, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24 - part 2
This is a really difficult, wicked issue to cope with. We want to make it easier for people to plant trees where trees should be. We don't want to put planning consents in place for that. If you want to plant six trees in your garden, I don't want you to have…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24 - part 2
So, although there's a reduction in the planned revenue, it's still more than was in there, so it's a reduction in the planned increase, if I can put it that way. So, it's not a reduction, just to be really clear, in the original level. It should still allow…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
—so we have a really good regional strategy in Wales, we've worked on it for ages, we have a really good relationship with our local authorities and our regions. We have a very well-developed programme with our city regions about where the investment is…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
So, the answer is: we can't, at all. But, fortunately, we have a very good relationship with most of our local authorities and so, actually, they've all been anxious to speak to us about it. There's no getting away from this: we're very cross about it, it's a…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
I believed it, anyway. [Laughter.] So, it's a great project. We've been able to talk to them, as well, actually, about some of the lovely-to-have things that we'd like to see alongside our solar farms, so the panels there are raised off the ground by some…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
You cut a lovely ribbon, Lee, and, magically, the electricity flows once the ribbon has been removed. [Laughter.]
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
That's very much where Jon was coming from just now, so this is about us attempting to get the public sector into a better position. So, there are a number of things that are standout projects we can direct the committee to, and if you get the chance to go…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
Oh, I don't know. [Laughter.]
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
The short answer to that is, 'yes, it is'. So, we've got the—. Ynni Cymru funding is ring-fenced inside the clean energy BEL. It's £1 million for 2022-23, £2 million for 2023-24, £3 million for 2024-25. So, easy for hard-working Ministers to remember—nice…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
And the other thing is, Huw, and I'll ask Jon to say a little bit more about this—this is a two-hour answer all by itself, in truth, but—we have a whole series of things in the carbon plans and in the net-zero plan where we do not have the data, really, that…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
So, we've met the first carbon budget. We're on track to meet the second carbon budget. The third carbon budget is very, very challenging. That's where we're at. So, we've taken some, I don't know what word to use—well, the 'right': we've taken the right…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
Dean, do you want to come in about the specifics?
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
So, that's the same answer, really. So, what we're doing is we're looking to put a range of measures in place that incentivise, if you like, the adaptation programme. So, you don't need very much budget to start the incentivisation process. What we will need…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
No, no—that's fine, Joyce. So, we're still in conversation with the four nations. The ETS scheme is a four-nation scheme. It has to be agreed by the authority, as it's called, which is the four nations acting together. We've been in a lot of conversations…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
No, no, absolutely—absolutely the case, and I'll hand over to Jon to give you the nitty-gritty in a minute, Huw. But, absolutely, it is the case that we have to have the UK on board with a number of these things, or we will simply not get to it. So, even if…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
No, clearly not. We constantly complain, and 'complain' is the word about the HS2 situation, which is clearly nonsensical. Ministers who have attempted to publicly defend it have been getting themselves into a right pickle because it is not defensible…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
We've been talking to local authorities about seeing this much more holistically. So, this is very much part of the placemaking programme that we have with them. So, rather than saying, 'It's going to cost our road maintenance budget X', we're saying, 'Well…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
Can I just add one last thing to that, as well?
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
So, I suppose, for temperate countries, the extremes are a problem, but Canada, for example, has massive problems with flooding and different soil conditions that they didn't have to cope with before. So, it's not unique to us.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
This is happening all over the world, basically, and what's happening is that lots of countries’ infrastructure can't cope with the new weather conditions—higher rain fall, more flooding, colder or higher temperatures. More wind is a really common one for a…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
Yes, and just to add to that, on the flooding, of course, there's a separate programme that includes some infrastructure work for flooding itself. So, we do have a programme that looks at that. But, it's a fact that our climate is changing, and I think it's…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
Just to add to that though, Jenny, obviously, in some parts of the country, having just discussed my hilly constituency, it is much more difficult, and so, actually, there are some successful schemes with Sustrans to lend out electric bikes, for example, or…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
The same for NRW.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
No, but I think if you—. Well, we hope that they will tell you as well that it's significantly improved, and we expect a really serious improvement in both organisations next year as we recalibrate it.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
Motion under Standing Order 17.42 (vi) and (ix) to resolve to exclude the public from items 4 and 7 of today's meeting
On that point, actually, Cadeirydd, just to blow Lee's trumpet a little bit here, we've been fundamentally recalibrating the relationship between the Government and this portfolio and TfW, and, actually, NRW as well, since we came into post. So, we've had a…
