Before starting, I’d like to thank, at the beginning of this debate, a few people. Thank you to Suzy Davies for promoting and co-sponsoring this debate, and I look forward to hearing your closing comments. And thank you to those who came to and contributed to a recent seminar that I held here in the Senedd on the history of Wales in the new curriculum. We had an interesting and productive discussion from experts in the field, and we heard presentations from Eryl Owain, from the Welsh history campaign, Euryn Roberts, a historian from Bangor University, Martin Johnes, a historian from Swansea University, as well as other teachers and professors. I’d like to also thank those who’ve shown an interest—a great deal of interest—in this debate today. It’s clear that we have fire in our stomachs to discuss this subject, and I know that the Culture, Welsh Language and Communications Committee has held a ballot to see what issues should be focused upon by them, and Welsh history was a clear winner in that ballot, and I look forward to seeing that committee pursuing its inquiry.

Now, it’s timely to hold this debate today, because the Welsh curriculum is being redrawn. The curriculum circulates around skills, rather than content. There is strength in doing that, but it can lead to problems and we have to be aware of that. Now, history, rather than the history of Wales, is named in a list of subjects that are to be taught under the title ‘humanities’, which is one of the areas of learning and experience. Now, humanities includes geography, history, religious education, sociology, and so on. They are intertwined, and so the Donaldson curriculum doesn’t set out any basis for teaching the history of Wales. And so what concerns me about this—not including the history of Wales specifically within the framework—is there is no certainty that the history of Wales and historical events within the history of Wales will be included in lessons in studying the new curriculum. We need to overturn that, and the new curriculum can be a particular opportunity to ensure that not one pupil loses the opportunity to learn about Welsh history.

I suggest a simple amendment: I suggest that 'history', in that list of subjects, should be changed to 'the history of Wales and the world', so that our assessment and our studies of global history come from the lens of our Welsh perspective. Learning about the history of Wales is vital for our next generations to make them informed and engaged citizens, which is one of the purposes of the new curriculum. At present, there is a requirement in the draft curriculum for a Welsh dimension, and that runs through the whole thing, but that isn’t at the heart of the curriculum and it’s one thread amongst many.

The principle behind the new curriculum is to give freedom to teachers to be creative in teaching their subjects, and that is laudable and shows an acknowledgement and recognition of the ability of our teachers, but there is a danger that the Government’s recommendations will lead to inconsistency and that good practice that is implemented in parts at the moment won’t be shared. So, we need detail with regard to how the new curriculum will be implemented, particularly remembering the cuts that are happening to school budgets.

The important point to bear in mind is that teaching the history of Wales is part of the current curriculum—or it’s meant to be. But we know that thousands upon thousands of pupils have been leaving school with a detailed knowledge of the history of Nazi Germany and the names of the six wives of Henry VIII, but not of the history of their own nation. So, it’s not necessarily legislation, the content or wording of the curriculum that will make the difference in that regard, but it is important that the history of Wales is rooted in the new legislation. But, as I said, legislation alone isn’t going to create the change that we want to see. It’s just as important to develop expertise within the workforce, to provide appropriate training and, importantly, to develop new, exciting resources, building on what is already available. And part of the problem is a lack of knowledge, confidence and awareness within our workforce. Perhaps the teachers themselves haven’t had an opportunity to study the history of Wales at school, and we need to break that cycle.

Talking about the resources, a number of the resources are ones that are England-centric, and there are many resources that aren’t relevant, truth be told. And what is difficult is for teachers to have the time to create appropriate materials and to develop ideas with other teachers. The cuts to school budgets and the lack of staff are making that increasingly difficult, and there is room for universities as well to assist in the work of creating the resources jointly with teachers, but that needs to be supported with funding and we need to provide enough time for that to happen, and we need a training programme on a wide range of issues in developing the new curriculum.

The First Minister said on Tuesday to my colleague, Llyr Gruffydd, that the history of Wales will be a central part of the new curriculum, with sufficient resources to support that work. Excellent. But how can we ensure that? We need a plan, we need work streams and criteria that are going to turn that statement into a reality.

The Welsh identity is alive and well. Increasing numbers of people are proud of their Welshness. People are proud of their roots and want to find out more about who we are as a nation. There is a duty to respond to that; the ambition is clear. We’ve seen the interest amongst our young people, as the murals to remember the drowning of Tryweryn have been raised the length and breadth of the nation, and there’s a great deal of interest in the Twitter feed @1919raceriots, which tweets as if the events of the race riots of Barry and Newport in June 1919 were happening today. And there was excitement around the Tiger Bay musical, which was developed by the Wales Millennium Centre, about the history of the multicultural docks here in Cardiff. Just three examples of bringing our history alive in a creative way and in a real way that fires the imagination and fires young people’s interest in learning more. Every nation needs to learn its own story—what has formed it and what its past is.

Every pupil should receive the same opportunities to learn about the history of Wales in its many forms and many interpretations in a way that challenges them and inspires them. There is a genuine opportunity here with the new curriculum and with the work that is happening around that to redress that, and it’s time for the next generation to learn about our story and our place in the world.