, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
But after a year where there was no growth in the budgets, what we wanted to do was to try to help others, not just to provide all of the funding to the coleg and the centre, but to help the other agencies that we've been talking about this morning—the…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
They are the two biggest single beneficiaries. They get more money out of the £3.5 million than any other aspect of the Welsh organisations that we will fund.
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Of course. Just to say at the outset, I was very grateful to the Plaid Cymru Members who were responsible for running the plans or schemes when we had our co-operation agreement last year, when we faced problems with funding and needed to be flexible in the…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
That's just the nature of making the decision. When we talk about the coleg Cymraeg, I think the reason why the coleg Cymraeg still resides with me is that the role of the coleg is not to provide education itself, but to plan for expanding Welsh-medium…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
‘Well, why wasn’t that with this, or why wasn’t that with that?’
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Just one general point to start, Chair. In one way or another, I have been part of helping to create almost every Cabinet in the period of devolution, and every time what happens is, at the end of the day, you have to provide responsibilities to people and…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
In the meeting that we had yesterday with the mentrau iaith, they were talking about, because we have more funding for the next financial year, increasing the work that they’re doing in the summer, and to draw in more young people to help them run the…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Maybe I'll offer one example, and Bethan will give more. It's a personal example, so I must apologise for that, because my grandson goes to one of the schools that Julie has mentioned. It's a fantastic school and it cultivates an approach to the language that…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
There are a number of things in the budget that help us to do that. I had an opportunity to meet yesterday, along with Jeremy, with the mentrau iaith. What they wanted to discuss was how we can find those ways for young people to enjoy using the Welsh…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
In the area of late immersion, as I’ve heard Alun Davies say already, it’s important for local authorities to collaborate together, and we see that starting to happen in the south-east. In terms of the work that Newport has done, they’ve had a report from…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Well, thank you to Gareth Davies for the question, Chair. The Welsh-medium capital grant scheme, I think, has been one of the great success stories of the last five years and more. It was originally agreed by Kirsty Williams when she was the education…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Of course, we'd be happy to share more information about how we monitor and what patterns the process of monitoring reveals.
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
I can ask Bethan to help with the figures and with the specific investments. But, just to say to the committee, we think that we are still on track to increase the number of cylchoedd meithrin. We have a target for 2026 to establish 150 cylchoedd meithrin…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Well, I think that the committee can see investments and activities in the area of the Welsh language across the entire Government. I want to pay tribute for the moment to the work of Jeremy Miles when he was responsible for the Welsh language. He funded a…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Well, thank you, Chair. So, the context for the current financial year, the committee members are familiar with that. The effort to find a way to present a budget on the floor of the Senedd for this financial year was the most difficult effort in the history…
, Culture, Communications, Welsh Language, Sport, and International Relations Committee
Scrutiny of the Welsh Government Draft Budget 2025-26: Evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Thank you, Chair. So, I'm Mark Drakeford, the Cabinet Secretary with responsibility for the Welsh language, and with me this morning I have Bethan Webb and Jeremy Evas, who have appeared before this committee many times over the years.
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
Let me explain to the Welsh Conservative Party: nobody is listening to you. Because while political parties can change many things—they can change their leader, they can change their policies—what they cannot change is their history. And your history is…
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
I understand it's not convenient for the Member to understand what happened. Her Government delayed and delayed, as they did year after year, until the very final part of February, the final estimates, and they decide, at that point in the cycle, that there…
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
I'll explain exactly to the Member what happened there, which was that her Government delayed and delayed making allocations to Wales. [Interruption.] No, no, this is absolutely the case. This is absolutely the—. She may not be—
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
There are estimates of those costs. I've shared them in a letter to the Chair of the Finance Committee, and I'm sure that that letter can be made available to the leader of the opposition, if he hasn't had time to read it as yet. It's been available for…
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
Of course.
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
Diolch yn fawr, Dirprwy Lywydd. As we've heard many times around the Chamber this afternoon, there was a new Government elected for the United Kingdom in July of last year, and thank goodness, Dirprwy Lywydd, for that—a Government elected with an overwhelming…
, Plenary
Welsh Conservatives Debate: New UK Government's first six months
Formally.
, Plenary
Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Well, Llywydd, I agree with Rhys ab Owen on the importance of attracting more children from BAME communities into Welsh-medium education. I recall in the first year of Ysgol Treganna, there wasn't a single person, no-one at all, from a minority ethnic…
, Plenary
Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language
Llywydd, in addition to our work across Wales to promote the Welsh language to help ensure that it is a language for all, we ask all local authorities to provide information in their Welsh in education strategic plan annual reports on how they promote the…
