National Assembly for Wales

I'm going to do the rest in English. We've just discussed with some of you the subject that we're discussing today, which is climate change, and you will see how the committee works. Hopefully, you will get as much out of it as we will. We welcome the First Minister and his officials. Thank you, First Minister, for coming out to us. I wonder whether you, just for the purposes of the record, would introduce your officials for us. 

Diolch. We've received apologies from Mick Antoniw and Bethan Sayed, and I'm just going to do the usual housekeeping rules. Can we keep our mobile phones and our electronic devices on silent, please? The pinging does start to drive me mad. The school bell sounds like a fire alarm, and I've twice wanted to run out—because of working in the fire service—thinking that we were going to evacuate. It sounds like an alarm but that will ring, obviously, because the school is operating in its normal way, and I'll resist jumping up and running out. But in case of a fire alarm, which I think is a different sound, then we will follow the signs, which are the two exit doors there to my right. And so, that's the housekeeping, and Members know they're free to converse either in English or in Welsh; we're a bilingual organisation.

So, the first part of our meeting today, the first item on the agenda is to explore climate change and the climate change emergency declaration, and then after that we've got some topical questions, as the First Minister always knows. So, First Minister, we're going to move on then to climate change and the climate emergency, and the research brief has structured it for us around the following six areas. So the six areas are: climate emergency and progress; cross-Government working; low carbon plan and national forest; funding for decarbonisation; achieving net zero by 2050; and climate change and air quality. So, we're going to try and work our way through that. I've told Members now it's six areas, so we roughly have to work that into about an hour and a half. Members need to be aware of that. 

With no further ado, if I could ask the first question, then, First Minister. What are the key actions of your Welsh Government? What action have you taken in response to declaring the climate emergency in 2019? 

Thank you, Chair. I would argue that the actions that the Welsh Government has taken following the climate emergency range the whole gamut of things that the Government does, from the very high level strategic end of things to the very practical policy implementation end of the spectrum.

Obviously, at the more strategic end, since the declaration of the climate emergency we have increased our 2020 target [Correction: '2050 target'] to 95 per cent from 80 per cent, following the advice of the UK's Committee on Climate Change. We have continued to pursue our very important proposals for the future of farming in Wales. A major response to the sustainable land management consultation—500 individual responses to that—following an even larger response to the original 'Brexit and our land: Securing the future of Welsh farming' consultation.

We have published our adaptation plan because climate change, as you will know, is not only about how we change the future, but it's how we deal with the past—the damage that has already been done. We published our 'Prosperity for All: A Climate Conscious Wales' plan back in November, and that sets out a whole series of actions that we will take, including flood risk and coastal erosion management; protecting our water supplies from the danger of drought in the future; growing more woodland; and protecting our open spaces.

We published our marine plan last year, and the Welsh Government commits ourselves, in that plan, to no fossil fuel extraction in marine waters for which the Welsh Government has responsibility. And that's a very important commitment, and it is line with our energy hierarchy, in which fossil fuel extraction is at the very bottom end of the hierarchy. We've taken enough of our share of the world's resources in that way already, and we don't intend to do more of that. So, the marine plan is very important in that way.

At the other end of the spectrum, Chair, as I said, in terms of just the practical things that we are doing, there will be a whole range of those, and, from the areas you described at the beginning, I'm sure there'll be a chance to discuss them later. But I'll just give you one at this point. In Maesteg, the Welsh Government is investing, alongside the local authority, in a very important demonstration project, which is a district heating scheme through water taken from disused mine workings. So, this is an attempt to create a circle here in Wales, in which the fossil fuel extraction that has been such an important part of our history can still be part of a solution to the challenges we face in the future. We've got an enormous potential resource trapped in coal mines that are no longer used, and the Maesteg initiative is an example of how we can turn that to our advantage. We think we are a European leader in that, here in Wales, and in 2021 there will be an international mine water conference here in Wales, where people from around the world will come to see some of the work we are doing there. So, from the very strategic to the very practical, the Welsh Government is taking action in response to the declaration of a climate emergency.

Thank you. We're at budget stage at the moment within the Assembly, and also, we're waiting to see what will happen with the UK Government's budget later next month. Tyler Kelly from the school has asked a question as well, which is: how is our money, Welsh Government money, being used to create a greener Wales? So, how much, I suppose, from within the budget that you have responsibility for, are we putting into a greener Wales?

Well, Chair, you can describe the answer to that question in a wide variety of ways. So, we're sitting in a school built through the twenty-first century schools programme. The twenty-first century schools programme requires as a minimum that 15 per cent of the material used in building a school is from recycled materials; that every building has to be Building Research Establishment environmental assessment method excellent in terms of its construction standards; that every building has to have an A rating as far as energy efficiency is concerned. So, that £3.7 billion-worth of investment, the single biggest capital investment in our budget, that drives action that has an impact on the climate, as well as creating fantastic buildings of the sort that we are in. 

At the other end of the spectrum, there are very small and very specific bits of investment there. So, you'll see in it that we are replacing [Correction: 'working towards replacing'] the 180 refuse collection vehicles that we have here in Wales. We're replacing them directly with Welsh Government money, because 400,000 [Correction: '4,000'] tonnes of carbon will be taken out of the budget here in Wales as a result of that single investment in those 180 vehicles. And if you think of it, Chair, what could be worse than a heavy goods vehicle? So, it emits carbon; it creates impacts on air quality; it stops and it starts; it drives, by its nature, through the most heavily populated parts of Wales. And that single action in the budget will not only have its impact in terms of climate change, but it will have impacts in terms of air quality and quality of life for people in those areas too. So, from the very top end of the budget, the £3.7 billion on twenty-first century schools, down to the thousands of pounds that will be spent on those vehicles, I think you can see this climate emergency having its impact in our budget.

Thank you. Russell, do you want to take the next one?

Thank you, Chair. Bore da; good morning, First Minister. Is Wales on track to meet its 2020 emissions reductions target and its first carbon budget?

Well, the UKCCC, Chair, says that we are on track, but it also says that the path is volatile, because the pattern of emissions is volatile and you can be taken off track by things that are beyond the control of any Government. So, a harsh winter can make a big difference to the path that you are on.

Over the period since the base year—the base year, Members will know, is 1990 for carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide—. Is it useful if I just briefly mention some of the figures, Chair?

It would be, yes.

So, the target has been that, in the power sector, by 2020, emissions would be no more than 2 per cent higher than they were in the base year of 1990. In fact, power emissions have declined by 7 per cent. So, that’s good news. In the power sector, it’s good news.

In the buildings sector, which makes up 10 per cent of Welsh emissions, the target was to reduce emissions by 30 per cent from the base year by 2020, and we've already declined by over 31 per cent. So, again, on track there.

The transport sector, which makes up 16 per cent of Welsh emissions, the target was to reduce it by 14 per cent between the base year and 2020, and so far it’s declined by 4.5 per cent, so that’s not as good as the other two. Taken in the round, the UKCCC tells us that we are on the path to reaching where we'd hoped to be at the end of the first carbon budget.

Can you tell us what discussions you've had with the UKCCC committee? What are the most recent discussions you've had?

The most recent discussions, Chair, would be in relation to the third carbon budget. Of course, we are, as ever, heavily reliant on the advice of the UKCCC. In order to help them to advise us, they recently issued a call for evidence and they've held two events—one in north and one in south Wales—as part of their call for evidence. We expect it to provide its advice to us, alongside advice that it is due to provide to the UK Government, and we expect to receive that advice in September of this year.

Tia Burns, who is one of the young people who is watching the session today, has asked a question: how will you reduce the carbon emissions from transport across Wales, such as helping people with electric cars? I wonder if you could address Tia's question.

Yes, thank you, that's a very good question, Tia, because as you can see, of the three areas that I talked about a moment ago, while on power and on buildings, we've been doing reasonably well, the sector [Correction: 'one of the sectors'] we've had the least progress on has been transport, so it’s a good question in that way.

In terms of electric vehicles, we are assisting the market in creating electric charging points. We had about 600 more during this last year than we had at the beginning. We're up to nearly 1,000 charging points now in Wales. We're using some Welsh Government money—part of our previous budget agreement with Plaid Cymru—to draw down money that is available from the UK Government.

But my view of Government action in this area is that we should be augmenting what the market will already do, rather than trying to do things that the market would do without us, and the market is acting pretty quickly in this area now. So, we see that there will be a significant increase in electric charging points that will make it more attractive to use electric vehicles, and we are using some Welsh Government money, particularly in public transport, so we will have more electric buses in Wales, as well as encouraging the conversion of taxi fleets in Wales from the diesel-type fuel they use now to electric-powered vehicles. 

Can I ask, First Minister? I noticed on the BBC the other day there was an article on this and it showed a map, and the map showed where all the charging points were across England and Wales. And there were a lot in England and very few in Wales, and especially in mid Wales, where I represent, there were hardly any at all. So, I take your point about assisting the market, rather than intervening and paying for those charging points yourself, but how are you specifically assisting the market to ensure that we've got charging points in every area of Wales? How are you specifically doing that?

Sure. So, I don't agree, Chair, that there are very few. There are nearly 1,000 now in Wales, and that's a very significant increase in one calendar year. How the Welsh Government assists—

I should just say, when the committee did some work on this, we had evidence, and some witnesses referred to 'a charging desert' in some parts of Wales. Those are not my words, those were the witnesses' that came to give evidence to our committee. 

Well, there are 1,000 in Wales. That is not to say that there are some parts of Wales where there aren't the number we would like and that's where the Government does have a role to play. If the market isn't providing, then the Government has to step in to make good market failure. But the market, as I say, I think is accelerating what it is able to provide in this area. Our job is to help to map—so, that's the first thing—so people can know where the gaps are. It is to use the money that we have directly to assist in areas where charging points are not developing through the market mechanism; to work with local authorities in that to assist the action that they can take; and, as I said, what we're trying to do with the relatively modest amount of money that we are able to provide ourselves is to allow that money to match funds that can be drawn down from the UK Government, so that Government acts where the market itself isn't likely to fill the need.

You mentioned you're mapping some of the areas where charging points are lacking. How are you mapping? How are you specifically doing that? Is that a role for Government or third parties? And, also, apart from the infrastructure, how are you going to encourage people to use EV vehicles as well—the other side of this issue as well? 

No, I think mapping is a job for Government. It draws together, of course, information that other people have got, but it's very important, isn't it? So, a constituent came to see me recently, Chair, from a family very committed to the whole climate change agenda. They had bought a second-hand electric vehicle, so it's an early generation electric vehicle, so its maximum range was 65 miles, and they wanted to go from Cardiff to Caernarfon and they did. But they'd had to work hard to make sure that they had the map, they knew where the next charging point would be and where the gaps were.

So, what is the Government doing to map those areas? What's the Government doing in that area?

Well, what the Government does is the Government collects the information that we have through our local authority colleagues, through commercial interests and then we provide—

And is that published somewhere?

We will be. Those maps are available already. That's how my constituent was able to show me on her map. She knew exactly— 

No, no. Is that the Government's map? Or is that a third-party map? 

If I may? A lot of the data is already available and we have data that we hold within Welsh Government and we draw that, as the First Minister has said, from public authorities. But we're working with Transport for Wales to come up with a plan that makes better use of our public sector assets across Wales to work with the market, as the First Minister has said, to try and stimulate provision of charging points.

What I was keen to know was: is there a map somewhere on a Government website or Transport for Wales website where the public can go to, which the Welsh Government has published, in terms of where the infrastructure is?

I don't think we've published a specific map. 

Is that something that you intend to do? 

We can look into that. There are a number of apps that you can use to find out where you can do it and probably most people will use those, if I'm completely honest about where—

No, no, and that's why I asked the question, because I know the First Minister referred to mapping out. And the final question is: you've said that you're going to be publishing your EV charging strategy this year, when this year is that likely to be published?

I think it's in the autumn, First Minister.

The autumn.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. Mike, you wanted to come in on transport.

I've got questions on transport, which are down for later, but we seem to have drifted into it now.

Yes, we'll do them. You do them.

You've talked, First Minister, about charging points as though it's one type. There are at least three. Tesla are entirely different to anybody else. There are two others. It's almost going back to the days of mobile phones, and every time you had a mobile phone, you had a different charger. You can't do anything about ensuring that they all use the same charger, but we have got that problem. I think, perhaps if you are going to put it on a map, you need to say which charger is there, because it's no good when somebody turns up and it's a Tesla charger and they haven't got a Tesla car.

But the thing people do want, though, is fast chargers. They really want to be charged in half an hour, when they're drinking a cup of coffee, rather than wait three hours while they wonder around some place they wouldn't have gone to otherwise, because that's the only way they can get charged. What is being done to promote fast chargers? We have got this problem that—. I don't have an electric vehicle. Why don't I have an electric vehicle? Because I go back and forth to Cardiff, and if I get one that has got 170, 180 miles, I've got a serious problem on a Wednesday night. Until we can get charging regularly available and a fast charger regularly available, people are going to be nervous about using electric cars.

I agree with that, Chair, and I think what Mike is pointing to is the still immature nature of the market, because these are vehicles still in very rapid development, and one problem with that is that if you do invest—and it is a significant investment—in an electric car, you are worried as a consumer that its resale value won't be sustained because people will want to buy the next generation of electric vehicles that won't have Mike Hedges's difficulty on a Wednesday night, because they will have a greater range. People hesitate to invest in today's vehicle if they think that next year's edition is going to solve a problem for them. So, it's an immature market, and that's true of vehicle charging points as well, including the rapid ones. I said we were nearly at 1,000 charging points in Wales, but I think we're probably at around only 60 rapid charging points in Wales. And Mike is right, of course, people don't want to have to think about spending long hours waiting on a journey—they want it done as fast as possible so they can move on.

Nick, have you got a supplementary on transport?

On the electric charging points. It was just a case in my constituency last year or the year before where a proposal for a new electric charging station at the entrance to Wales, the entrance to Monmouth, was turned down on planning grounds. So, I just wondered whether there was scope to look at planning laws in this area, so that when applications are going in for these charging points, given that we need such an increase in them, that perhaps—. I wouldn't say dispensation, exactly, because obviously planning is planning, but I think that there are obstacles at the moment in the planning system to some of these charging stations being developed.

Thank you, Nick. Well, I definitely think the planning system has a part to play, Chair. Where I had been thinking about it—. I'm less familiar with how the current rules apply to applications for charging places, but as we build new houses in Wales, is there not a role for the planning system in requiring that those new houses have charging capacity for electric vehicles? It's not a planning requirement at the moment, but as we move into this new world, then at least as new infrastructure is being created, you might want to have a planning requirement that makes provision, either domestically in houses, but also in new public facilities, that it's just a taken-for-granted part of the way that those new facilities are created that there will be charging capacity created at them. So, I'm agreeing about the role of the planning system, without being able to answer the specifics.

Thank you. David Rees. Number three.

Bore da, Prif Weinidog. We've talked about transport because you mentioned three sector emission pathways that are in the 'Prosperity for All' document, but there are others—industry being a clear example and we go on to land use, agriculture, waste and gases. So there are others. How are we doing in those others? Because clearly, in this town, we have industry as a major factor. Transport and industry together, for this town, actually, are the huge ones, and so far transport is nowhere near where we want it to be. So what are we doing on industry, for example?

Chair, it's an important question because it gets to the heart of a real dilemma in relation to emissions, which is that Wales is particularly exposed to certain sorts of emissions, which is why, uniquely, the UKCCC did not declare a 100 per cent target for Wales for 2050. It recognised that our power generation sector and our reliance on heavy industry means that [Correction: 'are part of the reason that'] you can't create, at the moment, a path to 100 per cent by 2050 for Wales—although we have asked the UKCCC for further advice as to how such a path could be created. So, David Rees is right: that is a real dilemma for Wales. We create things that the rest of the United Kingdom need. We export power from Wales, and yet the emissions happen here. So we have to account for the emissions and yet we're not the end user of the product for those emissions.

We provide an awful lot of the UK's steel requirements. We've always argued that you can't run an industrial economy without steel, and yet the steel industry in Wales creates the emissions in Wales and they count against our total. So we are working, of course, on the different sectors that David Rees has mentioned. We talked about industrial pollution on the floor of the Assembly only this week, and there are a series of things we are doing working with the industry. I think I want to say that I think the industry is very keen to solve this problem as well. We're working with a willing partner rather than with a partner that doesn't see the problem, or doesn't want to do things. But the challenge is very real there.

In agriculture, again, we have not made the progress we would want to make in agriculture. Again, the industry is very willing. The National Farmers Union's declaration of net zero by 2040 is a really important statement of intent by the industry. 'Brexit and our land' and its successor, 'Sustainable Farming and our land', provide a really massive opportunity to be able to reward farmers for things that they will do in the future that will make a positive difference in terms of climate change and the climate emergency. It's a conversation we have to continue with the farming community, but I think the opportunities there are genuinely enormous. And at the same time, we have to take action where there are things that happen in the industry that push us in the opposite direction—the recent discussion on pollution and regulation in that industry is part of that discussion as well.

Thank you for the answer. It was a very good narrative, but I suppose in a sense my impression from that was that we are not hitting the levels we were expecting in those sectors, so those sectors are also down as compared to the expectations of where we would be. So, we've still got some way to go. Even though the sectors may be keen, we've still got some way to go in those sectors to actually hit the levels you identified for 2021.

Well, the 2021 [Correction: '2020'] in agriculture we are there or thereabouts. We think we could do more. We certainly think we have to do more in the future. Industrial pollution is inevitably more difficult and inherently unpredictable. One of the reasons why we're on track for the first carbon budget is because Aberthaw has reduced in its activity, and you take one enormous emitter like Aberthaw and run it down and it has a very big impact on the Wales total. 

Okay. Well, let's take another big business in this, which is, as you mentioned, steel, and it's in this town. Evan Elias from the school has asked a question in relation to what can the Welsh Government do to work with Tata in this particular town in relation to the energy produced. Because we've already raised the question of energy, and you know I've raised the question of pollution as a consequence as well, and waste energy being recycled in the steelworks, but what can you do to help Tata and companies like Tata on the situation of renewables, solar and other forms, so that they can actually reduce their carbon footprint as well through other means?

Chair, it's worth noting, I think, that of the electricity that is purchased by Tata, the electricity that it purchases represents less than 5 per cent of its total energy consumption now. So, the company has already done a great deal; it generates over 50 per cent of its electrical power from the combustion of gases that arise from steel making on the site. So, the industry does already make a contribution to that sort of circular way of doing things. The Welsh Government has, through EU funding, been able to assist the plant in terms of its new energy generating plant. There is a heat recovery demonstration unit that's currently being established on the site, and that's through Horizon 2020 funding through Europe, because it's experimental and uses the very latest research, and Tata Steel have talked to us in the Welsh Government about their ambitions to have large-scale, low-cost renewable energy at Port Talbot. David Rees, more than the rest of us, I know, will know that there have been a number of attempts in recent years, a number of initiatives, that Tata has itself taken in terms of wind turbines, solar panels, unused land. They've not been easy to bring off, so far, but we continue to work with the company, and to provide money to the company as well, to do exactly what was being asked in the question from the young people here. 

Could I ask one final point: clearly, tidal was also identified by Evan as a solution, and we also know the Swansea bay tidal lagoon was something that we've all promoted and want to see happen—the UK Government pulled the plug on it—considering the UK Government now seem to be looking at large investment infrastructure projects, are you having discussions with the UK Government as to re-establish the Swansea bay tidal lagoon as a real valid opportunity to reduce our carbon footprint and to actually create more renewable energy? 

Well, Chair, of course we hope that the UK Government will change its mind in relation to tidal energy in Wales. Let's not forget it was a report that it itself commissioned, and from a former Conservative Minister, which said that this was an experiment that would have no losers—that you could only get winners from the experiment. I think it's just fair for me to say that the position in Wales has moved on; there are now a number of other locations in Wales that have got very active plans in terms of tidal lagoon technology. So, Swansea is in the lead, absolutely, because much more work has been done on it. The plans are more developed—the local authority, I think, has played a real leadership role in trying to find ways in which the original proposals could be adapted to make them more affordable and so on, but it's no longer the only player in this field. And the Welsh Government is in discussion with a number of different organisations that have come forward arguing for tidal lagoon technology to be deployed in their areas as the first experiment. So, I absolutely hope that the UK Government is prepared to make such an investment here in Wales, and we would definitely want to talk to them about Swansea, of course, but about that wider range of possibilities—three years on from when that debate was last held with the UK Government—we know there are in Wales. 

Okay. Just on that again, Ashton Hewitt has asked, 'Is it possible for Wales to be powered with renewable energy only?' And then Nia Trace has then posed, 'Is cost a problem in creating new renewable energy stations across Wales?' So, if you could briefly just outline, because I'm conscious of time, just to see whether there's—.

Well, cost is an issue, Chair, in this way. When new technologies come on-stream, they are always going to be more expensive during the formative period. So, we know what happened in relation to solar and to wind. In the very beginning, the UK Government subsidised those forms of energy because the technologies are new and inevitably more expensive. Today, solar and wind are as cheap as any other form of energy, but it was because Government was prepared to invest in the early stages of those technologies. I have an enormous frustration that we have not been able to reach an agreement with the UK Government for a similar strike price arrangement in relation to marine technology. That was at the root of the problem over the Swansea tidal lagoon, but it is also a real inhibitor now to our ability to push on to the next stage of marine energy development in Pembrokeshire and in north Wales as well. We've put an enormous amount of money, European money, into developing those technologies. They're ready to produce electricity. It will be more expensive than you can buy elsewhere. It's bound to be in those early stages. Therefore, you need a subsidy regime until you get to the point where those technologies are genuinely commercially viable. It's really important to us here in Wales and we really need the help of the UK Government to make that happen.

Is it then possible that we can produce all the energy we need in Wales from inside Wales? Well, I think it is possible. In fact, we've already done it because we've had the longest period we've ever had in Wales during 2019 when Wales was powered entirely from renewable sources. Now, you then get a day when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow and you need to put other sources of energy into the grid, but, actually, during 2019 there were whole periods when Wales was entirely powered by renewable sources, and I think that's fantastic, and I think we can do it entirely on that basis in the future.

Briefly, Llyr.

Okay, thanks. As always, we always spend an awful amount of time on the first section. So, we're going to move on now to cross-Government working. Janet, you've got a couple of questions.

Thank you, Chair. Good morning. How are you as First Minister ensuring that decarbonisation and climate change action is mainstreamed across your whole Welsh Government?

There are a number of mechanisms, Chair, through which we are doing that. We have a standing sub-committee of the Cabinet on decarbonisation, chaired by Lesley Griffiths. That draws together all the different actions right across the Government. That is going to culminate in the coming weeks in a whole Cabinet given over to this topic, which will take over the decarbonisation Cabinet sub-committee and other aspects, and devote a whole Cabinet to it. 

And, Chair, certain Members here will be aware—certainly, the Chair of the Finance Committee will be aware—that we changed the way in which we shaped the construction of the budget this year. I was very keen that the budget was driven by the cross-cutting responsibilities that we have identified as priorities in this Government, whether that's early years or housing or, in this case, decarbonisation and biodiversity. So, a Cabinet member was given the responsibility of tracking that topic right through the budget-making process, and I was very keen that it wasn't the Cabinet member that had the main responsibility for that matter. So, mental health was one of the cross-cutting issues. I was very keen it wouldn't be the Minister for health that would be given that responsibility; it would be somebody who didn't maybe think mental health was absolutely central to what they did. 

So, we constructed the budget in that way. At every point in the budget, there has been a Cabinet member there asking how the decisions that are being made reflect the whole Government's responsibility to tackle climate change, to deliver decarbonisation, to promote biodiversity. The budget is often the way in which you can try to drive cross-Government collaboration, because it results in a series of difficult decisions, but they're decisions you've got to make. I wanted to do it in a way that illustrated to everybody that this was everybody's business. 

Okay, thank you. And could you outline how the Welsh Government is working with the UK Government and other devolved administrations to tackle climate change? 

It's a good question again, Chair, because climate change is something that doesn't understand boundaries, so you've got to work with others if you're serious about it, and we do work with the UK Government. There are a number of things that the UK Government can do that makes a real difference for and against climate change, and we work with them, for example, in preparing for the COP26 conference that will be held in Glasgow this year. We're part of, at official level, the groups that are preparing for all of that, and it gives us a good opportunity to work constructively with the UK Government so that we share the efforts we can all make on this agenda. 

We certainly work closely with Scotland on it. We've had a number of streams that we've particularly worked on with them. Electric charging points is one. They've taken a slightly different approach to it. We are very keen to learn from that. Forestry is another area that we work closely with Scotland on. Hannah Blythyn was in Scotland in 2018 with Fergus Ewing, the Minister responsible. They went and visited a series of forestry initiatives they have there. And Lesley Griffiths shared a climate change platform at Madrid at the end of last year, which was the meeting that prepares for the COP26, and she shared that platform with the Scottish Minister, Roseanna Cunningham, I think, on the same topic. So, we work—

What about Northern Ireland? 

It's been harder, as you know, with Northern Ireland, because without an Executive—

What are your intentions going forward? 

I am very pleased indeed to see the Executive back in—. I said to Arlene Foster, the First Minister of Northern Ireland, when she was in Cardiff very recently, that I feel we've really missed not having them around this table, and now that they're back there are real opportunities. As I said, this is classically one of those things where what devolution allows is not a competition. I'm so allergic to the idea that what devolution is is a competition between the component parts of the United kingdom. It's an opportunity to learn from another, where we all try different things. Some things succeed, some things you would do differently another time, and you can learn that from others as well. And climate change is, I think, the paradigm case, really, for how we should work in that way. 

Okay. Now I have some questions from Erin Constable and Carys Samuel. Have you thought about increasing the price or raising taxes on single-use plastics, and what will be done to reduce the use of plastic that can't be recycled?

Well, thank you to Erin and to Carys for that. Again, this is an area where we work closely with the UK Government. There was a huge consultation exercise that the UK Government ran. They ran it out of the Treasury. It's the single biggest set of responses the UK Government has ever had, and it's on how we deal with plastics. At the moment, the UK Government's answer is to focus on stopping the use of plastic at the very earliest stages of the cycle. So, that's what they decided. They had four different areas that they could have focused on, and they decided that the most important one was the very beginning one. And there is a good case for that, because if you can reduce the amount of plastic that enters the different chains that plastic is used in, then the end point will be better. We were disappointed, Chair, I'd have to say that. One of the four strands was on single-use plastic.

That question is from Erin Constable, particularly about increasing the price of, or raising taxes on, single-use plastic.

I think the problem we face in raising taxes on single-use plastic just in Wales is that our border is incredibly porous, and what you would get would be people who have to sell goods, and who understandably want to try and buy them as cheaply as they can, because they've got to run businesses and so on, and if it was more expensive to buy it in Wales, and it was cheaper to buy it just across our border in Bristol, it would create a perverse incentive for people to go and buy those things in Bristol rather than buying them in Wales. So you've got to think carefully about how you do these things, otherwise you end up with a set of consequences that you hadn't planned for.

So, differential taxation between England and Wales, you've got to think of it very carefully in case it doesn't do what you want it to do and does something else instead. Can we, though? Are there things we can do on single plastics that make them less used in Wales? Definitely, and we've got plans that we'll be bringing forward during this year to say what more we think we can do on that. It's really important for younger people, we know.

And Carys wants to know what you will be doing to reduce the amount of plastic that can't be recycled that is used in food packaging.

The real answer is not to use it, isn't it? Because if it can't be recycled, then we ought to be trying to stop it being used in the first place, and food packaging is a classic example of that. Supermarkets are under the pressure of consumers. Consumers are more important, more powerful than Governments in some ways in this. If they knew that the people who are buying goods don't want to see it wrapped in enormous amounts of plastic, and would prefer to be able to buy it in recyclable containers and things, then the power of the consumer drives change in the marketplace. So, Governments can help, Governments can encourage, Governments can change the regulatory regime, and so on, but in many ways in this area, it's how every one of us acts, and how every one of us puts pressure into the system that says to the manufacturers, 'We'd rather you didn't do it that way.'

If I may come in just briefly for Erin and Carys, you might be aware there's a consultation out at the moment called 'Beyond Recycling', and that gives you the chance to feed your views directly into the Government. I'd really encourage you to go on the website, have a look and put your comments and views in, because it is really important that we hear from all parts of Wales and every Welsh citizen.

Thank you for that. Nick, can we move on to the low-carbon plan and the national forest and your two there?

Thanks, Chair. First Minister, the Welsh Government is due to publish its next low-carbon delivery plan in 2021. How will it differ from the first plan, both in terms of approach and ambition, and what lessons have been learned from that first plan and its development?

Thank you, Chair. How will it be different? Well, it will have a different level of ambition, because it will now be shaped around the 95 per cent target, not the 80 per cent target. It will be different in that we are working, and working with the UK Government and the UKCCC on modelling around emissions reduction. This is a complex area in which I do not claim to be an expert at all, but as this debate has developed, we know that we've got to get better at modelling and measuring and attributing things as well. That will be different. We will have aligned our carbon budget cycles and our financial budget-making cycles by the time we get into the next phase, so that will be different as well.

The approach, I think, is different mostly in terms of the level of public engagement. I know, rightly and inevitably, we'll be focused this morning on what Government does, but what Government does by itself is never going to be sufficient to deal with the climate emergency. It genuinely is something where we are all in it together in order to be able to make the difference that is needed. So I think the level of engagement with members of the public, including young people here and in other parts of Wales, in shaping the next plan is how we will go about it differently. 

So bringing the public along with you with that plan is key to its success. 

In some ways, Chair, I might argue that it's one of those areas where the public is ahead of politicians. It's not bringing them along with us; it may be them bringing us along with them. During the time even of the Assembly, we've seen a number of examples of this. People here will remember just how nervous politicians were about banning smoking in enclosed public places. They were very anxious that it would cause difficulties with the public, but it turned out that people were already there. Actually, climate change may be in the same space. 

Okay. Before you move on, Lynne's got—.

Yes, linked to that I wanted to put a question to you from Lili Mai Walford, who would like to know whether you are planning on adding the climate change emergency to the new curriculum in Wales.

Well, the new curriculum will certainly provide new and better opportunities for the climate change emergency and the whole of the environmental dimension of Welsh life to be reflected in the curriculum. Members here will know, but I'm keen that other people who are listening understand, that the new curriculum is moving away from having a long list of things that have got to be taught and into a way in which there are broad areas that people need to learn about and schools will have a lot more freedom about how to construct the timetable so that young people learn in the four different areas that the curriculum focuses on. That will give schools more opportunities, and this school has a very clear focus on these matters. The new curriculum will help in allowing the space and the focus to be there. 

Okay. Nick, we'll come back to you. 

That leads neatly into a couple of questions that I've got from our pupils in the audience. Well, two questions, actually, from Mali Loader and Lili Mai Walford, which I could put into one question: will you consider encouraging more people to buy locally produced food to reduce the carbon footprint by taxing imports that have come from far away? What consideration has the Government given to the movement for people to eat less meat and to look to veganism? There are many people who think that changing our diet might be a way in the future of combating climate change.

Well, the Welsh Government is already doing a significant amount of work in terms of local food, local production and local consumption. There's a very good example of this in Carmarthen, where we are helping to fund, through our foundational economy budget, work that includes the local authority, the local university, the local health board, which are all organisations that buy a lot of food, and to do that in a way that maximises the amount of food that is produced locally inside Carmarthenshire. It's a great scheme, and it's got some fantastically enthusiastic people in it who are making sure that the public pound is spent in exactly that sort of way, to stimulate local production and local consumption. 

Taxing food that comes from elsewhere in the world? Well, again, it's one of those ideas that I think you've got to think through carefully, because the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015, as well as telling us that we've got to take more care of our local environment, tells us that we want a Wales that is globally responsible. And lots of the food that we eat in Wales is produced by farmers in some of the poorest parts of the world, whose livelihoods depend upon their ability to sell into markets like Wales. So, you could have, if you did it the wrong way, you could tax food coming into Wales, where the worst effect would be felt on some of the poorest people on the whole of the planet, and who would then be forced into ways of doing things that create more damage to the planet than you would have saved by taxing them in the first place. So, taxation is a blunt instrument in that way, and can make things worse rather than better. And if you're a globally responsible Wales, you've got to think of other human beings in other parts of the globe who have even bigger struggles than we do, and where Wales has a part to play in helping them, rather than making their lives more difficult.

The UKCCC—the Committee on Climate Change—released a report at the end of January on land use, and it specifically got to the point of whether we should eat less meat to help the environment. And where they came down, and their strong recommendation, which I think we agree with, is that we could eat around 80 per cent of the current meat—when I say meat, I mean beef, lamb and dairy—that we eat now, because those are the three food groups that have the highest carbon emissions. And if you are going to eat beef and lamb in particular, then the carbon footprint, like you say, is very much lower if you eat good, Welsh-produced, and British, lamb and beef. So, the UKCCC, having done the analysis, says 'Yes, we should be eating less, but not necessarily zero.' It's about how that food is produced to keep its carbon footprint low, and eating more locally definitely supports that. So, the UKCCC agree with you. 

And the point is a really important one, because it isn't just the meat itself; it's how that meat is produced, and here in Wales, we have some of the most environmentally sustainable farming in the world, and we've got to make sure that that doesn't get swept away in the argument. 

That leads neatly into my last question, your comment about the need to think global. Could you provide some further detail on the proposed national forest for Wales, including information on timescales, funding, delivery and progress to date? You've mentioned the need to think globally. I know that there's tree planting going on in Africa, as well as in Wales; there's been match tree funding, which I have welcomed in the Chamber. So, if you could say anything about that. And, perhaps the role of farmers as well. Farmers have got a lot of land in Wales. If at least 5 per cent of that land was used for planting up the national forest, we could massively increase tree cover and help farmers to diversify. 

Great. Thank you, Nick. So, there's £5 million in the budget proposed next year to begin the establishment of the national forest. We plan to launch the national forest programme on 12 March, not very far from here. The national forest is a 20-year, 30-year, 50-year programme, and its impact on climate change particularly will not be felt in the early stages of it, because while carbon sequestration by tree planting is really important, trees don't actually sequester much carbon in the first five or 10 years of a tree's life. So, this is a long-term plan, and it will evolve over many years, and well beyond the time that I'll be involved in it, I'm sure. 

I have a view of the national forest, what I want it to be. I want it to be a counterpart to the national coastal path. I want it to capture people's imagination in that sort of way. I want people to be able to walk from one end of Wales to the other without ever leaving the national forest. And that means that, in some places, it will be linking corridors of woodland that are already there rather than planting everything from scratch. A lot of this is to do with the way in which we make better use of ancient woodland, and invest in bringing that back up to the condition we want it to be in. It will be a mixture of different things, so it's not going to all be conifers, for example; it will have proper—conifers are proper trees—[Laughter.] But—

I think we know what you mean.

We're not discussing that.

No. But broadleaf trees and resilient planting in that sort of way. There'll be commercial tree planting in there as well, though. We want more wood produced here in Wales. The housing sector is an enormous part of climate change. We want more wood from Wales to be available to be used in the construction of housing built here in Wales.

So, First Minister, this relies on pretty comprehensive mapping as well, doesn't it, of where the woodland is at the moment, what type of woodland it is? Is that information there already, or do you have to—?

Yes, there's an enormous—. I find out, rather than knowing already, I find out from—because I'm really interested in the national forest. I find out that there's an enormous amount of stuff that we already know, and is mapped and is available. And that's why part of the initial stages will be about identifying where the corridors can be grown to link up existing woodland and can be most easily begun. And then it will have tourism potential, it will have leisure potential, it will be about the condition, the connectivity, the rate of tree planting. There's some interesting and challenging conversations to be had with commercial interests here. We know that there are some private sector companies that will be interested in investing in our national forest; we might not be all that keen on what they do environmentally in other parts of the world. So, there are some challenging conversations to be had there. And I'll just say to Nick—you will know that we've had some very useful help from Michael Heseltine, Lord Heseltine, in our thinking about the national forest, because of the arboretum that he has created in Oxfordshire. He's been to Wales already, and I've had a chance to meet him, and we've had some extensive correspondence with him, in which he is offering to make his expertise and the experience that he's gained over 50 years in creating his arboretum—to make that part of the way we think about the national forest in Wales.

Okay. Certainly, there are now three other Members who want to come in, so I'll take Jayne, Mike and John on trees, but we do need to be conscious of the time, sorry.

Thank you, Chair. I think you've spurred us on to this with the exciting plans for the national forest, because it does sound very, very exciting. I just want to move on to urban tree planting, and greening our town and city centres, and improving that environment, which will be really important as well with climate change—that we have urban tree cover—and also with air pollution locally. I think lots of us would like to see this happening at pace, so how can we do more to ensure that urban tree planting is right up there?

I don't know, Chair, if everybody is familiar with the tiny forest movement. It's a movement that originates in Holland, and shows how you can plant a forest the size of a tennis court, and if you do it the right way, it has an impact on biodiversity and on urban environments far in excess of the size of the land that it's planted on. So, we have plans for tiny forests in different parts of Wales, and they'll be funded through some of the money that was set aside in the budget, published back on 16 December. We've got a £5 million programme in there, which is all about local nature resilience. I am very keen that we spend some of that money through community councils here in Wales, because I think, sometimes, they are the closest to the ground, and are able to think of some of those immediate local actions that you can take that have an impact on biodiversity, that plant more trees, that create a different sort of urban environment. We're working very closely with Keep Wales Tidy on the £5 million plan as well, and looking forward quite soon now to be able to give some detail of how the £5 million is going to be deployed in Wales, because we want the spend to start as early as possible in the next financial year. And those are aimed very much at the sorts of issues and the sorts of places that Jayne has mentioned this morning.

Mike.

In London they have some areas where they use tree planting to protect schools from pollution. I think that's a wonderful way forward, and I hope the Welsh Government will start promoting that. But my question is: we definitely need land and a local development plan for housing—why can't the local development plan also designate land for forestry, because the only way we're going to get forestry built at scale is by land being designated for it? I mean, if you didn't designate land for housing, you would have serious problems with house building, so the same thing, I think, should be there for forestry. If you don't think it's a good idea, why? 

Well, the national development plan does do that, and the idea is that, having agreed a national development plan that shows the big land-use designations in Wales, that will feed, then, down into the strategic development plans that we want local authorities to produce on a combined basis, and then the strategic development plans feed down into the local development plans. So, we publish our national development plan. I don't think I can say that it is entirely uncontroversial—there are some aspects of it that have received a very significant response through the consultation; we're working our way through that now. So, I think, in general, I'm agreeing with Mike's proposition that if you have a planned approach to it, and the land is designated for particular purposes, inevitably, that increases the chances that those purposes will be fulfilled. 

And finally on this point, John. 

In terms of public engagement, First Minister, I think it's important that we get the public on board for our environmental efforts, generally, including tree planting. So, I hear what you say about the community councils, but there are lots of community groups in our towns and cities, in our urban areas, doing all sorts of interesting things—greening local space, growing fruit and vegetables, just making it a more pleasant environment—and I wonder if there would be some mechanism by which community groups and the wider public generally might feed in ideas as to where they'd like to see trees planted? I think that could be an important part of the general effort to engage the public in the wider effort to tackle climate change and improve our environment through all that local action that's taking place.

Well, I completely agree, Chair, that we have to capture the enthusiasm we know is there amongst the public for this agenda. Sometimes that's a matter of just reminding ourselves of some things we're already doing. So, every child in Wales—every child that is born in Wales—already has a tree planted for them in Wales; they get a certificate that tells them exactly where that tree is, and they get a tree planted for them in Uganda as well. Wales has planted 10 million trees in Uganda—I didn't pick up the point that Nick Ramsay made about that. 

And last year I was lucky enough to be able to take part in a small event that marked tree planting by children in Wales on the same day as in Uganda—a young climate activist with hundreds of young people there celebrating the 10 millionth tree that Wales has planted there. So, there's an enormous public appetite. The £5 million fund will fund community orchards, as well as some of the other things, and it is absolutely open to community groups working through Keep Wales Tidy—already part of that third sector.

Okay, thank you. Llyr, we're going to come on to funding.

So, £15 million of that will be used to restore Natura 2000 sites, and that's really important because the decline in biodiversity in Wales is real—even if it's not obvious on the surface, it's very real below the surface—and that £15 million is a down payment. That's how I'm putting it. It certainly will not do everything we need to do, but it's an important down payment on the restoration of those really important sites. There's the £5 million I mentioned already, in terms of the local action on nature fund.

We've talked a bit already, Chair, about energy generation and renewable energy generation. One of the things we're really keen to do there is to increase the percentage of renewable energy generation that is local, and Lesley's already made a series of commitments to increase the involvement of local communities in that, and there's £4 million in the budget for a local energy fund for more community-led energy generation projects.

There's a whole series of things, Chair, that I could give you. Can I give just one example, and it's not a figure example? For the first time ever, in this budget, the amount of money in the transport budget that's going into active travel will be more than the amount of money going into road construction.

Local roads.

Local roads.

Because we picked that up with the transport Minister. It isn't lower than what's being spent on roads, because there are major road-building projects that aren't included in that.

There are, but if you take those out—. If you have a comparable thing. So, active travel is, by its nature, local—they are local cycle paths and local walking routes. If you compare with what's going to local road investment, for the first time, active travel is exceeding what we're putting into more cars on roads.

Thank you. I think we're going to move on. We're getting quite tight on time. I think we've covered engagement generally, Janet, so do you also want to do the second part of that question, then, No. 13?

Yes. Do you have any plans for the citizens' assembly for Wales to help shape the Welsh Government's decarbonisation priorities, similar to the UK climate assembly?

I think it's really important to have a good discussion about this. I am very committed to the involvement of citizens. Are there eight different citizens' assemblies on this topic now running in England? There's one in Scotland; there's been one in Ireland. The question in my mind is: what extra and specific would we want to learn from Wales if we were to hold a citizens' assembly? I don't see there's a strong case for doing one that simply replicates what other people are doing, because I don't think the answers will be hugely different if we did it in that way. What I want—. I'm interested in cross-party discussions on this matter, and, if we can shape a citizens' assembly in a way that shows a different light, allows us to explore issues that are specific to Wales, rather than just going over ground that we've now got a lot of citizens' views over, then I think the case is strong. But I think you've got to work hard to make sure you shape it in that way, and I want us at least to pause for a moment, and not just have a citizens' assembly because that phrase is the flavour of this particular period, because you know that there are other ways in which the views of citizens can be drawn into this: citizens' juries, community select committees—I've run one of those before now, when I was working in the university. You get a group of citizens together. The difference between the jury and the select committee is, in the jury system, they hear all the evidence in one go, and they talk about it at the end. In the select committee, you hear evidence and then you stop and talk about it, and then you call more witnesses and you talk about that, and people's views change as they go along.

So, I'm very committed to finding the right vehicle to make sure citizens are engaged with us on this agenda. Does that mean that equals a citizens' assembly for Wales? We should at least have a conversation about whether that is the most effective way to draw people into this conversation, or whether there may be other techniques we could try.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you. Can we move on to achieving net zero? Lynne, you've got a couple of questions around that.

Thanks, Chair. The Welsh Government has said that it intends to bring forward regulations this year to increase the 2050 emissions target from 80 per cent to 95 per cent. Given that progress on reducing emissions has been relatively slow, what more are you going to do to ensure the targets are met, and are you also planning to amend the 2030 and 2040 interim targets?

Well, we will be indeed bringing forward regulations this year, in the way that Lynne has said. The most recent data for 2017 shows a 25 per cent reduction in Welsh emissions against the baseline; the EU figure is 23 per cent. So, it's not as fast as we need to go, that's for sure. I don't think we are a laggard, though, in it. We're ahead of where the European Union average has been.

We need significant conversations with the UK Government about setting our next budgets because, as I said in my answer to Dai Rees, Wales has an unfair share, in this sense, of big emitters, and we need conversations with the UK Government because some of the regulations lie in their hands over that, and we look forward to doing that.

In transport, for example, which we started with, where we haven't done as well as we want to, tailpipe emissions from vehicles—it's UK-wide regulations that determine reductions in those, and we need to have those conversations with them too. I hope that that conversation with the UK Government will step up around preparations for COP26, because that's a good opportunity to do that. We will then take the advice, as we always do, of the UKCCC about the targets that are the right ones for Wales that reflect our unique set of circumstances and lie at the very challenging but achievable end of the spectrum.

Okay. Thank you. As you said earlier, the UKCCC had agreed with Wales that the target should be 95 per cent because of the specific circumstances we have here, but the Welsh Government has indicated that you want to go to a 100 per cent target, net zero. Is that realistic and affordable, do you think, given the particular challenges we face in Wales?

Well, we're the only part of the UK, Chair, that has asked for advice from the UKCCC as to whether we can go beyond what they originally told us [Correction: 'told us for 2050']. So, I think Lynne is absolutely right to point to the challenging nature of what we are asking for, and we will take their advice. If they say to us, 'Look, it just can't be done; the nature of the Welsh economy and so on means that you cannot plot a path to it, even a challenging path,' then we will have to listen carefully to that. But we've asked them to help us to find that path, and that's part of the seriousness with which we want to demonstrate that we are taking this issue here in Wales.

Okay. Dai, can we come to you for questions?

So, the plan, Chair, will demonstrate a cross-cutting approach from the Government in all of this. We will look for enhanced regulatory proposals, enhanced monitoring. We will look at industrial emissions, particularly in the clean air plan, as I discussed with David Rees on the floor of the Assembly this week, and we will look at the way in which modal shift will make a difference to the quality of air.

We've already introduced, as Members here will know, compulsory 50 mph zones on motorways where air quality is most compromised, and the latest evidence that we have from those zones is that they are making a genuine difference to air quality in those places. It's part of why I am committed to 20 mph zones as standard in urban parts of Wales, because we know that it makes a difference in terms of air quality.

And then the plan will set out how improved air quality makes a difference in health, in the environment, how it can be used to support the development of the Welsh economy—we've got to find a way of trying to square the circle between the environmental obligations we face and the need to go on being able to run a successful economy that offers employment to people in Wales, and then the way in which the plan can help us to reduce airborne pollution in Wales, with all the impact that that has on people's well-being. 

In parts of my constituency, wood-burning stoves are a real public health issue because of the nature of the geography. The smoke gets trapped at lower levels, has a real effect on people suffering from asthma—some people with very, very significant health problems. So, we're going to look to see in the White Paper whether there is more that we can do in terms of regulating for wood pollution, the potential for new targets, local air quality management.

I'm thinking—. It reminded me, when Mike Hedges talked about tree planting in London—if you drive down the embankment in London now, you will see regularly big signs that say, 'Turn your engine off', because idling in traffic at traffic lights, in traffic jams, has a really big and entirely avoidable impact on air quality. The signs are relatively new, and I was really struck by them when I was there recently; it really reminds you not to do that.

So, those are amongst the things we know already that the White Paper is likely to focus on, and it will provide a direct path into the possibility for whoever is in Government after May of 2021 to pick that up and to legislate.

Okay. David, you've got a supplementary, and I've got John Griffiths as well, and we have to do it all in about three minutes. 

I'll try to be very brief, because the First Minister knows full well my concerns on air quality here in this town. I'll be unashamedly highlighting three fantastic parts of the town, which are: Aberavon beach, less than a mile away; Margam Park, which is on the eastern entry; and, of course, the Afan forest, which is world-renowned for its mountain biking. But in the central part of all that, of course, is a very narrow coastal plain that has a major motorway through it plus industrial areas. So, when you're looking at industry and a clean air Act, will you look at, also— ? You've got other tools. Planning is one obvious tool we can look at, to avoid the cumulative effect of building more industrial sites that create more pollution. Just by Margam Park, we have two biomass plants—wood burning, as it happens—and we have steelworks and the other—[Inaudible.]—works, so there are large amounts, but planning can stop some of this. Will you look at how planning can be used to ensure that we do not have the cumulative effect?

Also, you mentioned idling, and we all know the junction 41 situation here. But some actions create more problems on local roads and create more idling as a consequence of that. So, will you look at, for any actions you take in any plan, the impact and what could be the consequences of that?

Well, of course, it's a bit of a theme this morning, isn't it, Chair, in some of the questions that we've had from students here that, sometimes, an action that looks like an answer creates other questions elsewhere, and it's certainly the case in Newport, where we know that traffic that diverts in different places ends up causing problems elsewhere? So the answer is that, yes, we recognise it and, yes, we will look to see how agglomeration can be tackled through the planning process.  

And then finally on this section, John.

It's great to hear that we're going to move towards a clean air Act, which I think we'd all support, but you've already said some things this morning, First Minister, that shows that there's lots of action that can be taken now, almost straight away, working with local authorities and other partners—the taxi fleets, the bus fleets and, as you said, the refuse collection vehicles. There are lots of things that can be done and done quickly. Given, as Dai Lloyd said, it's a public health issue—Asthma UK and the British Lung Foundation have made some very strong points on this—I think we really do need a real sense of urgency and immediate action, working with partners, that deal with the here and now as well as the future plans.

I completely agree with that, Chair. We're a legislature in the Assembly, so we inevitably focus on the things that laws can do, but there is so much more that we can do than waiting for a law to be passed. I'll give you my final example of the morning, if I can, Chair. I started earlier this morning talking about the investment we will make in replacing the fleet of refuse collection lorries. We're going to provide £7.9 million to improve the taxi fleet in Wales, particularly in big urban areas. That will lead to a reduction of 3,300 tonnes of carbon—that action alone—and will have a very direct impact on air quality in those areas. It doesn't need to wait for a law to do that. 

Okay. Thank you. That's the end of agenda item 2. 

We now move to agenda item 3 and, actually, we're not doing to badly for time. We're going to now move to topical questions. I have three topical questions today for you. The first one is from Mike Hedges. 

Bus passes: they were meant to be changed by 31 December, but I've still got people contacting me saying that they haven't had their bus pass yet. The closer we get to the end of this month, the more panicky the phone calls we're likely to have. Will everybody who applied by the initial date of 31 December receive their bus pass in time to be able to use it at the beginning of next month?

I might ask Andrew to help me with that. What I do know is that we've already agreed with Transport for Wales and local authorities that, if there are examples where bus passes have not been issued, people will be able to go on using their existing bus passes for a longer period than was originally envisaged, to make sure that individuals are not disadvantaged.

My understanding, but I will double-check for the committee and I'm happy to come back to the committee on the detail, is that, where people have made their applications they will get their passes. The concern that underpins your question is those who haven't made applications, and we are working, as the First Minister said, with Transport for Wales and local authorities to have that—

No, that didn't underpin my question. My question was about those who applied. If people haven't applied, it's their fault. If they have applied, it's Transport for Wales's fault. That was the point I was trying to get at. 

Sorry, my answer meant to convey that I think where people have made their applications, the expectation is they will have them by the date in question. The concern for us elsewhere is people who haven't. 

Chair—

Go on, you go in, because I've got something to say. 

I'm with Mike on this, because I have constituents who have asked me the question. They applied in October. They've not heard anything. We are less than two weeks away from the end of this month, and they're now getting very anxious as to whether they'll be able to get their passes on 1 March so that they can use them. So, I think it is a very important question. There are still many people who haven't yet had them, or even had any communication from them. 

I think I was just going to—. Can I just reinforce what David and Mike have both said? There are a lot of people who have applied early on that didn't get them. I think what has happened is they've reapplied, which has somewhat skewed your system. However, for a vast number of people, we are now 14 days away and they haven't heard anything, so the anxiety is there as well. 

We'll pursue it, Chair. Thank you. 

Thank you. Okay, Mike?

Yes, thanks.

Okay. Dai. 

Okay?

Mike, you wanted to come in, briefly.

Will you join me in congratulating the Swansea Council's huge growth in primary provision in Swansea East for Welsh-medium? Since local government organisation, you've have Ysgol Gymraeg y Cwm open, you've had Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Tirdeunaw open, you've seen Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Lôn-las open and now we're building—sorry, not Lôn-las—we've seen Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Tan-y-lan open, and we've seen Lôn-las expand and have a new building. We're now getting a new building for Tan-y-lan. Will you join me in congratulating Swansea Council on what its done there? The closure of Felindre was based upon very low numbers, in just the same way as a previous administration—of which Plaid Cymru were part of—closed Ysgol Garnswllt because it went down to single figures. 

I absolutely congratulate the local authority for what it is doing. Welsh is a language for everybody, and the development in the east of Swansea is a real demonstration of our determination that education through the medium of Welsh should be regarded as a possibility that is open to every sort of community that we have here in Wales. And without knowing it in detail, my guess would be that the pattern is the one that I remember when I used to chair the south Glamorgan Welsh-medium education committee back in the 1980s, that it operates in exactly the opposite way to English-medium education. In English-medium education, you survey populations, find out how many children there are and supply the need. So, supply follows demand. In Welsh-medium education, it's the other way around: you can provide something, the demand rises to meet the supply. So, you think there are 30 children, you provide a school for 30 children, 45 turn up on the day, and that's because when the Welsh-medium education is available, people respond to it because they now see that it's genuinely available for them, and the work that Swansea Council has done, particularly in the east of the city, I think is a real demonstration of that. 

I think, just to add to that, we should say it's the twenty-first century schools programme that the Welsh Government have led on that has given us all an opportunity to say we've seen new school buildings in every part of Wales. 

So, topical question 3—David Rees. 

Thank you, Chair. First Minister, I think this must be the first scrutiny session you've been to where we haven't had a Brexit-related question yet.

Yet. [Laughter.]

There's always one. [Laughter.]

To an extent it's not Brexit-related, but it is important, and obviously yesterday's reshuffle took place in the UK Government. We saw, actually, Chloe Smith being appointed as Minister for the constitution and devolution—which is an interesting change to her title—and we know that DExEU doesn't exist, but it seems to be that the work that they were doing, particularly on the future of EU relationships, is going over to the Cabinet Office. Now, in that sense, have you had an opportunity yet to assess the progress being made in the Welsh role in EU negotiations? And also, do you see the appointment of a Minister with particular identification of devolution in their title now as a means of changing the way in which inter-governmental relationships will exist, and maybe the structures of inter-governmental relations?

Well, can I begin, Chair, by saying that Chloe Smith has been a Minister who has been involved in these discussions over many months now? And I welcome her appointment as an individual, because I think she is someone who is familiar with what devolution means, and has been someone who we have felt that we are able to have a proper conversation with. So, I then want to say—as I've said many times—that relationships across the United Kingdom cannot depend upon the chance of individuals. So, in Chloe Smith I think we are lucky—we've got an individual who we know and respect and can work with. It could have been somebody who had none of those qualities, who knew nothing about it, who would be starting from scratch, and that isn't good enough. So, we're glad it's her, and we're looking forward to working with her. We need proper machinery through which the United Kingdom can function together in the future, and it can't rely on the chance of who that person happens to be.

In terms of the Welsh role in future negotiations, we're at a bit of a fork in the road here. The last JMC(EN) agreed with a proposition put forward by the Scottish Minister that there would not be another meeting of the JMC(EN) until there was real progress in defining a role for devolved administrations in shaping the UK negotiating mandate and in being part of the way in which negotiations are carried out. And what the JMC agreed was that we wouldn't meet again until there were papers in front of us that we could discuss how that was to happen. Those papers have not arrived as yet, and yet these things are about to start happening. These are not months and months away—in the next couple of weeks, we may see the UK Government publish its negotiating mandate.

Now, I'll briefly say it, Chair, because I've said it before: my preference is for there to be a proper forum in which all parts of the United Kingdom get together, agree a negotiating mandate. I understand that that means compromise for everybody, including Wales, no doubt, and I understand that, if you do it in that way, when you've reached an agreement you've all got to stick to it—you can't come out of the room and criticise it, because you've been part of agreeing it. And I think that strengthens the United Kingdom. I'd much rather be a UK Minister going into the negotiating room saying, 'And I am speaking on behalf of all four Governments of the United Kingdom, because this is our agreed position.' If that's not how it's going to be, if there aren't the mechanisms there, and there isn't the intention to operate in that way, then we will continue to represent Welsh interests, but we can't be bound by a process that isn't meaningful. We're not going to just turn up, when there's no real prospect of our voice making a difference, and then at the end say, 'It's all fine by us'. If the result is the fork in the road that says the role of the devolved administrations is to stand outside and speak up for their populations, we'll stand outside and speak up. But, in that situation, we will not be bound by what the UK Government says, and we won't, when it is right for Wales, stand back from being critical of it.

Okay. Thanks very much. And thanks very much for that, First Minister. So, that's the end, as I say, of the evidence session, and the topical. So, as always, you'll get a copy of the draft report to check for accuracy. And if we could have the note on the bus passes—I think what we'll do is probably e-mail into the department so that we can get that one, because it's getting to the point where I think we need that fairly quickly, rather than—.

And to say thank you to you and your staff and your officials, and once again to formally place on record our thanks as a school to the staff—. I'll start again: our thanks as a committee to the staff and the pupils of the school, Ysgol Bro Dur; you've made us very, very welcome. We don't travel light—I always say it—so, we're very grateful to them. The next committee meeting is scheduled to take place in the Brecon area, on 10 July.

I now propose to go into private, under Standing Order 17.42, which excludes the press and public. Okay. Diolch yn fawr iawn—thank you very much.