Last week was a great week for Wales and Welsh workers.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced billions of pounds for Wales in the Spending Review to invest in our public services, infrastructure, communities, and people over the next three years.
The multi-year Spending Review has set out the direction of the UK Labour Government and our public expenditure with a serious and significant investment in Wales’s future.
As Secretary of State for Wales, I have worked very closely with my cabinet colleagues for the past year to fulfil the promises we made to voters in the general election. And we are delivering the change we promised.
The cycle of historic underinvestment in Welsh rail has been broken with at least £445million for rail infrastructure improvements such as new stations, more and faster trains, increasing line capacity and continuing to help the Welsh Labour Government upgrade the core valleys line where lines have been electrified and hundreds of millions invested in brand new trains.
Our UK Labour Government’s investment will better connect people to existing and new jobs, as well as to our world-class tourist destinations and family and friends. It will deliver economic growth, greater opportunity, giving Welsh passengers the services they demand and improving the lives of so many people across the length and breadth of Wales.
People were right to worry that Wales’s rail network was being left behind after years of Tory empty promises. No longer – this is real funding that will lead to real improvements for passengers.
In the Autumn Budget, the UK Labour Government delivered the largest funding settlement for the Welsh Government in the history of devolution, and last week we did it again. This means extra money to invest in Welsh public services like schools, local council services and hospitals, continuing to bring down those NHS waiting lists, which have reduced by two-thirds in the last four months.
And after years of worry in our former mining communities that the coal tips dotting the landscape could be unsafe, unlike the previous Tory Government’s, we have stepped up again, with an additional £118 million to keep coal tips safe. That’s on top of the £25 million announced in the Autumn for the Welsh Government.
There can be no better example of the benefit of our partnership in power. Two Labour governments working together to deliver on the priorities of people across Wales.
Coal created Wales’s wealth in the past, and now we’re investing heavily in our industries of the future – in aerospace and defence, in Port Talbot’s transformation into a clean steel and energy centre and in our growing semiconductor sector in Newport and Cardiff.
We’ve also announced over £850million of funding for communities across Wales over the next three years. Despite the dreadful economic situation we inherited from the Tories after taking office last July, I’ve protected Wales’s percentage share and its amount of those UK-wide funds. This money will support communities and local projects that improve people’s lives from Anglesey to Aberystwyth, Barry to Bangor and Crickhowell to Chirk, helping small businesses to grow and take on more people and making improvements to our high streets and villages to make them better and safer.
Our UK Labour Government’s priority is to grow the economy, raise living standards and put more money in people’s pockets.
With last week’s Spending Review, we have done just that. We’re a UK Labour Government delivering for Wales in partnership with our Welsh Labour Government in the Senedd.