So, we go to the statement on student funding reform. The education Minister to make that statement, Kirsty Williams.

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. Back in autumn 2016, I came to this Senedd to announce the biggest change to student finance in Wales in a generation. As all of us know, student finance reform is a complex and controversial issue. Political parties and Ministers of all stripes, across the United Kingdom and further afield, have taken difficult decisions, and sometimes faced the consequences.

Over recent years in Wales, we have built a consensus and shown that a better way forward is possible. We have delivered a system dealing with up-front costs, while investing in our universities, that is unique in Europe. On coming into office, I agreed a set of principles with the Cabinet, which were our framework for delivering such a large-scale reform. The Diamond report was clear that the previous finance system was unsustainable, and it was questionable whether fee grants for full-time undergraduates was the best investment, whether it supported our institutions, and whether that policy widened access.

Our principles for reform remain our measuring stick for success. They are: that we maintain the principle of universalism within a progressive system; that we have a whole-system approach across modes and levels of study; that investment is shared between Government and those who directly benefit; that we enhance accessibility, tackling barriers such as living costs; and that student support is portable across the United Kingdom. Llywydd, it should be a source of national pride that we in Wales have delivered these principles into action. We now have a system that values and supports all of our students, whether they are full-time undergraduates, a postgraduate or a part-time undergraduate, and we have done so whilst delivering more investment into universities: HEFCW’s grant is up 80 per cent since 2016.

Let me turn to what we’ve achieved in terms of student numbers and funding. First-year full-time students from our most deprived areas are up, year on year, since we introduced our reforms. There has been a 51 per cent increase in first-year full-time postgraduates from Wales since 2016, and a 20 per cent increase in part-time equivalents, and this is after a decade of decline in numbers across the United Kingdom. Part-time numbers across the UK have also decreased over the last decade, down by 70 per cent in England alone. But, here in Wales, we are transforming lives through our support for part-time students. If you look at the Open University in Wales alone, Welsh part-time student numbers have gone up by 81 per cent according to official figures. And part-time students from our most deprived areas in Wales have gone up by 23 per cent.

The average non-repayable grant for full-time students from Wales is now more than £7,000, helping students deal directly with up-front costs. We've also introduced a Master’s bursary scheme for science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine subjects and for those who wish to study through the medium of Welsh, incentivising students to remain in or to come home to Wales to undertake postgraduate study. This scheme has supported Wales’s higher education institutions to incentivise the recruitment of the most talented Welsh students, in line with both our economic action plan and my response to the Diamond review. Of course, we have also maintained the education maintenance allowance, invested record amounts to support mental health and well-being, and we have the only higher education real living wage sector in the whole of the United Kingdom.

And what is more, we have supported our students to showcase their talents on the global stage. More partner students from Wales take part in the Yale global scholars programme than any other region or nation outside of the United States. We are only one of two Governments to have a Gilman international partnership with the US State Department, and we have our first ever Fulbright Commission partnership. We have mobility and academic agreements with partners such as Vietnam and we have developed and funded Wales’s first national outward mobility scheme, Global Wales Discover, widening access to overseas mobilities through shorter term opportunities.

Llywydd, we know that our education system thrives when everyone has a shared stake. When we set high standards for all, when we refuse to accept lower expectations and when we speak to the world with confidence, when we do that, we are truly fulfilling our national mission. Together, we can continue to support students of all ages and backgrounds, and build on the success of recent years. Diolch yn fawr.

[Inaudible.]—statement, Minister. Can I just begin by thanking everyone in the university sector who's really pulled out the stops to help students through this pandemic? I know we feel the same on that. I think we'll always be grateful to those who stepped up to this overwhelming challenge.

But student finance reform, of course, has given universities greater certainty of funding and has highlighted flexible study, and that is extremely welcome, but it's not achieved protection for students who are incurring huge personal debt yet not getting the education experience specifically that they paid for, whether that's because of strikes or in some cases a drop in quality of provision due to COVID. So, my first questions are: how do you think the next Welsh Government should handle calls for partial tuition fee reimbursements, bearing in mind the principles you've set out earlier on, and what are the long-term prospects for student loan repayments?

Up-front, can I say that I welcome any growth in the figures, of course I do, and also those international connections across the whole globe, not just our doorstep. But you've often played down the idea of a Diamond dividend, and that invites challenge to your claim at the opener of this statement of a transformative impact. I'm going to rely on the Higher Education Statistics Agency data to do that, because there are 1,135 fewer part-time undergraduates than three years ago, the last year before Diamond bit, and 3,000 fewer than five years ago. In that same three years before Diamond, we'd already seen rises, not declines in the actual numbers of full-time undergraduates and both full-time and part-time postgraduates. So, I see that there's been a one-year halt in the downward trend for part-time undergraduates, but I'm not sure that's really transformational when numbers of other students in Wales have been rising anyway, as they have, actually, apart from full-time undergraduates, which I think is interesting, across the whole of the UK, where of course they haven't had the Diamond reforms. And if you're attributing the rise in other student numbers in Wales to Diamond reforms, then the drop in part-time undergraduate figures in 2019-20 must surely also be attributable to the same.

If you compare those last two years with the 2017-18 figures, which is the last year before Diamond, there definitely are more postgraduate students from Wales and other parts of the UK, which is great news, but do you accept that, overall in the UK, there are more postgraduates in universities than two years ago and that, actually, Welsh universities are not getting the full share of the growth, despite Diamond? Numbers may be up, but the percentage of Welsh-domiciled postgrads studying in Welsh universities actually dropped in those last two years, from 69.3 per cent to 63.1 per cent. So, while there are more Welsh-domiciled students in UK universities, they still are choosing to take their talent over the border. So, why do you think that is?

And then, finally, could you give us some idea of the breakdown of postgrad areas of study in Welsh universities at the moment and how that reflects Welsh Government priorities? I accept, of course, that education isn't just about the Welsh economy or public services, but I'd like to see some level of connection between this research and the benefit for Wales. Diolch. Thank you. 

Thank you, Suzy, for those comments, and can I thank you for your acknowledgement of the hard work of university lecturers and staff the length and breadth of Wales, who have done everything that they can in the most challenging of situations to support their students? And I'm sure all of us in the Chamber would want to associate ourselves with the comments that people have been working incredibly hard to be able to do that.

Can I say that I'm sorry that the Member doesn't feel that part-time student numbers are a success story for Wales? I'm sure the Member does, like I do, meet with the Open University on many occasions, and they say that the impact of the Diamond reforms has been absolutely transformational, and the number of students that they see now studying on a part-time basis with the Open University in Wales is a source of great pride to them and compares incredibly favourably to the experience of the Open University across the border in England. Indeed, I recently had the pleasure of sharing a platform with the vice-chancellor of the Open University, and he was absolutely fulsome in his praise for the approach that the Welsh Government has taken with regard to the parity of esteem that we place on part-time study and the transformational effect that it has.

The point you made around part time, the average study time is six years, and so the HESA figures that you've referred to do include some of the issues before our reforms, and new students are the true measure of our success. And I think that needs to be taken into consideration when looking at the HESA studies.

With regard to postgraduates, one of the strengths and, indeed, one of the principles that I referred to in my opening statement is that our support is fully portable. If a student has an ambition to study at a postgraduate level at an institution outside Wales, I do not want the lack of finance or, indeed, lack of support from the Welsh Government to be a constraint on that ambition. I believe it's absolutely important that Welsh-domiciled students are able to study at universities where they choose to do so. But what we have done, as I said in my opening statement, is provide additional support with regard to additional bursaries that are available to those students who choose to study at a postgraduate level in Wales, particularly in the field of STEMM, because we know that higher levels of skills in those areas are absolutely crucial to growing the Welsh economy. And there are bursaries again for those wishing to study at that highest level through the medium of Welsh.

And so I think what we're able to deliver is a choice to Welsh students to be able to undertake their postgraduate study knowing that their Government will support them, but there will be additional support to those students should they choose to do so in an area that is particularly beneficial to the Welsh economy at a Welsh university, or to be able to support our opportunities to learn through the medium of Welsh and to develop those skills, and that capacity with our institution, because the ability to do that through the medium of Welsh doesn't benefit just the individual student taking that postgraduate course, but it actually helps build the capacity throughout the university to allow other students to benefit from that capacity.

Undoubtedly, I understand that students will have concerns about the quality of the teaching that they have received this term as a result of COVID, especially where, this term, the majority of that has had to be delivered remotely. Universities have worked hard. They've recruited additional staff to make sure that that teaching experience is a good one, and we monitor very carefully with both our own funding council and the regulatory bodies any levels of complaints where people feel their tuition has not met their standards, and I have to say, to date, we're not seeing a huge amount of increase in complaints on where we were in a usual year. However, I would absolutely acknowledge that that rounded experience above and beyond simply studying has been affected—so, access to all the other things that a university has to offer an individual apart from just merely tuition has been impacted, and we recognise that, for many students, there has been particular hardship. That's why I'm very grateful to Welsh universities for recognising that in terms of rent rebates for those living in their own accommodation, and the Welsh Government has invested, in the most recent round of funding, some £40 million to assist with student hardship. Whilst I can't take COVID away, we are looking to support students to take some of the financial stresses and strains away from students by working in partnership with the sector and HEFCW to be able to increase moneys for hardship. But I thank the Member for her acknowledgement of the efforts that the sector has made to date. Thank you.

It's true to say, as the Minister said, that this area has been one that has been politically contentious and complex over the years, and now that I'm finishing my elected office, I would like to reminisce and say this is how I started, by being student president at Aberystwyth University and campaigning against the introduction of any fees here in Wales, notwithstanding top-up fees that were eventually introduced sadly by the Labour Government, and that has meant the slippery slope towards more marketisation in higher education institutions whether we like it or not. In an ideal world, I'd like to see universality again, I'd like to see students not having to pay for their education, but the reality is we are where we are and I do believe, Minister, that you have gone further than many other Ministers in making sure that we can look at how students are supported, their living costs, and taking children out of poverty, and I will say that, from my perspective, I would like to congratulate you on that, and to say it will be for other people in future years to take on the mantle to carry this on when we have both gone to other places, should I say.

We've also supported many of the changes in the Diamond reforms, and I think it's important to say that it had quite a lot of cross-party support, especially with regard to part-time learning and flexible learning. I'd like to see that developed post pandemic, because it's a decision people want to make, and I think it's clear that people want to do that and they want to be able to be as flexible as they possibly can with life changes or family situations as they are at the moment.

But I'd like to focus on a few key areas, if that's okay. You told me in an education question response in 2019 that university recruitment was not a question for you, yet we have a situation where almost half of new Welsh undergraduates leave our country every year, and I simply don't think that that's acceptable, and we would like to be able to reverse that. I do recognise that you've done that, and you're working towards doing that with postgraduate study, but when we are seeing so many young people leave Wales, I would want to be trying to look at alternatives to at least try and encourage them back, potentially through postgraduate study, but also to think about staying in Wales in the first place, and I genuinely believe that a Government should have more leadership in this regard and not leave it  to the higher education institutions to do that. We want to see a Government take major steps forward. Yes, people will have their own choice of where to go, but if we want to develop our economy, if we want to develop the communities around our HE sector, academics and those in higher education institutions tell me that it's necessary for students to feel that they want to study more so here in Wales, so that whole community network can be progressed here in Wales. So, I'd like to hear your opinion. I think it probably will differ from mine, but we are where we are.

On the resilience of the HE sector, we can't ignore some of the issues that have arisen or come to light in relation to COVID. The fact is that many Welsh universities are struggling financially, and it's not just regarding COVID. Many institutions are struggling to compete in a heavily marketised HE environment. Three of the 21 UK universities identified as most at risk of insolvency are in Wales. So, when we're talking about resilience, what more can we do to ensure that universities here in Wales are protected into the future?

And my final point is that I agree that much has been done to change the outlook in higher education, but we have seen cuts to further education and, of course, many HE courses are delivered in a further education environment. So, I would like to hear your opinion as to how we can try and reverse that decline in the future, albeit I understand that you came to an agreement with Plaid Cymru for additional money in the last budget. But I think further education has been somewhat forgotten sometimes in the debate around these issues, and I would like to see more emphasis on that. But, thank you for all your hard work in this area.

Thank you to Bethan. She is right—I don't believe any political party can say that they have completely clean hands when it comes to the issue of student fees, and I would remind her of which parties were in Government in Wales in 2009 when the top-up fees were introduced. So, I think all of us have got parties where we've had to make some really difficult decisions, whether it be at Westminster or whether it be in Wales, about how we support the university sector and how we support students.

But the Member is absolutely right to say that what we have been able to achieve in Wales via the Diamond review is a level of consensus that has not been seen to be available in other parts of the United Kingdom, and that's because, I think, all political parties had an opportunity to contribute to the Diamond review, to bring their ideas to the table and to work hard to develop that consensus. So, I think Diamond has provided that opportunity to take some of the hard politics out of these very complex decisions, and has allowed everybody to have a seat at the table and to help develop a consensus that I think has brought real, real dividends not just for the sector, but for individual students.

On the part-time offer, I'm glad that Bethan has acknowledged this, because that ability to study in a different way and to recognise that a student isn't necessarily that traditional 18-year-old school leaver, is really, really, really important. I said in answer to Suzy Davies there's a tremendous impact and a tremendous rise in numbers that we've seen at the OU, but it's also important to recognise that our more traditional universities are also responding to this agenda, not just by offering part-time undergraduate degrees and part-time degrees, but we've seen a growing interest and a growing determination in the sector to offer micro-credentials to be able to support people who are looking for some qualifications and some accreditation that allows them to progress in their field of work or allows them to seek new work. I think that flexibility that is being shown in the sector is very, very welcome and recognises that they know that they have a huge part to play in COVID recovery in our nation going forward. Therefore, it is really important that our universities are in a position to respond positively and work with Welsh Government for that post-COVID recovery, and we've been able to do that by ensuring that we've been able to support our universities via the funding council in a way that we were not previously able to do so under the old system. We have seen a significant amount of money being able to go into HEFCW's budget to support universities, and we've responded positively as a Government during this crisis to be able to support them, going forward.

On this issue of where young people in Wales choose to go to university, Bethan, I don't want choice to simply be available to those students who can afford it, and a differentiation approach I think is one where— . We've tried to do that in postgraduate where there is support above and beyond what you would get, but I really think it is for the individual to decide where they want to go to university. And I don't think we should necessarily see it as a completely bad thing if young people decide to, perhaps, spend a period of time studying anywhere else. I see this in my own family. There's nothing unpatriotic about a young person in Wales who decides that they want to go and study in a different country for a period of time. In fact, if I look around the Cabinet table, I think the vast majority of Ministers studied at universities elsewhere and have come back to make a contribution to Wales. So, I don't want choice and a differential finding system to be put in place, where those who can afford to go to different universities have that choice, and those that are only reliant on support from the Welsh Government have to go to universities that Welsh Government want them to go to. But that's the difference, I guess, between your perspective on life and my perspective, in that I really value that individual choice and that individual freedom to fulfil people's potential.

But what I would say is that Welsh universities are tremendously successful in recruiting from other parts of the United Kingdom. We have a strong offer that is very, very, very attractive to individuals who live here in Wales and who choose to come and study in Wales. We've got something for everybody and a really, really strong reputation. Our universities score higher for student satisfaction than any other sector in the United Kingdom, and the quality of our research means that we outshine the system for our size—we punch above our weight in that regard. So, we have lots to recommend it, but I am not in the business of curtailing where individuals want to go to university by altering the system.

FE does have a really, really important part to play. We need to make sure that FE and HE work in collaboration and do not compete. Bethan is quite right to talk about the marketisation of the approach and the damage sometimes that brings. I think, in Wales, we are too small for that. Our sector and our institutions have something very unique to offer their communities and our nation, and they need to work in partnership with FE. And that's why it's disappointing to me that we've not been able to move forward with our tertiary education reforms, which I believe would have let us create a planning environment that could have cut through some of that competition and some of that marketisation, and we could have had a very clear collaborative agenda between who does what in education in Wales—we play to our strengths and there is a clear path for individual students to move seamlessly between different levels at a time that is right for them. 

The Minister referenced more consensus in Wales on higher education. I think there probably is something to be said for that. I'm not sure that she's yet entirely got me with the programme on progressive universalism, but I criticised the Diamond report initially for proposing maintenance grants for families with up to £80,000 a year income, which I thought was way too high, but the Minister brought that down, I think, to nearer £50,000. And I agree with much of what she said just now, and I certainly much prefer it to the Plaid spokesperson's approach and demand for leadership for staying in Wales in the first place. I agree with the Minister that it's in no way unpatriotic to decide to go to university outside Wales. I recall the absurd situation where the previous First Minister, I think, attacked Adam Price for having taken up the opportunity to study at Harvard. I think we should all have those opportunities to benefit from study elsewhere.

And where I really agree with what the Minister has said is that student support should be portable across the United Kingdom. I'd just like to say how different the Welsh Government's approach has been from that of the Scottish Government. There was a very interesting article in The Economist last week that referred to the Scottish Government education policy weakening the bonds that unite the kingdom. The Economist suggested that it was the intention of the SNP to do this, to stop people when they're young leaving Scotland and potentially going to England and some perhaps staying there, and to ensure that they stayed in Scotland and therefore were more likely to support the SNP. They get free education at university if they stay in Scotland but have to pay £9,250 a year if they go to England, so it's no surprise that many more stay in Scotland. What that's seen is mobility from Scotland fall very significantly. In Wales, I think 2 per cent of people each year go to another nation or English region, compared to Scotland, where only 0.5 per cent do so, and that's a massive difference. It's really increased, and that, at least in part, I believe, is due to the student finance system. So, I'd like to thank and applaud the Minister for what she's done on this area, even to the extent of giving higher maintenance and support if a student studies in London, because of the higher cost. I think there's a huge difference between what she and the Welsh Government have done compared to what the SNP and Scotland have done and, perhaps, what Plaid might like to happen here. So, well done on that.

Can I also just briefly ask her about COVID? Firstly, is there any chance that students might get some sort of refund for the terrible situations that so many have had over the past year and that still continue in terms of the value they've got? What are her views on that? Second, I recall, about a year ago, the UK Government put in caps—at least in England—to try and protect some of the lower-ranking institutions from seeing lots more students go to the higher-ranking institutions just for that year or two because of the COVID impact and because of not having international students. I think the Minister quite rightly complained about that unilateral action taken by the UK Government that affected Wales and how it would be much better if that had been done on a co-ordinated UK basis. Could she update us as to what's now happening on that issue?

Can I thank Mark Reckless for his comments? As I said, it's an important principle to me that there is portability of the package, allowing students to make choices about where they study. I don't know about deliberately trying to weaken the bonds of the union, but I think where the Welsh system does compare very favourably to Scotland is in terms of social mobility—I don't know about outward mobility, but actually social mobility—in the number of students who go to a university and the backgrounds that they come from. Because there are caps on the number of places, effectively, in Scottish universities, it does mean, I would argue, that perhaps they haven't seen the growth in the number of students from poorer backgrounds going to university that our student finance system has allowed us to do. So, I don't know about outward mobility, but I do think our system compares favourably in supporting social mobility and in ensuring that no matter what your background, you have the opportunity to benefit from higher education if you have the desire and the academic ability to do so, and that is not constrained by your parents or your financial ability to do so. I think that's a really important principle.

With regard to support for the sector and for students, we have created pro rata the largest level of student support during this COVID phase anywhere in the United Kingdom, I believe, with the £50 million that we've made available. As I said in answer to Bethan Jenkins and Suzy Davies, we can't take all the disruption and impact away from COVID, but we can support students at this time who are worried financially or whose well-being has been affected by the experience that they have gone through. That money has been put there to try and address that. At this stage we have no plans for a student fee rebate. That's partly because—and Mr Reckless knows probably as much as anybody in the Chamber about this—the issue of Treasury and the loan book being held in Westminster, and some of the complicating factors that make this not necessarily a decision that is easy to do on a unilateral basis.

With regard to student number controls, it was a source of regret last year that we were not able to work together collaboratively across the United Kingdom. Can I say that I do now meet on a very regular basis with my counterpart Michelle Donelan from the Westminster Government? I'm sure that such a situation would be avoided this year because communications and meetings are much improved. I'm sure that we can avoid a situation this year, because we are committed—myself and Michelle—to avoiding the situation that we found ourselves in last year.

Thank you very much, Minister.