1. What discussions has the Cabinet Secretary had with the Cabinet Secretary for Education regarding the progress of Welsh education provision in the Valleys? OQ61017

I have met the Cabinet Secretary for Education and she is supportive of the great work that has already taken place through the Welsh in education strategic plans, and she is eager to build on this good work. Local councils will submit their annual reports to the Cabinet Secretary for Education at the end of July.

Thank you for that. If we want to reach the target of a million Welsh speakers by 2050, the Valleys will be vital, but we are still waiting for news about the proposed Welsh-medium primary school for the Bedwas, Trethomas and Machen area, and it seems that Merthyr council is proceeding with identifying a site for a new Welsh primary school without taking into account the excellent work that has been done recently in the Gurnos area in terms of early years provision. These are just two examples of the challenges facing local parents who are desperate to send their children to Welsh-language schools.

Would you, along with the Cabinet Secretary for Education, be willing to meet with me and representatives of the local RhAG group to discuss what support the Government can give to local authorities across the south-east to make sure that everyone has the option to send their children to a Welsh-medium school?

Well, I thank the Member for that supplementary question. I have to say that I was disappointed that she didn't offer me a flower as part of the question. [Laughter.] But the point that the Member makes is entirely proper and the progress and the enthusiasm for Welsh-medium education in the Valleys is a pleasure to see. Every council, including the two that the Member mentioned, has strategic plans that are ambitious and do, as she mentioned, include commitments to open new primary schools. It is important that this happens in a way that considers the broader impact in terms of geographical availability, but also in terms of developments where people live so that the purpose of the strategic plans is achieved in the most ambitious way possible.  

I would be more than happy to meet with the Member to discuss this further. I would just say that there are two developments that I think are very encouraging and that I hope will ultimately come to fruition, namely the development of champions for promoting Welsh-medium education in the south-east, who do good work to ensure that people understand the benefits and advantages of Welsh-medium education on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the enthusiasm that we're seeing in the south-east, as we're seeing across Wales, in terms of the investment in late immersion. I think that both of those developments are extremely exciting in her region. But I would be more than happy to meet with her and the education Cabinet Secretary.

Cabinet Secretary, it's my belief that in order to properly embed the learning and speaking of Welsh in communities, there needs to be a clear and well advertised economic advantage for those to speak Welsh. Only through this will people invest and make every effort to encourage their children to speak Welsh. Graduate schemes and apprenticeships through the medium of Welsh are a great opportunity to inspire the next generation of workers to embrace the Welsh language as a skill that can help them in their working lives, particularly in key areas such as public service, in healthcare and in education provision, especially in early years learning. What steps are the Welsh Government taking to encourage the creation and uptake of graduate schemes and apprenticeships through the medium of Welsh, and what financial resources have you earmarked for this? Thank you.

I thank the Member for his question. I do agree with the point that it is important that we make available, through the medium of Welsh, the full range of educational opportunities for our young people, including work-based learning, apprenticeships and provision more broadly than that at the further education stage. The work of the Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol is really beginning to bear fruit, I think, in the increase in availability. It is still a significant piece of work—there is a long way to go before there is that widespread provision in all parts of Wales that we would all want to see. Some of those challenges are well understood and they're relating to the workforce, but some of it is about an expectation, often. And I was struck by the work of, I think, Coleg Llandrillo Menai, which they were talking to me about at the Eisteddfod last year, where they developed a mechanism and programme for individual staff members to be identifying these opportunities and bringing people to them in a really proactive way, which struck me as being a very productive way of going about it.

I would just say, in passing—I know this wasn't the main thrust of his question—that I'm not myself sure that the way we will encourage more and more people to learn Welsh is simply by talking about the economic imperative for it. There is an important element to that, but I think what we are learning is that people's relationship to the language is much more than transactional. I'm not suggesting he was making that point, but there is a sense of warmth and welcome towards the language that I think goes beyond what is the particular individual economic benefit to a learner. But it is important, as he says, to make sure that those opportunities are available, because we want more people to be working through the medium of Welsh in our workplaces.