I will say I'm grateful to the Cabinet Secretary for briefing me around this LCM yesterday. Given the protections of the positive resolution procedure, given the lack of objection from the local government and human rights committee, and also given that the Cabinet Secretary's comments about the very significant improvements in the legislation as it progressed, and the openness of co-operation between him and UK Government on this, we are also happy to support this LCM.

He says that it will allow Wales our own approaches, in addition to providing for a coherent and consistent approach across the UK. Is he really saying that all tensions between those two approaches have been ironed out, and is there not a necessity for some trade-off between those two objectives? When he talks about tackling fraud and managing debt, I assume by ‘managing debt’ he means chasing debt and trying to get people who owe money to pay it, notably to the Welsh Government. Is that the intention there?

I welcome the work to try and ensure that people in fuel and water poverty do get the discounts that they are entitled to—very large numbers of them do not. It has not always been easy to apply for those discounts or for people to have awareness of their eligibility. And I recognise the privacy concerns that Dai Lloyd noted, but nonetheless do think this is a worthy objective and I’m pleased that the legislation is doing that.

Could I also just flag the data science park around Newport, and the ONS being there and the opportunities that there may be for employment and economic activity, particularly in that area, through having this public sector data available to researchers accredited by the UK Statistics Authority? Does the Cabinet Secretary agree with me that this is a further significant opportunity for that data park around Newport? Does he also recognise that the UK Government and, I think, probably working with devolved administrations in this context, has been a leader in terms of ensuring open data? When these data are shared by researchers, will they then be available through their research on an anonymised basis? And does he feel that the right balance is still being struck between that and the importance of open data to the economic opportunities that will give, but also to the protection of appropriate confidentiality?