288.This section allows the Welsh Ministers to require reporting authorities, individually or jointly with other reporting authorities, to prepare reports on adaptation in relation to their devolved Welsh functions.
289.Subsection (1) provides that the Welsh Ministers may require a reporting authority to prepare a report covering any or all of the following matters:
an assessment of the current and predicted impact of climate change on the authority’s devolved Welsh functions;
a statement setting out the authority’s proposals and policies for adapting to climate change in relation to its devolved Welsh functions and its timescales for introducing the proposals and policies;
an assessment of the progress the authority has made towards implementing any proposals and policies contained in an earlier report.
290.Subsection (2) allows the Welsh Ministers to require two or more authorities to prepare a joint report. Subsection (3) allows the Welsh Ministers to give directions to the reporting authority about the timing of the report and the matters it should cover, and allows the Welsh Ministers to limit the report’s coverage to a particular geographical area.
291.The Welsh Ministers can only require a reporting authority to produce a report dealing with the authority’s “devolved Welsh functions”. See the notes on subsections (6) and (7) of section 70 for an explanation of what this covers.