6. Statement by the Counsel General and Minister for the Constitution: Interim Report of the Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:28 pm on 31 January 2023.

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Photo of Mick Antoniw Mick Antoniw Labour 4:28, 31 January 2023

I thank the Member very much for those very detailed questions—a large number of questions. I'll do my best to try and answer them. Perhaps I could just preface them by—. Of course, I do actually want to wait and see what the outcome of the independent commission's report is. Within our respective political parties, within our communities, within our organisations, of course we all have views. We've all been on this devolution journey for many years in different ways. I was very involved in the 1979 devolution referendum, the one no-one seems to mention, and the outcome of that was depressing. It was—. And we thought we might never ever have another referendum or that we might not ever achieve the establishment of the Assembly and then the Senedd. So, we have come an enormously long way. And it's fair to say I think, within all political parties, even within Plaid, within Welsh Labour, within UK Labour, there are a whole variety of differing views as to the principles of devolution, decentralisation of power, how it should happen and what the structure should be, just as there are differences in terms of what the UK should look like in the future. What I can say is, since I came to Wales in 1973, there is a confidence in Wales, there is a transformation in Wales, a confidence in the identity, in the language, in Wales's place within the UK and within the world, that has grown beyond anything, I think, that was ever conceivable back in those particular times. A lot of that is down to what has actually happened.