Questions Without Notice from the Party Leaders

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:48 pm on 14 March 2023.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 1:48, 14 March 2023

Well, Llywydd, I imagine that any party who puts a motion down in front of the Senedd does so in the hope that they will persuade other people to support it. I'm puzzled that the leader of the opposition wants to take issue with the fact that we supported the motion that he put down. Now, I know that the—[Interruption.] He can't take 'yes' for an answer, indeed. So, the person who led the roads review has written to all Senedd Members today, Llywydd—maybe the leader of the opposition hasn't had a chance to catch up with that yet—setting out the engagement that the roads review panel undertook, and it is extensive, but also making the distinction—which the Minister made, I know, in answering the debate—that there was engagement of the sort that was appropriate to the roads review panel. And then there will be further opportunities for public consultation and engagement when particular schemes come forward for their implementation. That's a different sort of engagement. It doesn't mean that there wasn't engagement by the roads review panel, as the chair has set out, and there will be, in the case of the different aspects of the roads review, further opportunities, often statutory opportunities, for people to have their voices heard, their views known, and so to help shape policy, no doubt in the way that the leader of the opposition hoped he was doing last week when he put down his motion for debate.