1. Will the First Minister make a statement on promoting the Welsh language? OAQ(5)0161(FM)

Our vision of a million Welsh speakers by 2050 demonstrates our ambition concerning the language. Promoting and normalising are essential components of our draft strategy, which is currently out to consultation.

First Minister, I note that you declared support for the goal of doubling the number of Welsh speakers by 2050, but there was little substance behind that announcement. I wonder if you can inform us exactly how you intend to meet that commitment. What are your targets and timescales for making sure that we are making progress towards that goal? For example, by when can we expect to hit the milestone of seeing three quarters of a million Welsh speakers? I’d be grateful if you could give us a date for that, please.

Bear in mind, of course, that the strategy is actually out to consultation at the moment, and that contains our proposals in terms of the way forward. One area, of course, which is hugely important, is to make sure that the local education authorities have proper Welsh in education strategic plans, and we have made it absolutely clear to them that we will reject any plan they produce—any of those authorities—that isn’t sufficiently ambitious.

As you’ve said in the past, First Minister, it’s important that we do ensure that the Welsh language is a living language in our communities. Therefore, it’s extremely important that we encourage people to use the language in all parts of their lives, including using the Welsh language online, for example. The Welsh Language Commissioner made it clear in the summary to her five yearly report, back in the summer, that there is potential for technology to facilitate communication through the medium of Welsh, because English tends to be the medium used online now. So, under these circumstances, can you tell us how your Government is going to promote the use of the Welsh language online over the next few weeks and months?

There are a number of things. First, of course, this is part of the strategy in terms of looking at ways and means of supporting and promoting the language in the digital sphere. It’s also very important to change the behaviours of young people. We have been funding certain Urdd projects over the past few years so that they can develop apps and so on to ensure that children and young people do see the language as a digital language, rather than thinking that English is the only language that they can use on social media.

Given this commitment to 1 million Welsh speakers by 2050, and a universal acknowledgement that bilingualism is best achieved by immersing children in a second language as early as possible, what arrangements have been made by the Government to implement Welsh learning in preschool classrooms?

[Inaudible]—have been the Welsh-medium education strategies that we expect local authorities to produce, some of them are more advanced than others, but it is hugely important that a proper pathway is identified by local authorities to ensure that access to Welsh as a language to be learnt or, indeed, to be taught through is as available in Wales as possible.