SAM ROWLANDS, Member of the Welsh Parliament for Fflint Wrecsam has welcomed the fact that Reform MSs voted with the Conservatives and Plaid Cymru.
Mr Rowlands, Welsh Conservative spokesperson for Education and Families, was speaking in the Senedd during a Reform UK debate on Childcare offer and calling on the Welsh Government to publish the full costings and timetable for the introduction of their childcare offer within their first 100 days in government.
He said: “Childcare is one of the most important areas of public policy, because it sits at the intersection of family life and economic opportunity.
“It affects how families organise their lives, whether parents can work, and how children are supported in their earliest and most formative years.
“When childcare is affordable and flexible, parents are able to participate fully in the workforce, businesses benefit from more stable labour supply, and the wider economy becomes more productive.
“When it’s expensive or inflexible, it can become a barrier to work and place additional pressure on family finances.
“Any successful childcare system must recognise the realities of family life and provide parents with genuine flexibility.
“That is why getting childcare policy right requires more than just ambition: it requires clarity about what is being proposed, how it will be delivered and how it will be paid for, so that families can have certainty and confidence to plan and prepare for the future.
“Policies should be properly costed, planned and transparent right from the outset.
“It’s this that gives families confidence in starting a family or growing their family and will go some way to fix what will continue to be the issue of our age, that declining birth rate. That is what this motion asks for, and that is why we should be supporting it.”
The final amended motion received the support of 11 Reform MSs and began by noting that, “Reform UK had no commitments on childcare in its Welsh manifesto”.
Mr Rowlands added: “Better childcare provision was a key part of the Conservative manifesto. We have been very clear that we want greater access to childcare in Wales and that we will vote with any party seeking to increase childcare provision.
“That is why we supported the original Reform motion and the amended versions put forward by Plaid Cymru.
“The Conservative Leader, Darren Millar MS, was very clear during the campaign that we would vote with any political party bringing forward policies we support, and better childcare is something we strongly support.”
