Kirsty Williams: Thank you, John. Well, great leadership and great leadership development impacts upon all of our children, but I would argue that it impacts disproportionately on those children from a poorer background. Undoubtedly, leadership in different settings requires sometimes a tailor-made specific programme for support. So, it's not for me to dictate all the time to the academy, but I do envisage a...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you very much, Rhianon, for your welcome to the academy. Obviously, our online resource is absolutely crucial to making sure that the academy is accessible, as is one of the crucial roles of our first tranche of associates of the academy. So, these are people that have applied to be part of the academy, they are from the length and breadth of Wales, and part of their role is to be out...
Kirsty Williams: Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. Many of you will know that this month marks the thirtieth anniversary of the introduction of section 28 that forbade schools to promote, or treat with equity, non-heterosexual relationships. Though section 28 has been consigned to history, its effect can still be found within our education system. Schools often find it difficult to provide fully inclusive sex and...
Kirsty Williams: Last year, I established the sex and relationship expert panel to provide independent advice on these matters, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the expert panel members and its chair, Professor Emma Renold, for their excellent work. Their report recognised that there is some excellent practice happening in our schools. This, however, is not happening in all of our...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Darren, for that series of questions. If I didn't make it clear, Presiding Officer, in my initial statement, let me say it again: I have no intention of teachers in our schools teaching children this topic that they are not developmentally—I can't even say the word—that they are not ready to learn [Laughter.] It's age appropriate and I've got no intention of doing that and I've...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you very much, Llyr, for your welcome of the statement. Just to provide clarity, I am accepting all the recommendations of the report in principle, and I want to make progress on all of them, the most important of which is to ensure that, as we move to our new curriculum, RSE will be a statutory part of that curriculum, which is new policy. It wasn't the intention initially to make it a...
Kirsty Williams: Presiding Officer, the Member has just said that sex education isn't just about biology, it's about values and ethics, and I don't think it's ever too young to start to talk to a child about values and ethics.
Kirsty Williams: I think—. As I said, I don't think it's ever too soon to start to teach children about values and ethics, and I would reiterate the point I made earlier in the reassurances I gave Darren Millar, that I have no intention of children being taught lessons that are not appropriate for their age. Now, the Member has just said that her party's policy is that there should be no sex education—I...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you so much, Jenny. The example you gave of a nursery child becoming a sibling is a perfect example of developmental-appropriate education. From the very earliest stage, we're beginning to make relationships, aren't we, with our parents, with our siblings, with our community, and that's exactly what we need to be teaching our very youngest children about. It's about how you cope with...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you very much, Lynne. The concern about the status of this subject in the curriculum is one of the reasons why I have decided to make it statutory in the new curriculum going forward—to be able to give it that prominence and to be able to secure this learning in the curriculum. It is a mental health issue. It's absolutely crucial that we equip our children with the scaffolding and the...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Mark. I hope you'd agree today that, if, in a previous administration, we pushed up against the wire, today we've gone through the wire by this announcement, and I would pay tribute to those in the previous Assemblies who pushed on this issue. It's crucial to me that, in discussing relationships and sexuality, what a healthy relationship looks like is a key fundamental part of...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you very much, Julie. I think there are a number of people in this Chamber who had involvement in some way or another with section 28—some people desperately trying to oppose it, and, unfortunately, I understand there is one Member here—well, not here in the Chamber at the moment—who actually voted for it, and I'm glad that we've been able to move such a long way. Julie, I...
Kirsty Williams: Can I thank Siân Gwenllian for her comments? I do want to make it clear that we're not in a situation where nothing is happening in our schools. There is some very good practice in our schools, as recognised by the report. The challenge, as always, in Welsh education—as I've discovered over the last two years—is how you make that consistent in all of our schools. So, I don't want people...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Joyce. I don't expect any further delays in releasing the resources that I've identified today. I think you're right—the concept of respect is one that will underpin much of the delivery of this curriculum. You also made a very important point: if any of us take time to listen to children and young people, they will tell you what we're providing for them at the moment is not good...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Jane. The responsibility for the planning of school places rests with local authorities. Local authorities have to keep under review the extent to which their existing pattern of school provision meets current and forecast demand for places and the requirements of a modern curriculum.
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Jane. As you said, I understand that the Vale of Glamorgan Council has decided to restart and re-issue its consultation because of concerns that were raised about the adequacy of the initial consultation proposal, especially a lack of an adequate community impact statement. I would urge all those that have an interest to make their views known to the council before the close of the...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, David. You're absolutely right to say that it is my intention to revise the school organisation code to include a presumption against rural school closures, and to designate a list of rural schools. Work is continuing on those proposals, but the direction of travel of policy in this area is very clear to all 22 local authorities, and I would hope that they would bear that in mind...
Kirsty Williams: Thank you, Mark. The responsibility, as I said earlier, for the planning of school places rests with each local authority. Local authorities do have to keep under review, as I said earlier, the extent to which their current provision meets the number of children they are statutorily required to educate now and in the future, and the needs of a modern curriculum.
Kirsty Williams: I would expect all local authorities to be designing consultation documents on school closures or mergers that contain accurate information. If they do not, then that simply is not good enough, and if the Member has any evidence that the consultation documents that are currently being issued with regard to the closures that he refers to do not contain accurate information, then I would be...
Kirsty Williams: Llyr, what I accept, because of continuing austerity, is that education is having to work in an atmosphere of restricted budgets. I acknowledge that and that's why I'm taking every opportunity that I can to get as much money to the front line as I can.
