Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:46 pm on 18 June 2019.
Well, Llywydd, I want to go back to the first point the Member raised because I don't agree with him at all that there has been no progress in relation to the provision of Welsh language services in the health sector. It's one, I think, of the really heartening things that has changed in the last decade that when I go into hospitals in any part of Wales now I see members of staff wearing visible signs that tell you that they are able and prepared to provide a service through the medium of Welsh. We have to encourage those people, we have to support those people, we have to find more of them, of course, but it doesn't help the cause of doing that to act as though those people who have been part of the real effort through the 'Mwy na geiriau' programme—if we dismiss their efforts and act as though nothing at all has been achieved. A great deal has been achieved. The position is very different to what it was. That isn't to say, and particularly in areas like psychiatry, that there isn't a lot more that we want to do, but we bring about improvement by encouraging people who are willing to be part of that effort rather than dismissing their efforts as though they had made no difference.
Now, when my colleague the education Minister says to Members that higher education institutions are independent bodies, they have to be that. It is simply not right that we should ever seek to interfere in the decisions that they make. As a Government, we have worked hard to sustain the sector here in Wales. We've worked with the sector in order to be able to do that. That's why I was, when I went to Aberystwyth yesterday, determined to meet with the vice-chancellor and her colleagues to hear about the work that they are doing and what we can do to support them in their efforts. It's why the education Minister met with the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales earlier today in order to carry on that effort. We understand that there are challenges. Of course there are challenges, a decade into austerity, in every part of what the public service tries to achieve in Wales, and higher education is no different. But the difference between the higher education sector in England and that in Wales is that we work with the sector with the aim always of supporting it rather than simply saying that market forces will apply and that those who go to the wall will go to the wall regardless.