The next item is a statement by the Minister for Education: curriculum and assessment reform, a White Paper on proposals for legislative change. I call on the Minister for Education, Kirsty Williams. 

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. The publication of our curriculum and assessment White Paper marks an important milestone in Wales’s current education reform journey. It is also a significant moment in our history as a people who believe in education as an individual, community and national endeavour. For the first time ever, we are bringing forward our own 'made in Wales' legislative proposals for the school curriculum. Yes, made in Wales, but shaped by the best from around the world. It is fundamental to achieving our national mission to raise standards, reduce the attainment gap and deliver an education system that is a source of national pride and public confidence.

This is the realisation of the call made in the nineteenth century by the great educationalist and progressive, Elizabeth Phillips Hughes. She was the first principal of the Cambridge Teaching College for Women, and returned home to be the only woman on the committee that drafted the charter of the University of Wales. In arguing for co-education, the promotion of women’s education and the importance of a Welsh dimension to our education system, she said that

'Education must be national, and must be in our own hands'.

And today, we are moving forward on that promise.

The essential features of the current curriculum, devised in 1988 by the then Westminster Government, is out of time with recent and future shifts in technology and the development of our society and economy. The high degree of prescription in the national curriculum has tended to create a culture where creativity has been diminished. There has been a narrowing of teaching and learning, with the professional contribution of the workforce underdeveloped.

I am absolutely clear that to raise standards for all and expand opportunities, we need to empower schools and teachers by moving away from a narrow, inflexible and crowded curriculum. Our new curriculum will support young people to develop higher standards of literacy and numeracy, to become more digitally and bilingually competent, and evolve into enterprising, creative and critical thinkers. It will help to develop our young people as confident, capable and caring citizens of Wales—indeed, of the world.

Since 2016, we have been working with a network of pioneer schools, experts and a wide range of stakeholders to develop a new curriculum. I consider this to be a key strength of our reforms—reforms for the people of Wales, shaped by the people of Wales. This approach has allowed us to keep schools and learners at the very centre and heart of our developments. It has promoted ownership of the reforms, which is key in ensuring the changes we are making are right and are sustainable.

You will already be aware of the majority of the proposed legislative changes, as they reflect and stay true to the recommendations set out in 'Successful Futures', the cornerstone of our curriculum reform. We are proposing to legislate to ensure the four purposes set out in 'Successful Futures' will be at the core of the new curriculum, with learners benefiting from a broad spectrum of learning. We're returning to the fundamentals of education by introducing areas of learning and experience, covering the humanities, health and well-being, science and technology, languages, literacy and communication, expressive arts and maths. This means that we're moving away from the days of a narrow curriculum and on to a different approach of teaching and learning, a curriculum where we break down traditional subject boundaries and give teachers the flexibility to approach different issues from different angles. By using this approach, practitioners will be able to use their professionalism and expert knowledge to create and design lessons that stretch our learners—stretch their learning, stretch their abilities and, crucially, stretch their horizons.

The White Paper proposes that the new curriculum be organised as a continuum of learning from the ages of three to 16. The emphasis is on seamless transition, with references to key stages removed. Instead, progression will be signalled through progression steps at five points in the learning continuum, relating broadly to expectations at the ages of five, eight, 11, 14 and 16. They will act as a road map for each learner's development, allowing for individual abilities, experiences and rates of learning and understanding. I intend to legislate to define these steps.

As a proud bilingual country, English and Welsh will of course remain statutory, as will religious studies and relationships and sexuality education. Alongside this, the cross-curriculum responsibilities of literacy, numeracy and digital competency will be statutory up until the age of 16.

Presiding Officer, this is an exciting time for education in Wales. Not only are we developing a curriculum that ensures our learners are equipped to meet the needs of the future, we are also developing a curriculum through genuine collaboration with our schools and key stakeholders. We need to ensure that our legislation, as set out in the White Paper, enables us to realise and not to stifle our ambitions.

I'm asking for Members in the Chamber today, and for people across Wales, to contribute over the coming weeks and months. The White Paper is ambitious and far reaching, but we will only reach those high standards through a genuine national mission and conversation. The content and detail of the new curriculum will of course be published in draft in April of this year. Today is about laying the foundations, consulting on the legislation that paves the way for the new curriculum, its principles, its freedoms, and the structures that will support it. Thank you.

Can I thank you, Minister? You're quite right, this is going to be a sea change for Wales, but there's always a risk with a sea change that people might end up drowning. And while, of course, you have the full general principle policy support of everybody in this Chamber, I hope, the big test of all this is going to be what is deliverable practically, and will it deliver the results that we want to see. 

We're actually talking about a piece of legislation here, so I'm going to mention that very much in this context. I was pleased to see that the overarching principles—and have been for a while—are clearer than what we have in existing legislation at the moment. You want to move away from a prescriptive system. I believe you when you say that, and we as Welsh Conservatives of course have always said that we want teachers to be free to teach and that we shouldn't have over-prescription here, but, of course, that comes then with a greater responsibility on visible accountability. The quality of teachers and teaching, which I think is probably the greatest factor—I probably won't talk too much about that today, though—and an improvement of standards in attainment, in achievement, that young people themselves believe to be valuable, as well as what Wales as a society believes will be valuable for us as a nation, and particularly for our economy.

So, we're talking now about what will be effective to deliver this in a way that helps us raise rounded citizens who can achieve for themselves and their country, which is why I wanted to ask, really, why the word 'responsibility' has only appeared once in what our young people will achieve through the six areas of learning, because I think it's great to see words like 'confidence' and 'resilience', and the ability to be participants, I think, or to participate in decisions, but if our education is not helping people to move on from just respecting the needs of other people, which is a stated aim, to actually thinking they might have a responsibility in helping people meet those needs, then I think we might struggle with truly co-productive policy making in future. Actually, I think that's where we need a sea change, a game changer, if you like, in public policy in the future—amongst other changes.

Now, I'm sure that you'll say that my point is covered by the AoLEs, and it would be great if you could actually pinpoint how you actually think that will be the case, but what's not clear to me either at the moment is how these good citizen parts of the curriculum, if you like, will be weighted against the examinable areas of work. Because I welcome absolutely this need to reduce gaming that can go on in the current system, but I think we also need to keep an eye as well on avoiding new areas of gaming where decision makers can either swing in favour of exam results or avoid difficult questions about exam results by focusing on the non-examinable activity. Because when we talk about teacher freedom—and, as I say, I agree with you on this—it's just trying to establish quite how free they will be. Will they be free enough to actually avoid the stated policy objectives of what you're trying to do here? So, perhaps we can discuss that a little bit.

I mentioned the issue of what young people themselves think is valuable, and I'd be grateful if you could just give some indication as to how children and young people themselves have been involved so far. The White Paper talks about the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development observation that Welsh Government and the education sector have been working closely together, but it would be quite helpful to get an idea about how those who will be receiving this new-look education feel about it.

I'm sure this comes as a huge shock to you, Minister, but I do want to talk about cardiopulmonary resuscitation and first-aid skills—their place in the curriculum. I know you've heard all the evidence—evidence that has persuaded other Governments, not just the UK, that this is so worth while that they actually haven't left it to teacher discretion. The health and well-being AoLE speaks to individuals looking after themselves, but not really very much about looking after other people, which goes back to my initial point about mutual responsibility. So, I'd be quite curious to know why, at the moment, it looks like Welsh children might be disadvantaged compared to their peers in other parts of the world, actually, regarding a skill that they will now be taking for granted.

I'm conscious of leaving some questions for others, but I have got some more. Oh, yes—accountability. Now, I accept that how accountability is going to be measured from now on is still very much something that will be discussed with this Assembly, but what I'd like some steer on today, because we are talking about legislation, is what action you would take and refer to in legislation if this poor link in Wales, as it was described by the OECD, between accountability and improvement is not replaced, and pretty swiftly, by a link that works, particularly as the White Paper says that some of the existing accountability measures will be retained?

Just briefly on Welsh language and the wording to teach Welsh in various places in the White Paper—I think we need to explore that on another day. We haven't got much time today. I particularly wanted to ask, though, about the introduction of teaching English in Welsh-medium settings for very young children, and I can understand perhaps on grounds of fairness, when we're introducing so much Welsh now into English-medium settings, that this could be an attempt to not treat one language more favourably than the other. But I think these are not like-for-like situations, and I think it would help if you could bring us some evidence that suggests that those very young children learning through the medium of Welsh, through a continuum or otherwise, are in some way disadvantaged in a way that introducing English into their lives at that stage would overcome. As I say, these are not like-for-like situations and I don't think you can treat them in quite the same way. Tangentially, I'm just wondering what consideration was given to bringing modern foreign languages into the AoLEs much more visibly before key stage 3. I know it's not the same as Welsh language, but I am really worried about the future of modern foreign languages, even under this curriculum.

And then, finally—as I say, I'll leave teachers' training for another day. I'm pleased to see that you'll be putting some duties for Welsh Government on the face of the Bill. I wonder if I could ask you to consider a duty rather than a power to introduce statutory guidance assisting local government, governors and school leaders about how they can evidence fulfilling those duties around the four purposes. Because I know you will say, 'Well, of course, the Welsh Government will do this, and it's actually mentioned in the White Paper', but by committing through a duty to introduce guidance—and I'm not suggesting what should be in that guidance—I think that gives some comfort to those who are looking for certainty from this legislation. I think I need to give you fair warning that we'll be looking at making those duties in amendments at some point to introduce and review statutory guidance, to have some powers to vary that guidance after scrutiny from the Welsh Parliament, and also, as I mentioned earlier, to see what powers you would be looking for in order to take action in the event of duties by others not being met.

So, you're already aware of expressions of uncertainty about the delivery of the policy—we've discussed it in committee and a little bit in the Chamber. So, you have work to do on that, and, actually, as a legislature, we want to help you meet some of those concerns. I think it'll help both of us—meaning us as a Parliament and you as a Government—if your Bill looks to create certainty for those who will be responsible for implementing the Bill in due course and just doesn't join the list of Swiss cheeses that have been rolling out from Welsh Government lately. Thank you very much.

Can I thank Suzy Davies for that long list of questions? I will try and cover them as best I can and as quickly as I can. I'm glad that the Member recognises that there is greater clarity around the purposes of the curriculum. Of course, this was a finding by Graham Donaldson in his 'Successful Futures' report, which said that we needed to have that clarity, and I believe that we have achieved that.

Understandably, as always in these discussions, the focus tends to go onto qualifications and actually what happens at the end of this process. Obviously, the qualifications in Wales will need to be aligned to the new curriculum. One of the things that we have been very careful to do during this entire process is to engage Qualifications Wales so that there is early sight from our qualifications body about what they will need to do to make sure that that alignment is real. That's also one of the reasons why I took the decision to delay the roll-out of the curriculum.

Originally, it had been conceived that there would be a big-bang approach and the entire system would move to the new curriculum overnight. Clearly, that, potentially, was particularly full of jeopardy for those students who were reaching the end of their compulsory education, working towards those high-stakes examinations. And that's why we've made the decision to roll it out. So, of course, qualifications related to this new curriculum will actually not be sat until 2026. It does seem like a long way away, but we're already in the planning process for what this new curriculum change will mean for qualifications.

I am anticipating, Presiding Officer, that Suzy Davies and I will have long debates about duties and statutory guidance. Of course, as the legislation is actually drafted and comes forward, I look forward to engaging in those. We have been quite clear about the duties that will be on the face of the Bill—duties to the Welsh Government and duties to schools and individual headteachers and governing bodies, and what will be required of them. But I'm keen to consider views that will come forward during the consultation paper here, first of all, and then when we move forward to the legislation. I will enter those discussions with an open mind.

The Member asked what role children have had in the process to date. Let me give you a very clear example: you will be aware from my statement, and previous statements that I've made, that we will be placing relationship and sexuality education on the face of the Bill. That is in response to the recommendation by the specialist group that reported and the weight of evidence that young people themselves gave to that process about how important this was. Actually, this is an example of the departure away from 'Successful Futures'—this is a new addition—but we're doing it because the weight of evidence from young people themselves who fed into that process said that they wanted to see this change and we've listened to that. And that's just one example.

Clearly, there have been other examples where young people have been engaged, but, crucially, we will be doing a specific body of work when the AoLEs are published at Easter, when there is something tangible to go out and discuss with children and young people. Of course, it's tempting at this stage to want to talk about what goes into the legislation and actually what is appropriate for the individual AoLEs. Suzy Davies will have to wait just a little bit longer until those AoLEs are published at Easter. That will, hopefully, give some insight into some of the other questions that she has raised. At that same time, we will publish further information about assessment and evaluation to go alongside the content of the AoLEs. The White Paper does set out some duties regarding assessment and how assessment for learning will take place under this process. And we always have to make the distinction between assessment and evaluation—they are two different things, designed for two different purposes in our education system, and further details will be published on the evaluation and the accountability measures later on in the spring. 

Can I come to the issue of language? Clearly, there is nothing in these proposals that will undermine the issue, which I think the Member was referring to, with regard to immersion, especially for our youngest children in Welsh-medium. I'm sure the Member, who I believe is a supporter of the foundation phase, will be aware of the current guidance that is available to foundation phase practitioners. It says that children

'should be helped to develop an awareness of Wales as a country with two languages' and

'Language skills learned in one language should support the development of knowledge and skills in another language.'

That's already in our foundation phase guidance, which all foundation phase settings are expected to deliver upon. There is nothing in this paper that I believe will undermine that.

My commitment to the language as an important part of our education system is a personal one, through the choices that I have made—positive choices I've made for my own children. I've got three towards the Government's target for 2050 who will be bilingual because of the opportunities of Welsh-medium education. It's a professional commitment and it is a policy commitment.

I am very proud that we are reforming the education system so that every child—every single child—is going to have a more equal chance to be a bilingual citizen of this nation and to learn even more languages at an early age. Because, like you, I share your concerns about MFL. I'm sorry if we haven't made it clear in the statement. Of course, key stage 3 will go; there will be no key stages in the new process. Actually, what we're hoping to do is to bring other languages earlier into a child's educational journey, whilst they are in primary school. That means modern foreign languages, that means ancient civilisation languages—the previous Minister, I know, had a particular passion for Latin. We are also looking at community languages—so, those are languages that are spoken in different parts of our community—and also British Sign Language. Schools will have the opportunity, and indeed they will be required to be able to bring those experiences into the primary sector. Because I think leaving it to secondary school to expose children to other communication, other languages, is too late and has led to some of the problems that we've seen in terms of take-up. 

I think that just about covers the points that the Member has raised but I'm grateful for the spirit of co-operation and the willingness to engage in this process. As I said, it's a national mission and we are a National Assembly, and I'm sure all Members will want to contribute. 

I would like to pursue three important aspects today: workforce training, assessment arrangements, and the impact of these changes on qualifications. These don't directly relate to the White Paper, of course, but they are part of the bigger picture in terms of the huge change that’s occurring. And the new curriculum will mean a transformational change to teaching methods, so what are the Government’s proposals for re-educating the workforce? I'm using the word 're-educating' or 'retraining' in order to convey the level of the task and the change, and I think that does so more effectively than the term 'professional development'.

Schools are calling out for concrete information about when this will happen—that is to say, when this major retraining will occur. Will it happen during school hours, outwith school hours, on additional inset days? How will it be done? We do need an idea about the financial investment that will be allocated to this—more detail, if you like. You've allocated £100,000, I think, for ongoing development or continuous development, but is this sufficient? Releasing teachers is expensive. It all needs to be planned very carefully beforehand, and we need to recognise the scale of the task facing us, and we need to emphasise that this includes classroom teachers, classroom assistants, and the school leaders. I am aware that CPD won't be part of the White Paper, but I do think that the questions raised by teachers and unions are very pertinent indeed.

My second question is on assessment arrangements, and you have mentioned that you will publish further detail on that in the spring. At the moment, before we have that information, teachers are concerned that they don't have a clear idea of the nature of the assessment methods that will run alongside the curriculum. We know about the annual adaptive tests, and we know about significant changes in terms of the broader accountability issues, but, in terms of the progress steps and the attainment outcomes, it would be good to have more clarity on all of this, and I assume that the intention is to move away from teacher assessment as it currently stands at the moment.

Now, another huge question, which nobody seems to be able to tackle at the moment, is: what will the impact of the changes to the curriculum be on qualifications, as Suzy alluded to? You did start to answer the question, but we do need clarity very soon on this issue. You said that 2026 is a long way off, but no, it isn’t, because the first cohort of pupils that will have followed the new curriculum—those in year 7 in September 2022—will reach year 10 and they will start GCSE courses in September 2025. Working back from that point, the schedules for those courses will have to have been published by 2024 so that teachers have time for preparation. There is huge work to be done, first of all, by Qualifications Wales, in terms of setting the criteria, and then by the WJEC, and any other awarding bodies who may be interested in qualifications, in terms of drawing up those qualifications and going through Qualification Wales's validation processes. Now, I know that, quite understandably, you’ve sought to avoid having the nature of the qualifications having too much of an influence on the curriculum, but the time has now come to actually make some robust decisions in this area.

Turning now to an issue that is a cause for concern for me, namely the Welsh aspects of this curriculum, and the Welsh identity of the curriculum, I would like to know how much emphasis there will be on Welsh history, for example. You talk about a Welsh dimension, but I am talking about a curriculum that is rooted in the Welsh experience, and I do think that there is a difference there, and I would like some clarity on that issue. There are questions that arise about the framework for the Welsh language, and what the assessment arrangements will be there, and there is a major question, which isn’t being answered at the moment, about what the nature of the qualification or qualifications will be in terms of the Welsh language. There is a lack of clarity about that, and that is a cause for concern; there is a vacuum there, and I would appreciate a little more meat on the bones, as it were.

Finally, I turn to an issue that Suzy started to address, which is on page 35 of the consultation document, and here it says that there will be

‘Duty on all schools and Funded Nursery Settings to teach English as a compulsory element of the new curriculum for Wales.’

Now, that strikes me as being very strange, in these days where the cylchoedd meithrin run by Mudiad Ysgolion Meithrin do provide their provision through the medium of Welsh. And every expert opinion in this area has emphasised that the immersion of children in the Welsh language, at that very early age, is the best way of producing children who are fluent Welsh speakers. And a statement such as that one does raise a number of questions, I believe, and it has frightened Mudiad Ysgolion Meithrin without doubt, and it appears to me to run contrary to the aim of a million Welsh speakers. So, I would like to know whether that is an error if truth be told, It’s such a strange and unexpected statement in the current context in Wales. It strikes me that it may be a mistake.

So—

Allow the Minister to respond to some of the questions then. I think that you have asked plenty of questions there. 

There are a number of questions that need to be asked, certainly.

To be asked and answered. The Minister, Kirsty Williams. 

Thank you very much to the Member for the questions. She is quite right, of course, that the professional learning requirements to implement the curriculum are not a matter for the White Paper, but just to reassure the Member that no education system can exceed the quality of those people who stand in front of our children day in and day out, and, therefore, having a professional workforce that is in a position to make good on the vision of the curriculum is absolutely crucial. That's why we have undergone a reformed initial teacher education process. It hasn't been without its pain, and we are confident that the new ITE provision centres that have been selected through that rigorous process will be in a position to ensure that those newly going into the profession will have the skills needed. 

We are currently working on groundbreaking alternative routes to qualification for teaching, which will put us at the vanguard of teacher education, and I hope to make statements on that shortly. But, clearly, we also have to attend to the needs of those who are already in the workforce, who, hopefully, will continue to be in the workforce for many years to come. I have previously announced to this Chamber the largest ever financial package of professional learning support in the history of devolution. Some significant resources are going in now and in the new financial year. Those resources will be made available directly to schools, where headteachers who are best placed to understand the professional learning needs of their colleagues in their school will be able to make individual plans for the use of those resources. 

I'm looking for a new approach, a new, innovative approach to professional learning. Gone are the days, I think, where we rely on sending people, usually to Cardiff, to spend the day listening to the sage on the stage, only then to go back and have little idea of how that could be properly implemented in individual classrooms. We need to be smarter than that. 

The Member does raise the important issue—and I know in having spoken to headteacher conferences before Christmas, that the issue of inset day, an extra inset day, is one that is high on people's agenda. Those Members who are au fait with the subordinate legislation processes will know that, actually, I do not have the power to simply announce an extra inset day. I am actively considering whether that should be made available, but it will have to go out to public consultation and will be subject to processes here within the Assembly itself. But I hope to make an announcement shortly about whether that process will be undertaken. But I understand that teachers will need the opportunity to prepare themselves for this new challenge, as will our school leaders, which is why I have been quite clear to our National Academy of Educational Leadership that, in commissioning programmes to support existing and aspiring headteachers, their ability to be able to support curriculum reform in their own schools should be an important part of that.

I wasn't being flippant when I said 2026 was a long way away. What I was actually trying to say—obviously not clearly enough—was that that will be here with us before we know it. And that's why it's been absolutely crucial to me that we have had Qualifications Wales engaged from the very start of the process. Work is already under way on understanding the consequences for qualifications as a result of these curriculum changes. And if the Member would like further details, I'm happy to facilitate a meeting between herself and Qualifications Wales, so she can hear, in more time than I'm able to give here this afternoon, and talk about the nature of that work, remembering, of course, that qualifications is now arm's length from Ministers.

That brings me on to the issue of assessment. The detail and emphasis of our assessment arrangements will need to change, to best support the new curriculum. The central focus of assessment in the future will be to ensure that all children and young people understand how they are performing, and, crucially, what they need to do next to make progress and move on. So there will be greater emphasis on formative assessment, to inform next steps for both teaching and learning. To strengthen the relationship between the curriculum and assessment, and to give a focus on each child's progress, there will no longer be levels. Instead, assessment will be based on the achievement outcomes, which will be published alongside the contents of the AoLEs. And they will expressly set out what achievement looks like in each of those six areas of learning and experience. And what I do propose—and is included in the White Paper—is that headteachers will have a duty to set achievement outcomes to support all children and young people at their school, to progress along the continuum of learning. And to ensure that there will be consistency between schools, we propose that they have to have regard to the achievement outcomes, which, as I said, will be published later on this year.

So, there will be a continued focus on teacher assessment, and assessment for learning, alongside our other assessment regimes, such as the online adaptive testing. With regard to evaluation, which, as I said earlier, is different—and that is how we hold the system to account, both individual schools and the system as a whole—details of that will be published later on.

With regard to the Welsh language, I was very grateful to receive the support of Cymdeithas yr Iaith yesterday, who have welcomed very much what we're doing with regard to the continuum of Welsh language learning. And we will be getting away from this distinction between what is classed as a 'first language', and what is a 'second language'. That is long overdue in our system, and I am very glad that we have got to the position of establishing a continuum. That continuum will also exist, of course, for the English language, and we would expect children to move along either continuum, at a rate and in a way that is commensurate with the nature of the language of tuition in their school. So, understandably, we would expect a child who is in Welsh-medium education, where the language of tuition is Welsh medium—that child would probably progress along the progression steps more quickly. But our intention is to continually review the progression steps so we can add added rigour into the system as the years go on.

I will be absolutely clear, as I was to Suzy Davies: it is already a requirement in the foundation phase that children have to develop an awareness of both of our languages, and language skills learned in one language support the development and knowledge and skills in another language. There is nothing in here that will undermine the issue of immersion. And actually—certainly in the 'cylch-s' I know best, in areas of Wales where we need more people to make a positive choice, to choose cylch, and to chose Welsh medium for their children—those 'cylch-s' work in a bilingual way, especially for children such as my own, who came from a family with no Welsh at all, to be able to settle in, and to be able to enjoy their time there, and to develop their Welsh language skills. And there is nothing in these proposals that would undermine that.

In fact, I would even go as far as to say that it's just not credible to say any proposal in this paper will damage our ambition for a million Welsh speakers, and what I should also say is that you should see my ministerial inbox. I try to stick to my principles on ensuring that the quality of Welsh learning is as good as it could be. But that results in some pretty horrible e-mails into my inbox, and it shows me we still have a long way to go—a long way to go—to win the argument about why having bilingual children is the best possible gift that we can give our children and young people.

And we have to be very careful about some of the language we ourselves use when discussing these issues, because I've been surprised in my inbox on a regular basis that we have parents who write to me who don't believe that their children should be taught Welsh at all—at all—in our system. As we're introducing a system that—. As I said, I want to ensure that all of our children have an equal chance to be bilingual speakers—. Then, we need to move forward carefully, and ensure that we don't scaremonger or feel that the issue of the language is being undermined one way or the other. 

Thank you for your statement, Minister. Your statement paints a very grand description of a very grand plan for a new curriculum, and I can't say that I disagree with the objectives of that curriculum. But, as you know, the Association of Directors of Education in Wales, along with the Welsh Local Government Association, have said that pupils' learning could be left to chance, because the plans are so vague. You have said, with no teaching experience at all—. You've had the audacity to say they don't understand the proposals or that they're working on out-of-date information. Well, if they don't understand the new curriculum or they're working on out-of-date information, the fault lies with the process that has been put in place for explaining that new curriculum and providing information on it. If essential people are out of date or don't understand the curriculum, then it's the Minister's responsibility to rectify it. So, I'd ask what the Minister's plans are to do that.

I'd suggest that the real problem here is that the WLGA and the association of directors of education do understand the new curriculum, but they seem concerned about whether that curriculum is clear enough to enable teachers to deliver it, and do so consistently across Wales. They've said that in the area of language and literacy learning 

'There are many high-level & grandiose themes at the expense of the nuts & bolts of language development – speaking, reading & writing' and that science and technology appear to be the 'least developed' area. This should be of concern to everybody. It would also appear that the 'nuts and bolts'—as they put it—of education are taking the second place to ambition for grandiose themes. 

My question is whether the Minister will take these criticisms on board or simply continue to deny that there may be a problem. I understand that the Minister wants more autonomy for teachers and schools, but does that not clash with the decision to force schools to adopt her vision of personalised assessments and sex and relationship education? So, Minister, how much more genuine autonomy do you want schools to have? And what areas would you not be happy to see them have more autonomy in? 

Qualifications are only as valuable as their reputation. The new curriculum will have to aim for a qualification at the end of it. But those qualifications are only as valuable as their reputation, as I've just said. And in recent years, we've seen employers lose a certain amount of faith in some university degrees, and some universities questioning the value of some exams taken at school. So, to what extent have you tested how the new curriculum is being received and regarded by universities and employers inside and outside Wales?

Young people today are having to establish themselves in a job market that's far more globalised than anyone here has had to cope with. So, to what extent have you looked at the curriculums of countries such as India and China that are producing more and more young people with exceptional skills? It's all very well looking at other European countries, but it's the developing countries that are increasingly dominating the global jobs market. [Laughter.] You can laugh as much as you like, but it's the truth. So, I wonder if you agree with me that we should be looking at how our youngsters can cope with the competition from there, rather than countries that are already having difficulty competing globally. 

And on the employability subject, although we clearly do need to develop that side of things, the Minister ought not to lose site of the fact that Wales still needs an education system that encourages young people to become innovators, pioneers, experimenters and groundbreakers. So, whilst I agree that numeracy, literacy and digital skills are all important areas, because they equip people with the skills they need to cope with day-to-day living and employment, can you tell me, if anything, what you've done to make sure our future curriculum won't be just about training people to have employability skills, but also give them the encouragement and skills needed to become the out-of-the-box thinkers and entrepreneurs of tomorrow? What leadership have you given on that particular matter, Minister? 

And lastly, the introduction of a new curriculum gives the Minister ample opportunity in future years to say that poor performance could be just down to schools getting to grips with the curriculum rather than the curriculum itself being flawed. So, what measures will the Minister put in place so that we will be able to measure its successes and failures, and the reasons from them, from its start, rather than years later, when the Minister is no longer in place to be held accountable for her management of the creation of the new curriculum? Thank you.

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

The Member began by asking about how do I respond to issues raised by the WLGA and ADEW. Well, of course, we rehearsed these at length at the recent meeting of the Children, Young People and Education committee, and my views haven't changed. Indeed, they've only been reinforced. The following Monday, I was at an event where I sat next to two of our directors of local education authorities and both denied that they had any sight of that paper and were unaware as to whom had written it. But, clearly, I do take on board that if there is a lack of clarity from the association of directors or the WLGA, then we must redouble our efforts to work alongside them, and I hope that is happening today. There is a change board being chaired by the Welsh Government's director of education and I hope both ADEW and the WLGA are in attendance as the change board finally signs off on all the AoLEs. 

The Member asks whether I have considered globalisation. Globalisation is one of the driving factors about why we need to reform the curriculum. This is one of the reasons why we are having to do what we are doing, to ensure that we have equipped our children to be those competitors in a global world. The Member asks about whether issues around creativity and critical thinking are part of this process. I would refer the Member to the four purposes, the duty of which the Welsh Government and our schools will have at the forefront of our minds when developing individual curricula. 

Now, the Member does make a very important point about the ability of Welsh qualifications to be a passport to opportunities anywhere in the world and I am absolutely confident that by working alongside Qualifications Wales, who have the legal responsibility to create and to police those qualifications, we'll in no way be disadvantaging Welsh children and young people. Their ability to use these qualifications as a passport, as I said, to universities, work experiences, employment opportunities anywhere on the globe—they will not be stopped because of these qualifications. There may lots of other reasons why they can't go to places to work and study, but it won't be as a result of these curriculum reforms.

No change is not an option—the jobs haven't been invented yet for our primary school children to do, so we absolutely have to change the curriculum. It's pointless learning facts by rote when everybody can look up facts on their mobile phone. So, I completely support the philosophy and the approach of the Government on this matter. I just wanted to confine my remarks to a few questions. First of all, the statutory roll-out in September 2022 is really not very far off. So, I wonder how we are minimising anxiety for staff facing change, which always causes—. I'm not interested in the Welsh Local Government Association and the directors of education; I'm interested in the grass roots. Because we have to be aware that, in England, there is a serious problem of staff retention in schools and because the job is just so all-encompassing if you're a full-time teacher. So, will the more creative curriculum for pupils also offer more creative and flexible career paths for teachers? That is one question.

My second question relates to the rather depressing document, 'Language Trends Wales 2018', which I think hit our desks last week. Relatively few schools—. This is about the massive reduction in the learning of modern foreign languages and the impact of Brexit, which this report touches on. More than a third of schools report that the Brexit process is having a negative effect on attitudes towards the study of modern foreign languages. Of course we should celebrate our bilingualism in Wales, but we can't just be learners of Welsh and English; we have to be learners of other foreign languages so that we are going to continue to be able to deal with the global environment. So, whilst we are embedding the new curriculum—and I wish you well with all of that—how are we going to stop the drain in modern foreign languages, because I haven't yet been able to find anything on that in the White Paper?

Can I thank the Member for the questions? Sometimes, in debates about the future of education policy, there is an artificial and a false choice, I think, made between having a curriculum that focuses on skills and having a curriculum that focuses on knowledge. Now, despite the fact that we can all Google when the battle of Hastings was or what happened on a certain date, that does not replace the fact that, actually, we still need some knowledge in our curriculum. We can't get away from that. This is not an 'either/or'. This is a curriculum that will have both in it.

The Member is absolutely right that teaching is a challenging, challenging profession, and there are two things that we need to do. First of all—and there is a work stream in Welsh Government to do this—regardless of the new curriculum, we have to look at workload issues for teachers in the current curriculum as well as the future curriculum. Simply offering people extra money if they stay in the profession isn't going to cut it. I have never met a teacher who entered a classroom because they thought it was going to make them rich. They do so because they are motivated by either a love of their subject and the desire to impart knowledge about that subject to other people or because they see the intrinsic value of contributing to their society, to their community, to their country by taking on this most important of jobs, and we need to make that a manageable job for them to do.

So, it's not about chucking money at them, like we have seen this week. It is actually about understanding and tackling those workload issues. But I do believe that the curriculum changes that we're working on here will make Wales an attractive place to be a teacher, because we will acknowledge their skills, their creativity and their ability to shape lessons to truly fit the children in front of them and not simply to have to work from a tick list that a politician somewhere said they had to teach. We also do know from looking at international studies by the OECD that one of the ways in which you can remove stress from those working in the profession is to up the levels of autonomy. Those practitioners who have higher levels of autonomy in systems, such as in Finland where there is high autonomy for individual teachers—that's where you have higher levels of satisfaction with the profession and you have better retention rates and fewer people moving away. And this is part of the process that we're in—giving greater autonomy and flexibility for teachers in their individual classrooms.

Now, with regard to MFL, I don't think that there is a dissenting voice—well, I don't know what UKIP think—but there is not a dissenting voice, I feel, on behalf of the Conservative Party or Plaid Cymru or on these benches here about the importance of MFL. We all share that. Of course, the issue is that, if you're a bilingual person, once you've learnt two languages, the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh actually are easier to learn. So, actually, as a system as a whole, having a bilingual system, we put our children in a better cognitive place to actually acquire other languages. But you are absolutely right: we do see a continuing challenge in persuading young people to take those languages on when they become optional subjects—usually, in most schools, at the age of 14. I've seen that in my own family; I've seen that challenge in my own family. What we're doing here, in our new curriculum, is actually bringing exposure to other languages—community languages here in Cardiff, recognition for those children who speak different languages at home, recognising community languages, modern foreign languages, the classical languages and British Sign Language—and the expectation in the new curriculum is that it will be brought down into what we would call the primary ages. And, actually, that early exposure rather than leaving it to 11, which is where most children, not all children—. Because we have some fantastic primary schools who are doing wonderful work with French, Spanish, German, Chinese. By bringing that down so that all children in the primary age have exposure to that language, I hope that will make a real difference in changing attitudes towards, and passion for, and an understanding that acquiring multiple languages is actually a personally growing thing to do, but, actually, has huge economic opportunities arise out of it if you are able to do that.

Can I thank the Minister very much for her statement? I welcome lots of the comments and, obviously, the tenure of the contributions this afternoon. Obviously, concentrating on the historical connotations in the first place, it was the Rev Griffith Jones of Llanddowror in Carmarthenshire who established circulating Sunday schools in the eighteenth century as a template for all modern schools. And such was the success of those circulating schools, it made Wales one of the most literate of European countries of all, at that time, in the mid-eighteenth century, such that Catherine the Great, the Empress of Russia, sent an envoy here to little old Wales to discover how those schools operated. You might not find that on your Google search, which is why we do need to teach Welsh history in our Welsh schools. So, I would make that plea, but, obviously, I've made that before.

In terms of time, I'm just going to concentrate on one point in your White Paper, and it is a point already alluded to by Suzy and by Siân Gwenllian. It's with regard to the duty on all schools—I see under section 3.79 here, bullet point 4:

'Duty on all schools and Funded Nursery Settings to teach English as a compulsory element of the new curriculum for Wales.'

I can understand where that comes from from an equality point of view, but it actually does not happen at the moment. I think it would be a backward step if our Welsh-medium nurseries, playgroups and early years in schools actually started introducing English now because this is about immersion of language. It is an unequal situation at the moment. I speak as a chair of governors of a Welsh-medium primary school in Swansea, where 92 per cent of the children come from a non-Welsh-speaking background. They depend for their Welsh learning on the school. So, only 8 per cent of them have some Welsh at home, and, in fact, only half of those have one parent. So, in other words, 4 per cent have one parent speaking Welsh. So, 92 per cent have a totally non-Welsh background. It is an unequal situation then, because it's about early language learning and immersion in that language.

The school that I'm now the chair of governors—previously, over 20 years ago, it was a bilingual school. It wasn't a Welsh-medium school, it was bilingual—English and Welsh. What we discovered was that some of the children did not always end up fluent in Welsh by the age of 11. Now they do. They start off, everything is in Welsh, English is introduced at seven—by 11, everybody is bilingual, coming from the 92 per cent non-Welsh-speaking background or not. And, obviously, it is easier to learn another language like French, Spanish and German, especially introduced at primary level. So, I would implore you—all international experience about learning language in a minority situation that we are in now, it is not equal, and we have to redress that inequality by making sure it's Welsh-only up until the age of seven, and then you also introduce other languages after that, because they have the overwhelming English influence at home, all around them, on television. They depend on the school for that Welsh. Look again, please, Minister, at section 3.79. Diolch yn fawr.

Thank you, Dai. The experience that you've just described in the school of which you are a chairman is the experience I have in my own family. My children are bilingual children. I took the time to ask my 14-year-old last night whether she had any regrets, because, for a parent to make that choice, it's sometimes not an easy choice. It has not been without its pitfalls when I have sat alongside them and, gosh, their Welsh far exceeded mine very, very, very quickly. It's sometimes not a comfortable place to be and it's not without its pitfalls. But I asked her last night whether she had any regrets and she said, 'I am proud. I am really proud that I can speak two languages' and, as she reminded me, 'That's something that you can't do', and, when they want to gang up on me and when they want me to not understand what they are saying about me—well, you can imagine how they address one another. Let me be absolutely clear here. I in no way want to undermine the principle of immersion, which is an important way in which we can assure that children can be bilingual children.

Can I just make the point about a Welsh dimension to this curriculum? Can I just say that a Welsh dimension has to be more than just Welsh history, Dai? There seems to be a debate where we always talk about the Welsh dimension only in the confines of Welsh history lessons. I don't want children just to learn about Welsh history—which, of course, I want them to do—I want them to understand about Wales's contribution to the wider world, I want them to understand about Welsh writers, actors, musicians, those people that have excelled in the expressive arts; the fact that it is a Welshman in Geneva who is running the hadron collider. So, I don't want the Welsh dimension simply to be the preserve of Welsh history lessons. I want the Welsh dimension of our curriculum to stretch right across every single area of experience and learning, because there is no area of learning and experience where Wales hasn't got a proud story to tell about its contribution to all those very, very important aspects. And we cannot confine it just to learning about our history.

Thank you. I have two more speakers and, as you can see, we are going over, but I will call those two speakers, but I would ask them to be brief and just to cover additional points that may not have already been raised. Dawn Bowden.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I will cut my preamble to the question. I briefly wanted, therefore, Minister, if I could, to focus on one of the four purposes that are set out in the proposed structural changes to the curriculum—that of ensuring that our children are ethical, informed citizens and, particularly, that they're knowledgeable about their culture, community and society in the world now and in the past. The objectives of this purpose are clearly laudable, but I'd like to follow on, I think, from the point that Paul Davies made earlier in his contribution, when he was asking the First Minister questions, regarding the lack of knowledge, or even denial, actually, about the Holocaust.

Having just spent the last week reflecting on the Holocaust and genocide and how the conditions for that can be created through ignorance and prejudice, and knowing, as we all do, that populism and intolerance is on the rise, I'd be interested to know what specifically we're likely to see in the new curriculum that will ensure that we do see more tolerant, inclusive and respectful individuals coming out of school, who have a greater understanding of the impact of their words and their actions. I'm sure you'll probably say that this is probably more appropriate for discussion or question once we're talking about the draft curriculum, but I'd still welcome your thoughts at this stage in terms of what specifically we can do within the curriculum to make sure that our children do come out of school with that much more rounded view and values and approach towards their place in society.

Can I thank Dawn Bowden for that question? When designing the curriculum and the individual content of AoLEs in schools, schools will be placed on a duty to be able to judge that content against whether that achieves those purposes. So, the fact that that purpose is there at the very centre of our curriculum—and the expectations of what kind of people we expect to leave our compulsory education system I believe are quite clear. 

I know that, over the weekend, the Member has been deeply involved with issues around remembrance of the Holocaust and I was very pleased last week to use my official communications channel to promote and highlight the fantastic resources that the Holocaust Education Trust have and to promote the use of those resources in Welsh schools. Can I give you a very practical example of how this is already happening with regards to our DCF, our digital competence framework? Sometimes people think, when we talk about the DCF, we only talk about how you use a computer, but it goes way beyond that. One of the things that we're working on on the DCF is the ability to spot fake news: to be able to go online, see a piece of information and to be able to ask yourselves those critical questions about whether this is true or false or how you can go and find out other information so you can corroborate what you've just read. And that ability to interrogate information that is made available on social media networks I think is now more important than it has ever been and that's, for instance, a crucial point of what we're currently working on with the digital competence framework, and, of course, that will be a statutory part of the curriculum going forward.

Finally, Rhianon Passmore.

Diolch, Deputy Llywydd. Thank you, Minister. There is, indeed, great potential and opportunity within this new curriculum, and, I believe, great prizes: I do welcome very much the strategic intention around early and pre-linguistic development across Wales. We need that linguistic development. We can be a bilingual nation to a greater extent, but we need to be a multilingual nation to take our true place in the world—and I won't talk about the areas of experience and learning about music and the arts today. Can you outline for me how you believe the role of the education improvement consortia will play out in delivery and potentially helping to implement the new curriculum in Wales?

Thank you, Rhianon, for that. Clearly, the middle tier, which includes our local education authorities, Estyn and the regional school improvement services, will have a critical role to play in ensuring that the curriculum is adopted and delivered to a very high standard. What I would like to do is to reassure schools that we will be using this period of time between the publication of the AoLEs, the passage of this legislation, and the statutory roll-out in 2022 to make sure that all aspects of our education system are up to speed and that any judgments that the school improvement service may or may not make as regards the effectiveness of the school—the personnel that they deploy to that school will be well-versed in the pedagogical principles and the ethos of this curriculum.

Thank you very much, Minister.