Diolch. As people watching and attending in the gallery might not be aware, the person who opens has to close and summarise the debate held, so I've been scribbling down lots of notes, which is why I wasn't quite ready when you first called me.

The Cabinet Secretary in her response said the Welsh Government's very aware of how important this issue is, and that Wales is a country of social justice, but the Bill is not needed. That's a contradiction. The people in the gallery, the people across Wales, have been telling us year after year—in the cross-party group on disability, which I chair, for example; in the cross-party group on deaf issues, for example, which I chair; at meetings and conferences I have attended, and elsewhere—that we've got to have this, that we cannot be the only country in the United Kingdom that hasn't got a statutory provision in this respect, that we have to impose and require duties on Ministers that apply in other parts of the United Kingdom. To do otherwise would be a gross betrayal and a failure of social justice delivery, a failure to recognise the barriers that BSL signers encounter, a failure to understand their needs and work with them to help them meet those needs.

The Cabinet Secretary referred to the audit of British Sign Language in Wales by the British Deaf Association—I'm aware of that, I've been closely monitoring it for years, engaging with the BDA and questioning your predecessors on this for years. Throughout that process, the BDA have repeatedly stated to me—and I know the predecessor Ministers, because they've told me—that they still need an Act as well. The audit is not an alternative to an Act. She said that Wales is the first UK nation to include BSL in the curriculum and we applaud that, and I, in the past, regularly raised questions about that, as did Members of all other parties. But as we've heard from a number of speakers, deaf pupils continue to be disadvantaged by continuing inequity in outcomes and that will continue unless we provide the specific BSL interventions required to break that cycle of underachievement amongst children who otherwise do not have learning disabilities, do not have learning difficulties, except for those created by the barriers that we still allow to happen, we still allow them to encounter in school and elsewhere in society, and that is not acceptable.

She referred to the disability rights taskforce, with over 550 group members—550 group members are looking at generic solutions, and when I meet them individually, they tell me they're getting concerned that the talking is going on and we need to be delivering on outcomes. We cannot simply, under the umbrella of generic approaches and continuing to raise awareness, fail also to address the condition-specific needs of different demographic groups and communities across Wales, in this case BSL signers and deaf communities.

As I said, if this Bill does not proceed, Wales will be the only part of the UK not covered by specific BSL legislation. Surely, cross party, that would be a matter of shame, especially when the equivalent legislation in the other parts of the UK, passed or going through the process in Northern Ireland, have all had cross-party support. At UK level in the House of Commons, it was a Labour MP that brought this forward, and I supported her for that. And like I said, this is a language Bill that supports Welsh deaf leadership on BSL matters in Wales. No matter how effective and efficient Cabinet Secretaries, shadow Ministers, civil servants and officials might be, they don't have the knowledge or awareness, or lived experience that people who can provide Welsh deaf leadership can provide.

The Cabinet Secretary said that the UK BSL Act has implications for devolved areas. Well, of course it does, because without that, duties applying to Ministers in the UK in England do not apply to Ministers in Wales in relation to the same devolved matters. So, BSL signers and deaf people in England and deaf children in England have provision and duties imposed on the Government there in this respect to report, to provide guidance, which would not apply to Welsh Ministers. That's not a partisan issue, that would again be a matter of disgrace for this nation and all parties in this place.

Sioned Williams said—