8. What is the Welsh Government doing to help students with cost of living pressures? OQ59270

Living costs should never be a barrier to studying at university, which is why, despite continuing budget pressures, the Welsh Government has ensured that the value of support has increased significantly by 9.4 per cent in line with the national living wage—news that was welcomed by National Union of Students Wales on behalf of its student membership.

Thank you for that answer, Minister. I'm sure that, like me, you are concerned by the news over the weekend that one in five students at Russell Group universities have considered dropping out over the cost of living. I returned to education as an adult, and at the same time trying to raise a young family. It was difficult enough then. I haven't got a clue how people are going to cope now. You have mentioned, of course, the 9.4 per cent increase in student maintenance support compared with the paltry 2.8 per cent for students in England. Ahead of that in September, is there anything else that you have on the table that we can offer support to those students with?

Well, I thank Joyce Watson for that important supplementary, and I recognise there's a particular challenge sometimes, as she was saying, for people going back to education perhaps later on in life. I know that she shares my pride in the fact that we are committed to making sure that, whether you're studying full time or part time, you have access to the same support pro rata, which I think has meant that many more students have been able to study part time and manage to balance the competing demands that she referred to in her question. I am in ongoing discussion with the sector to make sure that all options to support students impacted by the cost-of-living crisis are considered. I met on the weekend with the president of the NUS in Wales to discuss some further concerns that they were raising with me.

Joyce Watson will know that in addition to having the most supportive student finance regime in any part of the UK, perhaps a less well known aspect of that is that we make provision to cancel up to £1,500 of maintenance loan debt for each undergraduate student, so we always look at finding the most supportive and progressive way of spending the funding that we have. She will also know about the funding that we made available through the Higher Education Funding Council Wales to higher education institutions to fund some of the well-being pressures that have arisen in the context of the cost-of-living pressures. But we will continue to work with the sector to do all that we can together.