May I in the first instance thank Bethan Sayed for introducing such a philosophical topic, which gives me an opportunity to continue with the seminar, possibly? Because, clearly, as a Government, our powers in relation to the media are limited by the legislation surrounding devolution. I don't want to rehearse the issues over the devolution of broadcasting, but in my view the reason for not arguing for devolution of broadcasting is that we would then be talking about seeking control that would possibly be very limited or even fake control over one platform, whilst I think it's important to look—as we've been encouraged to do by Bethan Sayed in this debate—at the fundamental questions surrounding citizenship and participation, which relate to this whole question.

The media in any society are a means to have discourse and debate, and where that media is controlled by a minority of any kind—be that a powerful minority by virtue of the structure of the organisations controlling the media, or as in the example that we saw, towards the end there, of people who were involved with criminality by using and buying people to undermine opinions—then these trends are trends that, in my view, can only be dealt with practically by us as a Government by trying to undermine them. And that is by increasing the emphasis on constructive education on the media and in terms of social understanding of the nature of mass media.

Many years ago, I taught in this area, and I think that we have lost that fundamental emphasis very often, namely that we don't educate the population sufficiently on how to read the mass media. The emphasis is not in our schools or in our courses or perhaps even in places such as this place, where we discuss politics. Perhaps we don't discuss the fact that understanding relies on the ability of the individual and any specific group that one is part of to be able to analyse what is being said.

And therefore I have to say that I find it very difficult as a former part-time philosopher to respond to a debate where one can talk about 'the truth' or 'the reality' or 'the events', because as they were reported, as they occurred. Because, to me, every event is analysed and interpreted. Therefore, what we need to help to create is an active population that can analyse intellectually, that feel as soon they hear any statement, about any event, that the next question that should arise is: well, what really happened? Not that one can find the truth or identify the truth, because the person who is receiving the message wasn't involved in the event and wasn't witness to it in that sense, but that one actually develops an intellectual understanding and curiosity. I think that's central to this.

Therefore, what I will take from this debate is the need for us, as a Government—and this is an issue not just in terms of culture or the media, but particularly in terms of the curriculum and education—that we do seek to find out how we can use the new curriculum for Wales so that our children and young people will be citizens who have an understanding of ethics and can evaluate and use evidence and can become critical citizens, because the only truth in my view—and I’ve used that word myself now—but the only effective way, I should say, to respond to any fake news is by analysing what an event is and what is one’s understanding of that event.

The weakness of the term 'fake news' is that it suggests that there is such a thing as true news. All news is a description of an incident or an event, therefore we have to develop that understanding to see through what happened and to be critical in our understanding of it. Understanding democratic responsibilities and rights means that we have to understand that prejudice is commonplace in society, and that we must also be able to analyse our own prejudice. Did you want to intervene?