Member
14:12:22
7. What discussions has the Minister had with the UK Government
regarding the shared prosperity fund? OAQ54547
Member
14:12:28
Minister for Finance and Trefnydd
I continue to raise the importance of replacement EU funding in
full and for the Welsh Government to retain the autonomy to
deliver it. I pressed the Chief Secretary to the Treasury on this
matter when I met with him at the most recent meeting of the
finance Ministers.
Member
14:12:42
Well, thank you for that answer, Minister. Of course, I
appreciate the difficulty you have in getting a response. Now,
for those of us who watched live broadcasts of the Conservative
Party conference, we would have had a very adequate answer,
because the Minister was actually there in public giving public
pronouncements at meetings, making it absolutely clear that the
shared prosperity fund is something that is going to be
controlled and regulated in order to strengthen the union, and
that means very clearly, I think, that it's going to be used in a
way that undermines the whole principles of our devolution
settlement. Now, bearing in mind that the Minister seems to be
capable of doing that live on television, I wonder if, perhaps,
an urgent response is required from Welsh Government demanding
that we also be given the same privilege or luxury of an answer
so at least we can tackle those issues head on.
Member
14:13:40
Minister for Finance and Trefnydd
Yes. I can confirm that the Counsel General and Brexit Minister
reinforced our position as a Welsh Government—and one which I
know is shared across parties in this Chamber—with Ministers at a
meeting of the JMC last week on 10 October. And, of course, we've
been very active raising these points consistently, reflecting
the views of Welsh Government, but, as I say, the shared views
that we had the opportunity to put on record through a debate in
this Assembly, which said that the Welsh Government should retain
the autonomy to allocate the funding for those schemes because we
have the experience, the networks and so on in order to do that
most effectively, and also that principle of 'not a penny less'.
I was very concerned when I raised this with the Chief Secretary
to the Treasury and he almost batted that off, saying, 'Well,
that was a leave campaign promise, not a Conservative Government
promise', but, of course, the Prime Minister was the leader of
the leave campaign, so I think that we can certainly be
reasonably expected to hold him to account on that.
