INCREASING EDUCATION MAINTENANCE ALLOWANCE

In February 2023, alongside Luke Fletcher, Plaid Cymru MS for South Wales West, I c0-submitted a motion to the Senedd calling for Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) to increase. Whilst EMA was abolished in 2010 by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government, it was kept in place by the Welsh Government.

However, the weekly payment hadn’t increased since 2004, remaining at £30 a week. In April 2023, following our motion, the Welsh Government announced it was increasing EMA to £40 a week; a change that benefits 3,000 young people across North Wales. Moving forward, I am keen to ensure that EMA payments at least rise alongside inflation.

BANNING GLUE TRAPS AND SNARES

Upon being elected to the Senedd in May 2021, one of the first campaigns I became involved with was the fight to ban glue traps and snares in Wales. Both are cruel and indiscriminate devices which are responsible for the maiming, suffering and killing of many animals, including sometimes household pets.

In August 2021, I wrote to Lesley Griffiths MS, the Minister for Rural Affairs, asking her to legislate to ban these traps across Wales. In October 2021, the Welsh Government responded by announcing that they would ban glue traps. In June 2023, the legislation came into effect, outlawing these brutal wildlife traps across the country.

As the Chair of the Cross Party Group on Animal Welfare, I am very proud to have played a role in making Wales a safer place for our wildlife.

BACK YOUR BUS CAMPAIGN VICTORY

In the Spring of 2023, with the ending of the Covid-linked bus emergency funding, there were threats of debilitatingly significant cuts to bus routes and networks across across Wales.

I joined with Unite Cymru to call for the Welsh Government to provide the funding required to protect bus networks and routes. I wrote for Nation.Cymru outlining how important buses are for both the Wales of now and the Wales of the future.

Unite Cymru launched a petition calling for the funding to be reinstated which was signed by nearly 5,000 people.

In June 2023, the campaign succeeded, with the Welsh Government announcing a new Bus Transition Fund to keep bus routes running across Wales.

I also successfully called on the Welsh Government to commit to rolling out a nationwide campaign to promote the use of public transport.

ITS FOR THEM NATURE CAMPAIGN

Before I was elected to the Senedd, I was the Deputy Leader of Flintshire County Council, as well as being the Cabinet Member for Streetscene and Transportation. As part of my portfolio, I was responsible for biodiversity and introduced a number of schemes across the county to improve wildlife, from wildflower planting, to reduced grass cutting and managing grass verges for biodiversity. So when I was elected to the Senedd, it was with great delight that I was invited by Lee Waters MS, the Deputy Minister for Climate Change, to play a leading role in the #ItsForThemNature project.

The project is designed to encourage management of grass verges and amenity grass for nature. If you have noticed that your local grass verges or grassy areas have been left to grow, that means they are providing a blossoming home for local wildlife. They provide a variety of food and habitats for insects, birds, bees and invertebrates. With one in six species at risk of extinction in Wales, we need to act now to save them.

That is why the Its For Them project is so important and I have been delighted to see local authorities across North Wales taking part, such as in Gwynedd, pictured below.

SECURING WELSH GOVERNMENT SUPPORT FOR DOORS ON SUPERMARKET FRIDGES

Since being elected, I have been working with Friends of the Earth Cymru to campaign to get supermarket chains to retrofit doors to their supermarket fridges. Across the UK, supermarket fridges use 1% of the UK’s power supply every year. Open fridges lead to a huge amount of wasted carbon emissions, as well as increasing supermarket energy costs which has a knock-on effect on prices.

In May 2023, the new Wales Retail Forum Action Plan was published, which included an aim to retrofit doors to supermarket fridges, with the Welsh Government backing the plans by announcing the provision of loans for the purpose of retrofitting.