, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, the sabbatical programme is one of the ways in which we can support teachers to develop Welsh-medium skills. So, if you look at the broader range of things that we do, then I do think that the budget we have is sufficient to take us to the next phase…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, obviously I was disappointed in the census results, but I was also heartened by the results in the national survey, which shows the opposite trend. So, the task, as I was saying at the end of last year, now is for us to look at why those sources of data…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, I would be concerned if that was the case, and we must make sure that it isn't the case, because the whole point of the new system is to be driven by the particular profile of needs of the individual learner—that's the entire rationale for the new…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, it's the same point that I made at the start, in a sense, which is, I think that being able to maintain the level of funding has been challenging in its own terms, really, across the piece. Obviously, this is a priority area for us, so I wanted to make…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Yes. Just to say, on the school improvement funding that we provide, that is only one source of school improvement funding as well. Local government themselves provide school improvement funding. I might ask Owain to say a little bit more about that in a…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Yes, absolutely. As I was saying, that's the purpose of the programme. We know that there is a link between a school's ability to teach in the appropriate way with the facilities the school has. So, that's why we want to make sure that pupils in all parts of…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, the entire programme was designed to address that, so we're in constant dialogue with authorities around their own schools, but also with dioceses where there are faith schools, with voluntary-aided schools and also with further education colleges. So…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, just to say, I don't wish to be particularly party political about it, but this is one of the most extraordinary aspects of the settlement from the UK Government: there is not a single penny allocated for capital in that budget. Where we are, you're…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, the money that has just gone into the budget is separate from the funding in the budget already for teachers' pay, so they're separate things. The teachers' pay funding was part of the negotiation for the last round of RSG, and this is money that has…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Certainly. So, the budget hasn't gone down by £5 million; one item in the budget has gone down by £5 million, but the net increase in the budget is the £9 million figure. So, the budget, taken as a whole, is £9 million higher this year than it was last year…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
I'm sure we can do that, Chair.
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, this is one of the sources of support that we provide for students in further education. And I started, Chair, by talking about how challenging it has been just to maintain levels of funding across the budget. And this, I think, is one of those…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
So, universities are very alive to that and have a very good understanding of who's applying for funding and how to make sure that those perceptions are addressed. But there are also other sources of support that are available to non-Welsh domiciled students…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Yes, okay. Well, they obviously don't get the Welsh student support package, and, generally speaking, that [correction: other support packages], obviously—certainly within the UK and internationally—is [correction: are] not as supportive as the funding that…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Was that the—
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Yes. The pilot for that was extended to the end of this academic year. It was slowed down because of COVID, effectively, so we ran it longer. So, the pilot does come to an end at the end of this academic year. There are 45 schools running the pilot for us. I…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, as with every other time—. Every other time we've been able to extend it, we've been able to do that very near the point at which it's gone live, if you like, and the reason for that, I think, is twofold. One is that we want to identify the existence of…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Yes. Our principle in relation to that policy has, obviously, been to maximise the roll-out, really, as quickly as possible, given the cost-of-living pressures that families are under. There's been an increasing eligibility for free school meals, but we also…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, that's been where we’ve focused our efforts, really, to make sure that we don't need to do that. I think the programme for government and the co-operation agreement, obviously, are at the heart of what we're promising to deliver, so we've been able to…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Well, I suppose, in a way, it is defined by the needs of future generations, really, isn't it, given it's an education budget. It's all about making sure that we give future generations the best start in life. In a sense, that's the organising principle of…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
I should say—and I think all Ministers will probably be saying this when they are being scrutinised on their budgets—it was probably one of the toughest budgets during devolution, really, to write. The economic backdrop is punishing, both in terms of the…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Thank you, Chair, and good morning, and a happy new year to you all. Thank you for your initial comments on the research paper—that is appreciated, so thank you for that.
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2023-24—evidence session 1
Thank you very much.
, Plenary
Topical Questions
Thank you. I agree with Sam Kurtz—it’s important that we do find ways of promoting the Welsh language, and continue to find creative ways of doing so, so it is cool and modern for those who will hear those positive messages. But there are many different ways…
, Plenary
Topical Questions
I thank the Member for the question, and it’s a very important question, I think, if you do want to tackle what’s being demonstrated in these figures. The census doesn’t tell us anything about Welsh language use, and it doesn’t tell us anything about people’s…
