Having written to the Welsh Education Minister urging her to address Wales’ A-level fiasco after 42% of A-level results in Wales were downgraded, I am pleased that she bowed to pressure and allowed teacher assessed grades to instead be awarded for all A and AS Levels, and GCSEs, this year. However, it is concerning that the First Minister defended Wales’ controversial grading system and made it clear that it would have remained in place if the UK Government had not announced that results in England would be based on teacher assessed grades.
Following publication of the Welsh Government’s revised household projection figures, I have written to the Housing Minister asking her to confirm what effect these will have on the expected future housing build figures and types within Local Authority Local Development Plans.
The Labour Welsh Government have forced Local Authorities to base the housing figures in their Local Development Plans on previous higher statistics, but the new statistics show, for example, that household projections in Wrexham will fall by 2,348 between 2020 and 2030, whilst rising in Flintshire by 2,526 over the same period.
However, the picture is complex, where additional housing needs are also highlighted over the same period. For example, the number of single parent households in Wrexham is projected to increase by 363 and in Flintshire by 507, and single person households by 1,044 in Wrexham and 1,395 in Flintshire.
I criticised the Welsh Health Minister after he dismissed the request of a North Wales disabled person with underlying health conditions for the wearing of face masks to be made mandatory in all shops in Wales. In England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, face coverings must be worn in shops and other specified enclosed public spaces.
The President of the Royal Society has stated, “If all of us wear masks, we all protect each other and therefore we protect ourselves" and “Not wearing one outside the home should be considered as ‘anti-social’ as drink-driving”.
Reacting to the announcement of an additional £260 million funding from the Welsh Government for local authorities in Wales, I stressed that the losses of revenue experienced by local authorities as a result of the pandemic could take generations to recover from, and called for a long-term plan to prevent local authorities finding themselves in an even worse position.
The Welsh Local Government Association’s estimated budget gap for April to September alone totals £315m, equivalent to £52.5m each month.
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