Plaid Cymru Assembly Member Simon Thomas took part in BBC Wales’s new debate programme ‘The Hour’ in Newport, Gwent, about immigration.

After the programme Mid and West AM Simon Thomas said: “Immigration has been a contentious issue in the past but Wales as a nation benefits from immigration.

“The tragedy is that London centric policies have resulted in policies on immigration that have damaged the Welsh economy. We need a system that works for us here in Wales this is why Plaid Cymru believes we should introduce a Welsh visa to allow any skills shortage to be plugged.

“Plaid Cymru will create a Welsh Migration service to ensure that migration meets Welsh needs and introduce a skills shortage list of trades and skills which are not currently being met by Welsh workers.

“Meaningless targets based on number plucked out of thin air do nothing for our economic or social needs like ensuring we have enough doctors and nurses in our hospitals and food on our table.”

In our crucial agriculture sector, 65 per cent of workers are non-UK EU citizens and approximately 80 per cent of seasonal workers employed in agriculture come from the EU.

In the health and social care sector, as of September 2015 around 1,140 EU nationals were employed in NHS Wales, with six per cent of our doctors having trained in other parts of the EU.