Thank you. The Cabinet Secretary is well aware of my concerns about the potential loss of this grant, and I'm grateful to her for her engagement on this and for meeting with me about it yesterday. I have no doubt that she is personally deeply committed to supporting our poorest pupils, but on this issue, we need some urgent clarity and assurances.

In the last five years, the school uniform grant has benefited 1,107 pupils in Torfaen—young people whose families would otherwise have struggled to afford school uniform. This year, there are 202 pupils who should be eligible for the grant. We've had assurances about a new scheme, but there remain important unanswered questions about which I would be grateful for a response from the Cabinet Secretary today. Firstly, will the Cabinet Secretary guarantee that every pupil who was eligible for school uniform support under the old scheme will be eligible under the new scheme?

There has been a suggestion that the scheme could be more flexible and fund other school-related activities that families are struggling with. Now, I welcome any extra help for pupils on free school meals, but that help must be additional and not at the cost of existing support for school uniforms. There are too many activities that children from low-income families are excluded from—things like school trips, which is worthy of a debate in its own right here. Back in 2015, the predecessor Children, Young People and Education Committee published our report on our inquiry into educational outcomes for children from low-income households. A recommendation calling for Government to strengthen and clarify guidance for schools on charging for activities related to education was accepted in principle. I believe that it is now time to look again and strengthen that guidance.

I'd like to ask the Cabinet Secretary: what will be the delivery mechanism for this new grant? I would have serious concerns about that money going directly to schools. There is already a well-established delivery mechanism in place through local authorities, which families are familiar with. Families are used to having discussions about the sensitive matter of family incomes with a larger, more anonymous body that is the local authority. I would not want to see families having to go cap in hand to the school office to ensure that their kids have got the uniform they need to attend school. If it is the Cabinet Secretary's contention that schools are better placed to provide this support, then I would like to see the evidence for that and to know precisely what consultation there has been with those families likely to be affected.

I really welcome the indication that the Government has given that they will look at putting the 2011 guidance for governing bodies on school uniform on a statutory basis. It is good guidance, but it is not being implemented. Proper implementation of the guidance will deliver affordable school uniforms for all families. We must ensure that as many generic items that can be bought in supermarkets as possible are used. The guidance currently states that schools should only stipulate basic items that can be bought from retail chains at reasonable costs rather than from one supplier. High-cost items like blazers should be avoided, and logos restricted to one reasonably priced item, but this is just not happening. A quick look at the year 7 uniform list for just one school in Torfaen includes a number of items that can only be bought in one specialist shop: a blazer, £27.50; school tie, £4.50; and the PE kit alone, £44. So, £76 in total for one set, and I know this is replicated in schools across Wales. It is not good enough.

I wanted to conclude by highlighting two wider points about the way we make decisions about resources for our neediest pupils. The first is on the approach to the budget round this year, and this is not just directed at the Cabinet Secretary for Education, but across Government. I believe it has led to the situation and also the controversy around ongoing support for minority ethnic and Gypsy Roma Traveller pupils. I do not believe that the decision to effectively just pass the responsibility for funding to local government without clearly identified and sufficient resource is going to meet the needs of the young people we are trying to benefit. The ring-fenced funding was there for a reason.

Secondly, I would question the processes that have led to these decisions in the first place across Government, in particular, around consultation and the lack of a child rights impact assessment, which applies not just to education, but across Government. We trumpet our record on children's rights in Wales, but I am far from convinced we are doing anything like enough to live up to that commitment and to deliver children's rights as a reality in Wales.

To conclude, we know that universal credit will push thousands more children into poverty. There could not be a worse time to remove support for school uniform grants or to put obstacles in the way of claiming it. Thank you.