Thank you very much, Darren, for that. Can I, too, join you in thanking the Conservative nominee for his participation in the work of the review? Again, I’m very grateful for that. You raise a very good point regarding cohort protection, and I want to make it absolutely clear today that students who are already in the system and enter into the system on one specific student support package will complete their educational journey on that support package. It would not be fair to change the rules of the game for students who are halfway through their course. So, we will offer cohort protection to those people who are already in the system and, indeed, who apply under a system. Because if you make an application to a university and then, halfway through that year, you find that, actually, the circumstances have changed again, that would not be fair. I want to make that very clear to people today: that there will be cohort protection. That’s the only fair way to manage the change from one system to another.

With regard to people with caring responsibilities, the ability to support part-time students in a fair way hopefully gives those people for whom perhaps it’s simply not feasible, practical or affordable to go to full-time study, the opportunity to engage in part-time study. That’s what’s really important about this package: yes, we need to ensure that we look after traditional undergraduate students but, actually, the nature of higher education is training—the nature of our workforce and our population in training. People want to be able to be flexible in how they acquire higher level skills. It’s vital to the future of our economy. Therefore, being able to provide support for part-time students is really important. It’s also important to state that this package looks at the support for looked-after children, or children who have experience of the care system, to put in place a maintenance system for them, which will allow them to be able to go on to university without being fearful of upfront living costs—how they pay for their rent, their food, their books. I know that issues around carers are of particular interest to the National Union of Students. In my meetings with the Wales NUS, I have given a commitment that I will look, indeed, to see what the barriers are to carers in accessing higher education, and if possible I want to make some progress on that because I know that it is of particular concern to NUS Cymru.

With regard to timing, as you’ll be aware, there are a number of steps that I need to go through, the first of which is Her Majesty’s Treasury. Perhaps Darren Millar could use the auspices of his party to ease those negotiations. The Treasury is in charge of the loan book, and therefore we cannot make progress on this until I have clearance from the Treasury. You will also be aware, from reading Sir Ian’s report, that there are actual constraints within the Student Loans Company, of which we are a minority shareholder. I have to be absolutely confident that, in moving forward, the Student Loans Company will be able to cope and administer this system. I do not want Welsh students falling foul of the new system because of a lack of capacity within the Student Loans Company. I will only move forward when I have those absolute guarantees that the Student Loans Company can move to accommodate our systems. Otherwise, that would potentially only cause difficulty for Welsh students, and I want to avoid that.

Knowledge transfer is absolutely key. We’re not waiting just for the implementation of Diamond. I, Julie James and my Cabinet Secretary colleague, Ken Skates, are already looking at what more we can do in the field of knowledge transfer in universities. Some of the processes are very complex, and we’re not getting the biggest bang for the current buck that we’re spending. So, we really need to look at that system, not just in the context of Diamond, but what we can do more in terms of higher education and knowledge transfer.

Nursing bursaries are a matter for my Cabinet Secretary colleague who is in charge of health, and I’m sure he’ll have some interesting things to say in response to the Plaid Cymru minority party debate tomorrow afternoon with regard to nursing. So, I don’t want to pre-empt anything that he may say in the debate tomorrow.