Children, Young People, and Education Committee

Thank you, Chair, and I want to associate myself with your comments of thanking all those people who actually wrote in about the consultation on the guidance, and I just want to thank my colleague Laura Anne Jones, who spoke on this issue at the Senedd last week.

I just want to put on the record my concern, Chair, that a lot of people who are home educating children are removing those children from school because they cannot get the additional learning needs provision they want or the mental health support they want. And I think something that we could do is look at that as part of the inquiry we've got into disabled children and see how we can fit all that in together to make sure that we're highlighting some of those concerns that people have wrote in to us about. Because I think we owe it to those young children that are being home educated because they cannot access that service to highlight this issue and put recommendations to the Government of what they should be doing, to make sure that those young people get the support that they deserve and need, to make sure they get a full and rounded education. Diolch, Cadeirydd.

Thank you, James. Sioned.

I agree with your comments, Chair. I'd also like to thank the people who have written in to us. It's evident that there's a lot of concern in the community among those who choose to educate their children at home, and what I was concerned about in reading these responses is that there is this notion that they are somehow being persecuted by the Government and that their voices haven't been heard during the consultation, it appears to me. What comes through very strongly is that many of them say that school isn't appropriate for everyone, for some of the reasons that James raised there, in terms of concerns about a lack of support for mental health or well-being. So, I do think that we should reflect what we've received to the education Minister, and I would welcome the fact that we could do further work to investigate some of the issues, where they are relevant to us as a committee, in the future.

Diolch, Sioned. So, would Members be content to write in the first instance, raising our concerns around the number of people who've got in touch with the committee, and then we'd obviously publish the response that we receive from the Minister as well? And as James has mentioned, for some people, some issues will come up in our work that we've been doing on the ALN reforms as well, as well as our inquiry into equal access for disabled children. And we can keep a close eye on these things and perhaps look at what we can do in the future as well. Are Members content? Lovely. Thank you.