Neil McEvoy: ...to me with concerns that some children from disadvantaged backgrounds may be missing out. That's because their difficult lives at home may make it difficult for them to consistently get into school on time to benefit from the free food, which can affect their learning. It's a sad fact that there are children in Wales who live in real poverty and go hungry. So, has the Government explored...
Neil McEvoy: 5. Will the Minister make a statement on the free breakfast in primary schools scheme? OAQ53119
Neil McEvoy: 5. What discussions has the Welsh Government held with Cardiff Council in relation to increasing the number of Welsh-medium school places? OAQ52971
Neil McEvoy: ...in that country. Why? Because 75 per cent of the population voted for it. Sovereignty brings options. In Wales right now, we don’t even have the power to ensure that our children can travel to school safely, because we're unable to legislate on putting seat belts on service buses. A sovereign Wales would have an independent legal jurisdiction. And in a sovereign Wales, everyone would...
Neil McEvoy: ...an entrepreneurial people. The first £1 million deal on the planet was done in Cardiff, just a stone's throw from this Assembly, in the old Coal Exchange. In the past, when our children needed education, we were the first to set up schools—Griffith Jones and his famous circulating schools, which by 1761 had made Wales the most literate country in the world. Workers also established...
Neil McEvoy: .... There is no provision for those men, especially those who are victims of domestic abuse because there's just nowhere for them to turn. Many of them are excluded from their children's lives. Schools will routinely exclude dads—routinely—they won't get school letters, they don't know when the concerts are, they don't know when parents evening happens. Equally, doctors surgeries will...
Neil McEvoy: ...brings no increase in pay. Level 1 teaching assistants can attain it—this is all from a teaching assistant who's raised concerns with me. Training takes just six weeks—just three days out of school. Only a single piece of work needs to be prepared for a child, a group or a class. The qualification you need to do it is a single GCSE in maths or English. I think, really, this is just...
Neil McEvoy: ...or the truthfulness of these allegations, but they have been put. It has been alleged to me that New Directions provide free sport event tickets, boozy free golf days, and football kits for schools, allegedly in order to secure more business. Will you investigate these allegations and report back to this Chamber?
Neil McEvoy: Diolch. I’d like to raise the experience of a school in my region and that’s Ysgol Gymraeg Nant Caerau in the west of Cardiff. In 2012 the school had 86 pupils on a site designed for four to seven-year-olds. Now, the school has 240 pupils aged between four and 11, and they’re having to turn children away. There’ve been expansions of schools in other areas, but Nant Caerau is having to...
Neil McEvoy: 6. Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on achieving the Welsh Government’s target of one million Welsh speakers through the education system? (OAQ51112)
Neil McEvoy: ...correct, but, morally, I would say he is wrong, because there’s a world of difference between the aspirational routes in the Act and where children actually walk and how they actually get to school. So, will your Government write to the council reminding them of their responsibility to keep our children safe? I would like some kind of statement about this matter, because safer routes to...
Neil McEvoy: ...this matter does relate to Cardiff council. It’s an important matter and relates to transport. The cabinet member for transport on Cardiff council is refusing to act on dangerous routes to school. Two roads come to mind: Heol Isaf in Radyr, where cars speed at up to 70 mph, and Caerau Lane in Caerau, where the road heads towards Mary Immaculate High School and children have to cross...
Neil McEvoy: ...and we need legislation to stop that. I think, in Wales, we also suffer from linguistic discrimination because there are parents in this city—the capital of Wales—who cannot choose Welsh-medium education. That’s wrong. The deaf community as well, if you receive education from a tutor, there is no minimum qualification of British Sign Language for a teacher and that is wrong. Gypsies...
Neil McEvoy: What I would like to see is a commission for education, because, with the best will in the world, you’re not going to solve the problems of the education system over the next five years. So, what you need to do is sit down with people from every political party, teachers from all over Wales, all different sectors, and discuss what people want and where we want to go. In terms of being a...
Neil McEvoy: ..., I think it was a really positive thing for the Labour Government to legislate to bring class sizes down to 30. But really, since 1999, I think what we have in Wales is a legacy of failure. Each education Minister clearly—clearly—has failed the children in Wales. I’m pretty unhappy with lots of discussion about targets so on and so forth, because quite often targets just give...
Neil McEvoy: Well, you could easily have asked the same of your colleague who is the finance Minister, when he did three jobs at the same time—Minister, AM and also a further education lecturer. My position on my allowance is quite clear: next year, it’s going to my community. But, to return to the throwing away of millions of pounds—millions of pounds—I’ve just flagged up to you where you have...
Neil McEvoy: I think what we’ve done here is make the best of a bad job, really. We all know of the situation from Westminster with the cuts coming from London, but I think people here have to realise that you over there are elected to be the Government, and you need to take responsibility. What I find ironic, really, is that people in the lead administration don’t even want the authority to change...
Neil McEvoy: Deaf people have a right to access education. I’ve had concerns brought to me by constituents that this isn’t really happening as it should and there are staff at only level 1 or level 2 signing. So, Cabinet Secretary, would you please engage with British Sign Language students who have passed level 6 to work in the education sector, so that we can try and improve matters of access?
Neil McEvoy: ...few case studies, there are no diagrams, there's no interactive content. Now, this is really important, Minister, because, in other words, it breaches the Welsh Government's own guidelines in adult education, which expect content providers to tailor courses to the learners’ needs, and I would know that as a teacher. You’ve failed to do that. It's another failure on your part. There is...
Neil McEvoy: I couldn’t speak a word of Welsh until I was 32 years of age, and I started to learn Welsh when I was a teacher, because, in my school, there weren’t enough Welsh teachers available to teach children for the Estyn inspection. I went to the university in Lampeter and followed a Wlpan course over two months, and taught Welsh within a week of finishing the course. As a language teacher,...
