8. What actions are the Welsh Government taking to reverse the decline in the number of pupils studying modern foreign languages for GCSEs and A-level? OAQ54763

Thank you, Delyth. Since 2015 we have invested over £2.5 million in the Global Futures programme to ensure that our learners experience the benefits of learning modern foreign languages. This includes funding consortia partners to develop centres of excellence with schools and universities and the student mentoring programme, specifically aimed at increasing uptake of language qualifications.

I thank the Minister for her answer. The British Council's latest 'Language Trends Wales' survey makes for stark reading for those of us who believe that learning modern foreign languages is important not just to increase the skills base of our young people, but to increase their empathy and to widen their understanding of other cultures. The research shows that the decline in pupils taking these subjects at GCSE and A-level since 2000 has continued unabated, which I'm sure you'll be aware of. This year there was a further 7 per cent decrease at GCSE and also an equivalent 5 per cent decrease at A-level.

The British Council concludes that the incentives and support for modern foreign languages at schools should go much further than what the Welsh Government is currently offering through the Global Futures initiative that you've referred to. Minister, they offer 11 recommendations, mostly based around developing a new multilingual approach in primary schools and supporting teachers to promote modern foreign languages to inspire and motivate children to take them at GCSE. Will you confirm that you will give due consideration to these recommendations when the full report is published, and think again about what needs to be put in place at primary level so that we can start to reverse this lamentable decline in modern foreign language teaching?

Can I say that I agree with the Member? We still clearly have a great deal of work to do to address the decline in modern foreign language uptake at GCSE level. The students that take modern foreign languages do exceptionally well at them, but those numbers are a worry to me and a worry, I'm sure, to everybody in this Chamber.

What was more heartening to read in that British Council report was that, actually, whilst there is still that challenge in the secondary sector, the picture is indeed improving in primary, and those initiatives within primary schools are absolutely crucial. I was pleased to read in the report that there is evidence of more primary schools embracing MFL within their own curriculum.

It is my intention, with the publication of the new curriculum for Wales, that we will be explicit that we would expect to see modern foreign languages being brought in as part of the curriculum at the upper age range of our primary schools to give children an opportunity to engage in those subjects early on. But indeed, in some of our pioneer schools—. I was recently at a new through school in the Valleys where the very youngest class was reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar—many of you, I'm sure, are aware of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, that icon of children's literature—and they were learning the fruits that appear in that book, they were learning the words for those fruits in English, yn Gymraeg, and en Español, in Spanish. And for those children, it was just the love of learning those different words that they were being given, and that demonstrates that it is possible to do this.

With regard to Global Futures, it is my intention to refresh the Global Futures plan, but I have to say, as I said earlier, if we carry on doing the same thing, we're going to end up with the same outcomes. So, I want to be convinced by my officials that, actually, what we're going to offer in a new version of Global Futures is really going to address the problem, because just simply carrying on with the same approach from the Government will not see the step change that the British Council is calling for and that you're calling for.

Thank you very much, Minister.