Vaughan Gething: I thank you for your further follow-up question. I’ve been clear and consistent about the question of a medical school in north Wales. I’m awaiting final advice, and when that advice comes in, I’ll make a decision. I’ll also need to have a conversation with my Cabinet colleague the Cabinet Secretary for Education, because the budget isn’t in one particular area of Government; it’s...
Vaughan Gething: ...sort of conversation with the pharmaceutical industry, who, after all, will still be significant players in investing in the future of medical research and innovation, and in which our higher education sector—and, going back to the points Angela Burns made, about the way in which we use data within Wales as well. Because what the English system doesn’t have is it doesn’t have a...
Vaughan Gething: ...come out in the strategy we’ve just consulted on—how we understand properly how we invest in our workers, to get right some of the—[Inaudible.]—with my colleague the Cabinet Secretary for Education, talking about how we get things right and about the culture of our schools. So, we understand the way in which we both need new skills and acquire those new skills from the workforce of...
Vaughan Gething: .... The genomics for precision medicine strategy was developed by the genomics taskforce, built upon close working between colleagues in the Welsh Government, the NHS, the third sector and higher education institutions. The taskforce has worked hard to consult throughout the process, and to ensure that as many stakeholders as possible have been able to have their say in the development of...
Vaughan Gething: ...commonality: book prescriptions, art, music and sport, and the role that they have. There are a number of things we’re already doing with young people, both myself and the Cabinet Secretary for Education, where we have a number of things we’re doing in schools to help to try and support people and their resilience in the most general terms, and understanding what we can do to promote...
Vaughan Gething: ...Presiding Officer. I’m happy to move the motion on the paper before us today. As all of us recognise, our health and well-being depend on many factors: family, relationships, work, play, housing, education and money, to name but a few. The ways in which we manage when our health is affected are numerous. We know that we often feel better after a walk in the park, or socialising with...
Vaughan Gething: ...of social media activity has been very encouraging, with our promotional video being viewed 30,000 times, and our content reaching over 110,000 people. Now, I know the motion calls for a medical school in Bangor, and Sian Gwenllian has been very consistent in her calls on this issue. As the First Minister made clear in this Chamber, in the coming weeks I will make a statement—as I...
Vaughan Gething: ...will provide not just the direction of travel that we’ve been very clear about recently, but a fuller and more comprehensive long-term approach to supporting people undertaking healthcare education, when we announce our full and final response to the Diamond review in due course.
Vaughan Gething: Well, I reckon lots of those things do take place, particularly in primary schools, but also in secondary schools, too. There’s a challenge again about how we normalise it and also that normalisation not just being something that is confined to a school. It isn’t solely the responsibility of education professionals to get children and young people to be physically active and physically...
Vaughan Gething: ...I will just run through some of the comments that have been made, in particular, and quite understandably, Rhun ap Iorwerth’s contribution. I want to deal with some of the points about structured education, because I do recognise the need for improvement—the need to have a proper audit trail to allow us to properly understand the level of take-up and what we can do to further improve...
Vaughan Gething: .... Unfortunately, I won’t be able to support amendment 1 tabled by Plaid Cymru, as we don’t think that it’s correct to state that children and young people are unable to access structured education. We know these services are available. But, I understand there is a very real concern about the recorded take-up of structured education and the figures that we get from our audit. All of...
Vaughan Gething: ..., because, often, what people do want is support within their community and that’s often more appropriate. I’m looking forward actually to—. I understand that the Children, Young People and Education Committee are looking to have an inquiry into this area, and I look forward to giving evidence to that committee, answering questions before Members and, again, having an evidence-based...
Vaughan Gething: ...to confirm the Government supports all of the amendments. We launched the Healthy Child Wales programme in October last year, for all children and their families, to improve health, social and educational development and long-term physical, mental and social outcomes. The programme will safeguard the health of children through screening and surveillance services from birth to seven years...
Vaughan Gething: ...provide, in both recovery, rehabilitation, but also in prevention as well. And I’m happy to confirm that the £95 million investment I announced recently, in the future of healthcare training and education, does include a 13 per cent increase in nurse training. So, we recognise the value of district nurses, and we recognise the need to continue to increase, not simply to replace, but to...
Vaughan Gething: Last week, I announced a £95 million funding package to support a wide range of education and training programmes for healthcare professionals. This included a 13 per cent increase in nurse training places, a 40 per cent increase in midwifery training places and enables more than 3,000 new students to undertake study in Wales.
Vaughan Gething: I recognise the vital role midwives play in supporting women through their childbirth experience. On 20 February, I announced a £95 million funding package to support education and training programmes for healthcare professionals, which included a 40 per cent increase in midwifery training places. This is the highest level of midwifery training places commissioned since devolution.
Vaughan Gething: ...I can’t support the motion as I don’t believe that imposing a statutory duty is the right approach to take at this time in delivering improvements across Wales. In particular, the impact on the school curriculum is not one that the Government can support, and I’ll hopefully explain that in some helpful detail. I set out in my written statement in December the excellent work that...
Vaughan Gething: ...approach, but we’ll be led by the evidence on the right way forward. Finally, your point about diet and exercise. Again, it’s come up in other questions, but there is a consistent healthy schools message, and any Member who visits one of their local primary schools in particular will be hard pressed not to see a healthy living and healthy eating messages within their schools. So,...
Vaughan Gething: ...where we recognise there are socioeconomic inequalities and we recognise they are unlikely to engage in those wider public health messages, wherever they are. I think it’s really important we use school as a real lever—particularly primary school, where parents are more likely to be engaged. But I recognise that, even at primary school, it’s still more likely to be women who engage...
Vaughan Gething: ...development. We’ll now have all-Wales coverage. Last December, I issued a written statement highlighting the progress we have already made in Wales in raising awareness, particularly in schools, of the importance of life-saving skills such as cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the use of automated external defibrillators. The out-of-hospital cardiac arrest plan that we will publish this...
