I fear that the motion and the Conservative amendment take certain issues for granted without evidence to support them. There are a number of large schools in my constituency providing excellent education to the pupils. There are also many small schools in my constituency providing excellent education to their pupils. It's also true to say that the size of a school can have a negative or a positive impact on the quality of education. I've seen large schools being run in a very effective manner, creating small spaces and being flexible in the way that their staff's skills are used to the greatest extent for the benefit of pupils. I've seen small schools doing excellent work despite the problems and challenges that they face. There are many factors affecting the quality of education, and I would argue that excellent teachers inspiring pupils and raising their expectations are a crucially important factor. That can happen in large schools and small schools alike.

I'll turn now to another issue addressed in the motion, namely the journey from home to school. The Government amendment mentions that there is a review of the Learner Travel (Wales) Measure 2008. Section 10 of that Measure includes a general duty that every local authority and Welsh Ministers must promote access to education and training through the medium of Welsh when they exercise functions under the Measure. In the guidance document published in 2014, the Welsh Government confirms that local authorities must act upon that duty to promote Welsh-medium education and training in deciding upon the closest appropriate school. But, the suggestion that the closest school could be appropriate although it doesn't provide the language of choice is unacceptable and emanates from the fact that the concept of an 'appropriate school' is defined very narrowly in the Measure, in a way that makes no reference to its appropriateness in terms of the medium of the language of the education provided. This does appear as a fundamental weakness in trying to look at the responsibilities emerging from the legislation. So, any review that happens needs to take full account of that point and, also, of the court decisions recently on Welsh-medium education in the Rhondda Cynon Taf area.

I note that the original remit of this review has now been expanded to include the 4 to 16 age group as well the post-16 age group, so there is an opportunity here to make a difference. I suppose this will now be a matter for the next Senedd, in terms of any changes emerging from the review, and it is disappointing that there hasn't been progress made during this term. So, thank you for the opportunity to make those comments, and although we agree with elements of the motion and elements of the amendments, there are also elements that we are unable to support, and therefore we will be voting against them today. Thank you, Llywydd.