The First Minister has been in the job for a bit over a month, and in his second first minister’s questions, the 200 thousand pound donation from a company run by a man convicted of dumping waste illegally. Party leaders are still questioning the decision to take the donation, and even members of Vaughan Gething’s government have said they wouldn’t have taken it.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 The fact that you registered a donation from a convicted polluter doesn't make it good
00:06 judgement to have accepted that donation. We've long associated Westminster with sleaze.
00:12 That is not what we want here in Wales.
00:17 During his campaign for First Minister, Vaughan Gething accepted a £200,000 donation from
00:21 Atlantic Recycling, which has twice been convicted of dumping illegal waste.
00:25 Pride leader Srinath Yorworth thinks the First Minister shouldn't have accepted the donation
00:29 and thinks it's a big red flag against his integrity.
00:33 Did the First Minister ask who it was from, was told about the donor's criminal past and
00:40 said, "Ah, it doesn't matter, I'll take the money anyway," in which case that raises fundamental
00:45 questions of judgement? Or was it that despite the scale of this donation, he didn't think
00:51 to ask for proper due diligence? That would again be very poor judgement. Which was it?
00:59 All of the due diligence was undertaken about whether this was a permissible donor that
01:02 money could be accepted from and it was declared properly and it's on the record now.
01:08 Andrew R.T. Davies pointed out that Vaughan Gething's rival for the job of First Minister,
01:12 Jeremy Miles, said on the weekend that he wouldn't have taken the donation and questioned
01:16 whether Gething made the right decision.
01:19 I would urge you again, First Minister, given the severity of some of the assertions that
01:24 have been made and in particular the corrosive nature of those assertions, to look at the
01:31 appointment of an independent advisor to address these concerns and provide you with what I
01:36 hope is a clean Bill of Health. I genuinely hope that all of those loan and equity investments
01:42 to businesses in Wales are made independent of the Welsh Government by the Development
01:48 Bank. Those are the facts. There is no reason to undertake an investigation when the facts
01:54 are so clear and unambiguous.
01:57 (laughs)