NDM8686 Plaid Cymru Debate - Education funding

NDM8686 Heledd Fychan (South Wales Central)

To propose that the Senedd:

1. Notes the report 'Falling Short: The deepening school funding crisis in Wales' by the NAHT which states that the educational landscape in Wales is currently facing a harrowing funding crisis.

2. Regrets that as a result of Welsh Government mismanagement and underfunding:

a) Wales saw its worst ever PISA results in 2022;

b) it has missed its target for the recruitment of secondary school teachers for the past eight years;

c) outdated and discredited guidelines on teaching reading skills have negatively impacted literacy skills; and

d) the number of vacancies as a result of a skills shortage in Wales reached a peak of 20,630 in 2022.

3. Calls on the Welsh Government to:

a) immediately honour the commitment made by Labour in Wales in their 2024 General Election manifesto to provide additional funding for education;

b) reverse the 6 per cent cut in expenditure per pupil within the education budget, as noted by the NAHT, as a first step in supporting teachers and pupils and raising attainment levels; and

c) define how many more teachers will be funded by Labour in Wales' promise, and when they will start teaching in classrooms.

Falling Short: The deepening school funding crisis in Wales

The following amendment was tabled:

Amendment 1 Jane Hutt (Vale of Glamorgan)

Delete all and replace with:

To propose that the Senedd:

1. Notes the NAHT report 'Falling Short: The deepening school funding crisis in Wales', and recognises the pressures on school and local authority budgets.

2. Thanks Wales’s dedicated teachers and school staff for their hard work, and welcomes the Welsh Government’s response to the fifth report of the Independent Welsh Pay Review Body, which includes a 5.5 per cent pay rise for teachers.

3. Recognises that, despite the brutal impact of 14 years of Conservative government on Wales’s public finances, the Welsh Government has:

a) introduced the new Curriculum for Wales and a new system of supporting learners with additional learning needs, both of which put the learner at the centre of the education system;

b) implemented a whole school approach to support children and young people with their mental health and wellbeing; and

c) protected funding for core public services in 2024-25 through a 3.3 per cent uplift to local authority budgets and maintaining direct grant funding to schools including the Pupil Development Grant which supports learners from low-income households.

4. Supports boosting standards in schools and colleges as a Welsh Government priority, including a focus on improving national consistency and providing more support for literacy and numeracy. 

5. Supports targeting teacher recruitment in shortage subject areas such as maths, sciences and modern foreign languages, and Welsh-medium education.