, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Chair, I realise, in listening to Lesley's question, that I don't think I've referred to the code once in giving evidence to you. The code, in a way, is the golden thread of this Bill. The code that it will establish is how we will link that experience that a…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, I am very keen to learn from the committee's work on the Bill. There will be further iterations of the explanatory memorandum as the Bill makes its way through the Senedd. It takes us back, in a way, to the very first questions from Cefin about whether…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
On that last point, of course, Lesley Griffiths is quite right to point to the risks that that could happen. The difference between the two, though, I think is clear enough. The commission for tertiary education is just that: it is tertiary, it is…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Thank you very much for the question. It's something that runs through the Bill in its entirety, namely that what we want to create here are expectations that are reasonable but also ambitious. So, there is a spectrum here, isn't there? We don't just want to…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
We’re very alert to exactly that. The purpose of the Bill is to address the feelings that we know have been there from young people who’ve gone through compulsory Welsh in an English-medium school who feel at the end of it that they’ve not got anything…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
I'll just begin by saying that I think the points that Lee has raised about consultation are important ones that the committee would find useful. We can put a note together drawing together the requirements that the Bill sets out for consultation, and how…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
I'll ask Bethan to answer that.
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, first of all, to emphasise the point that was made in the question, there is a challenge in recruiting the number of people we need with the linguistic ability to teach through the medium of Welsh and to teach Welsh in other schools. My colleague the…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Because the exploration that went on around the White Paper really revealed the fact that the Welsh Ministers have this power already. So, it's a general principle—Iwan will be much more eloquent on this than me—a general principle of good law making that you…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, it doesn't reflect a change in ambition. The ambition is the one I've just tried to set out. We tested this as part of the White Paper consultation process. Now, here is something that some of us who were involved in this at the very beginning would not…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Thank you for the question. That was the point I was very briefly referring to earlier. It does set out a much clearer structure through which there's a line of sight between the ambitions that the Senedd sets in this area and the way that those ambitions are…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
No, the Bill provides for two extensions and no further extension. By the time we get to the end of the second extension—. There is an indicative timeline in the explanatory memorandum, which, if Members haven't all had a chance to see, we can circulate…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Lee, thank you. I’ll probably ask Bethan to say something in a minute, but your question has pinpointed something that I haven’t had a chance to say anything about yet, and, Chair, if you know that there are questions still to come that will cover this, I’ll…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Thank you, Chair. I want to make one general point, if I could, in answering this question, and it's a contested area—not everybody around the table will share exactly the same views on it. As I've said a couple of times, I think one of the great advantages…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, it's very important for me to say, Chair, that nothing in this Bill in any way undermines the importance of the work that is done to encourage the use of Welsh beyond the statutory curriculum. We've already talked a bit already today about how that can…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Thank you, Chair. Well, what I think is meant by that in the EM is this: we are in the very fortunate position in Wales that there is a real enthusiasm in our local authorities for the ambition that we have as a Government, a real enthusiasm for the language…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Yes, I do. It is complex, and I'm not sure whether we have a final answer yet, but we have an answer.
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
On the final point, Cefin, my starting point is that I don't think there's anyone in Wales who can't speak Welsh. That's where I'm starting from. North Wales Police, they've done the most work in this area. They say there's nobody working for North Wales…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Thank you, Cefin. The common framework is one of the things that's so exciting for us in this Bill, because we're going to use something that's brand new to us but isn't brand new at all to other people in Europe, where they've been using this framework in…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Rwy'n meddwl bod pethau yn gwella, a bod pethau yn newid. Fel mae'n digwydd, es i i Ysgol Gymraeg Nant Caerau yn Nhrelái ddydd Gwener diwethaf, ac roedd hi mor wych i weld ysgol o blant lleol yn llawn—yn fwy na llawn—o deuluoedd sydd wedi dewis addysg drwy…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
I must say that the ambition in the strategy is to have a million Welsh speakers but to double the use of the language as well. We don't draw attention to that usually, but that's extremely important—not just to have more people who can speak the language…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, Chair, I'll turn to English for this bit of it. So, the work between the Office for National Statistics and our own knowledge and analytical services has been set in train. I was very grateful to Sir Ian Diamond, as the chair of ONS. He recognised very…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, it's important that each report assists the other in the work that we want to do. In terms of the internal aspects, in terms of what we ask Welsh Ministers to do, we ask them to demonstrate clearly to people what has happened with those issues that are…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
Well, I don't think that people will be losing out on an opportunity to scrutinise if the report will have come out in the previous year, so, there will be opportunities to scrutinise. That has been part of the discussions that we've had in putting the Bill…
, Children, Young People, and Education Committee
Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill - evidence session 1
There is nothing in the Bill that would slow down the process in terms of achieving the target; certainly, we wouldn't tell people to slow down. [Laughter.] If we can achieve the target before 2050, of course, that would be something to celebrate, and the…
