Hefin David: ...group—the cross-party group I chair on small and medium-sized enterprises—a report on self-employment, which gives us that picture. Self-employed people in the Valleys also tend to have fewer educational qualifications than those in urban or rural Wales, and what would concern me is if the Government's approach is entirely towards high-tech fast-growth firms and leaving behind those...
Hefin David: ... base supporting the development of a universal system, which promotes social mobility as well as economic prosperity, by extending entitlement to affordable, high quality childcare and early education.' And that being to children of non-working parents. The only way I can understand that is where it's put into the context of Flying Start areas, and an ideal way of doing that would of...
Hefin David: ...Caerphilly. How can we then ensure that that number grows so that the people who wish to be self-employed, particularly women, can access self-employment? That would involve engaging further education colleges, local schools and people who would operate successfully through Communities First in previous cluster areas. Finally, recommendation 6, for my contribution. We know that the lower...
Hefin David: ...mix-up, he is being denied the chance to take the test. When I rang Oxford, they told me that they have to treat everybody equitably, which I found utterly absurd, given that he is a state school student, and I think, in this case, they should relax the bureaucracy to allow him to study. So, will the Minister agree that Oxbridge colleges need to become more flexible and accommodating,...
Hefin David: The Children, Young People and Education Committee took evidence from Mick Waters last week, and I welcome what you said about separating competence and the new standards. But I do have a little bit of concern about the language used in some of the standards. It’s quite complex and takes some time to interpret. Mick Waters said that they held long conversations when the working group were...
Hefin David: ...practice was not seen as an attractive option because: “…they see what we see, which is a 10-minute revolving door, starting at 8.30 a.m. through to 6.30 p.m., with no protected time for education, no protected time for the expansion of other interests, and no protected time even for administration. It’s relentless. When you look at the other side of it, you see the GPs—our role...
Hefin David: ...Change project, which was set up using money from dormant bank accounts and based on a partnership between the Big Lottery and Welsh Government. The aim is to get 16 to 25-year-olds who are not in education, employment or training and who have learning disabilities and/or autism into long-term employment. One of the organisations working with it is Trinity Fields School and Resource Centre...
Hefin David: ...two different sites, the Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospital for Wales in Cardiff, and the Royal Gwent Hospital in Newport. The problem is that his appointments are on separate days, meaning his education suffers due to more time off school. If a range of paediatric rheumatology services could be provided in one dedicated place, then this would reduce the impact on his school attendance,...
Hefin David: ...Wednesday afternoons and Thursday mornings off to study, and organisations simply couldn’t afford that. But what I would say is private sector employers and public sector employers have a duty to educate their people. Employers say, ‘What happens if I educate my people and they leave?’ Well, what happens if you don’t educate your people and they stay? It’s really important that...
Hefin David: I declare an interest as an associate lecturer at Cardiff Metropolitan University. I want to focus my contribution on the importance of part-time education. I speak having had 15 years’ experience of teaching part-time students, and I guess that’s probably around 1,000 part-time students in that time, one of whom—just to demonstrate how well part-time students can do—was Alun Cairns...
Hefin David: ...current staffing numbers are 50 staff across four directorates. Can you confirm if that’s correct? If so, how would the future staffing and organisational structure compare to the current Higher Education Funding Council for Wales arrangements?
Hefin David: ...Davies spoke very well. [Interruption.] The event was attended by representatives of the local authority, local employers—he was heckling me there, reminding me to mention it—further and higher education and transport providers. One of the key themes to come out of the event was the importance of sharing social capital across local supply chains in the northern Valleys, where...
Hefin David: I’d like to echo Steffan Lewis’s concerns, and also offer my condolences to the family of Glyn Summers. I think the question is: how can the Welsh Government ensure that schools are able to reflect on occurrences—those rare occurrences—when something adverse happens on school trips? And the First Minister said he’d keep it as an open question. Would he be willing to elaborate on how...
Hefin David: ...away. So, maybe the fourth industrial revolution is also changing the nature of our politics, as well. Can we be—[Interruption.] Can we be that optimistic that such a thing will happen? I think education is at the heart of this, and I would like to return to the argument that was advanced by Professor Tom Crick on Radio Wales this morning. He welcomes the development of the digital...
Hefin David: Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on the sharing of learning between pioneer and non-pioneer schools in relation to the roll-out of the new curriculum?
Hefin David: ...to Thomas’s pet and garden supplies, which has been there since the 1950s. I took time to appreciate their existence, the role that they’ve played in my background and in my life as I went to school at Heolddu. Indigenous businesses, buffered but unbowed, provide goods and services that contribute to our everyday lives. These businesses, rooted in our different communities, are far...
Hefin David: ...a response last week, took a very welcome look at these issues. And as she said in her statement, the complexities involved in these matters, FE and HE, has led to unhelpful competition between education and training providers, with duplication or gaps and confusion for learners. And the Minister for lifelong learning, as I mentioned earlier at question time, said, when he visited the...
Hefin David: I welcome that statement and the measures that she has just identified in response to the Hazelkorn review. In her evidence to the Children, Young People and Education Committee on 10 November, she stated that, in the more immediate future—before that further consultation takes place—when she submits her annual remit letter, there'll be an expectation that, of the money that has been...
Hefin David: It’s good to hear that the Cabinet Secretary supports that flexibility. At the Children, Young People and Education Committee last week, the NUT said that PPA is a big issue in primary schools in particular. It was Neil Foden of NUT Cymru who said that schools were freeing teachers for the required 10 per cent of their teaching time and releasing them from their workloads, which is to be...
Hefin David: 4. Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on the most effective use of teachers’ planning, preparation and assessment time in schools? OAQ(5)0092(EDU)
