3. What discussions has the Welsh Government had with the UK Government regarding the competitiveness of Welsh ports? OQ59232

We work with the UK Government on a range of port-related issues, including floating offshore wind, the free-ports programme and border control posts. In the coming weeks we will pay particular attention to the impact of the Windsor framework on the competitiveness of Welsh ports.

I welcome the progress on Northern Ireland, or the Windsor protocol, but I share your concerns that the deal agreed last week could have a negative impact on Welsh ports, and that includes Fishguard and Pembroke. Brexit has done a good job in boosting French ports at the expense of UK ports. It's far easier now, of course, to bypass Welsh ports, and we can't afford any further decline. The Prime Minister's excitement about Northern Ireland's privileged access to the UK and EU markets is particularly galling, given that he campaigned for the rest of Britain to give it up. Do you agree with me that the least that he can do is help Welsh ports to compete? What should that support look like, instead of the hypocrisy that we're currently seeing? 

I thank Joyce Watson for that, Llywydd. I, too, welcome any progress made on resolving the outstanding issues on the Northern Ireland protocol. During the time that there has been no Executive in Northern Ireland, I have kept in contact with all the main party leaders. During the autumn, I met with Michelle O'Neill as leader of Sinn Féin, I spoke with Jeffrey Donaldson as the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, and I held meetings with Doug Beattie, the Ulster Unionist Party leader, and with the leaders of the Social Democratic and Labour Party. I did that in order to convey to them the interest that the Welsh Government has in making sure that there is a functioning Executive there in Northern Ireland able to be in the room when we conduct discussions between the four nations of the United Kingdom. 

In the meantime, Joyce Watson is absolutely right, Llywydd, that the terms of the withdrawal agreement from the European Union handed Welsh ports a clear competitive disadvantage. Irish businesses bypass the land bridge in favour of direct links to EU ports in France and Spain. Prior to leaving the European Union, Rosslare had, as I remember, four major routes, and they were between the island of Ireland and Welsh ports. Now, there are 40 routes out of Rosslare and they're going directly to the European Union, to the single market, despite the fact that it takes longer to do so and it's more expensive to do so. But they're doing so because of the barriers to trade that they now face when they route goods through Welsh ports and on to the European Union through Dover. 

On the Prime Minister's excitement at having created a position for Northern Ireland where they have access both to the UK single market and the EU single market, I was tempted to write to him asking him if he could find the same advantages for Wales as well, because it is absolutely an irony that he should celebrate something that he himself worked so hard to deny to the rest of the United Kingdom. 

Joyce Watson asks what could be done by the UK Government. There are simple things that they could do, Llywydd, that would enhance the prospects of barrier-free trade between Welsh ports and our most important and nearest neighbour. They could, for example, negotiate a veterinary agreement with the EU. That would remove entirely the need for sanitary and phytosanitary checks at Welsh ports. We have traded successfully with goods coming from the Republic of Ireland through Wales for 50 years without the need for such checks to be in place. A sensible UK Government would come to a veterinary agreement and we'd be back to where we were before, to quote yesterday's Financial Times, the folly of Brexit was imposed upon us. 

First Minister, I have many happy memories from working aboard the Stena Europe and the Lynx sailing from Fishguard to Rosslare in the early 2010s when I was still a student. Much of the chatter and the talk below deck and in the galley then was that the consolidation of the two ports in Pembrokeshire was to be forthcoming in that time. Since then, in the last month, we've heard Irish Ferries being very tight-lipped around their future, causing great concern to constituents of mine and crew onboard the ferry in terms of their future of sailing from Pembroke Dock to Rosslare. Are the Welsh Government aware of any plans to consolidate the two ferry services out of one port so that there is only one set of sailings from Pembrokeshire to Rosslare? Diolch.

Well, Llywydd, the preferred outcome of the Welsh Government is that we sustain the highest level of service between Welsh ports, both Fishguard and Pembroke Dock, and that is what we have been focused on in the difficult days of the last few years. It is uncertainty that drives companies to have the sort of discussions that Sam Kurtz mentions. Hopefully, a Northern Ireland protocol deal will provide greater certainty for companies operating across the Irish sea, and what would give them not just greater certainty, but would improve the chances of being able to sustain the current level of service, is if we could, as I suggested in my answer to Joyce Watson, return to conditions where barrier-free trade was as close as possible to the circumstances we enjoyed only a few years ago. 

There's no doubt at all that Brexit has been very damaging to the port of Holyhead. One strong argument for giving a free port designation to Holyhead is that that designation has already been given to Liverpool, where it's possible to sail directly to Northern Ireland, and the fear is that that designation gives an unfair advantage to Liverpool over Holyhead. 

But in looking to the longer term, one other threat to Holyhead is the state of the barrage. Now, the Welsh Government has been eager to show support in investing in maintaining that, and Stena has demonstrated that they're also willing to invest, but there's a third party—the UK Government. So, can the First Minister first of all confirm ongoing support from the Welsh Government to make that investment, and give us an update on the negotiations going on between the Government and the UK Government to ensure that this investment can happen to give that prosperous long-term future to the port in Holyhead?

I thank Rhun ap Iorwerth for that question. I do agree that one of the things that we are going to keep a watching brief on over the weeks to come is to see whether, in the new agreement, there is a greater emphasis on companies going directly from the UK to Northern Ireland. The details are important and we don't have them yet, but we are going to be determined to pursue that point.

Regarding the breakwater in Holyhead, we are still part of the discussions that are ongoing. We're working with Stena and we as a Government—as we've said already—are willing to be part of the group that's coming together to pay for those costs. It's important to have the UK Government around the table as well; I am rather concerned if they do withdraw from that process. We've seen over the last week what's happened with the Holyhead hydrogen hub, where they haven't come to the table with the funding that they had already announced. And we've seen a couple of things that raised concerns with us regarding the role that they are willing to play with that breakwater as well. But we're still there, and Stena are still there, recognising the importance of doing that work for the future of Holyhead.

Good afternoon, First Minister. I concur with the comments made by my colleague Joyce Watson and with yourself as well in terms of Brexit and its damage to the competitiveness of our Welsh ports. I just find it surprising that our colleagues in the Conservative Party, in their condemnation of the roads review, say that Wales is closed to business. Well, actually, you've closed Wales to business through taking us out of the EU. Our Welsh ports have been damaged significantly by trade and traffic, and for that I think you should at least own up, if not be ashamed of yourselves. 

But I do want to talk about another aspect, if I may, of our Welsh ports, and that is our access to wind energy. We know that there are specific developments—for example, in my region in Pembrokeshire, where we see Blue Gem Wind energy actually developing our access to that wind energy. We reckon that there will be about 10,000 jobs developed. One of the big issues, though, is accessing permits for that development, and I just wonder whether you could comment on that, please, First Minister. Diolch yn fawr iawn.

I thank Jane Dodds for that supplementary question. 

Of course, she's absolutely right that it is central to the future not simply of the ports themselves but of the Welsh economy that we have that investment in floating offshore wind. A huge amount of effort is going into creating that future. I'm very pleased to be able to say that the consents that are needed for the Erebus project, the first genuine commercial demonstration of floating offshore wind in the Celtic sea—that Natural Resources Wales has provided its consents so that that scheme can go ahead, and I think this week, the Minister was able to provide the consents that Welsh Ministers need to provide under section 36 of the Electricity Act 1989.

So, the consents that are needed to allow that really important project to go ahead are now there. Its importance lies in its demonstration of our capacity in Wales to take schemes from the drawing board and actually into commercial-scale operation. I think this week has been a very good week for Blue Gem, and we will continue to look very positively at the development of that project for everything that it will demonstrate about our commitment to renewable energy and to the ports that will be at the backbone of that development.