Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Education – in the Senedd at 1:42 pm on 25 September 2019.
Bearing in mind the huge changes that will be happening in schools, not least with the change in curriculum and the preparation for that, but also the long-standing and very acute complaints made by schools now about their direct funding, I have to say I was disappointed not to see that more explicitly in even the cross-cutting themes of Government, because, of course, if you get education wrong, it has an effect on every other area of spend as we go forward.
The UK Government has announced that 2.3 per cent above inflation boost to the Welsh block. There's also over £2 billion due to come to the Welsh Government from the UK schools budget—specifically schools, not education. That's over three years, and I accept the annual settlement is a restriction on planning. You've seen the CYPE report on funding for schools, which concluded that there is a very real and present danger on the sufficiency of school funding. I'm sure that the Minister for local government will be making the case for more money for her portfolio, more money for councils. Are you going to be leaving it to her to find the extra direct funding that schools need?