy schemes. We do see that in some places, but we don't see anything like the number and the quantity that we require in order to deliver on our net-zero ambitions, but also to address some of the social issues that we debated in an earlier question. So, what can the Welsh Government do, Minister, to bring local government together to ensure that local government has the tools—the financial tools as well as the expertise that Peter Fox described—in order to provide local communities with the means to deliver renewable schemes that will address all the issues that we've been debating earlier?

I agree that local authorities have an important role and an important potential in that particular space, which is why I know that the Minister for Climate Change is engaging with them in respect of the development of the Unnos work, and I hope that she'll be making more information available to colleagues on the development of that work before too long. So, perhaps that would be an opportunity to explore that in greater detail.

I won't be tempted to bite either on the point that you made about the formulations of local government, and I realise that I neglected also to respond to the finance spokesperson's point on CJCs, but there'll be other opportunities.