Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Education – in the Senedd at 1:42 pm on 9 January 2019.
Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. I'm sure you're expecting me to return to the Western Mail report today, Minister, which I do. Darren Millar mentioned that school leaders are feeling exhausted and under threat and particularly
'unable to cope with impossible demands set from on high by a range of bureaucratic people'.
After citing funding, which you probably would expect, and retention and recruitment problems, those headteachers added that the—and I'm quoting from them—
'the best education systems do not recruit talent and then constrain them with top-down policy or an overly centralised...school leadership.'
And, of course, as leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats in the past, you will have agreed with the manifesto in 2016, which stated that,
'Teachers deliver the best results when they are given flexibility and support, not smothered by bureaucracy. We will provide more freedom for teachers and greater flexibility to our schools.'
The National Academy for Educational Leadership—can you explain who is shaping and driving that to avoid any concerns that this too is about impossible demands set from on high by a range of bureaucratic people?