The Budget

The UK Budget presented by the Chancellor of the Exchequer last week provided Wales with an additional £45 million: £17 million in 2006-7 and £28 million in 2007-8.  In line with the financial settlement for the devolved administrations, it is a matter for the Assembly Government to decide how the extra funding should be used.  These decisions are taken in the context of Welsh policies, programmes and the Government’s overall strategic vision outlined in Wales: A Better Country.   In announcing the new resources last week, I promised to allocate them to front line services as quickly and effectively as possible.  This statement sets out how we intend to do that in 2006-7.


The Cabinet has considered the areas to which it intends to target these resources.  A key element of Assembly Government policy is to ensure that all children have the best possible start in life.  Vital to that is high quality education provision in schools throughout Wales.   Therefore, we intend to provide up to £13m as a specific revenue grant for schools to improve educational outcomes for pupils who are underachieving particularly where there is disadvantage such as looked after children. This sum is at least equivalent to the extra funding for schools in England. .  

We will also invest a further £300k in the police led personal and social education programme for children which addresses a range of community safety related issues including drugs, alcohol, and domestic abuse and anti social behaviour.  We will extend the programme to include other issues such as race/hate crime; how links could be made with the Fire Service in relation to dealing with arson issues; and binge drinking and solvent abuse.   We will also provide £300k to support the implementation of the recommendations in the Hidden Harm Report by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs. This will mean further support for the children of substance misuse parents.   We will also be adding £100,000 in support of extending the effective scheme of eco schools in Wales.  

We have already made significant advances in providing NHS dental services to the people of Wales.  Our aim to bring patient access levels up to at least 40 per cent is clear.  In order to speed up the delivery of this vital public service £2.6 million is being allocated to the provision of primary dental services to make sure that target is delivered across Wales.

Wales will benefit once again from UK Budget allocations.  Our funding arrangements mean that we are free to allocate these according to our own priorities.  These allocations account for £16.3 million of the Budget funding for 2006-7.   I intend to consider some further capital allocations and I will announce our plans in this regard shortly.