It was a pleasure to join with local Senedd Members and Councillors for a celebration of the Kerala community in Newport recently.

The Kerala community comes from a region of southern India, and a number of families moved to Newport around 20 years ago.

Although we were seated in St Julians School I thought we could have been transported thousands of miles away to India, as we enjoyed the traditional songs, drumming, and dancing.

The event was arranged by Edward Watts MBE. Newport is blessed with many local heroes and one of the greatest must be Edward who has supported many community organizations in South East Wales for very many decades.

The Senedd Conservative Group believes very strongly that the decision by the UK Government to scrap winter fuel support for pensioners was wrong and should be reversed.

Last week we held a debate on the issue in the Senedd. Many of us spoke up to voice our concerns. In the run-up to the election Labour MPs claimed that they would support pensioners and condemned any suggestion of scrapping winter fuel support then only a few months later they voted to do just that.

I have heard from at least one local pensioner who has had to go out to work in order to make up for the money lost. This is no way to treat the most vulnerable members of our society.

The issue came up a lot at the Usk Show which I attended on Saturday last week.

On the Conservative stand, we asked people to place a sticker showing whether or not they agreed with the policy. It will be of no surprise to anyone to hear that the vast majority thought the government were wrong.

I grew up on a farm in Usk and feel that much more needs to be done to support the farmers who put food on our table. Farmers and their Union representatives raised concerns about the ongoing spread of TB in Wales, the costs of complying with the NVZ regulations, and the need to ensure that the new version of the Sustainable Farming Scheme does not require 10% of good agricultural land to be put aside for growing trees.

I fully support farmers on these points and will be raising the issues in the Senedd.

Laura Anne Jones is the Senedd Member for South Wales East