Part of 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Education – in the Senedd at 2:17 pm on 21 November 2018.
I thank the Cabinet Secretary for that response, but it doesn't actually reflect the reality of modern foreign language teaching in Welsh schools today. The latest Universities and Colleges Admissions Service figures indicate that there are 80 students from Wales who secured places on European language and literature courses last year—down from 120 at this time last year. And, over the decade from 2009, A-level entries in French and German have fallen by two thirds—and they fell again last year—and Spanish by a half. The Government's 'Global futures' document was published in October 2015, and it was a plan to promote and improve modern foreign languages in Wales during the five-year period up to 2020. This programme seems to have utterly failed, so what is the Cabinet Secretary going to do to try to repair the damage that has been done?