The next item on our agenda is the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Education on the national strategy for small and rural schools. I call on the Cabinet Secretary to make her statement—Kirsty Williams.

Thank you, Presiding Officer. This Welsh Government, as set out in ‘Taking Wales Forward’, is committed to successful, sustainable rural communities. I am clear that there can be real benefits—academic, cultural and social—to pupils and communities through the delivery of high-quality education in small and rural schools. As I set out in my statement to the Assembly in July, strengthening and extending school-to-school relationships, and prioritising education leadership, are critical to raising standards and tackling the attainment gap. A specific national strategy for small and rural schools recognises that schools and communities in different parts of Wales face different challenges as we move forward with our reforms.

I know, and parents across rural communities know, that small and rural schools play an important role in raising standards and extending opportunities for all. Indeed, they are often critical in engaging pupils and families from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and raising pupil aspirations. As Members will be aware, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development was here last week testing our reforms. It is worth noting that Finland, a system that consistently performs well in OECD studies, has a significant proportion of small and rural schools, and actively supports their position and role within the education system.

I am committed to education reforms as our national mission. All our young people deserve an equal opportunity, regardless of background, to reach the highest possible standards. And I am ambitious for small and rural schools, as I am for all schools in Wales. In recognising the challenges and priorities for education in rural and smaller settings, we will take the following actions: I will shortly consult on amendments to the school organisation code, in respect of a presumption against the closure of rural schools. Let me be clear, Presiding Officer, this does not mean that rural schools will never close. However, it does ensure that a local authority’s case for closure must be strong, and that local authorities conscientiously consider all viable alternatives to closure, including federation. I propose to develop the first-ever list and designation of rural schools. When considering closing a school, local authorities will be required to establish whether the proposed closure involves such a school. And I will be making funding available to encourage and support the development of federations across all maintained schools in Wales, along with better information and guidance for those considering collaboration and federation. Our wider plans to develop school leaders will include proposals to build the capacity of experienced, successful leaders of rural schools to deliver effective leadership across groups of rural schools.

I propose to establish a rural and small schools grant of £2.5 million per year from April 2017, to be administered by the regional education consortia, in collaboration with their local education authority partners, which will be used to support greater school-to-school working, including informal association and collaboration; to encourage innovative use, for example, of how to use new technologies to combat the issue of professional isolationism by harnessing the power of information technology; to provide administrative support in schools where headteachers have a significant timetabled teaching commitment; and to increase the community use of school buildings.

Presiding Officer, this is not a strategy to stand still. It is a recognition of the importance of education in our rural communities, as it is across the country, but also to ensure delivery of innovative and ambitious education for pupils in those communities.

To conclude, just nine months ago, sitting over there, I was grateful for the opportunity to present a short debate to the Assembly on the importance of rural schools. Now, as Cabinet Secretary, I’m able to recognise and promote the essential role of small and rural schools in our national mission to reduce the attainment gap and to raise standards for all our young people.

May I thank the Cabinet Secretary for her statement this afternoon? I think it’s about time that we tackled some of the problems that have cast a dark shadow over some small and rural schools over a number of years. As someone who lives in a rural community, as someone who’s a parent of children who attend a small rural school, and someone who’s a governor of that very same school, I particularly welcome the statement, and also, of course, I do declare that I have an interest in that regard.

You mentioned, of course, the creation of a national strategy for small and rural schools, but you don’t give us many details as to how, perhaps, you’re going to go about doing that. So, perhaps you could tell us something about the process that you have in mind in that regard, and when you expect that strategy to be in place.

I warmly welcome the change in the presumption against the closure of schools in the school organisation code, and that’s certainly something that already exists in England. Of course, the main factor within the current code, if my memory serves me correctly, in considering closure is to protect educational outcomes, and I don’t think anyone would suggest that that should be changed. I know that placing a focus on the quality of education is what’s needed, rather than, perhaps, the more physical aspects, such as surplus school places and so on. You’ve mentioned the need to take into account a broader range of options rather than closure. Perhaps you could tell us a little about how we can broaden the menu of options available, because, as far as I can see, there are federation and clustering, and perhaps some element of more meaningful collaboration. But, more than that, what ideas do you have for schools to consider?

As I referred to surplus places, and as you make no reference to surplus places in your statement, which has, of course, been a strong focus for your predecessors at least in terms of the emphasis on the reorganisation of schools in rural areas, may I ask you, perhaps, to tell us whether you feel there’s been too much emphasis on that in the past? Are you going to reduce the emphasis on that? Certainly, it’s been a focus, of course, for the twenty-first century schools programme—one of the main objectives of band A, if memory serves me correctly. Therefore, will there be less emphasis on surplus school places in future, when it comes to looking at twenty-first century schools, as well as the wider issues in terms of school reorganisation?

For me, of course, a school doesn’t exist within a vacuum, and we also need to look and take account of the relationship between rural education and protecting, supporting and developing rural communities more broadly. Could I ask you, therefore, what discussions you’ve had with other Cabinet Secretaries on the need to tackle the wider problems, because closing a small school is very often a symptom of the fact that the local economy isn’t maintaining young families and people have to leave and there is depopulation as a result of that. So, trying to resolve one problem without a more meaningful effort to tackle the other can only be part of the solution.

I know that, in Scotland for example, following the commission they established a few years ago to look at rural schools there, they have set a clear focus on introducing family centres in rural schools as well as early years services in those rural schools. Of course, there is a clear link to that with some of the things that we’re hearing from the Cabinet Secretary on communities and childcare and these children’s zones that have been mentioned as a possible opportunity. I would like to hear what opportunities you believe there may be in terms of rural provision in that regard.

Also, there is a need to encourage other sectors to play their part and to collaborate in order to support rural education. And I’m not just talking about the voluntary sector, but certainly further and higher education, especially perhaps in terms of secondary education in rural areas. I would like to know how you think there could be a possible contribution from that direction in supporting some of the things that we want to see developing.

Again in Scotland, there is additional funding provided to the highlands and islands university in order to encourage them to work more closely with rural schools. You refer to the creation of a £2.5 million fund, and, whilst I welcome that and do recognise the financial pressures on the Government, in the context of some of the other proposals and plans, it isn’t such a huge amount. Certainly, looking at the scale of the challenge and the need for additional support in the rural context, one would always want to see more funding. But, I will ask you perhaps whether that is the starting point, because one would assume that we would need a broader effort. One thinks about ICT, and you refer to it as one of the issues—of harnessing the power of IT with that funding. I attended a meeting last week where a teacher at a school told me that, if there are more than two pupils online at the same time, then the whole thing comes to a grinding halt. So, there are infrastructure problems. I know that the Government is aware of that, but one could perhaps feel that we are not making the progress that we should be making in that regard.

Attracting teachers to work in rural areas is also a challenge. If you’re a deputy head in a large school, then what’s the incentive for you to become a headteacher in a smaller school? You have to ask that question, because the financial incentive in terms of salary isn’t such a great one when compared with the additional burden and responsibilities that would come with that headship. So, how will the strategy that you mention assist in tackling the pressures in terms of staffing resources in that regard?

Finally, we can’t look at the situation of rural schools without also considering the issue of school transport in a rural context, because the provision as it has existed has been reducing. What we’re seeing, of course, is a number of parents taking their children with them to the towns or the centres where they work for their education because the transport provision that may have been there in the past is no longer there because of various cuts imposed. So, has any consideration been given to that? If not, what consideration will be given to strengthening the school transport provision because, without that, it makes it extremely difficult to ensure that people can take advantage of that service?

Thank you very much, Llyr, for, I think, what was a welcome of the policy statement this afternoon. To begin with the issue of the formation of the policy, I had hoped that, via my statement, I would give you a strong direction of travel. We will be formally publishing a full strategy that will guide us in ensuring that our investment of the £2.5 million is informed by that.

With regard to the schools organisation code, I will be going out to consultation on the issue of a presumption against closure. You’re quite right: such a presumption does exist in England; it also exists in Scotland. It hasn’t existed in Wales to date. But there are other aspects of the code that people may wish to comment on and this is an opportunity, given that it’s three years now since the code was introduced and we’ve had three years of experience of dealing with that code. I know, from meeting with the WLGA just last week, that they have some issues themselves with how they think the code could be improved. So, this is one particular aspect, but there will be an opportunity for wider discussion about the code. I think it will change the nature of the discussion, or the place where local authorities start from, and I think that’s what’s really important in bringing that presumption in. As I said in my statement, that does not mean there can never be any change. Sometimes, for very good, strong educational reasons, we need change, but at least we’ll be starting from that particular point, and local authorities will have to demonstrate that they have properly considered alternatives to maintain education in those areas.

With regard to surplus places, you’ll be aware that the agreement between me and the First Minister—the progressive agreement that brought me into Government—makes specific reference to the issue of surplus places. This in an issue in rural areas, but I must say that this is not only an issue for rural areas. If one looks at some experience in other parts, local authorities have been very quick to take surplus places out of the system, only to find themselves then with demographic changes within their particular area meaning that, for some people, it’s very difficult to get into the school that is their local school. So, actually, we need to look at surplus places in the round to make sure that we’re looking over a wider period of time, so we can better anticipate the peaks and flows that there inevitably will be in potential admissions into schools.

You’re quite right—education on its own cannot solve some of the significant demographic problems that rural communities face. I’m working very closely with my Cabinet colleague, the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children, around the issue of children zones, as well as the childcare offer. In some parts of rural Wales, Llŷr, you’ll be aware, as I am, that the opportunities for childcare are very, very limited indeed. The market simply isn’t there, so therefore working in conjunction with the schools would be a perfect opportunity to address some of those. And of course, the selection of Gwynedd and Anglesey as one of the pilot areas gives us that opportunity to test this significant childcare offer in a rural area. We didn’t want the pilots all to be done in an urban setting; we wanted to be able to test these proposals in a more rural area, and that’s why I’m very glad to see Gwynedd and Anglesey as part of the pilot, to see what we can do to work in those areas. But we need action, and work for people—high-quality paid jobs in rural communities. And crucially for me, we need access to affordable housing, which is one of the biggest barriers to young parents and families living in their communities—the sheer unaffordability of housing and accommodation in the areas where they grew up. We really need to make progress there, and that’s why this Government is committed to building significant numbers of extra affordable homes.

Llŷr, I agree that we can always do with more money, couldn’t we? But this is a start, to be able to look to see how we can use this money. I will be looking for evidence of real change though. This is not business as usual. This is not just additional money to support the status quo. This is additional money to drive forward real change in how we look at different models. And those models could be hard federations and collaborations, or soft federations and collaborations. We know we have some examples of primary schools working in clusters, but I’d like to see the development of the role of executive heads. You asked about recruitment and retention—why should somebody move on? Well, I think the prospect of being an executive head in a rural community is a very exciting prospect for an up-and-coming, go-getting, would-be school leader. So, those different kinds of arrangements are one of the ways in which we will attract people to be school leaders in rural areas. I’d like to see more people consider the idea of a federation between secondary and primary. Often, federations are only seen in the context of one particular age group. Why not look at federations across a particular community area—something that actually happens in the Isles of Scilly, for instance, as an example there?

With regard to transport, obviously this is a matter for my Cabinet colleague, the Minister for transport. The rules are quite clear: if a child lives a certain distance from their school, then they are entitled to transport to their nearest suitable school. There is ongoing work at the moment across departments to look at the issues around home-to-school transport in the round.

Thank you, Cabinet Secretary, for your statement. I know of your commitment to rural schools. I know you used to fight passionately when you were an opposition member on behalf of schools in Powys that were threatened with closure by that particular local authority, and, of course, you were matched by many other Assembly Members representing rural constituencies in this Chamber. Like your constituency, my constituency has also seen a number of rural schools close in recent years, and there are some, unfortunately, which are still threatened with closure. So, I do very much welcome the fact that you have said that there will now be, in the future, a presumption against closure and that local authorities will be required to look at every alternative and leave no stone unturned when looking at the way their schools are organised. It’s all too often been the case in some parts of Wales that local authorities have stubbornly dug their heels in as a result of the poor guidance, frankly, from the Welsh Government that has allowed them to do that, and, as a result, some very good schools have closed. So, there’s been a pretty rough ride for rural schools in recent years, and I’m very much hoping that that will change.

Now, that’s not to say that there aren’t some questions that I hope you will be able to answer today in respect of this additional resource that you are making available. I’ve seen the list of things that you hope to achieve with that resource. With every respect, £2.5 million is not a huge sum of money to be able to meet all of the aspirations on that particular list. I wonder whether you’ll be able to give us some clarity as to whether that is £2.5 million extra on top of your budget that is going to be available next year, or whether this is from within the education budget as a whole and it will mean that you are robbing Peter, effectively, to pay Paul, and also, just precisely what your definition of a rural or small school actually is. Because, obviously, that will determine very much where this money flows to. You’re giving it to the regional consortia rather than the local education authorities to distribute. If you can clarify precisely why that is the case, that would also be helpful.

Whilst I accept that federation can be a very effective model, and, in fact, it’s something that is working in respect of a school that was threatened and is still threatened with closure in my own constituency—Ysgol Llanbedr—which is now working with another school, against the local authority’s wishes, in order to survive, and is making a jolly good show of it, with increasing pupil numbers. But, if you could just tell us exactly how this cash will support federations, given that federations actually generally result in saving significant sums of money—is it just to prime the pump, are these long-term arrangements, or is this a short-term fund with these one-off grants having a period in which they are available to schools and then that period eventually coming to an end? So, I do welcome the extra cash, I welcome the statement and I welcome the direction of travel, but I think a lot depends on these definitions as to precisely what a rural or small school is. I think a lot depends on how the money is going to be used and how thinly that jam is going to be spread across the many hundreds of rural schools that we have here in Wales. So, perhaps you can give us some clarity on those things.

Thank you very much, Darren, for the welcome for the statement. To begin with, as I said to Llyr with regard to the presumption of closure, I hope that really does shift the basis from where we start these conversations—rather than closure being the first option on the list, and rather than the last option on the list. But I hope as well, via the consultation on the code, we can look at ways in which we can strengthen the consultation exercise. I’m sure you’ll be aware that many people find the current consultation exercise is not as strong as they would like it to be, and there is an opportunity to strengthen that with regard to all schools, actually, and how all schools are dealt with in the system.

Let me be absolutely clear, and I explained this to your colleague Mohammad Asghar at the committee last week, who was very kindly—no, Andrew, actually, was substituting in his absence. Let’s be absolutely clear, the education MEG is up by 3.5 per cent. There is an additional £53 million going into my portfolio in this budget round, which has allowed me to prioritise and bring forward new initiatives. The £2.5 million allocation is to support a range of specific proposals coming forward from local authorities on how they will use that money to support educational provision in their particular area to drive up standards. Alongside that, rural schools will also have the opportunity to participate in funding that we have available for leadership and funding that we will have available for federations and closer school-to-school working in our self-improving schools system. I will want to make sure that all that money is spent at the front line, driving improvements and quality in our education for our rural children. I do not expect that money to be sat in county halls or in regional consortia offices.

This is an opportunity to drive up and address the very specific challenges of standards in rural Wales: the challenge of being a headteacher with a high teaching workload, and how you manage that; what we can do to develop the role of business managers across a range of schools; the very real challenges of a stable workforce that doesn’t have the opportunity to get out and learn from other schools; the fact that, in a rural school, if you have a small workforce, how you can have the expertise to make sure that your curriculum planning and your resources are as wide-ranging as they could be. So, I’ve set out some ideas of how I expect the money to produce the change, but if schools and LEAs come forward to me with other radical ways that demonstrate how they would drive up attainment for our children, I’m willing to consider them. But, the crucial thing for me is that my expectation is that this money gets to the front line and makes a real difference for those children.

With regard to a definition, we don’t have one, Darren. That is part of the problem, and we will be working on exactly how we can get a robust definition. At the moment, the Wales Audit Office has figures that I would regard, in the context of my own constituency, as large schools. So, we need to work closely to be able to agree on that definition.

But, as I said, what’s really important is that people shouldn’t regard this as the status quo. This is a specific part of our overall commitment to driving up standards across Wales, and there are some particular challenges of how we achieve that in some of our more urban communities, and there are particular challenges of how we achieve that in rural communities, and this, I hope, will be part of the solution as part of our overall national mission.

Thank you for your statement, Cabinet Secretary. School closures, and even the threat of school closures, cause divisions within and between rural communities, especially when there is competition between pupils for school places. When the school is closed, there is a loss of a social and cultural resource and physical meeting place for members of the committee. The local school acts as an employer and consumer in the local area, and some studies note that parents feel less inclined to become involved in a new, larger school if their local school closes. Small, rural schools may have particular benefits for students, such as smaller classes and a community ethos.

What happens to the schools that are closed? The local authority makes a profit by closing the school and selling off the land for development, and at the same time, a major cog in community life is removed. Additionally, parents’ views are ignored or largely not taken into account. A local newspaper near me quoted that parents had been left shell-shocked by the decision to close Ysgol Maes Edwin on Flint mountain. Even the local Labour MP for the area, David Hanson, didn’t want the school closed. Mr Hanson spoke particularly about how new housing developments in the area, like Croes Atti, a development of 100-plus houses within the catchment area of the school, mean that it would be wrong to close the school, as the people moving into those new houses will probably need some school places for their children. The local authority should listen to him, perhaps.

I welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Education’s declared ambition for small and rural schools. However, I would have much preferred to have seen a full commitment from her, plus the appropriate use of resources being pledged, to support rural and small schools staying open and the reversal of recent decisions to close small schools in my region, for instance, the school on Flint mountain. Thank you.

Presiding Officer, can I thank Michelle Brown for her contribution? She makes a valuable point with regard to the importance of the physical building often in a community, and that’s why, as I announced in my statement, I will be looking to see what we can do to increase the community usage of school buildings as a way of maintaining part of the fabric of life in rural Wales. But, let’s be clear, schools are already doing this to great effect. Schools in my own constituency have stepped up to the plate and have taken over the running of sports facilities that would have been lost in the community. Schools are currently engaged, for instance, in taking on library facilities that would have been lost to the community, and I want to encourage the greater use of school buildings as a real asset for the people who live in that particular area.

The Member also makes a valuable point with regard to the economy. This was the point that was made to me by the members, and the lead member, for Gwynedd Council when I met with them on Friday morning. They recognised that. That’s why they are looking to themselves, and to support from Welsh Government, to find innovative ways in which they can maintain education settings in a whole variety of communities, because they recognise that very point and their responsibility across the board.

The consultation will begin shortly. I’m sure the Member will want to participate fully in that, but I must say it is not my intention at this stage to revisit any decisions that have previously been made.

Can I thank the Cabinet Secretary for her statement today? In particular, I very much welcome what you’ve said about making funding available to encourage and support the development of federations across all maintained schools, along with better information and guidance. I think that is very important. You’re aware of my concerns on this issue.

I was also very interested in what you said about the consultation on the school organisation code being an opportunity for all concerned parties to feed in. As you know, it is not just rural schools that find the issue of school closures very difficult. All schools, in my experience, tend to be very much the heart of their community, and I know that you’re aware that I have some concerns about the school organisation code. I think it is definitely timely to review it, and would just like to ask how you see that process going forward, and in particular, how you will ensure that parents and communities get a say in the reforms that you’re looking at.

Presiding Officer, can I thank the Member for the questions? I hope I’m not divulging too much of a secret that, in the previous Assembly term, Lynne and I would send messages across the Chamber on this very subject of our frustrations with the school organisation code.

I think it is timely, three years into its existence, to review its effectiveness. I particularly want to look at the issue of how we can amend it to look at the principle of presumption against closure, but I know that there are frustrations across the Chamber, from Assembly Members who represent all different types of communities, about whether it is as robust as it can be. I hope that we can avail ourselves of this opportunity to look at this in the round, because the Member is absolutely right: schools are important, whatever the nature of the community. I’m aware that in some Valleys communities the schools at the top end of the Valleys are probably equally as remote as some of the schools that I know and love very well. So, we need to look at this in a holistic way, and this is certainly not setting a different standard for one type of school as opposed to another.

The Member is right about how we can engage with parents and communities. I will be using the full range of publicity machines that are available to the Welsh Government. I hope we’ve had a good start today in publicising this. I’m grateful the media have highlighted the statement this afternoon, but I will be relying on Assembly Members themselves, actually—I’d be very grateful to Assembly Members across the Chamber if they themselves would take part in the consultation and if they would make the consultation widely available to people whom they know have an interest in this particular issue. The more voices we can hear, the more opportunities we can have to have an organisation code that’s on point and really reflects the concerns of the people that we all represent.

As you state, small and rural schools can provide real academic, cultural and social benefits. When I called on the previous Welsh Government to respond to concerns that Flintshire County Council was using old and inaccurate data and acting in breach of the school organisation code in respect of a number of proposed school closures there, including small and rural schools, Ysgol Llanfynydd County Primary School and Ysgol Maes Edwin in Flint mountain, referred to earlier, your predecessor said,

‘I can’t comment…in terms of the school organisation code and the guidance, because, of course, this may come before Welsh Ministers.’

Of course, in the context of small and rural schools, that hadn’t been the case since 2013. Now, although councillors must only consider material evidence relevant to the school organisation code and the accuracy of the data used by the council cabinet as the basis of their recommended decision to close schools, when these closures came to council, the highly political comments by the council leader were not material to the matters that the council must consider, and this political point scoring on both occasions raised serious concerns about the basis on which his cabinet took their decisions.

You state you’re not going to revisit decisions previously made. Does that therefore mean that you’re bolting the stable door after the previous Welsh Government and current First Minister allowed the horses to bolt, or, in circumstances such as this, will you reconsider the evidence used to justify the closure to members and the public, in the context of what the school organisation code actually required?

Mark, I thought I had made it quite clear in my answer to Michelle Brown that I’m not prepared to reopen cases that have been already discharged. Mark, I can only be responsible for the situation I find myself in now. This is not about shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. This is a genuine opportunity to recognise the particular challenges of delivering education in a rural area and the barriers that may make it more difficult for that education to achieve absolute excellence, and I am determined to do that. I am sorry that you feel that this policy—. Unlike your education spokesperson, who sees that there is merit in what I am doing, I am sorry that you have not been able to share in that enthusiasm.

I thank the Cabinet Secretary.