Item 9 on the agenda is the Health Protection (Coronavirus Restrictions) (School Premises and Further Education Institution Premises) (Wales) Regulations 2020. I call on the Minister for Education to move the motion—Kirsty Williams.

Motion NNDM7525 Rebecca Evans

To propose that the Senedd, in accordance with Standing Order 27.5:

1. Approves The Health Protection (Coronavirus Restrictions) (School Premises and Further Education Institution Premises) (Wales) Regulations 2020 laid in the Table Office on 11 December 2020.

Motion moved.

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I formally move the motion on the order paper. As I set out last week, following advice from the chief medical officer and Public Health Wales, it was recommended that secondary schools move to remote learning from 14 December until the end of term. As everybody in this Chamber is well aware, rates of transmission are currently increasing, and we are sadly on course to having 2,500 people with coronavirus in hospital by Christmas Day.

While I am delighted with the offer that we were able to make yesterday with regard to asymptomatic testing for schools, and the announcement of a vaccination programme that began last week, these interventions and these processes will take time to take effect. We need to continue to put in place the necessary restrictions to protect the NHS and to save lives.

We recognise, as we did during the firebreak, that it is much more difficult for primary and special school-age children to undertake self-directed learning. That is why we have encouraged primary and special schools to continue to stay open, unless of course there are compelling and clear public health and safety reasons for them not to be able to do so. Having spoken to local education leaders, we are increasingly confident that schools and colleges have the online learning in place to continue to ensure that our young people continue to learn.

However, Deputy Presiding Officer, it is really important for me to state this: this is not an early Christmas break. Critically, our secondary and FE learners should be at home learning at this time. We all need to do what we can do to minimise contact with others, and to make a real difference to the course of this virus and, ultimately, to save lives. I would appeal to the young people of Wales who have seen their education in school disrupted once again to follow this advice.

I also want to be clear that schools are regulated and controlled settings, and there is no new evidence to suggest that schools are no longer safe. The majority of transmission appears to continue to be through community contacts and activities around the school environment, rather than the school environment itself. As we begin vaccinating, we can be rightly optimistic for a better 2021. But, at this time, we have to be cautious, and we must still keep working together to keep Wales safe and to keep our young people learning.

Thank you. I call on the Chair of the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee, Mick Antoniw.

Diolch again, Dirprwy Lywydd. Members will know that these regulations were laid late into the evening last Friday, and they came into force on Monday. We considered the regulations at our meeting yesterday morning, and we are grateful for the work of officials in preparing the necessary regulations and papers. Our report has again been laid before the Senedd to inform this afternoon's debate. Our report contains one technical point, which notes that there appears to be an inconsistency between the English and Welsh texts of the regulations regarding which enabling powers are being used. Our report also contains five merits points, which I will briefly summarise.

The first and second merits points note the Welsh Government's justification for any potential interference with human rights, and that there has been no formal consultation on these regulations. Our third merits point acknowledges that these regulations have been made in response to a public health emergency. We believe that the Welsh Government should, however, provide more detail on who it consulted and when, prior to making these regulations, and we've asked the Government to provide this information. We've also noted that there was no equality impact assessment for the regulations. In this fourth merits point, we've asked the Government to explain what arrangements it has made to publish reports of equality impact assessments, in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 (Statutory Duties) (Wales) Regulations 2011. Finally, in our fifth merits point, we've noted there was no child impact assessment for these regulations, and we've invited the Welsh Government to outline the steps it took to assess the particular impact of these regulations on children. Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd.

Last week the First Minister said this:

'I want very strongly to endorse today the joint statement made between the Welsh Government and the Welsh Local Government Association, which urges schools to remain open until the last day of term, while recognising that there will be individual sets of circumstances where that will not be possible....The real problem is that we do not have confidence, from the behavioural evidence, that if children are not in school, that they would simply be being kept at home and kept away from the contacts that would otherwise create greater risk. The fear is that children who are not in school will be in even riskier environments.'

'If I thought that those young people would genuinely be at home, genuinely self-isolating, genuinely creating that period before Christmas to keep them safe, I'd be attracted to the idea. I'm afraid the risks are that that simply wouldn't happen, that those children would be doing riskier things than they would in school. Better for them to be in school.'

In saying this, the First Minister and the WLGA support the long-held views of the children's commissioner and, indeed, this Senedd—better for them to be in school. Even in the firebreak, schools were open for children up to year 8. Now, I will recognise that incidence and transmission rates in parts of Wales are very worrying and that figures associated with some secondary schools are also worrying. But 'associated with' and 'responsible for' are different things, and we have not yet seen published evidence that says that they are the same thing. I'm yet to see the evidence that says that the risk within—and I mean within—the confines of secondary schools justifies their blanket closure. Indeed, we've seen the introduction of mandatory face coverings on every part of the estate, except classrooms, to minimise that risk further. The health board briefings refer to behaviour outside the school gate, and, as we've heard in this Chamber, and, indeed, the Minister's opening remarks, that it's between households that presents more of a problem.

And now secondary pupils will be at a greater temptation to do, as the First Minister said, those riskier things than they would have in school, not least because many of them will be old enough to be unsupervised at home. But, for those younger secondary school pupils who really shouldn't be at home alone, the chances that their working parents won't be able to take time off to provide that care is real, because they are no longer considered key workers, and I'd be keen to understand, from the Minister, why that's the case.

I'm also unhappy about these regulations because they fail to compel primary schools to stay open. I understand that the legal default position, if you like, is that they should stay open anyway, but the regulations are quite plain as to the consequences of secondary schools disobeying the law. So, why not the same for primary schools in regulations? Because instead, we have local authorities flouting, once again, the education Minister's authority. Now, I absolutely understand the need for the teaching unions to consider the safety and the working conditions for their members—of course I do—but I hope they understand that they have overplayed their hands on this one.

The local authorities themselves also need to be in the spotlight, because where's their backbone on this? Rolling over the Minister yet again, what do they think this does to her authority, especially when they, through the WLGA, just a week ago, urged the very opposite of what they're doing now? Minister, we have different views on a lot of things, but this lack of respect for your office should concern all of us, because this has now happened twice on the issue of school closures, and it's almost as if the local authorities are goading us into taking away their responsibility for education.

In the meantime, I really would like to thank pupils, parents and school staff for their continued hard work in all this confusion, and wish them a merry and hopefully peaceful Christmas. Thank you.

Plaid Cymru will vote in favour of these regulations. I believe that the decision to close secondary schools could have been taken earlier because of the details that had been outlined by the technical advisory cell on 3 December, but the Minister chose to wait until the chief medical officer virtually ordered that this needed to happen, and that has created problems.

I believe that provision should have been put in place on school sites for children of families who can't, or can't afford to arrange child care for the younger secondary school pupils, particularly with so little warning or notice for families that schools were to close. This decision taken late in the day has created a whole host of problems, and in very many cases, it's grandparents who have to help out, and therefore they are putting themselves at risk of possibly catching the virus. Now, for many people, there is no choice but to carry on working, and to rely on older family members to help, or to leave the children home alone, and that, clearly, isn't acceptable either. So, provision for them, for those families who can't arrange childcare this week, would have been a step in the right direction, in my view.

I continue to be very concerned about the digital divide. As the BBC and the Children's Commissioner for Wales have found, there are children who still don't have laptops; they are trying to access education through gaming machines, Xboxes or mobile phones. There are children who are slipping through the net, and although the Minister feels the situation is under control, that isn't the picture that is emerging for me through the work referred to me as casework and so on. That's why Plaid Cymru is calling for the establishment of a national register for tracking who has digital equipment and who has broadband connectivity, so that we can then provide the additional resources as is required.

Finally, in light of all of the disruption to education that has been happening now since March, I do call on the Government to publish its post-COVID education plans early in the new year, and to announce how they will be implemented, and what additional resources will be made available to schools. A huge effort will be required to support our children and young people through their education and with their mental health and well-being; that's required now, but it'll be required for months, if not years, to come, and the sooner we can see the plans for the ensuing period the better, so that we can scrutinise them constructively from the back benches. I'm very eager to support that process. Thank you.

Thank you. No Members have requested to make any more interventions, therefore I'll call on the Minister for Education to reply to the debate. Kirsty Williams.

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. Can I thank the Members for their contributions to the debate this afternoon? With regard to the comments made by Mick Antoniw, the Welsh Government agrees that there is an inconsistency between the enabling powers cited in the Welsh and the English texts—in section 45(3)(c) it is cited in the Welsh text, and in 45(3) in the English text. This is a typographical error in the English text, which does not affect the validity of the regulations.

With regard to consultation, it is the case that no formal consultation was possible, given the emergency situation we found ourselves in, although within an hour of receiving the advice from the chief medical officer, we were able to meet with officials from the WLGA, and subsequently with ADEW to discuss the situation that we were in, and there were no objections from either. We have previously discussed, from our learnings on the firebreak situation, some of the issues that we need to be cognisant of, with a special regard to the education of vulnerable learners, and we have sought to give flexibility to ensure that those vulnerable learners can be catered for in their high school or FE colleges during this week. 

Moving to the points that were made by Suzy Davies. You're absolutely right: there is a balance of risks and rewards that have to be examined during these times, and displacement activity of children outside of a regulated setting is a source of concern to me, but those balance of risks change, and they change quickly. It was with great regret that I received the advice from the chief medical officer and Public Health Wales, but, having received such advice, it is incumbent upon me to act upon it. As I said, the announcement was made within hours of that advice being received. We simply could not have moved any faster. I appreciate that that comes late in the day, but my priority throughout this has been trying to keep children in face-to-face learning for as long as we possibly can do that. And, clearly, because of the impact on children's rights, there has to be a pressing public health need to deny them of their right to face-to-face learning, and, in the absence of advice from the CMO and Public Health Wales, I'm not about to deny them those rights, unless we find ourselves in an emergency situation, and I would not have had that advice previously to that. But it does mean that decisions are, indeed, taken late in the day. 

Both Siân Gwenllian and Suzy Davies raised the issue of childcare. Can I be absolutely clear, we have not asked schools or education to provide childcare since the Whitsun half term. We did not ask schools to provide childcare during the summer holiday or in the half term holiday. But, clearly, one of the issues that educators feel most proud about is that, whilst they are carrying out face-to-face teaching, that is allowing our key workers, including members of our health and social care staff, to get on with their jobs. And I know that many teachers feel very proud of the role that they are playing on the front line to allow other front-line workers to carry on caring and looking after all of us. But let's be very clear: we're not asking them to provide childcare; we're asking them to provide a due education. But, clearly, there is a knock-on effect to families, and I regret that. I really, really do. 

Siân Gwenllian also talked about the issue of a digital divide. We have made significant progress. The success of the Welsh Government in this regard has been noted by independent educational think tanks outside of Wales. But, clearly, we always need to do more. That's why we have set up a group with ADEW to understand what the remaining barriers are to supporting a distanced, digital and blended learning approach.

I meet with headteachers every week. Today, I met with the acting primary head of St Illtyd's in Blaenau Gwent, and she was happy to confirm to me that every single family that had requested IT support, whether that be with connectivity or with a digital device, has been given that support that is necessary. And we are working closely with local education authorities to identify schools that have not been in that fortunate position. 

I can confirm that new IT equipment and devices are being sent out to schools on a regular basis and, by February, we anticipate that we will have provided 133,000 new pieces of equipment to Welsh schools to address these concerns. Unfortunately, the world and his wife are trying to get hold of IT equipment at the moment, and I acknowledge that there have been some delays in satisfying some schools' orders, but we are working, as quickly as we can, to address that, and, as I said, by February, I'm confident that we will have been able to source 133,000 new, additional devices for schools to ensure that, where we, unfortunately, have to take these decisions, pupils can keep on learning.

Could I ask the Minister to wind up, please? 

Certainly. With regards to primary schools, we have to recognise—I have to recognise—that the responsibility for primary schools lies with individual governing bodies, advised by their local authorities. Welsh Government's advice has been clear that primary education should continue to the end of term, and I'm very grateful for all teachers who have worked incredibly hard over this academic term. It has been relentlessly challenging and difficult, and I'm grateful for their efforts. Thank you.

Thank you. The proposal is to agree the motion. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Therefore, we defer voting under this item until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.