, Equality and Social Justice Committee
Childcare follow-up inquiry: evidence session 3
In terms of your top line of the aims is to improve children's outcomes and help close the poverty-related attainment gap, how successful have you been in enabling people from less well-off families to ensure that they are getting this valuable service?
, Equality and Social Justice Committee
Childcare follow-up inquiry: evidence session 3
Very good. I should have said, Martha, that we have, obviously, all read your paper, which is extremely useful at giving us some of the detail. So, it's really just to probe why you did X rather than Y. Jane Malcolm, could I bring you in in terms of how…
, Equality and Social Justice Committee
Childcare follow-up inquiry: evidence session 3
This is the third evidence session we've done on our childcare follow-up inquiry, and I'm very pleased to welcome Jane Malcolm, the national operations manager for the National Day Nurseries Association Scotland, and Martha Friendly, joining us from Toronto…
, Equality and Social Justice Committee
Introductions, apologies, substitutions and declarations of interest
Welcome to the Equality and Social Justice Committee. We are a bilingual institution, so there is instant translation from Welsh to English for anybody who's joining us today. Before I go on to the discussion of today's scrutiny meeting, I'd just like to…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
General Scrutiny
There's just so much we need to do on this, because we're facing down big food. The so-called healthy food you're talking about that's available, a lot of it is laced with ultra-processed chemicals that are actually all completely part of the problem. In…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
General Scrutiny
Okay, I agree that it's not just Eluned Morgan's department that has to deal with this. We're making a significant investment in free school meals for primary school children, but we're having great difficulty in understanding how we get healthy food into…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
General Scrutiny
Yes. Obviously, one of the biggest challenges that the Welsh Government faces is how we turn the health budget around from being an ill-health service to a service where prevention and primary intervention have a much higher focus, so that we have a healthier…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
General Scrutiny
Fair enough, but Unite says that 350 staff have already left, and clearly there will be more as a result of this absolutely appalling decision. So, we have to offer people hope as well as capture the really important skills they already have.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
General Scrutiny
The key issue is that we don't lose people with transferrable skills. Skills is at the heart of the economy Minister's strategy, and I didn't see anything in the announcement from the economy Minister about how we're going to support people, who are already…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
Exactly, how we marshal the resources to achieve the outcomes.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
The point is the monitoring framework sounds woolly, and it doesn't convince elected Members on the backbenches—collectively, of all parties—that it's going to deliver a sea change in a focus on reducing child poverty.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
We represent very similar constituencies.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
The monitoring framework is just too woolly—
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
So do I, Minister.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
But, if you don't set child poverty reduction targets, you don't have your Government focusing on achieving those child poverty reduction targets, and, against you, you've got the children's commissioner, Audit Wales and the Bevan Foundation and many others…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
The Equality and Social Justice Committee heard a wealth of evidence that the Welsh Government's draft poverty strategy lacked ambition, and focused far too much on what we can't control, which is what goes on at the other end of the M4. So, we can't do…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
Okay.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
But there is an endemic problem, isn't there, that good practice doesn't travel well, and that there is huge variation, as John Griffiths has said, between local authorities? So, we somehow have to get a grip on this because of the urgency for the outcomes…
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
Okay.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
Okay. I urge you to look at why we are consistently missing the targets that the Government sets itself when we hear some local authorities are even suggesting they might go bankrupt as a result of their failure to change the model of support.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
I'm not arguing against that.
, Committee for the Scrutiny of the First Minister
Care-experienced children
What your two civil servants have outlined is, obviously, very important work, but what I'm concerned about is the pace of change, because, despite the fact that we had a First Minister who made this one of his high-level commitments and ambitions, we're…
, Plenary
Debate on the Climate Change, Environment and Infrastructure Committee Report, 'Report on performance of Dŵr Cymru'
Absolutely. Councils used to deliver water butts in Cardiff, but unfortunately, because of the cuts, they no longer do. But nevertheless, those who can should harvest their water because it’s better water for the plants that doesn’t have fluoride in it. But…
, Plenary
Debate on the Climate Change, Environment and Infrastructure Committee Report, 'Report on performance of Dŵr Cymru'
This is obviously an extremely important issue that I'm sure all our constituents are extremely concerned about. We have a Victorian drainage system that is absolutely not fit for purpose, not only because of the increase in our population, but because of the…
, Plenary
Debate on a Member's Legislative Proposal: A Bill to strengthen food security
I welcome Janet's interest, but I'm afraid I'm going to vote against it.
