1. Will the Minister provide an update on Welsh Government discussions with local authorities in Gwent about the provision of the SenCom service? OAQ53347

Thank you, Lynne, for your continuing work on this important subject. 

Working on a regional basis can help ensure resources and expertise are targeted effectively to support learners with additional learning needs. I have asked my officials to engage with SenCom to understand the potential impact on learners of Newport’s proposed withdrawal from that service.

Minister, I continue to be dismayed at the apparent willingness of Newport City Council—a Labour council—to jeopardise services for a very vulnerable group of children and young people by their withdrawal from the effective and highly specialised regional SenCom service. Newport are now, belatedly, undertaking some consultation with families, but parents have complained about letters being sent out only in English, in small print, and too late for parents to attend important consultation events. Would the Minister agree with me that in order for consultation to be meaningful, it needs to be timely, in a language parents can understand, including minority ethnic parents, and in a format that is accessible to parents who themselves have a sensory impairment? And do you share my continued concern at the way Newport City Council is handling this planned change to services for children with a sensory impairment? 

Lynne, it is absolutely critical that those families who are in receipt of this service are engaged with properly and that the individual interests of individual learners is never forgotten. And I would agree with you absolutely that any consultation with families needs to be meaningful, and that cannot be meaningful if parents are unable to engage in that. As I have said, in my original answer to you, my officials will continue to seek reassurances from Newport and, indeed, other local authorities who may be impacted by this proposal, to ensure that the learning needs of those individual children and young people are not jeopardised.  

Minister, I just heard your previous answer to my colleague. You may be aware that I asked for a statement on this issue on 11 December, and was told by the leader of the house that you were in discussion with Newport City Council about the rationale for the withdrawal of the service and that you would report back. Since then, many charities, such as the Royal National Institute of Blind People Cymru, Wales Council for the Blind, Guide Dogs Cymru and Sight Cymru have raised concerns that Newport's decision could lead to a postcode lottery of this provision. Councillors from all parties in Monmouthshire unanimously backed a motion to oppose Newport City Council's decision, deeply regretting the level of uncertainty it has created around this essential support network. Minister, what action will you take to ensure that services for these vulnerable children in south-east Wales are protected, please?

Well, I can assure the Member that I wrote to Councillor Debbie Wilcox, the leader of Newport City Council, back in November, seeking reassurances. A response was received from the said council in December, and the council stated that they were confident that they will leave a significant and well-funded service that should be more than able to maintain the current levels of delivery to the remaining four local authorities. However, as you will have heard from Lynne Neagle, the situation is fluid, continues to change. Newport council are belatedly now engaging with parents of children who use this service, but, again, as we've heard from Lynne Neagle, the quality of that consultation exercise is at best questionable, and my officials continue to liaise with Newport City Council over their actions on this particular service. 

Minister, I know your strong personal commitment to this and to ensuring that all learners across the whole country have the very rich education experience that they have a right to expect. I share Lynne Neagle's absolute dismay at the actions of Newport City Council. I feel that Newport City Council is turning its back on some of the most vulnerable learners in the country and acting in an entirely cavalier fashion, without any real care or consideration for the impact that this is having on learners across the whole of the Gwent region. It is a tragedy that, at the time of your consulting on the code for additional learning needs, this is taking place and causing such distress for people in the region. Minister, my question to you is this: how can you as a Welsh Government ensure that we have the structures in place in the future to ensure that councils are unable to cause this distress, unable to act in this way, and unable to turn their backs on the needs of some of the most vulnerable people in our society?

The concern that I have is that SenCom services, which, as everybody has recognised, is a service that delivers on a regional basis to a very specific group of children and young people with very specific additional learning needs, actually has been, I would argue, an example of very good practice—of local authorities pooling their resources, working together, to ensure a strong, sustainable service. Now, the fact that Newport has made these decisions—which they are entitled to do—demonstrates how we will have to look again at how we encourage and support local authorities to work on a regional basis where there are proven advantages for doing so, and I continue to have such discussions with my colleague the Minister for Housing and Local Government.

John Griffiths is not in the Chamber to ask question 2.

Question 2 [OAQ53370] not asked.