Welsh budget: Climate change a priority says Rebecca Evans

Climate change will be a central part of the Welsh government's tax and spending plans, the finance minister has said as she prepares to deliver her budget.

Rebecca Evans is also promising to spend more on making coal tips safe.

The Conservatives said helping services and the economy recover should be the priority.

This is the first budget since the government struck a deal with Plaid Cymru, which includes commitments to pay for free school meals for all primary school children and childcare for two-year-olds.

Ms Evans said: "This budget will leave Wales in a better place to manage the effects of the climate and nature emergency that are already affecting so many communities in Wales, and will only affect more in the future."

Ministers hoped the UK government would pay for the work, but no extra funding was announced in the Chancellor's recent spending review.

He said "every penny" would be spent, including on delivering vaccines, contact tracing and supporting schools.

"The money is not sitting on a shelf doing nothing," he said.

The Conservatives also said business rate holidays should be extended, and called for compensation for businesses who were losing bookings because of the Omicron variant.

Tory MS Peter Fox said: "Labour have been responsible for running Wales since the days of Tony Blair, but along with their nationalist helpers, they've consistently failed to improve our economy and public services."

The Welsh government wants the UK government to re-introduce furlough - a call echoed by Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price.

"We need to know if it's needed in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland - or indeed England - that financial support is available so we can provide furlough," Mr Price said.

Secretary of State for Wales Simon Hart said the UK Government had provided "unprecedented support to people, businesses and administrations right across the UK since the beginning of the pandemic", which would continue with the doubling of upfront funding to the Welsh government to £270m.

"It will be followed by a record funding settlement for Welsh Government of £18 billion a year for the next three years and is on top of billions in extra money which has already been provided during the pandemic to support public services in Wales," he added.

Plaid MS Llyr Gruffydd said the Welsh Government could have done more had its funding not been cut by the austerity policies of the last decade.

His party's deal with the government "will secure transformational support for some of our poorest households and will change people's lives for the better across Wales", he said.

Amid a pandemic and climate crisis, Welsh Conservative leader Andrew RT Davies told Radio Wales Breakfast he appreciated the budget was a "balancing act".

"I accept fully it's a very challenging set of circumstances. On the one hand you've got the public health demands and dilemmas and on the other you've got the climate change emergency that is affecting economies and climates across the world," he said.

But he added there were concerns over the deal between Labour and Plaid Cymru.

"What is of concern is obviously the first minister's own words only six, seven months ago when he called some of the policies that are going to be pursued through this budget 'voodoo economics'," he added.