Thank you for your statement, Cabinet Secretary. I commend Qualifications Wales for conducting this research and for publishing the report. I also agree with the sentiments you express in your statement, Cabinet Secretary. It is interesting to note that the report comments that there has been no substantive research into the views of professionals on early and multiple entry for examinations. Can the Cabinet Secretary please explain why this is? The Labour Party, which has been in control of the Welsh education system for 20 years now in one way or another, is supposedly plugged into the unions, so why do you think it’s only now, thanks to Qualifications Wales, that the opinions of educational professionals have been sought on the issue? The report also mentions that Welsh Government’s guidance on early and multiple entry was greeted far from enthusiastically by some of the teaching profession. So, where was the Welsh Government’s understanding of the issue when they produced that guidance? There appears to have been a serious and long-term breakdown in communication between the teaching unions and the Labour Party, I’d suggest.

I’m pleased that you’ve decided to implement the two recommendations made by the report. However, it’s disappointing that were it not for this report, you wouldn’t have any suggestions for dealing with the problem and that is something that concerns me and should concern every parent of school-age children in Wales. Apart from implementing the two recommendations made in the report, what are you doing to tackle the root cause of the problem, which is not necessarily schools entering the students for exams early, but the excessive stresses and pressures they’re trying to avoid by doing so?

So, whilst I welcome these ideas that have come from Qualifications Wales, they clearly only deal with the symptoms of an underlying and undeniable illness in the Welsh education system, not the root cause itself, which is a lack of vision sadly matched by a lack of analysis and planning by the Welsh Government. Qualifications Wales have confirmed that some schools are taking action on not putting the educational interests of our children first despite obviously not wanting to. They’re being forced by Government to do so. I wonder if you agree with me, Cabinet Secretary, that it is a damning indictment on this Government that they have brought about an education system that does not have the education of Welsh children as its top priority. What would the Lib Dems have done differently, or is your party happy with a Labour perspective that makes a school more worried about its reputation on paper than the life chances it bestows on its pupils? Thank you.