Cyllideb Llywodraeth y DU

Part of 1. Cwestiynau i'r Prif Weinidog – Senedd Cymru am 2:20 pm ar 28 Mawrth 2023.

Danfonwch hysbysiad imi am ddadleuon fel hyn

Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:20, 28 Mawrth 2023

(Ddim wedi ei gyfieithu)

I thank Carolyn Thomas for that very important supplementary question, because she puts her finger exactly on the flaw at the heart of the current UK Government's prospectus. The Chancellor said that his was a budget for growth, but he failed to do the most basic things on which growth depends. It tells us why, since 2010 and the current run of Conservative Governments, growth in the United Kingdom economy has collapsed compared to anything that was achieved in the previous 60 years.

The two basic components of a genuine growth strategy, Llywydd, are investment in people and investment in the infrastructure that allows an economy to grow. Far, far from investing in people, as Carolyn Thomas says, families in every part of Wales are thousands of pounds worse off than they otherwise would have been had the failed and flawed policies of austerity not been followed. There was nothing for those people in the budget, the spring statement of 10 days ago.

As for investment in infrastructure, the derisory £1 million of capital investment that's been offered here in Wales means that those things that would create growth in the economy—investment in digital infrastructure, for example—all of that will be far more difficult. Carolyn Thomas has highlighted and exposed this afternoon, Llywydd, the flaws at the heart of the UK Government's strategy, and the fact that there is a prescription available for them were they to be serious about reversing the 13 years of Tory decline.