Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Education and Welsh Language – in the Senedd at 2:41 pm on 6 October 2021.
Well, this is a very important point and I want to acknowledge the pressure that school leaders and teachers are facing at present, but also over the past year and beyond. I was discussing on Tuesday morning with local authorities and education unions, and the wider education workforce, and I asked them to pass on our thanks as a Government, and I'm sure, as a Senedd, to their workforces for what they've been doing in very difficult circumstances over the past year.
In terms of specific provision to support the well-being and mental health of school leaders, we have been doing a variety of things. The whole school framework for well-being includes interventions that support teachers and leaders as well, as well as specific interventions by Education Support and others, so that they have space to be able to deal with the pressures that have been a reality for them over the past year.
In terms of further resources, we have, through renew and reform, provided significant sums of funding to recruit additional staff to alleviate some of the pressure on school leaders to deal specifically with the impact of COVID. So, that has had the effect of increasing provision and increasing the capacity in our schools. And also, in terms of the question of accountability and assessment, the Member will know of the steps that I outlined over the summer in terms of lifting some of those requirements over this past period, understanding fully that the pressure that follows on as a result of that isn't welcomed at the moment as schools deal with the challenges of COVID and so on.
And, in addition to that, we have a working group with local authorities and unions that is working on the measures that we can take to decrease the bureaucratic requirements on our schools to ensure that we shoulder some of that burden.