I want to look at three particular areas—and I'm looking forward to hear the Minister’s comments on these three areas—starting with recommendation 1, relating to prejudice on the grounds of gender. Of course, unfortunately, some of the conclusions in the report aren't new to us, and certainly, in autumn of 2012, the Enterprise and Business Committee raised the importance of tackling these issues in order to expand access. A recommendation was accepted that the Welsh Government should monitor differences between genders in apprenticeships, the reasons for those differences, and to consider the possibility of setting targets for improving recruitment rates for women in apprenticeships in the priority sectors for the economy.

Accepted also, back in 2012, was the recommendation that training should be provided on gender equality for professionals in the field of careers and educating to correct any stereotyping in the advice that they give to young people. But, unfortunately, of course, over five years after publishing that report and accepting those recommendations, only 1.6 per cent of construction apprenticeships and 3.1 per cent of engineering apprenticeships are held by women, as opposed to 96 per cent of childcare and teaching and development apprenticeships and 91 per cent of hairdressing apprenticeships that are held by women. So, this does raise questions about the steps that have been taken by your Government over the past five years to get to grips with this issue, and it raises a question also about whether you will be genuinely taking action on the recommendations that have been made by this committee.

We discussed this morning, in the equality committee, the role that the economic contract can play in being used to try to get rid of some of these stereotypes. Even though this committee hasn’t considered this issue, I wonder what your comments would be. Could this contract be used with regard to apprenticeships as well to try to tackle some of the stereotypes on the basis of gender?

Secondly, I want to look at the aspect of the Welsh language and apprenticeships through the medium of the Welsh language. Again, the gap in the likely demand for apprenticeships through the medium of Welsh and the ability to meet that demand—. That isn’t unexpected either. The number of apprenticeships offered through the medium of Welsh has been extremely low for years. In 2014-15, only 0.3 per cent, or 140 apprenticeships, were completed through the medium of Welsh, out of well over 48,000 apprenticeships. The Welsh Government’s response to criticism of the situation was to change the way that the statistics are gathered, by publishing a figure for the number of apprenticeships with some element of bilingual teaching—and that could mean as little as introducing one bilingual resource to the students. Clearly, we need to get to grips with the situation in order to reach 1 million Welsh speakers by 2050, and also to fill the gaps in skills in areas such as social care, where there is a need for Welsh speakers to provide services for Welsh speakers.

The decision to extend the responsibilities of the coleg Cymraeg to include further education colleges and workplace learning is to be welcomed, but we need a sufficient budget for that work and in order to increase the proportion of apprenticeships that are completed through the medium of Welsh.

Finally, and very quickly: even though the committee doesn't mention the apprenticeships levy from the point of view of the police—please forgive me for wandering into this field—it is a cause for concern because a year after the apprenticeships levy was introduced, it's still unclear who has the responsibility for the levy. My colleague the Member of Parliament for Dwyfor Meirionnydd, Liz Saville Roberts, has received contradictory information—information from you that it's a matter that is reserved on a UK level, and information from the Minister for police also, which states that they're not responsible for police training. So, nobody's taking responsibility for training police, and nobody's taking responsibility for the apprenticeships, which would be very beneficial, of course, in this area. So, I would like to use this opportunity just to ask the Welsh Government to explain what's happening with apprenticeships for the police and the levy in that regard. Thank you.