MS, First Minister: Today, I
can confirm that the Welsh Ministers have discharged the
statutory requirement for the reporting period 2025–26 set out
under section17 of the Social Partnership and Public Procurement
(Wales) Act 2023 (“the SPPP Act”).
The SPPP Act requires the Welsh Ministers to consult the Social
Partnership Council (SPC) on decisions of a strategic nature
about the reasonable steps they take towards meeting their
well‑being objectives, as set under the Well‑being of Future
Generations (Wales) Act 2015.
Section 19 of the Act also requires the Welsh Ministers to
prepare an annual report in respect of each financial year
explaining what they have done to comply with this duty in the
last 12 months. This report must be agreed with the SPC or
include a statement explaining why agreement was not reached.
Cabinet agreed that the section 17 duty would be fulfilled by
consulting the SPC each year on the three overarching
drivers of the strategic delivery of the Welsh Government's
Programme for Government: the Welsh Government's Legislative
Programme, Annual Review of Well‑being Objectives, and the annual
Budget Priorities. I can confirm that consultations on these took
place throughout 2025 at SPC meetings on the 12 March, 4 June,
and 22 September respectively. These consultations allowed
SPC members to participate at a formative stage of the strategic
decision-making process on the delivery of the three overarching
drivers of the Programme for Government.
Legislative Priorities
I consulted the SPC on the Government's legislative priorities by
giving members an overview of progress with the Bills being
considered by the Senedd at that time as well as the proposed
Year 5 Bills. Discussion centred on the Bus Bill and the
need to protect workers, the Health and Social Care Bill and the
removal of profit from children's services, and the Homelessness
Bill. The SPC's views were fed back to Cabinet and the
relevant Bill Ministers as part of finalising the legislative
programme ahead of my statement to Plenary
Annual Review of Well-being Objectives
I had a constructive discussion with SPC members about progress
towards our well-being objectives with members expressing views
on the measurement of progress, how to achieve intergenerational
change and whether, in future, there should be a separate
objective relating to promotion of the Welsh Language. We
also discussed the Welsh Spending Review.
2026-27 Draft Budget
The Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language highlighted
the difficulty of securing Senedd approval for the 2026–27 Budget
and stressed the need to give public services certainty after the
May election. He warned that failure to pass a budget would
trigger cuts to current spending levels, severely affecting
services and jobs.
SPC members recognised the difficult context and said that they
would stress the importance of passing a budget to their
networks. The Cabinet Secretary said work with local government
and other sectors continued, and an update on planned mitigations
would follow.
All minutes and papers relating to the SPC have been published on
the SPC website, and can be found here.
