Part of 3. Questions to the Minister for Economy – in the Senedd at 2:40 pm on 31 January 2023.
We continue to work constructively with representatives for Wrexham. That's why we continue to engage in both the Wrexham Gateway project and indeed the shared discussions taking place on the broader Mersey Dee Alliance as well. I won't join the Member in celebrating the levelling-up fund round 2. There was an extraordinary delay in projects. The Member might want to consider whether celebrating and asking others to join in celebrating the levelling-up fund outcomes is really appropriate when you consider that Wales got 10 per cent of the last funding round. In contrast, we used to receive 22 per cent of the UK's allocation of previous EU structural fund programmes. We are still being short-changed and the way that replacement moneys are being allocated is a direct breach of very clear repeated manifesto pledges that Wales would not lose out by a single penny. The Conservatives really need to decide whether they want to celebrate Wales getting less or join the campaign for Wales to get its fair share, because the levelling-up fund is doing anything but that.