Delyth Jewell: ...'t count, particularly because of the first-past-the-post system. So, can we have a statement, please, outlining the importance of democratic engagement, and how that can be conveyed to children in school, to adults as well, so that everybody will feel motivated to get out and vote when we get to the next election?
Delyth Jewell: ...they did underground. There was a camaraderie, of course, a bond that bound men together. But above ground, those forces enriched the towns in the miners halls, eisteddfodau, the libraries, the educational drive and town-hall meeting culture, all led by miners and their families. They may have worked below ground, but their sights were set on the sky. In one of his poems, Harri Webb...
Delyth Jewell: The school day can contain many stresses. I'm not just talking about maths tests or rushing to finish homework on the school steps, I'm talking about children who go to school hungry and can't afford a snack at morning break, children who feel dread going through the gates because they're worried that someone might notice that they're not wearing the right shoes or carrying the right bag, who...
Delyth Jewell: ...is gravely amiss. In devolving policing, as well as the justice system, we can start to tackle these deep-set inequalities within our society. We can link justice and policing with health, education and social policy, as Lord Thomas acknowledged. We can look seriously for the reasons for crime in order to prevent it from happening in the first instance, rather than simply continuing with...
Delyth Jewell: ...of this has to entail increasing the sense of ownership that non-Welsh speakers feel for this language that enriches all of us in society. Some of the fiercest campaigners I know for Welsh-medium education are the very people who were denied the chance to learn Welsh when they were little. So, Minister, how do you think that Government plans and targets can work in concert with the need to...
Delyth Jewell: ..., as a committee, the additional funding for the Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol. However, we are of the view that the best way to ensure that children truly pick up the language, thereby leaving school fluent in Welsh, is through being immersed in the language from a very early age. This means significant investment in early years provision and language transmission. To this end, it is...
Delyth Jewell: ...for families. This comes at a time, of course, when millions are already struggling to make ends meet, to put food on the table, to pay phone bills, broadband bills, transport cost, housing costs, education-related costs—the list just goes on and on and on, doesn't it? One step the Welsh Government, I think, really needs to take is to reduce the overall costs of living in order to...
Delyth Jewell: Well, thank you very much for that. The 'Cymraeg 2050' strategy does refer to increasing the proportion of each school year group receiving Welsh-medium education from 22 per cent by 2031. There are counties in the south-east where there isn't a single Welsh-medium secondary school. But, even in the primary sector, there are areas that are missing out. Since the closure of the Ysgol Gymraeg...
Delyth Jewell: 3. Will the First Minister make a statement on the future of Welsh-medium education in South Wales East? OQ57532
Delyth Jewell: ...in concluding, Dirprwy Lywydd, is that again we need to make sure that women of all ages get the sense that smear tests are normal, that they're not something to be worried about. When I was in school, they were talked about in this hushed, quite horrified way—not by teachers, I should say, but by other pupils—and I got this impression it was going to be this very painful thing....
Delyth Jewell: ...indignity of needing emergency food. But too often in our society, poverty is instead paraded almost as a punishment. Let's cast our minds back to last year, when the societal debate around free school meals in England made headlines, and pictures of the measly portions afforded to children in some local authorities were shared on social media. We saw halved peppers in clingfilm, handfuls...
Delyth Jewell: ...brothers; their parents are very dear family friends. Music can change people's lives. We're even getting this from this short debate. Sadly, A-level music is too infrequently now being offered in schools, but young people need to be made aware of the exciting career prospects that exist for talented instrumentalists, singers and teachers. Now, I'm biased because my mother was a...
Delyth Jewell: Thank you, Minister. Plaid Cymru, of course, welcomes the fact that there will be a new Welsh-medium primary opening in Merthyr next September. We also support plans to open a Welsh-medium primary school in Tredegar in 2023. I would like to thank Rhieni dros Addysg Gymraeg and local authorities for their work in progressing this, and the Government for providing the resources. Many other...
Delyth Jewell: 4. Will the Minister make a statement on the future of Welsh-medium education in South Wales East? OQ57151
Delyth Jewell: Tomorrow will mark 55 years since the coal tip above Aberfan collapsed and killed a school full of children and teachers, and, in the 55 years since, the task of removing other coal tips from our mountainsides is still unfinished. I note that some have asked the Welsh Government to carry the burden of making these tips safe, a burden that should have been carried by Westminster decades ago....
Delyth Jewell: ...like to see movement on this by the Government, and I'd be more than happy, and enthusiastic, to work with the Government on this, and I am genuinely eager to hear your view on what can be done in schools to respond to this eco-anxiety. And finally, Minister, bearing in mind that climate change is but one huge challenge amongst a number of challenges facing the next generation, how does...
Delyth Jewell: ...have to take notice. Last year, a Cardiff University study was published that had interviewed children in 35 countries across the world. The study asked them about how happy they felt at home, at school, about their future, about themselves, and, in many aspects, Welsh children had some of the lowest scores. The interviews happened long before COVID, and, as Platfform have reminded Members...
Delyth Jewell: ...them on the bakestone a moment too long. Those were some of the first signs. She used to sew and crochet and she'd delight in telling people that when my father was little, she'd made his entire school uniform, even down to the grammar school blazer, with the barathea material she'd bought in Pontypridd market, and she'd bought the school badge and sewed it on. But that solace of sewing...
Delyth Jewell: ...difference that means that children have full bellies, that means that families can keep the heating on, but it also means that children can have books, pocket money, and that they're able to go on school trips. Because those things shouldn't be luxuries, they shouldn't just be for the well-off children; they should be normal. The cut will be self-defeating. At a time when Governments want...
Delyth Jewell: ...while some children can grow up in homes with food aplenty and golden wallpaper, the rest can make do with gristle or crumbs from the rich man's table. If there's one lasting image from the free school meals debacle in England last year, it's those photographs, shared on social media, of the inadequate meal parcels: the halved vegetables wrapped in cling film, because those children...
