This brings us on to item 5, which is the debate on the Petitions Committee report on access to British Sign Language. I call the Chair of the committee to move the motion—David Rowlands. 

Motion NDM6952 David J. Rowlands

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

Notes the report of the Petitions Committee on Petition P-04-628 To improve access to education and services in British Sign Language, which was laid in the Table Office on 5 October 2018.

Motion moved.

Diolch, Llywydd, for the opportunity to open this debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee. The petition we are discussing today relates to British Sign Language, and the ability of deaf children and their families to learn and use BSL in their everyday lives. As we all know, communication is a vital aspect of life. However, for some it can pose significant challenges on a daily basis.

This petition, which collected 1,162 signatures, was submitted by Deffo!, a forum for deaf young people based in Swansea. I welcome Deffo! and other observers to the public gallery, and I would also like to inform Members that an interpreter is signing proceedings in BSL in the gallery. A BSL version of the committee’s report is also available online, and a BSL video of this debate will also be made available later today on Senedd.tv.

I would also like to thank the petitioners on behalf of the committee—and, I am sure, all Members of this Assembly—for their tenacity and commitment to fighting for improvements to the education and support available to deaf and hard-of-hearing young people in Wales. In particular, the committee thanks Cathie and Helen Robins-Talbot from Deffo! for the information they have provided throughout the process, as well as to Luke and Zoe who gave deeply compelling oral evidence to the Petitions Committee during our consideration of the petition.

The petition calls on the Welsh Government to improve access to education and services in British Sign Language in order to improve the quality of life for deaf children and their families, and to deaf people of all ages. There are around 2,600 deaf children in Wales and over 3,000 pupils whose major special educational need is hearing impairment. BSL is a distinct language that is not dependent upon, or strongly related to, spoken English. The British Deaf Association state that there are approximately 7,200 BSL users in Wales, 4,000 of whom are deaf.  The Welsh Government recognised BSL as a language in its own right in 2004.

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

The petition has a number of objectives: improved access for families to learn BSL, for BSL to be introduced to the national curriculum, better access to education through BSL, and making more services and resources accessible in BSL for deaf young people. I will focus for the rest of this contribution on each of the petition’s objectives in turn, in order to outline the evidence the committee received, the conclusions we reached, and the responses provided by the Welsh Government.

Firstly, the petition calls for improved access to families to learn BSL. Deffo! have stressed the vital importance of this so that parents and siblings can communicate with and support deaf children within their family. They told the committee that cost can be a significant problem, with basic BSL classes for adults costing £300 per person and advanced courses up to £1,600. There are also few opportunities for families to learn BSL together, as most classes available are provided through adult education centres. The Welsh Government has consistently told the committee that provision of these classes are the responsibility of local authorities. However, the result appears to be a lack of provision, because it becomes a choice within local adult education budgets. The evidence the committee received demonstrates that, in most cases, there are no free or low-cost sign language courses available to parents and children.

I note that the children’s commissioner has also recommended that BSL should be made accessible to all families with deaf children, and the committee has heard that the National Deaf Children’s Society is disappointed that this has not been taken forward.

The petitioners have argued that the current status of BSL and the fact that it is considered to be a choice rather than a medical need mean that this is the type of provision that tends to be squeezed out during times of financial pressure. They have proposed that the Welsh Government should recognise BSL as a minority language, and that local authorities should consider it to be the first language of many deaf and hard of hearing children and young people. They consider that this would serve to improve and protect provision for learning BSL. The Petitions Committee agree. We believe it is vital for families of deaf children to be offered an opportunity to learn how to communicate through BSL. As a result, we consider that the Welsh Government could do more by guiding local authorities to treat BSL as the first language of many deaf children and young people as a way to reframe the conversation about what constitutes adequate provision. Furthermore, we have recommended that the Welsh Government gives consideration to the development of a national charter for delivery of services and resources, including education, to deaf children and their families. We think this would help to improve the consistency of provision throughout Wales.

I welcome the fact that the Welsh Government has accepted both of our recommendations in this area, and that it has also acknowledged that members of the deaf community face a number of issues in relation to BSL, including a shortage of interpreters. In her response, the Minister commits to reviewing the provision of BSL in Wales and considering the development of a national charter of the type recommended by the committee. We would welcome an update on this work this afternoon, and urge her to ensure this work is progressed with pace in order to begin to improve the support available for deaf children and their families.

Moving on, the second call in the petition is for BSL to be included in the national curriculum. The petitioners have advised the committee that the majority of deaf children in mainstream schools do not have access to BSL in school, but are taught sign-supported English instead. This does not transfer outside of school, and therefore deaf children still have to learn BSL in order to communicate with other members of the deaf community. Deffo! argue that, if BSL were to be included within the national curriculum, it would help other learners to communicate with deaf or hard of hearing people in social and other contexts, as well as gradually improving communication in everyday life.

Throughout our consideration of the petition, Deffo! have expressed frustration with their experience of seeking to engage with the Government on this matter, and with what they consider to be a lack of engagement with processes such as the Donaldson review. That said, during this time, they did have the opportunity to meet the previous Minister and the committee has welcomed the fact that BSL is included within the languages and communication area of the new curriculum. 

However, we remain concerned about a lack of national direction in relation to ensuring that BSL provision is widely available in Welsh schools, and the Minister’s response to our report indicates that this will largely remain at the discretion of individual schools and local authorities. Speaking frankly, it is currently difficult to see this as promising any significant step forward in improving the ability for pupils to access BSL through the curriculum. I urge the Minister to consider further how schools can be specifically encouraged to pursue this option in light of the formal recognition of BSL as a language in its own right.

The committee has also called for the Welsh Government to explore the creation of a GCSE in BSL. After this was raised by Mike Hedges, the previous First Minister wrote to Qualifications Wales on this subject. The response indicated that Qualifications Wales does not consider it viable to develop such a GCSE solely for use in Wales. However, subsequently, the UK Government has indicated that it is giving consideration to the development of a BSL GCSE. We understand that Qualifications Wales is open to adopting any GCSE developed and we would urge them, and the Minister, to ensure that this happens quickly in order to avoid a situation where deaf pupils in Wales fall behind their counterparts in England.

Access to appropriately qualified staff was also of significant concern to Deffo! They highlighted a number of statistics, including that pupils have just three hours of contact with a teacher of the deaf per week on average, far less than the target of 270 hours per year, and that significant numbers of appropriately qualified teachers are due to retire in the next 15 years. Deffo! suggest that many are being replaced by teaching assistants. In response, Ministers have referred to duties on local authorities to identify, assess and make provision for children with special educational needs. Again, however, the committee were concerned by a sense that there is insufficient impetus coming from the Welsh Government to make this the case in reality. It is unclear how the Government ensures that these duties are implemented sufficiently in practice.

In our fourth recommendation, the committee urges the Government to engage with workforce planning issues and consider the long-term sustainability of support for deaf pupils. The Minister’s response refers to welcome additional funding being provided. However, the National Deaf Children’s Society has referred to this as a short-term solution to a growing problem, and we urge the Government to continue to focus on ensuring that Wales has an appropriately trained education workforce in relation to the needs of deaf pupils.

The final aspect of the petition is a call for more services and resources to be accessible through BSL. Deffo! told the committee that many deaf young people fail to access services with the reasonable adjustments they are entitled to under equalities legislation. For example, witnesses noted that there is only one deaf youth worker for the whole of Wales. Deffo! want BSL users to be able to access information about services such as education, healthcare, social services and public transport in their preferred language. They told the committee that they felt demoralised by their inability to access such services.

Ministers have noted that the Welsh Government does not have the power to legislate in relation to the provision of languages other than Welsh. However, the committee believes that our earlier recommendation in relation to the development of a national charter for the delivery of services and resources to deaf children and young people will help to address some of these issues if it is taken forward. Such a framework could help to improve consistency of service provision across public services and provide greater accountability where such provision does not meet suitable standards. Again, I urge the Minister to ensure that this is taken forward in a robust and meaningful way.

In conclusion, Dirprwy Lywydd, I want to thank Deffo! again for bringing the petition forward and everyone else who has provided evidence to the committee. The issues raised by this petition are many and varied, and they challenge all of us here to seek to ensure that deaf children and young people in Wales are able to access the education and other services that they should be entitled to. I welcome the positive response received to our recommendations from the Minister, and I hope that, if they are taken forward, these actions result in improvements for deaf children and their families. Diolch yn fawr.

Thank you. Janet Finch-Saunders.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I will sign. [Signs in BSL.] That's the trouble with having a long name. [Signs in BSL.] That said: I am Janet Finch-Saunders and I am a BSL student. Over the last year, my team and I have enjoyed the pleasure of learning BSL. We've already passed the first level and are now studying for the next. The reason for this is because I acknowledge the fact that many of the 7,200 BSL users in Wales rely on BSL as their first language and believe the support we offer should be more accessible to our deaf community. Through my role on the Petitions Committee, I have been delighted to support the cause made by Deffo! for improved access to information and services in BSL.

Following the Welsh Government's recognition of BSL as an official language in 2004, it is fair to say that progress has been poor. Whilst there are some pioneer schools, as part of the area of learning and experience for languages, literacy and communication, there's a lot of vagueness about where these schools are and how other children in schools can access this approach. Of course, it is reassuring to see that special educational needs schools are included in the trial group. However, it is deeply concerning that BSL is being classified as an international language, alongside other classic and modern languages. Not only is it incorrect in this instance to classify BSL as an international language, it simply undermines the necessity of this education for the 2,642 deaf children in Wales. As such, I would like to see an equivalence of BSL to English and Welsh used more widely in our schools. Qualifications Wales has dismissed the introduction of a GCSE in BSL at this stage, arguing that BSL will invite too few students. While they concede that this may be subject to reassessment following the conclusions of the Department for Education's collaboration with BSL partners, I consider that Wales should also undertake further preparations to pioneer the introduction of a GCSE in BSL.

GCSE aside, as for the Children's Commissioner for Wales's report, it is essential that sufficient funds are available to ensure that parents and close relatives of deaf individuals receive BSL training. And do you know what? How ironic that my colleague Suzy Davies AM told me of the news release:

'Parents of deaf children face funding "postcode lottery"

Parents of a deaf four-month-old have to pay £6,000 for sign language classes if they want to communicate with her.'

That is appalling in this day and age. Such inconsistencies are also creeping in to—. Oh, sorry. I've jumped ahead, sorry. Crucially, I believe that urgent action is needed to address the inconsistencies in the services currently being provided. I have seen first hand how there is a variation between different local authorities, and, for example, my colleague Mark Isherwood AM and I co-operated with the deaf community in Conwy County Borough Council following the withdrawal of financial support and the negative impacts on those merely wanting to communicate as regards council services in a way that they are only able to do.

Such inconsistencies are also creeping into education, as data released in July 2018 highlighted the fact that seven out of 18 respondents thought that SEN specialist services were not meeting the current demand for hearing impairment services. This is worrying, given that there are 3,116 pupils with this communication requirement in Wales. Whilst I welcome the fact that the Welsh Government has acknowledged there are problems and have allocated £289,000 to support professional training of a local sensory workforce, I am concerned that this is insufficient to ensure there is wide consistency across the service, especially when there is only one deaf youth worker for the whole of Wales. As such, I now implore you to listen to the recommendations of this report and to develop a national charter for the delivery of services and resources to deaf children, young people and their families, as a matter of urgency, so that there is a clear national benchmark and standard that all organisations and authorities can work towards. We are lucky. We can communicate here in the way that we are easiest able to do so. It is about time that the deaf people in our community are able to do the same. Diolch yn fawr iawn. 

First of all, can I declare an interest in that my sister is profoundly deaf and a user of British Sign Language, and also, as president of Swansea Hard of Hearing Group? And before anyone says, 'Why not Welsh sign language?', sign language is descriptive. You translate the sign into any other language you are familiar with. It does not use an alphabet, but has signs to describe what someone wants to say.

Turning to recommendation 1:

'The Welsh Government should support British Sign Language as a minority language, and encourage local authorities to recognise it as the first language of many Deaf children and young people when providing support and education services.'

For many deaf children, sign language is their first language, it's their language in the education system and it's the way that they converse and learn. Sign language should be treated as an equal language in the education system, no different to Welsh and English. It is a matter of educational equality that British Sign Language is treated equally with Welsh and English.

The Petitions Committee said that we therefore recommend that the opportunity to learn British Sign Language is made available to children at all levels of education. As part of this, we encourage the Welsh Government to continue to explore the creation of a GCSE in first-language sign language with Qualifications Wales. I again hope that that will be pushed forward. That sums up what is needed, and that is a GCSE in British Sign Language, so that proficiency in it can be recognised. It should be treated equally to English and Welsh in terms of a GCSE. This would mean that when jobs ask for grade C or better in English or Welsh, then it should also say 'or British Sign Language'. This provides equality of opportunity for those who use British Sign Language as their primary method of communication.

It is not only the deaf community that needs British Sign Language, but the rest of the population, who need to be able to communicate with those who are deaf. The petition calls for better access to British Sign Language classes for parents and siblings to support them in communicating with a deaf family member. Surely this is a reasonable request. The vast majority of children who are born deaf, or become deaf very young through diseases such as meningitis, mumps and measles, have hearing parents. A deaf child comes as a shock to parents and siblings who want to learn how to communicate with the deaf member of the family so that they're not left out. 

Turning to the last committee recommendation:

'We recommend that the Welsh Government continues its engagement with the Welsh Local Government Association on Workforce Planning for SEN specialist services, with a particular focus on teachers working with Deaf and hard of hearing children and young people. This should include

consideration of the longer term sustainability of these services. As part of this we support the introduction of a minimum standard BSL qualification for learning assistants supporting Deaf children and young people.'

This is incredibly important, because if people are working with deaf children, then they have to have at least the same level of language as the children they're working with. Whatever qualifications and support we say should be provided become meaningless if we don't have people qualified to teach and support learners. We can pass and agree all sorts of things here about the importance of having this support, but unless we've got people trained and capable of providing the support, it's not going to happen. 

Finally, the petition calls for services to be accessible to deaf young people in British Sign Language. Deffo! told the committee that many deaf young people are not able to access services and referred to a survey that suggested that most deaf people struggle to access healthcare such as GP surgeries. GP surgeries that only accept telephone calls for appointments or want patients to ring in and then ring patients back cause huge problems for those who are deaf and are not able to undertake that. I've talked to deaf people who have gone to a surgery and been told they've got to ring in. They say, 'Well, I can't hear', and it's, 'Well, that's the way we work.' And I think it is important that surgeries do show support, and I think it is important that surgeries realise that there are deaf people out there and that the one-size-fits-all of, 'Ring in, and we'll ring you back', doesn't work for people who can't hear. 

There is a lot that needs to be done to help the deaf community. Accepting these Petitions Committee recommendations and implementing them would be a good start. certainly not a finish, because the deaf community feel that they have not been treated fairly over many years. And I'm sure you recognise that, Deputy Presiding Officer. And it is important to ensure that we start making steps in that direction now.

British Sign Language is an important language that isn't adequately recognised. At present,  there is no adequate provision or no adequate rights in place to support deaf people at any stage of their journey through life, starting in the earliest years.

Ninety per cent of deaf children are born into hearing families. Therefore, new parents often have no experience of deafness, and have to learn how to communicate with and support the specific needs of their child afresh. Astonishingly, there is no free lesson provision, and, therefore, it's often a challenge for families to ensure opportunities to help their children. And it's true to say that this is a form of language deprivation. No child should be deprived of their right to their language. It's inevitable that a child's earliest development would be affected by this communication vacuum, because a lack of communication capability leads to feelings of isolation that have a negative impact on the emotional and mental health of an individual, and possibly on their life chances more widely.

Things don't improve when a deaf child goes to school. Deffo! says that, on average, deaf children who receive mainstream education in Wales leave school at 16 with a reading age of nine. Often, their speech and lip-reading skills are poor. Also, there has been a consistent gap in the attainment levels of deaf children compared to their hearing peers, which is at its widest in the foundation stage and at key stage 2. This gap exists because of the barriers that deaf learners face, more often than not. And this is also a concern for the children's commissioner, who has stated that the lack of commitment to closing the attainment gap between deaf learners and their hearing peers is an issue that needs attention from the Government and from local authorities, in order to ensure appropriate support for the communication needs of children and young people who are deaf, including BSL learning opportunities that are accessible and affordable, at a range of levels.

And this lack of focus is also highlighted when looking at local authorities, with only one Welsh local authority committed to the British BSL charter from the British Deaf Association. So, it's time to achieve that focus on developing our own national charter for the provision of consistent services and resources for deaf children and their families.

The Welsh Government needs to track the development of deaf children and their families throughout their education journey, and ensure that the appropriate provision is available, because the statistics speak for themselves. At present, there are far too many deaf children who use BSL as a first language being supported by school staff with too simple levels of signing. And we need to think seriously about encouraging teachers to gain a BSL qualification, at appropriate levels.

And turning, therefore, to the new curriculum, there is an opportunity here to encourage far more use of BSL in schools. And, as we know, BSL isn't only for deaf children, and teaching BSL at school could give an additional opportunity for children, across the spectrum, to learn another language.

Having considered all of this evidence, and the statistics, it's clear that work needs to be done by us, as politicians, to promote the importance of BSL resources and services, so that the appropriate support is available at all levels, from infancy to adult life. And the Welsh Government also has a responsibility to meet the requirements of the petition. Thank you.

Thank you to the Petitions Committee for introducing this debate. I'd like to thank the petitioners for their efforts in highlighting that we're not doing enough and how we can improve the lives of deaf people, particularly children and young people. 

There are many laws and accepted principles that seem unquestionable now, but would not be in existence without those like Catherine Robins-Talbot and Deffo!, who work hard campaigning for people who have been unheard for years to be given a voice that will not be ignored. Society gets to know about a part of their community that they never knew and policy makers turn from indifference to conviction.

I would urge the Government to accept all the recommendations in the report. I know that resources are limited, but it's a question of priorities and about how far up that list of priorities deaf people are for Welsh Government who are the only people here who can act on this.

It's nearly two years since the first time an MP in Westminster asked the Prime Minister a question using BSL, in an effort to have BSL put on the national curriculum in England. BSL has now been recognised as a language for 16 years. There are over 150,000 users of BSL in the UK—more than 87,000 of whom are deaf. So, the question for me is why BSL is not already on the curriculum in some way in Wales. If the petitioners felt that provision for deaf people in Wales was satisfactory, they wouldn't have gone to the trouble of petitioning the Assembly and proposing solutions.

I note that, in paragraph 20 of the report from the Petitions Committee, the Government say that it's up to local authorities to support families where a child is deaf or hard of hearing. But I do have to question the consistency here of a Government that is constantly stating and implementing their desire to support those who communicate in Welsh, but not those who have no choice but to communicate in BSL. 

Our tradition of being a community and society that sticks together and works through adversity and unfairness makes us proudly Welsh and British, and making sure that our young people have every opportunity to offer their best to Wales and have Wales offer its best to them should be as important a part of what being Welsh is about as any other aspect of a rightly proud Welsh culture.

For what good reason shouldn't it be part of the national curriculum, even at a basic level, so that all our young people know BSL exists and are given a chance to study it as a GCSE language option that realistically will probably offer our society and communities more positives than some other language options? Deafness and a reliance on BSL should not be seen as an additional learning need. BSL speakers don't have a learning difficulty. The only difficulty they face is that too few of the hearing population don't understand the language they speak and that's our fault rather than theirs. They should not be the people who face the negative consequences of a society that effectively chooses not to engage with them, and not supporting the recommendations in full will be nothing short of saying, 'You're on your own. We hope you have rich parents who can afford the extra help you need, because you're getting little or nothing from us.'

We've had legislation pass for inclusive play areas, where children with physical disabilities can play alongside those who don't, and part of the justification for funding those was that it will raise awareness of disability and how little it should matter in modern Welsh life. Surely the same can be achieved for deaf children, if all children were introduced to BSL at school. How many deaf children avoid using play areas because of the difficulties they face when another playful child tries to speak to them? How many more deaf children would get to meet and play with, and have in their circle of friends, hearing people if even very basic BSL were on the national curriculum? Who can imagine what positive outcomes that would have for deaf children in later life?

There are lots of policies and laws built to entrench equal rights for numerous other groups, but we don't seem to have equal rights for deaf people. These young people need us, and we need the talents of these young people that for too long have been unfairly untapped. Wales would benefit and deaf people would benefit if only we opened our eyes to see what they have to say. That's why I support the recommendations of this report and hope that the Government will change their response to recommendation 3 to an unequivocal acceptance and to implement the report's recommendations without delay. Thank you.

Thanks to Deffo! and to those who gave evidence to the committee and to Stuart Parkinson as well for e-mailing. Also thank you to Cardiff Deaf Creative Hands. I went there once for a visit and it was really, really informative as well as enjoyable. 

I don't think the deaf community really gets a fair crack of the whip. I think they're very excluded. When I launched the Propel group in the autumn—or in the summer, actually—we made sure we had somebody signing, as well as the translation. Just listening to what was said earlier, and the fact that in Wales there is one youth worker— one—it's unbelievable that there's only one youth worker who is fluent in BSL, British Sign Language. It's a scandal, really, that. And 'A Curriculum for Wales, A Curriculum for Life?' —the whole point in having devolution, the whole point in developing Welsh institutions is to be different, to be fair, to be innovative, and we have 'A Curriculum for Wales' saying that they don't want, or that they're not going to make sign language a qualification, which is simply wrong, and there should be a political decision to correct that.

There's an issue of training as well for teachers. I'm told they only go up to level 3; they don't get further training. Deaf teachers don't have access to all teaching methods. The course for teachers for the deaf at the University of South Wales has just been scrapped. There's a huge issue as well about British Sign Language deprivation and the issue of fatigue in school for pupils who have to lip read with difficulty.

I support the recommendations. I think British Sign Language should be a minority language. It should be on the national curriculum and there should be a charter. And I'd maybe like to invite the Minister to visit Cardiff Deaf Creative Hands in this city to see what good work is being done, and maybe you could come along with me, or with the other regional Members, or I'm sure the constituency AM would come along as well. What I'd like you to do this afternoon is to give an undertaking to implement the recommendations of this report. Thank you. [Signs in BSL.] 

Deffo! Wales Deaf Youth Forum submitted this petition to improve access to education and services in British Sign Language, or BSL: improving access for families to learn BSL; adding BSL on to the national curriculum; improving access to education in BSL for children and young people; and providing better access to services in BSL, such as health, education, social care and public transport.  

British Sign Language is the UK’s fourth indigenous language, recognised in its own right in 2003, and campaigners are calling for deaf BSL users to be seen as a language minority group. Currently, there are deaf children in Wales in mainstream education with limited access to other deaf peers and communication support. As a result, they leave school at 16 with an average median reading age of nine. They often also have poor speech and lip-reading skills, which hasn't changed since the 1970s, and failures in increased mainstream education are only exacerbating this. Families have limited access to support groups and other similar families, and are unable to learn BSL unless they can afford the high costs involved. There is no opportunity for deaf children and young people or their families to learn their own language, BSL, or even to gain BSL qualifications until they are 16 years old, when they leave school. They've missed out on important life skills, life-changing conversations within the home and local and worldwide news.

Last month, the education Minister announced that modern foreign languages were being included within international languages in the curriculum, and that this would also include BSL. However, BSL is not a foreign language, it is indigenous. The National Deaf Children’s Society have stated that although they appreciate that the structure of the new curriculum will facilitate the ability for schools to teach BSL on the new curriculum, they believe that the Welsh Government could take an active role in encouraging schools to pursue this option. They added that encouraging more schools to teach BSL is crucial, given its status as an official language in Wales. They said that, at present, too many deaf children who are first-language BSL users are being supported in schools by staff who have only a very basic level of Sign. They're very disappointed that a recommendation by the children's commissioner that access to BSL should be made available to all families with deaf children, has not been taken on board, and they said a stronger message is also required to ensure that local authorities start to regard provision for learning BSL as part of their duty in meeting a deaf child's additional learning needs, because they said that, at present, this is simply not happening in practice. 

In response, Deffo! Cymru stated that 

'the GCSE benefits only those in secondary school, whereas learning from nursery will prepare all of those who access BSL for a future GCSE or indeed the current system of Qualifications for BSL'.

Although they welcome the education Minister’s vision for seeing languages taught in schools, they express concern that this is the choice of the school, not the child,

'to enable them to improve access to learning, further education, social skills, leisure pursuits, employment and life fulfilment'.

Twelve days ago, I visited the together creating communities group at St Christopher’s School in Wrexham, at their request, to discuss their work exploring whether Wales could follow Scotland’s lead in implementing BSL into the curriculum.

Deaf constituents in north Wales have e-mailed:

'deaf people who I am advocating are suffering all throughout Wales and many are in mental health crisis', adding that the British Deaf Association is very much at the forefront of pushing for legal recognition of BSL in Wales, and is asking local authorities and public services to sign up to their charter for BSL, and make five pledges to improve access and rights for deaf BSL users. We have a charter already—let's use it—but presently, only two of the local authorities in Wales have signed up.

Last October, I called on the Welsh Government to respond to calls for BSL legislation in Wales made at the north Wales Lend Me Your Ears 2018 conference, looking at Scotland’s 2015 BSL Act and their 2017 national BSL plan, establishing a national advisory group, including up to 10 deaf people who use BSL as their preferred or first language. Although the Wales Act 2017 reserves equal opportunities to the UK Government, a BSL (Wales) Bill would be compliant if it related to the exceptions listed in it. Without specific rights-based legislation, the Welsh Government’s generic legislation is going nowhere.

Thank you. Can I now call the Minister for Education, Kirsty Williams?

Presiding Officer, I'm very pleased that we're having this debate today. [Signs in BSL.] And I'd like to thank the committee for their work in this area and for its report and the recommendations. I wrote to the Chair last November with the Welsh Government's response, so I do not propose to replicate all that in detail now this afternoon. But to be absolutely clear, the Welsh Government has accepted the recommendations of the report, either in full, or one recommendation in principle, because that recommendation relates also to the issue of qualifications at GCSE level.

The Welsh Government has an independent qualifications body and as Members have referred to, there is already some work that has gone on with Qualifications Wales with regard to a GCSE. The decision was made that a Wales stand-alone GCSE would not be viable, but that an England and Wales GCSE may well come to fruition. In the meantime, it is important to recognise that equivalent qualifications at both level 1 and level 2 are available, and that those qualifications do count towards a school's accountability measure. But I will write to Qualifications for an update on the collaboration that they are having with English examination boards, and I will be happy to put the copy of that letter in the library. 

The Welsh Government formally recognised British Sign Language as a language in its own right in 2004, and I would be the first to recognise that more could be done to develop a co-ordinated approach to the promotion and support for BSL, and work is ongoing in recognition of this. We are continuing to address the issues and difficulties being faced by members of the deaf community in Wales. This includes supporting training to increase the number of qualified interpreters in Wales, and we are in the process of tendering for a review of BSL provision for adults in Wales, which will report in June. We are aware that current provision is limited. It's limited for the offer, it's limited for access and capacity to deliver it too. Despite this, ultimately what is important is that I want to develop a fair and equitable system. So, that review will look at current provision. We will also look at latent demand for BSL provision for adults in Wales, what factors facilitate our Act as a barrier to that demand, and the Welsh Government will consider BSL as an essential communication skill, and, as such, what the cost would be to delivering that to a level 2 and whether we have the workforce to deliver that to a level 2. So, this work will be ongoing, and, as I said, will report in June.

One of the options that we are actively considering is indeed a national charter for the delivery of services and resources to deaf children, young people and their families. We envisage that that charter, between the Welsh Government, local authorities and other partners, would help us understand current provision. It would also reflect the good practice guidance and standards being developed on deafness and hearing loss to support the implementation of our social services and well-being Act. Critically, it would also help us to address the current shortage of interpreters and tutors.

To further assist local authorities in planning their workforce and identifying training needs, we have published data, which we commissioned from the Data Unit Wales, providing information on the local authority-based specialist workforce. Local authorities are indeed responsible for ensuring that BSL is available to children who have been identified as requiring it. However, the new curriculum, which we are rolling out from April, will allow schools to develop curricula that meet the needs and reflect the interests of their pupils. The area of learning and experience for languages, literacy and communication, which is in development, will encompass a wide range of languages, including British Sign Language, which I have never described as a 'foreign language'. 

We also have the benefit of the Additional Learning Needs and Education Tribunal (Wales) Act, which was enacted last year. This will deliver improvements for children with additional learning needs, including those with a hearing impairment. The Act has fairness and equity at its core, and aims to ensure that all learners are supported to reach their full potential, whatever that potential is. The Act is expected to come into force from September 2020, and the phased implementation period will last until 2023. Until then, local authorities must ensure that they continue to comply with the duties placed upon them by the Education Act 1996, and the special educational needs code of practice for Wales.

Alongside legislation, I'm also working to raise the attainment levels of learners with additional needs. Needs should be identified early and addressed quickly so that everyone has the chance, as I said, to reach their potential. I want every pupil to be able to enjoy their education, to be ambitious and to succeed in whatever they choose to do, which is why we have developed a transformation programme along with the ALN Act, because nothing short of transformation is going to be acceptable. I have committed £20 million to this over the course of the Assembly to provide support, advice and challenge to local authorities, schools and early years settings and FE institutions as they prepare for the implementation of the ALN reforms. A substantial amount of the £20 million funding will be directed towards workforce development. In line with our national mission for education, I have allocated £289,000 over three years to support professional training of the local authority-based sensory workforce. This funding includes training in BSL at various levels, and postgraduate training for teachers of the deaf. 

We're also developing a national approach to career-long professional learning—an approach that builds capacity for all practitioners, including teaching support staff, classroom teachers and school leaders. Last autumn, we consulted on draft professional standards for assisting teaching, which we expect to be ready from September this year. Career-long professional learning is one of the five dimensions of these standards, and is relevant to meeting the needs of all learners. The importance of this is referenced in the overarching values and dispositions that accompany the standards. We have ensured that headteachers' responsibilities to facilitate this is contained in their formal leadership standards. 

Our priorities of raising standards, reducing the attainment gap for all students and instilling public confidence in our education system are at the heart of our vision and actions for education in Wales. Every single reform that we're working on together is driven by those three priorities, and delivering on them will ensure that all of our learners and all of our teachers are supported to be the best that they can be. I'm very happy, Presiding Officer, to provide updates to the Assembly once the commissioned report is available. Can I just finish by saying that I'm very happy to support British Sign Language? [Signs in BSL.]

Thank you very much. Can I call on David Rowlands to reply to the debate?

Can I thank all the Members who contributed to this debate? I apologise for not being able to respond to Members individually, but I'm very much constrained by the time available. I will, therefore, concentrate on the Minister's responses. It is very gratifying to know that you can have BSL in levels 1 and 2, and it's also gratifying to find that there's a £20 million fund now being given—but, again, unfortunately, to local councils with no hypothecated part of that. So, it's patently obvious that local government is not being as responsible as it should be and that they're patently failing to provide BSL opportunities. 

Can I ask a question?

Yes, of course.

Thank you for taking my question. My question is—. My team and I have been able to acquire the training in BSL through here, the National Assembly for Wales, and our staff development team, who I would like to put on record my thanks to. Would you agree with me that, really, it's incumbent on all of us as Members to, perhaps, look into learning BSL? The staff development team here are more than willing to provide this. I just think that we should all be proficient ourselves as we move along. Thank you.

Well, I absolutely agree with you, Janet, on that basis, but we are talking here about education on a much wider basis, and what we're talking about, really, is the provision of BSL for children in particular within the education system, and the truth of the matter is that there is no specific pathway for these children to take. And I will thank the Minister for the fact that she is saying that we are pursuing the possibility of a GCSE in BSL, but you are following on from what England are doing. Now, we're supposed to be innovative in Wales and, surely, we should be ahead of the game on that basis.

So, in conclusion, Llywydd, I hope that this debate and the petitions process as a whole have been a positive experience for Deffo! and their supporters, and I thank them again for their engagement with the committee and the Assembly as a whole. I hope the Welsh Government will give further consideration to additional points raised by the committee and by other Members who have spoken this afternoon and that the recommendations that the committee has made are followed through in total. Diolch yn fawr.

Thank you. The proposal is to note the committee's report. Does any Member object? The motion is therefore agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36. 

Motion agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.