Part of 2. 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:46 pm on 3 October 2017.
That was a response worthy of the Secretary of State for Wales—and that’s not a compliment, by the way. The reality is that the system has been changed. We’ve just introduced, of course, the new GCSEs; that has happened. So, far from sitting back and doing nothing, we’re encouraging schools to enter pupils for GCSEs and other qualifications, and at the right time—and at the right time—so they’re not entering them early in order to get them through a particular subject and the grades are coming down as a result. That is something that we have done as a Government. [Interruption.] Well, it’s unlike David Melding to be like this, but, clearly, something has caused him to be annoyed this morning, or this afternoon.
We’re confident in what we’re doing: we’re confident in what we’re doing in terms of changing the syllabus; we are confident in what we’re doing in terms of results—we see results improving, both at GCSE and A-level. We see money going into education in a way that’s been deprived from schools by his party in England. We see schools being built across Wales that would not be built by his party if they were in power here. And, of course, we want to make sure that as many of our pupils have as many opportunities as possible to enter examinations in order to get the qualifications that they need—that’s exactly what we’ve done in terms of the system we’ve now introduced.