Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Education and Welsh Language – in the Senedd at 2:38 pm on 2 March 2022.
Thank you, Minister. I'll just repeat: by contrast, in England, there were noticeable increases in French and Spanish from 2019-20, and that, since records began, Spanish has increased to 100,000 plus. It's completely different to our numbers, which are declining. Also, we have seen the modern foreign language teachers numbers in German and French decline by 14 per cent and 15 per cent respectively over the last five, six years. Is one of the causes of the Global Futures programme failing the lack of teachers coming forward, and, if so, what steps are you doing to rectify that, please, particularly, as you said, because the new curriculum presents us with so many opportunities, as does, potentially, changing the school day? So, we need to have these teachers in place so people are able to have those modern language opportunities if they desire, going forward. Thank you.