The next item, therefore, is a statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Education on international student mobility. I call on the Cabinet Secretary to make the statement. Kirsty Williams.

Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Only 2 per cent of Welsh students at universities currently spend time abroad studying, volunteering or undertaking work experience as part of their studies. At a time when it’s never been more important for our students and graduates to be global citizens, for there to be stronger cultural and economic links between Wales and the world, and for even greater academic and employability outcomes for our students, we need to ensure that international opportunities are an aspiration for many more students. 

The Deputy Presiding Officer (Ann Jones) took the Chair.

I want to see the number of Welsh students who spend time abroad as part of their studies double by the end of this Government. As someone who benefited hugely from time studying abroad as an undergraduate, I know how such an experience broadens horizons, expands key skills and ensures connections that last a lifetime. Research from Universities UK points out that these gains are particularly significant for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. However, it is these students who too often miss out on, or don't even apply for, these transformational opportunities.

We have made a start on addressing this by targeting Generation UK—China student mobility funding towards widening participation. Today, I'm announcing a new international student mobility pilot, which will make a significant contribution to our ambitions to increase opportunities and raise aspirations. We have been developing the pilot in discussion with British Council Wales as part of our response to the Diamond review's recommendation on support for students who choose to study overseas.  It will focus on Welsh-domiciled students at Welsh higher education institutions and it will run for three years from 2018-19. The pilot will offer a mix of opportunities for Welsh students at Welsh HE institutions, including study, volunteering and internship, ranging from two to three weeks to eight weeks. Our scoping study showed that it is these sorts of opportunities that will lead to the strongest take-up.

This will help to encourage participation from a wider group of students, hopefully including those with, for example, caring responsibilities or in employment, and will avoid duplication of any schemes already available. I believe strongly that Government should invest in these opportunities, but there is also a responsibility for universities to step up. On that note, I am pleased that many Welsh universities have signed up to Universities UK's Go International campaign to double the percentage of undergraduates who have an international placement as part of their university programme.

We are investing £1.3 million in this pilot over the next three years, and further details on those mobility opportunities will be published shortly. Of course, there are already good examples of work taking place within the sector with the support of Government, and I'd like to take the opportunity to mention these today also. We were recently able to support the Global Wales project with European transition fund investment worth £3.5 million. This funding will not only support the promotion of Wales as a study destination, but will also support outward mobility opportunities for Welsh students in Global Wales's priority markets, such as Vietnam and the United States. These opportunities, as part of our wider international education programme, are important for social mobility, employability skills and soft power links for Wales. 

The Seren Network goes from strength to strength, and I was delighted earlier this year to secure a new partnership between Yale University and Seren. This new partnership resulted in 16 Seren students having the opportunity to participate in the Yale young global scholars summer programme. Let me tell you, Members, this was a life-changing experience for all that took part. This exciting partnership will continue and expand in 2019. These relationships with leading global universities have also offered us the opportunity to lever engagement in our wider education reforms, and I hope to make further announcements on this very soon.

As I mentioned earlier, our new investment provides additional and new opportunities. It will not duplicate existing schemes. We are clear in our view that the United Kingdom should continue to participate in Erasmus after Brexit. Wales benefits hugely from our participation in Erasmus+, allowing people to study and undertake work experience and volunteering in another EU country. In fact, the total funding awarded to Welsh projects amounts to some 6 per cent of the UK total Erasmus+ funding awarded since 2014, and that is above our population share. The call for the 2019 projects has just been announced by the British Council and I would encourage Welsh institutions to submit applications.

In conclusion, Deputy Presiding Officer, I am determined that many more of our students, from all backgrounds, benefit from the transformational experience of spending time studying, volunteering or undertaking work experience abroad. International experiences benefit individual students, strengthen overseas links for our universities, and promote bilateral exchanges for Wales with communities and countries across the world. Thank you.

I welcome the statement from the Cabinet Secretary. As someone relatively new to this portfolio, I was actually shocked myself to learn only 2 per cent of Welsh students currently spend time abroad studying and volunteering or carrying out work experience. It is heartening to hear your statement that you do intend to double that figure by the end of this Government. But of particular concern to me is how the opportunities do present themselves for those from disadvantaged backgrounds—our care leavers, disabled students. And I ask how the new international student mobility pilot that focuses on Welsh higher education—how will you be hoping this will extend, if at all, to the further education sector? Because, to me, it's important that children from both sectors are able to experience the opportunities that present. So, if not, why is this not the case? It is crucial that our under-represented groups do have the same opportunities to go on international— you know, courses away. And I just simply cannot see why that would not be the case. So, if the Cabinet Secretary could enlighten us further. 

Can I thank Janet for that question? Could I make it absolutely clear that the reason why we are going for relatively short periods for the pilot is to allow for students that do perhaps have other responsibilities, who could not afford the time to take a year abroad, which is perhaps traditionally what many students would see as a period of international study?

These short placements, for two to three weeks up to eight weeks, will allow for, we believe, following research that has been undertaken on behalf of Welsh Government by OB3 Research and the Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research, Data and Methods—. This gives us the optimum chance for the highest level of take-up. These particular grants are available for those studying in Welsh higher education institutions, as recommended by Diamond. But that's not to say that there aren't significant opportunities for international study in the FE sector. Of course, in many areas, FE colleges are delivering A-level programmes to our Seren students and are participating in the Seren programme. You've just heard me say about our new links with Yale University, and we are hoping to build upon those. And FE colleges have been particularly successful in drawing down Erasmus+ funding. Both our school sector and our FE colleges have excelled themselves. As I've said, we have had a greater than population share of the resources under Erasmus+ that has looked to fund a range of very exciting projects in FE that have allowed FE students studying at academic and vocational colleges to have periods of study abroad.

The challenge we have now, Janet—and perhaps you can help us with this—is convincing your colleagues in the Government in Westminster to allow us to continue to participate fully in the Erasmus+ programme. And, at the moment, it is far from clear, after 2020, that we will be able to do that. The Westminster Government is currently undertaking a value for money study. We have been more than happy to support that review with all the data from Wales, which I believe makes a very strong case for continued participation in the scheme. The universities of Wales and the colleges of Wales are very clear on their desire to continue to participate fully in Erasmus+, as is the students' union of Wales. It seems, though, that, at this moment, those voices have not been listened to.

And I would, once again, reiterate the experience of Switzerland, who left the Erasmus+ programme—decided they could do something better on their own. It ended up costing them more money for fewer opportunities. We should learn from that and not think that some UK-alone scheme would be a satisfactory replacement for ongoing continuation and participation in Erasmus+, which is, as I said, what this Government wants, what the students of Wales want, and what the universities and colleges of Wales want.

Apologies for my late arrival. Thank you for advance notice of this statement. Following Brexit, it needs to be ensured that international students continue to be welcomed to Wales and are aware that they are valued. It also needs to be ensured that students from Wales are encouraged to be outward looking and to seek opportunities to study abroad. Plaid Cymru believes that students from Wales should be able to study in the world's best universities and have the opportunity to live and to work abroad. Our 2016 manifesto pledged to provide first-time students financial support for Welsh-domiciled students enrolling as undergraduates in universities outside the UK as well as expanding our support for Erasmus+. as has been mentioned already today. to get more young people to see the world and to have enrichment from those experiences. It is therefore welcome to hear the Cabinet Secretary is launching an international student mobility pilot as part of the Welsh Government's response to the Diamond review's recommendations on support for students to study overseas. 

You mentioned there is £1.3 million in the pilot and that further details are to follow. I'd just like to ask when those details would follow, considering that we would need to scrutinise how that investment is being put in place by the Welsh Government and whether that money would be enough or whether it could be used in different ways or whether other parties may have ideas as to where that money could be utilised.

Will the Cabinet Secretary give not just this Chamber but the international student community assurances that they will not only be welcomed in Wales but also valued? I understand that this scheme is about taking Welsh students out into other countries, but it does work both ways. If we attract international students to Wales, it will broaden the experiences of students here in this nation of ours, and it will allow for us to meet people we would never otherwise have met—in my case, my husband, so, I am very thankful that we had that opportunity here in Wales. 

What representations has the Welsh Government made to the UK Government in securing continued Welsh involvement in international student exchange programmes post Brexit? Do you see a role for some form of continued Committee of the Regions in helping facilitate continued co-operation in this area, something that I and my colleague Mick Antoniw, who currently sit on the Committee of the Regions, are looking into?

How does the Welsh Government plan on mitigating the cost of losing EU students post Brexit? We are seeing a decline in applications, and as I said in this Chamber only recently, Wales is already way down the league table in terms of EU student numbers and applications. So, a further reduction is going to be very hard for the HE sector to absorb, when, almost certainly, we will see an even further decline in EU student numbers as a result of Brexit. 

What plans does the Welsh Government have in place if we are unable to remain part of the Erasmus scheme? And do you share my concern that the increased anti-EU-national language being used by the Prime Minister as part of her hard line against EU freedom of movement and to sell her proposed EU deal risks putting continued co-operation on this front in jeopardy?

Finally, will the Cabinet Secretary consider a pilot scheme to provide support for students to study further afield for the whole of their degree programme, as recommenced by Diamond? I think that this would be something to look at in the round so that we can encourage young people to not only do part of their degree abroad but to do all of their degree abroad and to bring that wealth and talent back to Wales. 

Thank you for the series of questions, Bethan. Let me be absolutely clear, Welsh universities and colleges are open for business, and not just to international students, who, as you say, bring a depth to our university towns in what they bring with them, but also, of course, faculty as well. International faculty is a key strength in our sector, and a significant number of our lecturing staff in HE institutions in particular are international lecturers. They are very welcome in our universities and help make our universities as strong as they are.

That is the message that myself, Universities Wales and Global Wales are taking to the world—the very strong offer that Wales has with regard to higher education and further education. One only has to look at the student satisfaction surveys that show that Welsh universities rank higher amongst students for their satisfaction at their experience than across the border in England or in Scotland. We have excellence in research and excellence in teaching, and we have a wide variety of institutions, either city based, like here in Cardiff, or on the coast, whether that be in Bangor or Aberystwyth—we have a real mix, so something for everybody. And I'm sure you'd agree with me that what international students and faculty can be assured of if they come to study or work in Wales is a very warm, warm welcome from our communities, who value their contribution very much indeed.

With regard to the ongoing challenge of recruiting international students, of course, this is not helped by the determination of the UK Government to include students as part of the immigration figures. Nobody sees international students as immigrants, only Theresa May and the Home Office. Poll after poll after poll show that the public do not view international students in this way, and international students come here, they study here, they learn their skills here and the vast, vast majority of them then take those skills back to their home country. So this idea that, somehow, they should be included in these figures is highly damaging—highly damaging—to the HE sector, not just here in Wales, but across the United Kingdom. 

I have had meetings with Sam Gyimah and my Scottish counterparts in this regard to talk about international student recruitment as well as ongoing opportunities for British students to study abroad, particularly as part of the Erasmus+ programme. I am due to meet with them again shortly. I've invited them all here to Cardiff, and I'm very glad that they have taken the opportunity to agree to that invitation, where, once again, we will sit as a group of education Ministers to try and form a common understanding of the challenges that face us all and to try and put those messages across to the UK Government. 

With regard to European student recruitment into Wales, it should not be unexpected that we have seen a drop in those students as our student support package has changed. It was an inevitable consequence of a very generous offer that EU students were able to avail themselves of under the previous regime; that financial incentive has now been removed, as we move through our Diamond packages. Actually, the year before, we outperformed the other UK nations in terms of international and EU student recruitment, so it should not be unexpected. But that does mean we have to redouble our efforts, alongside our partners in HEIs and FE colleges, to spread the message of the strong offer that we have here in Wales.

This is why I recently was with Global Wales in New York, alongside the vice-chancellor of Swansea University, hosting a Study in Wales event and, most recently, in Vietnam, where we were able to negotiate with the British Council a significant tranche of new Chevening scholarships—Wales universities having the most of them—to attract Vietnamese students to our country, and we will continue to support our university colleagues in their recruitment activities, where we can add value to them. 

This is initially a pilot for short periods of study abroad. As I said, this is a result of research that has been done by WISERD on behalf of the Welsh Government, because we feel that this is where there is the largest demand. Demand for international placements has been growing steadily in Wales, but at 2 per cent, we lag behind England and Scotland in the number of Welsh undergraduates who avail themselves of these opportunities. This is an attempt to supplement what we're already doing to increase those opportunities, especially for those students, as I said, from particularly disadvantaged backgrounds who have been least likely to apply for previous opportunities or for study abroad in the round.

We will continue to keep under review, given the financial constraints that we're currently working under in the higher education sector, whether we would move to a situation where we would fund entire degrees in international universities. We are not in a position to undertake that at this moment, because we believe that there are other pressing needs on the higher education budget in Wales, and our priority for the Diamond dividend is to reinvest in expensive subjects and to increase resources going into the sector here at home. 

What a good point the Cabinet Secretary makes about international students, and the action she's taken in this Chamber that contrasts so severely with the Conservative UK Government's cynical policy of discouraging international students coming to this country because they affect immigration figures. The Conservative benches in this Chamber should be ashamed of the Conservative Government and that policy.

So, this is a very good focus on opening Wales and opening the world to Welsh students. One thing I'm particularly interested in and would welcome is the focus on students, which you've just mentioned, from disadvantaged backgrounds. What I also ask is: it's not just students from disadvantaged backgrounds, but students—future students—who live in communities of multiple deprivation who may not be from disadvantaged backgrounds themselves. So, I'm talking about Valleys communities, particularly places like Senghenydd and Bargoed in my constituency. I went to school in Bargoed. When I was in school, I wouldn't have considered international study—it wouldn't have been on my mind. I didn't come from a disadvantaged background, but it just wasn't in the culture of the school.

So, if we're going to encourage students to travel abroad, I think we need to look at how primary school students and secondary school students are educated in the value of international study. People can say to them, 'Well, look, you can get abroad—you can travel abroad—and this will be great for you'. It wasn't until I was 25 and travelling abroad to China to teach that I realised the value of international study. I tell you something: I wouldn't have had the confidence to do it when I was 18.

You make a very good point, because often these are issues to do with aspiration and actually creating that spark within the individual to seek out these opportunities. The research shows us that people from a disadvantaged background are least likely to seek out these opportunities, so this is about raising aspiration.

As I said earlier in answer to Janet Finch-Saunders, some of the strongest projects that Wales has seen in the Erasmus+ programme are, actually, school-based projects, and that's really, really important—that Erasmus is not just seen as a university programme. It's actually available for schools and FE colleges, and schools are engaging in that very well at the moment.

But, as you know, one of the four purposes of our new curriculum is to create global citizens ready to play their part, here in their own communities but also in the world. So, hopefully, our new curriculum will, from the very earliest ages—from three years old—begin to teach children about their place in their community, but also the fact that they are a citizen of the world and there are opportunities for them out there.

One of the reasons why the opportunities are limited to two to three weeks to eight weeks is because those are seen as more desirable. It's a big leap, isn't it, to take a year living away from home and moving to a country for a year, but the ability, maybe, to go for two to three weeks or up to eight weeks is a much more manageable proposition and an accessible one and an attractive one. We believe, following the research that has been undertaken to inform this policy initiative, that that's where it makes the biggest difference.

We anticipate that between 400 and 500 students will be assisted by this pilot. It'll be operated by the British Council Wales, which already has systems in place for other opportunities. Hefin, if you had have met the very sparky 16 and 17-year-olds from schools across Wales who went to the Yale global scholars programme, you would've been in awe at their confidence, their aspiration and their ability to compete on a global stage with other young people and to hold their own. The confidence that that has given them to come back to Wales and to set their aspirations even higher for what they can achieve has been remarkable. If we can provide more of those opportunities for more of our students, I feel that at least part of my time in this job will have been very well spent.

Thank you for your statement. I think this is a very important issue, because there's a real danger that, as we have this threat of leaving the EU, we will become an inward-looking country when we are part of a global economy. We can't get away from that. This idea that we somehow can hack it on our own is pretty frightening.

Anyway, I want to pay tribute to Cardiff University in particular, who have been focusing a lot of effort into ensuring that, as far as possible, they encourage all young people who are studying there as undergraduates to build in some sort of international experience. That's absolutely as it should be, because they've already done the research that shows that studying abroad improves their employability, their confidence and their broader education. So, well done, Cardiff University, and I'm completely terrified at the fact that only 2 per cent of Welsh students overall go abroad.

But focusing back on the very important point you make about the significance of students from disadvantaged backgrounds going abroad, I heard what you said to Hefin David and the importance of having these short-term international experiences. But I doubt if they're going to be in Vietnam or the United States, given the distance involved—are they? I think, surely, we need to be focusing on our biggest markets, which are in Europe. We're not going to be able to move our country to some other part of the world. I just wanted to ask what you're doing to ensure that disadvantaged students are taking up the opportunities of this new £1.3 million because, otherwise, we know they will be taken up by the less disadvantaged students who will always have families that would probably be able to make arrangements for them on their own. 

Could you just explain why you have not considered extending this opportunity to FE students who are studying, just as importantly, the technical skills that are also going to make them employable and make an important contribution to our economy? Those are my two questions. 

Thank you very much, Jenny. I'm very happy to join you in congratulating Cardiff University for the significant work that they have done in this particular field. We have been very careful in trying to design this scheme to complement what our universities are already doing, and it's certainly not to absolve them of any responsibility that they need and are taking in this regard. 

As I said in my opening statement, perhaps this work is more important now than it ever has been as we approach Brexit. Wales has never been an insular country. Our outlook has always been global and international. Only last week, in her Welsh language speaking assessment, my daughter talked of the Welsh people who were there at the signing of the declaration of independence for the United States of America. We have sent our people out into the world, who have created and done amazing things. At this time more than ever, we need to increase Wales's soft power. We may not have responsibility for foreign affairs in this Chamber, but that does not absolve us of our responsibility to get Wales out into the world, and what better way, what better asset do we have to sell our nation than our young people? They are our best asset, and that's why I'm determined that more of them should have the opportunity. 

Of course, we want students to continue to have opportunities in Europe; that's why we're fighting so hard for the Erasmus+ project. But I can assure you, Jenny, it's only six hours and you can be in Boston, and with the new flight from Cardiff to Doha, you can be in Vietnam in less than 12, so the idea that an eight-week programme isn't long enough for you to go to some of these places, I would argue, is not the case. We will be looking for the British Council, who will be administering this scheme, to help us collect data to make sure that a wide range of students are taking up these opportunities. As I've said throughout this, one of my guiding principles in this job is equality of opportunity and closing the attainment gap. That attainment gap isn't just about qualifications; it's about an opportunity attainment gap as well, and I hope this programme helps us to achieve that. 

Thank you very much, Cabinet Secretary.