 Wel, bod yda, i chi gyd, croesionol, i pob un. Welcom to everybody, thank you for being at this first press conference after the summer and at the start of what will be a very busy few months ahead. The term starts on Sunday when we will improve the safety of all road users, including motorists, by introducing a default 20 mile per hour speed limit. So, if you know, I had the chance to meet people living and working in St Pryde's major in the Vale of Glamorgan last week. They were part of the first trial of 20 mile an hour zones and they spoke very eloquently there about the benefits and the improvements that they have seen since that new speed limit was introduced. Early in the term we will begin the process of modernising our democracy as we introduce the senate reform legislation, taking steps to create a senate which properly reflects the needs of today's Wales. This is a once in a generation opportunity to reform the senate, to deepen and strengthen our Welsh democracy, growing from the structures which were created 25 years ago now, before lawmaking and tax raising powers were devolved to Wales. By the end of the autumn term in December we'll publish the second report showing the progress we've made towards the shared commitments in the cooperation agreement with Plyde Cymru. During the autumn we'll be putting the final touches to other parts of the legislative programme, the bill to reform the bus industry and a bill to give people living in the shadow of disused tips a greater sense of security. All of this, of course, are being carried out against the bleakest financial backdrop in the whole of the devolution period. The last time I was at a press conference at the end of the summer term I explained the incredibly difficult financial situation we were facing and we have worked right through the summer to address the deficits that we now face. Those are deficits created by a decade and more of austerity and then the events of more recent times, the impact of very high inflation, unfunded public sector pay rises, sky high energy prices and the mess the UK government has made of the economy. All of that means that our financial position is up to 900 million pounds lower in real terms than what was expected at the time of the last spending review in 2021. Cabinet has been working throughout the summer to look at where spending can be delayed or deferred to where it can be re-prioritised or reduced to ensure that we can balance our budget. It's been a complex piece of work involving thousands of individual budget lines. We're now bringing all that work together. The Cabinet will be making the difficult decisions to ensure the public services continue to have the funding they need and that at the same time we do not breach our budget limit this year because if that were to happen it would create an even more difficult funding situation. Over the last couple of weeks while we've been working intensively on the budget, we've also been responding to the UK Government's Department for Education's updated risk assessment for school buildings with reinforced auto-claved, aerated concrete. As you know this form of concrete was used in buildings across the UK between the 1960s and the 1990s. I want to be clear that this is not the first time we've paid attention to RAC. The public sector in Wales has been carefully and safely managing property which has been identified as containing RAC. What changed last week was the Department for Education's risk assessment. Here in Wales two schools in Anglesey which were temporarily closed last week had both been subject to a regular monitoring regime. They were closed at the start of last week for further safety inspections to be carried out and I'm very glad that both schools are now partially reopening to students. And these are the only schools so far affected in Wales. Local authorities have been reviewing their school estate to identify any areas suspected of having RAC and on Friday last we published the latest position of each local authority as the assessment work continues. A clear majority of local authorities in Wales have confirmed that their schools are not affected. We continue to expect the results of all the initial assessment work by the end of this week at the latest. And I know that this has inevitably been a worrying time for parents, teachers and students but I hope that the emerging picture in Wales will be one that people find reassuring. And of course I want to thank everybody in our schools and the local authorities who have worked very hard over the last days to undertake these checks and to ensure people's safety. Of course RAC is used in buildings far beyond the education, estate and local authorities are assessing their other buildings for RAC. We know it was used extensively in the construction of Withibush Hospital and to a lesser extent in Neville Hall Hospital. Six wards have now been closed at Withibush. We've allocated nearly £13 million to support the ongoing survey work and remediation. And in Neville Hall it's fortunate that RAC is not present in patient areas at the hospital but some areas have been closed in that precautionary way. Tomorrow the Minister for Education will provide an update on the floor of the Centre and we will provide a further update by the end of this week so that everybody can be kept informed about those latest developments. And there's a dedicated page now on the Welsh Government website where all that information can be found. Well yesterday's match against Fiji in the World Cup was a heart-stopping occasion but now that we're over that first game people in Wales will be looking forward to another Welsh win on Saturday. And as the Rugby World Cup progresses the very best of Wales will be on show all over France. We will have taken some of our leading artists, food producers, culture across the channel to showcase the huge amount of talent Wales has to offer as part of our year-long Wales in France programme of events. I'll end this morning of course by wishing Wales the very best of luck this weekend against Portugal and in the final two group matches against Australia and Georgia. This is a challenging group, some of those later matches in particular will be very tough but the team can be completely confident that they have the support of a whole of Wales in going as deeply into the competition as is possible. Diolch o galon i chi gyd am now going to take some questions and I'm going to start in the room, Claire, Claire Bawd, from Bawr Media. Thank you First Minister. So we know that 20mph is coming in on Sunday and the Welsh Conservatives have put in another motion in the Senedd to try and block the 20mph coming in again. Now how are the Welsh Government planning on convincing them and many other people across Wales who are skeptical that it's not a waste of money and that it is worth all this time and effort whilst the Welsh NHS is struggling and whilst there's a cost of living crisis going on? Well, I'm confident that Conservative motion will be defeated. This is a manifesto commitment of the Labour Party. It was in our election manifesto and I sometimes feel that the opposition parties, the Conservative Party in Wales in particular is accusing us of keeping our promises. Well, we will be keeping our promises and our motion will not have a material impact on that. The questions of money are fair enough but the answer is also very straightforward. We will invest around £32m in one-off expenditure, changing signs, making sure the roads are properly marked out and so on, and that one-off money of £32m will save £92m every single year in the NHS. So, we will be paid back many, many times over for the investment that we are making. And while I understand that all change is challenging and that at the start of making a difference, saving lives, preventing accidents, giving people back the streets on which they live, I'm also confident that once it's there and people get used to it, people will find the advantages. Of it, just as other changes in the field of road transport, the breathalyzer, seatbelt wearing, other speed limits, controversial in their time, are now completely accepted. And we saw in the last couple weeks the RCN Wales ending their strike action as they accepted the Welsh Government pay offer, but in her statement Helen Wiley said, you know, a key part of this deal working was the Welsh Government keeping their promises of ensuring that the work-life balance for nurses across Wales improves dramatically. How are you going to promise that that improvement continues and prevents further strike action potentially into three months' time? Well, I was very glad that the strike action has been brought to an end. Part of that was intensive discussions with the RCN, but with other trade unions in the health field as well, about not just money, but conditions of service and the way in which the working day is navigated by people in what are very pressured and very demanding. So, we have a detailed programme of work that we've agreed with our trade union colleagues and we will be implementing that in exactly that same spirit through our partnership arrangements. We've always had, as you know, we've recently passed our social partnership bill, but in the health service we've always had partnership arrangements and those arrangements are what have helped us to come to the agreement we now have. So, we will be using those partnership forums to make sure that the things we've talked about already and are committed to doing jointly that we pursue those now over the months ahead. Clare, thank you very much. I'm going to go to Joanne Gallagher from ITV Wales on the screen. Morning, First Minister. ITV Wales has had exclusive look around Withibosh Hospital, looking at the repairs and the cost that is going to go into funding the repairs that they are doing with RAC. Currently, it's £13 million. That number is expected to grow. Do you think that money would be better placed, therefore, on building new hospitals rather than patching up the old ones that have got this condition? Joanne, thank you. I think that's a really important question. Because the Minister for Health's own area is centred around Withibosh, the decisions on the immediate investment that needed have come to me, and I've agreed to those, but I've also sent a very clear message to the local health board that I wanted to see any further requests for help to be within a broader plan for how they expect services in that part of Wales to be designed for the future. I was the health minister myself when we embarked upon a relatively modest set of investments at another hospital in Wales to deal with a different sort of building difficulty. By the time I'd stopped being health minister, that was over £100 million that was required. What I want to see in Withibosh is the Welsh Government working with the local health board to make sure that the building is safe and patients and visitors and staff are kept safe. But I want to see it within a clear sense of the longer term plan for health services in that area, including the future of the Withibosh site, always being part of the plans of the health service there for the future, but now needing to be thought of afresh in the light of these latest developments. Diolch. We know that there have been dog attacks in Wales in the past and sadly deaths. Therefore, I wonder what your thoughts are on the possible banning of this American bully exiled dog which is currently being looked at by the UK Government. Well, I think the UK Government should get on with it and get on with it as fast as possible. Some people here will remember that a 10-year-old child died in Caerphilly back in 2021. I attended the Police Federation National Bravery Awards in London just at the start of the recess and the small team of police officers who attended that absolutely awful incident were nominated for a national bravery award. I was fortunate enough to be able to talk with them about what they had witnessed that night and how they had helped others to deal with it. You cannot imagine how awful that must have been. We wrote to the UK Government then urging them to strengthen the protections in law against what we had seen. The Dangerous Dogs Act of 1991 I think is non-devolved. It's in the hands of the UK Government. I think they should have acted already and I certainly think they need to act now. John, thank you very much. I'll go to Ruth Mozalski at Wales Online. Thank you, Minister. We're obviously days away now from the 20-mile-an-hour limit coming into force and there's been, especially plenty of antithopy about it. Has that reaction that you're now starting to gauge given you any thought that maybe it's not the right policy, that we shouldn't be pursuing that for Wales? Well, Ruth, as I said, it was a commitment in Labour's manifesto. It was in front of people in Wales when they cast their votes. Politicians are very often criticised for not keeping their promises and this is a promise that we will be keeping here in Wales. I'm reinforced in my belief that it is the right thing to do from the experience we see elsewhere in the world. Spain, which has had this policy in place over recent years, has seen a 20% reduction in urban deaths on their roads. They thought they saw a 34% reductions in fatalities involving cyclists. Myself, I think when people begin to see the policy in action, most people will agree that it is a relatively small thing to ask, that we drive at speeds that save people's lives. And the evidence that driving a 20mph rather than 30mph is very clear on that point. Wales has often led the way in progressive policies. We're used to them being controversial at the time that we introduced them. When we changed the law in relation to organ donation, no other part of the United Kingdom was willing to do the same thing. And you remember how controversial it was here in Wales. Now every part of the United Kingdom does so. Last week, the Irish government announced that they were introducing the same policy on roads in the Republic of Ireland. I am reconciled to a period of turbulence when you make a change, but I am also confident that once the policy is there and operating, people will see that it is a sensible and progressive thing to do. It will prevent accidents, it will save lives and it will be absolutely worth doing. Thank you. This morning you've reiterated your warning about the budget shortfalls, again saying it's £900m that you're going to have to try and plug. Given that headline figure, are the policies that you've announced such as universal free school meals and providing primary school children with free childcare for all over two, sorry? Are they still affordable? Well, I've had to be clear with all my colleagues that at the start of this exercise there wasn't any part of the Welsh government that could be regarded as outside the parameters of the exercise. But the exercise has all been about our priorities and making sure that even in these toughest of times we preserve the things that we think are the most important, even if we have to slow down or reduce or implement over a longer period of time than we'd hoped some of the other policies that we will pursue. We are in the closing stages of all that work. I met with cabinet colleagues three times last week. Cabinet will meet again today and we continue to work through the fine detail of it all. I don't think it's sensible for me to start telling you the results of our individual threads in all of that, but as soon as that work is completed and we're ready to explain to people how we will manage the rest of this year, then the finance minister will make a statement on the floor of the Senate and we'll put all that information into the public domain. Ruth, thank you very much. Over to Dan Davies in the room. We hear in this morning that the deal to keep Wilco shops open is not going to work and we understand that that could affect a thousand jobs in Wales. What is the Welsh government going to do to help those people and more broadly to help the high street? Well, it is very sad news that the different rescue attempts that have been identified over past weeks look like they're not going to come through and I'm afraid it does tell us something about the wider state of confidence in the economy. What we will now do is to do what we have done and done successfully in the sorts of instances in the past. We will put a group together, the DWP ourselves, Careers Wales and so on to make sure that we do everything we can to match people who will be losing their jobs with other opportunities that exist elsewhere. In some ways a moment in the Welsh economy where there are contradictory patterns to be seen, we still have very large numbers of vacancies and we have more vacancies than we have people looking for them. The vacancy numbers are coming down, the number of searches people have to make to get a job is going up so there are some contradictory patterns in the data. But the data does still show lots of vacancies and our job is to make sure that people looking for jobs who were working for Willco will know where those other opportunities lie and we can do everything we can to help them to find them. We can make some investments to make sure people are trained for new careers where they have things they would like to do in the future. There is a future for the high street in Wales but it's not a future that rests on trying to recreate the high street of the past. The high street of the future will I think be a much more mixed place, it will have more residential accommodation, more people will live over shops in the high street. There will be a greater emphasis on leisure, there will be more restaurants and opportunities for people to come and enjoy themselves and there will be retail of course as well. We have got some very successful high streets in Wales but what they managed to do is to find a unique identity, something that makes them different to other high streets and therefore makes them places where people want to visit. We work with the retail consortium and people who are in the field to try and design that future. It's another transition and transitions as we know are challenging for people but I feel very much that there is a successful future for the high street but it's got to be innovative and it's got to be focused on a distinctive offer and it's got to involve a wider range of elements than the traditional high street of the past. Wel, ar ôl nifer o posibiliadau i helpu'r cwmni wilco, mae'n dristu clwed, mae'r posibiliadau na ddim wedi troi mas i'r helpu. I ffindio rhywun arall i Cymru drostodd a gwaith mae'r cwmni wedi wneud. A ben i'n wneud fel Llywodraeth e'n byth ni wedi wneud a wedi wneud yn Llywodraeth mewn nifer o chi'r destin yn y gorffennol. So ei dod tasglu digilydd pobl sy'n gweithio anumai sema anghymru a DWP o Llynddaen i helpu pobl sy'n gweithio i wlco a hyn o bryd i ffindio a swyddi newydd. Mae lot o swyddi am ar gael anghymru a hyn o bryd, so byddwn ni'n ganw'n bwyntio ar helpu bobol ti ddim yn mynd i gweithio i wilco yn dyfodol, i fyndio ble mae'r posibliadau a eraill a posibliadau newydd ble mae'r bobol yn isio cael fforddiant er enghraifft i paratoi am pethau newydd yn y bobadau nhw. Fe ddod am ystryd fawr yn cyfredinol, yng Nghymru ni mae dyfodol Llywodraeth Argyll i'r ystryd fawr ond bydd hwnna ddim anghyl yng Nghymru allu mynd nôl a beth oedd yn gweithio ar ystryd fawr yn gorffennol. Mae'n poesig i fod â'n hyblig, i credigol, i fel o ddola'n mwy o bethau, i'n gallu neud ar ystryd fawr mwy o bobol yn byw anna posibliadau o bobol cael hamdau na bethau a bethau fel na, a ble mae'r stryd oedd fawr yn llwyddo anghymru a hyn o bryd. Mae'n llwyddo atos mae'n nhw'n rhoi fel o beth unigryw. Rhyw resom i mynd fanna sy'n wahanol i'r osama i mynd i'r strydau fawr yn yr ardal. So, i'n cydweithio, gyda bobol sy'n cydweithio, yna maes i triol i cynllunio am dyfodol i'r stryd fawr yn cyfredinol trwy fod fel wedais i hyblig, creadigol, a ffocasi ar beth sydd unigryw am beth mae bobol yn neud yn lleol. Ddechrau'n fawr iawn. Given the financial hole that you say you're in, I would imagine that you were gutted over the summer to hear Keir Starmer make clear repeatedly that he's preparing for a general election without making any new spending commitments. Have you communicated to him that as far as public services in Wales are concerned, you can't carry on like this and that an incoming Labour Government will have to spend more? Well, of course, I do have regular discussions with the leader of the Labour Party and he is very well aware that just as we face these genuine difficulties in Wales, he will inherit responsibilities if Labour wins the next general election, as I very much hope we will. He will face a similar pattern everywhere in the United Kingdom. An incoming Labour Government is not going to be able simply to turn on spending taps because of the economic mess that that Labour Government will inherit, but what you can be sure of and you know Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves and others have said this very often. The purpose of an incoming Labour Government would be put the economy back on its feet, the find ways of returning us to levels of growth which will routine in this country for 60 years. Between 1945 and 2010, the disruptive period is the period of austerity and the flawed and failed policies followed in that period. Put the economy back on its feet, get growth to happen again, use that dividend of growth to reinvest in our public services. It's not going to happen on the first day of a Labour Government. We know that, but the ambition will be very different indeed. It will be, as I say, to make sure that we return at the economy of the United Kingdom to that path of growth which was sustained for 60 years and more and then to be able to repair the damage in our public services that has been such a feature of the last 13 years. Diolch yn fawr. Thank you all very much indeed.