5. What is the Welsh Government doing to improve the representation of women in industry? OAQ52007

Our actions are focused on providing women with the opportunities and support they need to enter, re-enter and progress in the workplace in order to achieve and prosper. This includes our childcare offer, encouraging women into science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, training and upskilling programmes, all-age apprenticeships and tackling discrimination in the workplace.  

Thank you. The UK has a deficit of engineers and difficulty attracting women into industry. Recently I attended a recruitment fair in Newport for CAF Rail's ground-breaking new project building trains and trams. They're offering a range of roles, including managerial, technical and operational. CAF Rail has a 40 per cent female Spanish workforce. In the UK, women only make up 11 per cent of the engineering workforce—the lowest percentage of female engineering professionals in Europe. I know the Welsh Government are doing lots of positive work with young people and schools, however, what action is the Welsh Government taking to engage with businesses who are eager to increase the amount of women in this sector?

Actually, as it happens, I've just come hot-foot from chairing the Women in STEM board that I chair and we've just expanded the membership of the board to include people from industry for exactly that reason. So, the Member makes a very timely and good point. And one of the things that the board has been highlighting to me is this whole issue about societal mores, if you like. Why are there more engineers in some European countries than here? And it's because it's just socially acceptable for women to do those sorts of jobs, where it's been, unfortunately, less socially acceptable here. So, we are looking at a range of things that can address some of those issues. I did talk a little bit about the This is Me campaign, which is challenging those gender stereotypes. So, if we think, that's a very important part of this. We also have our STEM Cymru II programme, which encourages more young women to progress into engineering careers, and, to date, over 3,000 young women have engaged with that programme. I don't know if many of you have met Jessica Jones from Cardiff, who's one of the first success stories, who subsequently went on to become the first female to win the UK's Young Engineer of the Year award following her involvement in devising the contraction optical monitoring system.

Jessica is very much an ambassador for female engineering students and has just completed her degree in astrophysics. Our programme helped her on the way, and we are engaging with young women such as Jessica to get as many ambassadors out into our schools as possible and I've been having long conversations with my colleague the Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Transport about how we can, as part of the economic action plan, encourage businesses to engage with that programme more fully.

Finally, question 6—Leanne Wood.