Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Education – in the Senedd at 2:13 pm on 18 March 2020.
Well, Mark, quite rightly, as you said, local authorities have a statutory responsibility for the preparation of an accessibility strategy for their entire educational estate, and schools themselves have a similar statutory responsibility. These strategies and plans must be prepared, implemented, reviewed and renewed every three years, and it's very—I'm appalled by the situation that you've just explained. It's simply not acceptable in my eyes.
Of course, one of the ways in which we are addressing this as a Welsh Government is our twenty-first century schools and colleges building programme, where we take these issues over accessibility as front and centre in what we want to achieve in our educational estate. But schools have existing legal responsibilities, LEAs have existing legal responsibilities, and I'm always happy to investigate those cases that you've just highlighted and challenge the behaviour of local authorities if that's not being adhered to.