, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
No, actually, it was a problem and she was looking to create something to support Welsh exporters, but the title she came up with for it was exactly the same title that we use, and we said, 'Well, actually you'll confuse businesses', and actually it was…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Your broad analysis is entirely right, and unavoidable. There are more barriers to trade now compared to when we were part of a member state in the European Union. That’s undeniable. Our challenge is how we nevertheless support people to trade and continue to…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
It has.
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
We've got a futureproofing fund of £20 million, which should be available for retail and to support measures to contribute to the action of the plan. What we’ll need to do is we’ll need to see how that money is to be used, to see that it really is delivering…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Well, it's a matter of weeks not months before I provide the detail on the funding, because we want people to have an opportunity to see how we want to run the fund, and we're actually working through with a range of business stakeholders the design of the…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
We've had a number of programmes looking at areas of work within other departments, and, to be fair, Lesley Griffiths and the food and drink team were helpful in this, in volunteering to have a review of the work they're doing to look at how they support the…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
In the recent visit to Elite Clothing Solutions, we were looking at the work they're doing with the uniforms contract with Transport for Wales. It's a really good example, and it's a consortia—you've got sewing done in Treorchy as well, you've got design work…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
So, what we've done is, we've been trying to get away from that budget line being the only area of activity. Because I think that's the problem, otherwise, it just gets siloed, I think, and all the foundational economy takes place with that one budget line…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
What if we provide some correspondence, bearing in mind the inquiry that you're looking to do? I think we can do something that's coherent, then, for you as well.
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
So, we don't have correspondence that isn't helpful, but to think about how that works with what the committee's already got planned as well.
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
I think the committee are looking to do some work on DBW, aren't you? And would it help, as well as considering that, to think about what Business Wales do alongside DBW in the business support environment?
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
I don't think we will see Business Wales become small 'c' conservative in its approach and I don't think we'll see DBW become small 'c' conservative either, because part of the mission is, we're looking at where there's a gap in the market, as opposed to…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Yes. So, it's entirely fair that with less money, we can do fewer things. So, the service has looked again at efficiencies, about what it can do. So, there will be more support available in a digital format—some businesses want that—and to then think about…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
So, Business Wales still has a budget of more than £20 million, and Business Wales has a good track record in supporting businesses, those that grow. I think Cardiff Business School has done previous assessments showing that businesses that have Business…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Communities for Work+ has moved to supporting areas where there are more than 20-plus reductions in head count. For ReAct+, the budget has been reduced. We have found, fortunately, in the last couple of years, that the ReAct+ budget has not been fully…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
This goes back into the overall budget challenge. If you can't deliver the overall budget challenge then you can't be a functioning Government. And again, if people in this or other scrutiny sessions think it's the wrong priority to prioritise health and…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
The challenge is the levy isn't something that we have introduced or controlled. The levy, actually, when it was introduced, meant that we had an immediate £9 million reduction in funding. So, the levy doesn't deliver for Wales. If you have a business in…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
There's a great deal more than MEGs that are provided; the individual budget expenditure lines are provided and available. There's loads of information about the budget. If you want to go through every expenditure line, you can do; that information is…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
No. I think you're putting words in my mouth that I haven't used. What I'm saying is that not just this committee, but anyone who wants to find extra money to go into this area, needs to identify where it comes from. That's within the Government, if we wanted…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
I think the challenge is that we've then got to identify other areas where further cuts can be made, and that almost certainly means job losses. What I said yesterday in the debate around the size and the scale of it was real. If you look at the paper and the…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
We still have a commitment to degree apprenticeships, and I mentioned yesterday that we're carrying on the roll-out of a number of things. And again, Dr David has talked about the rail sector and construction coming on in September as well. What I think the…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
He's in jury service, as opposed to before a jury. [Laughter.]
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Apprenticeships are part of the young person’s guarantee. We’ve provided 27,000 opportunities that we don’t think would have been there through the young person’s guarantee as well. So, when we think about the additional side of what we’re doing—. And if you…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
Again, that was an active choice in the budget. I could have chosen to do something that meant that we would reduce the number of higher-end qualifications in the apprenticeship programme and we could have delivered more starts. Politically, that would…
, Economy, Trade, and Rural Affairs Committee
Welsh Government Draft Budget 2024-25: Minister for Economy
But I should say I recognise why providers are unhappy. I'm not telling them to celebrate the fact that there's less money available in the next year with the real reduction and then there'll be a reduction in starts. This, again, is one of those choices…
