Cabinet meeting: 10 July 2023

• Rt. Hon. Mark Drakeford MS (Chair)
• Lesley Griffiths MS
• Rebecca Evans MS
• Vaughan Gething MS
• Jane Hutt MS
• Julie James MS
• Jeremy Miles MS
• Eluned Morgan MS
• Mick Antoniw MS

• Hannah Blythyn MS
• Dawn Bowden MS
• Lynne Neagle MS
• Julie Morgan MS
• Lee Waters MS

Officials

• Andrew Goodall, Permanent Secretary
• Des Clifford, Director Office of the First Minister
• Rebecca Dunn, Head of Cabinet Division
• Toby Mason, Head of Strategic Communications
• Rory Powell, Head of First Minister’s Office
• Jane Runeckles, Special Adviser
• Madeleine Brindley, Special Adviser
• Alex Bevan, Special Adviser
• Daniel Butler, Special Adviser
• Ian Butler, Special Adviser
• Kate Edmunds, Special Adviser
• Sara Faye, Special Adviser
• Sam Hadley, Special Adviser
• David Hooson, Special Adviser
• Clare Jenkins, Special Adviser
• Owen John, Special Adviser
• Phillipa Marsden, Special Adviser
• Tom Woodward, Special Adviser
• Christopher W Morgan, Head of Cabinet Secretariat (minutes)
• Damian Roche, Cabinet Secretariat
• Catrin Sully, Cabinet Office
• Kathryn Hallett, First Minister’s Office
• Tracey Burke, Director General Climate Change & Rural Affair
• Jo-Anne Daniels, Director General Education, Social Justice and Welsh Language
• Reg Kilpatrick, Director General COVID-19 Recovery and Local Government
• Tim Moss, Chief Operating Officer
• Andrew Slade, Director General, Economy, Treasury and Constitution
• Judith Paget, Director General Health and Social Services
• Helen Lentle, Deputy Director Legal Services
• Alex Slade, Director of Primary Care and Mental Health (item 4)

1.1 Cymeradwyodd y Cabinet gofnodion y 3 Gorffennaf / Cabinet approved the minutes of 3 July.

Welsh Government annual report

2.1 The First Minister informed Cabinet that he had hosted a press conference earlier that day, in advance of the Plenary debate on the Welsh Government’s annual report. The First Minister had highlighted the government’s high level achievements and what ministers had been able to deliver despite the challenging financial situation. He had also signalled, given the high levels of inflation, there was less funding available in the current and future years and Ministers would need to take difficult decisions in the coming months.

3.1 Cabinet considered the Plenary grid and noted that Plenary was due to finish a little earlier than usual on Tuesday, with voting time around 5.30pm, as Stage 3 of the Health Service Procurement (Wales) Bill had been postponed until the autumn term, due to changes to the timing of UK legislation in Westminster.

3.2 In terms of Wednesday, a Senedd Commissioner would be responding to the short debate on Members needing to learn CPR. Voting time was scheduled for 7pm.

4.1 The Deputy Minister for Mental Health and Wellbeing introduced the paper, which asked Cabinet to agree to approve the direction of travel in the development of successor strategies to Together for Mental Health and Talk2Me2.

4.2 In 2012 the government published the Together for Mental Health strategy and in 2015 the Talk to Me 2, the suicide and self-harm prevention strategy, both of which operated until the end of 2022. There had been a public commitment to the development of successor strategies and to an independent evaluation of the outgoing strategies to assess their impact and inform the next steps.

4.3 As part of a wider programme of reviews, there had been extensive research into the impact of both existing strategies, which included external engagement with service users, carers, practitioners and service delivery providers.

4.4 There was strong support for developing successor strategies to continue the work on the key objectives, but more needed to be done to support those experiencing more severe mental ill-health, many of whom still lacked the understanding and support from their communities and wider society.

4.5 Cabinet approved the paper.

Cabinet Secretariat
July 2023