Part of 2. 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:43 pm on 4 July 2017.
Carwyn Jones
Labour
1:43,
4 July 2017
The leader of Plaid Cymru asked what the point of Labour is. I can remind her that we have 28 MPs and her party has four. That is the point of Labour. People have faith in Welsh Labour. We saw that in the General Election campaign. They keep on saying, ‘Do this, do that’. Well, people aren’t listening to them. She and I are in the same position in terms of the public sector pay cap. Surely, there are two things she must agree with. Firstly, that the first port of call must be to secure the money from Westminster. Surely, we don’t give up on that. That is something that we need to pursue. Secondly, surely she doesn’t expect us to make a decision on the hoof, without examining all the potential costs, and that is something—
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
In a general election, each constituency chooses an MP to represent it by process of election. The party who wins the most seats in parliament is in power, with its leader becoming Prime Minister and its Ministers/Shadow Ministers making up the new Cabinet. If no party has a majority, this is known as a hung Parliament. The next general election will take place on or before 3rd June 2010.
