APRIL is bowel cancer awareness month.

Bowel cancer is the second biggest cancer killer in Wales.

However, if diagnosed early, survival rates improve dramatically.

My colleagues and I have long called on the Welsh Government to improve access to screening and early diagnosis for bowel cancer.

We support reducing the eligible screening age from 60 to 50 and have called to ensure NHS Wales' local health boards are planning ahead for changes in screening practices.

We have also raised our concerns with the Welsh Government about the need to ensure that changes to screening practices are as effective as possible in detecting bowel cancer at the earliest opportunity.

On Lynch syndrome, we support Wales' local health boards adopting NICE Guidance on this and have called on the Welsh Government to take action to ensure these practices are adhered to in Wales.

It is deeply regrettable that this important preventative step is not being taken routinely.

I will continue to raise the importance of early diagnosis of all cancers in Wales, and to ensure that NHS Wales is able to provide the highest standard of cancer care and treatment to its users.

- The decision by the Welsh Labour Government to cut a £700,000 grant to help poor families with the cost of school uniforms has been widely and deservedly criticised.

The Welsh Labour Government’s school uniforms grant – available to Year 7 students eligible for free school meals – is to be scrapped, despite helping 5,500 learners last year.

This is a sad indictment of Labour’s mismanagement of its resources, and will hit the poorest pupils the hardest.

For families on low incomes, school uniforms are a significant expense and this grant helped thousands of pupils last year.

Just days ago the Welsh Government was forced to find £14 million to cover another scrapped education grant, and this is yet another example of the ongoing cuts to education grants.

- Latest figures confirm council tax has now risen by more than 200 per cent since Labour took control of Wales in 1997.

This year’s average council tax in Wales has risen by an inflation-busting 5.07 per cent - above the informal cap set by the Welsh Labour Government.

Council tax has now risen in Wales by an astonishing 201 per cent since 1997.