2. What is the Welsh Government doing to support adult community learning? OAQ52029

Diolch, Mohammad. Our adult learning in Wales policy statement was published in July and set out our priorities for adult learning. I will shortly be consulting on proposals to restructure the delivery and funding of adult learning, with the aim of providing a sustainable and secure future for this important provision. 

Thank you very much for the reply, Minister. Community learning has a significant impact in helping people gain the skills needed to achieve sustainable employment in the future. However, Welsh Government figures show that the number of community learners in Wales has fallen by more than half in the last five years. Arad research has described the sector has described the sector as being under severe pressure, and they state that,

'it is essential that there is sufficient support for adult community learning to ensure high quality delivery across Wales that is consistent and accessible.'

Will the Cabinet Secretary commit to properly funding community learning for the benefit of our communities and social care in Wales please? 

There's no doubt that in terms of what we'd like to do, we'd like to have put a lot more money into adult community learning, but that's been really difficult when we've seen a £1.4 billion cut from the UK Tory Government. So, that's been the problem for us. But let me be clear that, in deciding then what our priorities should be, we have concentrated on the importance of training people up for employment. We've concentrated on basic skills in particular, on core skills to encourage people to learn English, for those who have it as a second language, and really making sure that we have those essential skills that allow people to access the workplace. 

Minister, I wanted to ask you about individual learning accounts. What are your plans in terms of the launch of pilots, and will you ensure, and how will you ensure, that the lessons to be learnt from previous versions of the ILAs properly inform the new version?

Thank you. I think this is quite an exciting opportunity for us, and one of the first things I did when I was appointed as Minister was to go and listen to what a lot of the think tanks had to say. And this was an area where they said, 'Actually, there's a real opportunity.' Now, it's true in the past that the individual learning accounts had a bad name. In Wales, there wasn't a problem, but there was a degree of problems in England in relation to money exchanging. Now, I think we're in a different place because we now have the opportunity to do things digitally, so money won't change hands. We have now gathered, last week, a group of people who are experts in this field to shape what that pilot should look like, to look at what the pitfalls might be. So, progress is being made, and I would hope that we would be able to launch something in about September. 

The reality is, of course, that some of these education services are moving further and further away from communities across Wales. You will be aware, for example, that the college in Denbigh is now going to close in the summer. I’ve spoken to some of the students and they are concerned that they won’t be able to juggle their studies and the part-time work that they have because they will have to travel further to access that education in Rhos-on-Sea or in Rhyl. So, may I ask what the Government is doing to ensure that these services will remain in our communities and that post-16 education is accessible to all?

I do understand that there’s been quite a lot of response to what happened in Denbigh. What is important, I think, is that we respect the independence of the colleges—they make the decisions. But, of course, we have to ensure that we enable people in every community to have access now to further education. So, we will have to look, I think, at ensuring that we find ways of ensuring that people from those communities can get to those centres where the teaching exists. Of course, cuts have had an impact on the sector, but what’s important is that we have the experts to teach people in the best way possible.