Felly, symudwn ymlaen at eitem 6, datganiad gan Weinidog y Gymraeg ac Addysg ar fynd i’r afael ag effaith tlodi ar gyrhaeddiad. Galwaf ar y Gweinidog, Jeremy Miles. 

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Ddeuddeg mis yn ôl, fe gyflwynais i gyfres o gamau i'n rhoi ni ar ben ffordd wrth daclo effaith tlodi ar gyrhaeddiad addysgol. Mae bylchau cyrhaeddiad rhwng plant a phobl ifanc mewn ysgolion cynradd ac yng nghyfnod allweddol 3 sy'n cael eu heffeithio gan dlodi wedi lleihau dros amser. Mae'r cynnydd hwnnw wedi bod yn llai cyson ar gyfer dysgwyr ar lefel TGAU, ac mae effaith y pandemig yn debygol o fod wedi gwaethygu'r bylchau. Ond does dim un ateb syml. Allwn ni ddim delio gyda’r mater hwn drwy un fenter neu drwy ddiwygio un rhan o'r system; mae angen i ni weithredu ar sail system gyfan.

Yr wythnos diwethaf, fe roddais i’r wybodaeth ddiweddaraf i’r Senedd ar ein map trywydd newydd ar gyfer addysg, sef, ‘Safonau a Dyheadau Uchel i Bawb’. Mae’r map trywydd hwnnw yn nodi'r camau rŷn ni’n eu cymryd ar y cyd ar gyfer addysg. Mae’n rhaid i ni edrych ar bob cam gweithredu yn fanwl i sicrhau ein bod ni’n taclo effaith tlodi ar ddeilliannau addysgol. Heddiw, rwyf am roi’r wybodaeth ddiweddaraf i Aelodau ar y camau a gyflwynais i 12 mis yn ôl, sydd bellach yn rhan o’r map trywydd.

Y ffactor pwysicaf mewn perthynas â mynd i’r afael ag effaith tlodi ar gyrhaeddiad mewn ysgolion yw sicrhau addysgu a dysgu o ansawdd uchel. Rydyn ni wedi cymryd camau ar draws y system i sicrhau ein bod ni’n rhoi sylw i’r ffactor hwnnw gan fanteisio ar dystiolaeth ryngwladol o'r hyn sy'n gweithio. Mae deall effaith tlodi eisoes yn rhan o hyfforddiant cychwynnol athrawon, a byddwn ni’n cryfhau'r ffocws hwnnw. O fis Medi ymlaen, mae cymhwyster cenedlaethol ar radd Meistr mewn addysg ar gyfer athrawon sydd eisoes yn cael eu cyflogi yn cynnwys modiwl sy'n canolbwyntio ar leihau effaith tlodi, ac fe gafodd adnoddau newydd eu darparu yn ddiweddar i athrawon a chynorthwywyr addysgu. 

Mae'r dasg o gefnogi'r ymgyrch hon wedi'i rhoi i'r Academi Genedlaethol ar gyfer Arweinyddiaeth Addysgol Cymru ac Estyn. Mae Estyn wedi bod yn rhoi mwy o sylw i'r hyn y mae darparwyr yn ei wneud i leihau effaith tlodi ac wedi cyhoeddi arweiniad ategol newydd ar beth maen nhw'n ei arolygu. Mae gan yr academi genedlaethol rôl i sicrhau bod arweinyddiaeth ledled Cymru yn cydnabod effeithiau tlodi ac yn mynd i'r afael â'r effeithiau hynny.

Ym mis Ionawr, gyda chymorth yr academi genedlaethol, fe benodais saith pennaeth eithriadol i fod yn bencampwyr cyrhaeddiad. Maen nhw'n gweithio gydag ysgolion sy'n bartneriaid ledled Cymru i rannu eu profiad o daclo effaith tlodi mewn ysgolion yn llwyddiannus. Rwyf wedi cwrdd â nhw ddwywaith erbyn hyn, yn fwyaf diweddar ar 9 Mawrth, i gael clywed eu canfyddiadau nhw, a fydd yn llywio ein datblygiad polisi ni.

Dirprwy Lywydd, there is always more to learn. Over the last 12 months, we've looked across the UK and internationally to inform policy, drawing on the expertise of organisations like the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the Education Endowment Foundation. As I set out last year, we know from research and inspection evidence that schools that couple effective learning and teaching with a focus on family engagement are most effective in overcoming the impact of poverty on educational attainment.

Earlier this month, I announced additional capital funding for community-focused schools to improve the accessibility and community use of schools. We will invest £40 million in the next two years, building on the £20 million made available in 2022-23. We'll continue to provide support for community-focused school managers. I've also announced an increase in funding for family engagement officers from £3.84 million to £6.5 million over the next financial year. By working with families, these roles are having an impact in helping address the barriers learners face, such as poor attendance, attainment or mental health and well-being issues. We've developed and updated our guidance on community-focused schools and we are working closely with our education partners to finalise revised attendance and engagement guidance.

I'm committed to the pupil development grant, which provides around £130 million a year of additional support to schools. We've prepared revised guidance, informed by the work of the Education Endowment Foundation and Estyn, to support schools to better target this funding on what works and improve monitoring and evaluation of impact. This will be published in the summer term.

I recognise the difficulties recruiting teachers into more challenging areas. The Education Policy Institute are undertaking a rapid review of the international evidence in this area and will report to me over the summer. I'm committed to maintaining the £13.6 million support for our school essentials grant. This will continue to ensure learners do not go without uniforms or school equipment and can participate fully in education.

The University of Wales Trinity Saint David will report over the summer on some initial scoping research to understand the use and impact of mixed-attainment teaching in Wales so we can ensure learners facing poverty are not held back in their progression and aspirations.

We've expanded our whole-school approaches, including a toolkit to support schools and settings to develop and embed their own whole-school approach to achieving high standards of oracy and reading. Our whole-school approach to emotional and mental well-being and access to free school meals in primary schools are particularly important for those facing the impacts of poverty.

I want to provide more opportunities for children and young people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds for wider enrichment. We continue to invest in support to access the national music service, language and science, technology, engineering and mathematics tutors, and the expressive arts. Our school holiday enrichment programme provides £4.85 million of investment for fun and educational activities over the summer holidays, targeted at areas most affected by poverty.

Equity must continue through to tertiary education. The core duties we've set out for the commission for tertiary education and research include promoting equality and widening participation for those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.

Finally, Dirprwy Lywydd, I want to look ahead to the next 12 months and beyond. To build on the foundations we've now put in place, I want to highlight three priorities. Firstly, we must keep learning from others. We will build on our UK and international networks to identify and share best practice on what works from across the globe. We'll keep developing our relationships with the OECD and EEF, as well as forge new relationships, such as a memorandum of understanding with Flanders.

Secondly, we'll move from research to policy development in priority areas. This includes developing a policy for incentivising teachers into challenging areas, and better understanding of the impact of mixed-attainment teaching in Wales.

Thirdly, we'll need to be able to identify where additional support is needed and to target it effectively, tracking our progress throughout. I published detailed information on our next steps for an information ecosystem in January.

I gloi, hoffwn i ailadrodd yr ymrwymiad a wnes i'r llynedd: mae pob un plentyn yng Nghymru yn haeddu safonau a dyheadau uchel. Cyhoeddais i'r map trywydd i gyflawni hynny'r wythnos diwethaf, a heddiw, rwyf i wedi rhoi diweddariad i chi ar rai camau penodol i fynd i'r afael gydag effaith tlodi. Fyddwn ni ddim yn dewis rhwng tegwch a rhagoriaeth yn ein hysgolion ni—rhaid inni gyflawni'r ddau beth.

Thank you, Minister. As you know, the disadvantage gap in Wales is far worse than in England, with the worst disadvantage gap in England still ranking higher than much of Wales. So, the question has to be asked: why, after two decades, are you only just thinking of this now? What quick wins are you hoping to achieve with these champions, as well as a long-term plan to turn around these embarrassing gaps in attainment between the poor in Wales and the more affluent?

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has highlighted over the years that the educational performance of children from poorer backgrounds compared to their peers from more prosperous backgrounds provides clear evidence of the impact of poverty on achievement. So, Minister, don't you actually think cutting the pupil development grant, aka support for the poorest students in Wales, flies in the face of the statement you've just read out today and that this will actually harm attainment?

Now, I understand the Welsh Government is commissioning research and pilot activities to address gaps in understanding and develop new approaches, and I know this includes the appointment of the seven attainment champions. However, we're already seeing schools up and down Wales struggle to share best practices on a whole array of issues. You may have set up a new website for sharing such best practice, but, in reality, teachers are saying it's cumbersome and that they're not using it. So, when the new advice from the attainment champions is fed back to schools, how are you going to ensure best practice is shared better than it currently is?

And as you know, ultimately, the best way the Welsh Government can alleviate the impact of poverty on educational attainment is to alleviate poverty in Wales full stop. We need proper investment in Welsh communities, especially rural areas, as well as a more pro-business approach that also incentivises skilled workers to live and remain in Wales. These are all necessary steps to lifting more people in Wales out of relative poverty. This is also a crucial way to cut the attainment gap and increase the life chances of our learners.

My final question: how is your department going to work cross-department to ensure this happens? What plans do you have in place to ensure that Wales has a multipronged approach to educational attainment? Diolch.

I thank the Member for her observations and the questions that she has asked. She makes an important point, I think, about the ability of schools on their own to address the full impact of poverty on educational attainment. Schools are in their communities, they're in their society, and there are things that schools can do, and there are things that schools can't do, in terms of addressing that broader range of challenges.

But what the statement I've described today does is—to answer the Member's question, I think—to set out a whole-system approach that starts at early years and extends through school, college, work-based learning, higher education, and, importantly, lifelong learning as well, to bring a whole-system focus on how we tackle the impact of poverty on attainment.

She made the point that PDG, pupil development grant, has been cut. That is factually incorrect; it’s been increased both in cash terms and in real terms, and that is for the very simple reason that it’s a very effective way of targeting funding at schools to reflect the cohort of pupils living in disadvantage.

She makes an important practical point about how best to spread best practice through the system. I don’t actually recognise the point she made—she mentioned a website; I’m not sure which website she was referring to, but I don’t recognise quite the point that she was making. Although, as it happens, in the discussions that I had most recently with the attainment champions that I’ve appointed, one of the issues we were exploring is how we can make sure that heads in schools right across Wales who want rapid access to good case studies of what has been effective in other schools—how we best make sure that is easily accessed and made quick use of. So, there is definitely work that we will want to do, together with our attainment champions and also the National Academy for Educational Leadership, in that space. But she asked me what measures we are going to take; I had taken, I think, about 10 minutes to spell out the wide range of measures that we are taking, so I think I can do no better than refer her to my statement.

Diolch, Weinidog, am y datganiad heddiw. Yn amlwg, mae hyn yn dilyn trafodaeth gawson ni yr wythnos diwethaf o ran hyn, lle roedden ni yn pwysleisio pa mor angenrheidiol ydy o ein bod ni yn edrych i sicrhau bod cyfle cyfartal i bawb, lle bynnag bo nhw yng Nghymru a beth bynnag fo’u cefndir nhw, ac rydyn ni'n gwybod dyw hynny ddim yn wir ar y funud, ac mae yna nifer o fesurau fan hyn i'w croesawu heb os. Rydyn ni'n gwybod hefyd, wrth gwrs, o ran yr holl dystiolaeth, ein bod ni'n gwybod o ran absenoldeb fod yna gysylltiad rhwng tlodi ag absenoldeb, ac un o’r pethau dwi'n ei groesawu’n fawr ydy'r parhad o ran yr arian efo'r swyddogion fydd yn ymgysylltu efo teuluoedd. Byddwn i yn hoffi gofyn—. Dwi'n gweld bod yna gynnydd wedi bod o ran hynny—jest eisiau gwybod sut byddwch chi'n monitro o ran effeithiolrwydd y cynlluniau hynny. Yn sicr, mae’r ymateb wedi bod yn dda, gan ysgolion dwi wedi bod yn ymweld â nhw, lle maen nhw wedi galluogi hyn, a dwi'n meddwl y bydd hyn yn cael ei groesawu yn fawr ganddyn nhw.

If I may just focus on the £40 million investment that you mentioned in terms of the community-focused schools to improve the accessibility and community use of schools, obviously, that investment is welcome, but I’m still not clear how exactly they are going to help in terms of attainment, especially when we look at the connection between school absences and attainment, because, obviously, if we can’t even get our children and young people to school, then, obviously, they’re not going to be able to take advantage of any additional facilities there, and this seems to be a fundamental point.

I don’t see, in terms of your announcement today, for instance, who exactly will benefit from that investment, because there’s no mention in terms of transport costs, something that we’ve discussed many a time now as being a barrier, something that came through with the children and young people committee's inquiry into school absences. I’m still not very clear, in terms of that capital investment, how that’s going to help tackle the problem that we have now, and I wonder if any of this funding or funding being made available to the family engagement officers will be towards transportation at all.

Another issue I’d just like to mention is that, obviously, we know poverty affects every aspect of a child’s life and, in school, it can lock children out of opportunities to participate, learn and thrive, and research shows that children and young people from less affluent homes are more likely to report higher levels of loneliness, lower life satisfaction and no enjoyment in going to school. So, we know that transport can be a barrier for some, but, for some, school is not a good place to be. Worryingly, the social exclusion felt by low-income learners is frequently heightened by other forms of inequality, with lower income children from Gypsy, Roma and Traveller and black groups more likely to say that they are lonely and unhappy at school compared to white Welsh or British children of a similar socioeconomic status. Will the Minister therefore provide an update on the Welsh Government's plan to target these groups who greatly feel social exclusion, and perhaps explain how this increase in funding or investment will support them?

Certainly, as I said at the beginning, we very much support any investment that helps to ensure that we lessen that attainment gap that exists presently. Of course, through the co-operation agreement, things like free school meals are absolutely essential, and we very much welcome them. But, in terms of secondary schools, obviously, that falls outside of the co-operation agreement, and therefore we would still ask, where there is opportunity, to look at the expansion of free school meal provision at the secondary age.

Mae angen i ni gydweithio. Mae angen system sydd yn mynd i drawsnewid pethau. Rydyn ni'n gweld y ffigurau pryderus gan Sefydliad Bevan hefyd o ran y gwahaniaethau rhwng bechgyn a merched a'r gwahaniaethau sydd yna o ran cyrhaeddiad o ran hynny. Felly, gaf i ofyn pa gynlluniau yn benodol sydd i sicrhau bod gwahaniaethau fel yna hefyd yn cael eu taclo? Mae'n rhaid inni sicrhau cyfle cyfartal i bawb, ac fel y dywedais i ar y dechrau, nid dyna'r realiti ar y funud. Mae hyn i'w groesawu, ond dwi'n meddwl bod yna'n dal cwestiynau o ran sut rydyn ni'n mynd i sicrhau'r gorau i bawb. Diolch.

Well, the Member made an important point about what are the biggest challenges, and I think possibly the biggest challenge that schools face is making sure that young people are in school. There are obviously very high levels of absence, which many, many schools are reporting. And the Member asked an important question about what the investment into community-focused schools and the family engagement officers that I announced recently will do in relation to that. I should say, as I mentioned in my statement, on the question of absence and engagement more broadly, we are reviewing the guidance available to schools on some of the strategies that schools may adopt. And one of the key issues relates to the threshold for additional intervention—the 'persistent absence' definition. I think there's a very strong case for reviewing that to make sure that more support is more quickly available to families than is often currently the case. And the funding for family engagement officers and education welfare officers as well helps to provide additional capacity in the system.

She asked me whether I'm persuaded that that money is well spent, effectively. I don't think there'll be a Member in the Chamber who will not have visited a school with a family engagement capacity who doesn't immediately see the benefits of that. It's often a 24/7 job, actually, and often involves work on the weekends and certainly in the evenings, as well as the necessary work during the school day of connecting with the family and visiting the family, and so on. It's a very important role, I think, in schools that have a need for it. And I hope that the funding that we have made available will be able to contribute further to that. 

On the question about the funding and how that relates to absence and attendance, I can probably do no better than refer her to a report today on WalesOnline, which describes the £46 million that we've invested as part of an attendance strategy, and it records a discussion that I had yesterday at a school in Cardiff, which is doing extraordinary work in terms of partnership with other organisations, including the local council but also the university and sports teams and so on. What they were telling me at the school yesterday was that it helps the young people relate to school differently. So, many of the young people—who were interviewed for this piece, by the way, as well—were telling the journalist that they felt 100 per cent more committed to school by virtue of also being able to do these additional activities as part of being a community-focused school.

We were also hearing about parents coming in to help volunteer to support some of those activities who themselves were benefiting in terms of developing their skills. But, perhaps—I felt at least—more importantly, it was reshaping the relationship of parents to school and rebuilding that relationship of trust, which is really an important part of the challenge for getting young people back into school. So, I encourage her to look at that, because I think it's just a very live example of the sort of thing that we are hoping to achieve here.

There's more detail available in the guidance that we published. There are two iterations of guidance, which we published at the end of last year, which really spell out what the community-focused schools programme is all about, how it can help with attendance and attainment. What I would say, though, is that the key thing is it will be different for each school, and the whole point is: what is the relationship between this particular school and this particular community? And that will be very different in different places, obviously.

The whole-system approach, I agree, is a really important one when we're trying to tackle the impact of poverty on attainment. Hungry kids don't learn very well, and we know from Gordon Brown that 4 million children across the UK are going hungry. But there is also a cultural issue in that six in 10 people never cook from scratch, so this goes well beyond people who are struggling with the cost-of-living crisis.

I noticed that your nearly £5 million investment in the school holiday enrichment programme, and I wondered what consideration you've given to teaching young people and their families to cook during those summer holiday programmes, because there obviously isn't time during the school day, but that seems to me a really effective way of combatting the dominance of the processed food culture that is going to bankrupt the NHS.

Otherwise, I'm intrigued to hear what these exceptional headteachers you've designated as attainment champions—. What are their words of wisdom that they shared with you, most recently on 9 March, on how to tackle the really complex issues around poverty and attainment?

I think the Member is absolutely right to mention the importance of food as part of the summer food and fun programme—it's sometimes called 'food and fun', in some parts of Wales. I share with her her passion for making sure that schools teach young people about the whole range of purposes of food, so nutrition, obviously, but eating together. You could also teach large parts of the curriculum through food, and I most recently had an opportunity of visiting a school in the constituency of the Member for Wrexham, my friend Lesley Griffiths, and saw there young people being taught to cook things and taking recipes home, so that they could cook them again at home, and I just thought that was a very powerful example of the sort of thing that the Member is talking about. We are working—. Julie Morgan and I are working at the moment on aligning the various programmes that the Government funds over the summer holiday, to make sure that we obviously ensure as much coverage as possible, but also to look at making sure that the kinds of opportunities that the Member is referring to are more widely available. She will know that nutrition is already an important part of that summer holiday provision, and that often takes the form of cooking with young people, but what can we do to make sure that's a more universal experience?

On the second question, 'What are we hearing from attainment champions?', they have two roles. One is to work with particular schools. It's currently still a pilot programme, a six-month pilot programme, working with particular schools on particular approaches based on their own experiences. But the question she's asking is on the other part of their role, which is: how are they informing system-wide development and policy development? There are some pretty clear themes, I think, about the importance and strategies for developing pupil voice, which evidence suggests is particularly important in the context of re-engaging some young people who might find it more challenging. But also we heard about the importance of mixed-attainment teaching and good usage of the PDG. That's why increasing that, as I mentioned to Janet Finch-Saunders, is so important.

I mentioned, essentially, how at the very heart of this is high-quality teaching and learning, but what are the strategies that enable that to reach children and young people who might need a different kind of approach? Links with parents, links with carers, and also the importance of leadership at a school level in relation to this. I spoke to them and was teasing out what it is that distinguishes schools that have been successful in this and those that maybe have had a little bit more of a challenge. One of them said to me, 'Well, some heads who had really committed to this have lost the sense that they might be able to do anything meaningful about it,' if you like, because it's such a big challenge. There isn't an absence of commitment. There is not a single head in Wales who isn't completely committed to this, but sometimes it's a challenge to see how you can make that difference, and that's why this is so important, because we can share that best practice across the system and make sure that heads have ready access to things that are working well elsewhere, so all those strategies can be brought into play.

I very much welcome the new funding and focus on community-focused schools, Minister, which I know we've discussed before. I have some good examples, I think, in my area, including Maindee Primary School, which is multicultural and is doing some really good work, and tells me that they have to invest heavily in staff to support parents and families with wider issues, such as food, housing, medical issues, benefits and other wider non-education issues. So, it's great, I think, that a school like that will benefit from this new focus and funding.

The new Monmouthshire County Council administration is taking forward some interesting initiatives. They have a new service tackling the impact of disadvantage at its heart, and they've brought together a range of professionals, from educational psychology, pupil referral, family support, and created a new post within the team to provide leadership. And in addition to that, Minister, they've got some really good initiatives linking with the third sector, providing grants to support learning experiences for pupils, such as providing tents to enable schools to provide camping experiences, and are also looking to provide breakfast-club funding for secondary school pupils. So, with all that going on in my area, Minister, I very much welcome that new focus and that new funding.

Daeth y Llywydd i’r Gadair.

I thank John Griffiths, and I know of his commitment to the principle of community-focused schools, not least because of the successes in his particular area of many schools in achieving that, and I think he just highlights two important themes in what he has just said. Firstly, that role of school staff connecting with families around a range of issues, which might not be directly around the education of their children, but cements that relationship of trust between the school and families. And the second theme, which is so important, is the linking up of different services, whether that's a physical co-location in the school or a network of connections, so that school, but also housing services, children's services, primary healthcare—all those services are part of a seamless offer. Some schools are doing that very well. Many schools want to do more of that, and I think there is much more we can do across the system to make that a more common experience for many of our schools.

Thank you, Minister. I've got two questions today. My first is about initial teacher training. I think it's really important that trainee teachers are allocated a mix of school placements, so that they're able to gain experience in working with pupils from more disadvantaged backgrounds. And this is to build their skills and their expertise, but also, crucially, to build a passion for what is probably one of the most rewarding aspects of teaching. What work are you doing with universities in Wales to ensure that they deliver placements on this basis?

Secondly, I note your comments around ensuring that we tackle the impact of poverty on attainment throughout the year and not just during the school term. From visiting projects in my own constituency, including, for example, in Penywaun, I know what good work the school holiday enrichment programme does, not just for children, but also their families and school staff. So, building on your answer to my colleague Jenny Rathbone, I'd like to say that I appreciate the pressure on budgets, but I'd like to ask if you've given any consideration to whether this provision could be extended, both geographically and in terms of the school year.

I thank Vikki Howells for those two questions. On the first question, one of the aspects of the job, which is a great pleasure actually, is being able to visit the initial teacher education partnerships across Wales, both remotely in the past, but now also in person, and talk to the cohort of students going through the postgraduate certificate in education about their experiences and answering questions from them. I always take the opportunity of those fantastic meetings to highlight just how important I think it is that every single child, whatever their background, is entitled to the full range of care and commitment from every single teacher, and that is a very widely shared principle and passion, I think, amongst teachers qualifying in Wales.

But the question she asks is important: what are we doing structurally to make sure that that is a strong feature of initial teacher education and placement? She will know perhaps from previous discussions that we are currently refreshing the criteria for accreditation of ITE programmes in preparation for the next round of reaccreditation, so this is a timely discussion in that sense, and we are strengthening the requirement for all student teachers to be aware of and have experience of tackling the impact of poverty on attainment and how they can address that through strategies. Obviously, questions around placement are important in that sense. Clearly, that's already an expectation from ITE, but we plan to beef that up in the next round of accreditation.

Secondly, yes, we are making sure we can satisfy ourselves that the funding available for the school holiday provision is being spent as effectively as possible. I fund some of that from my portfolio; Julie Morgan funds related interventions from her portfolio. For this summer coming, we're making sure that both programmes, if you like, speak to each other and can co-ordinate, but in the future we will be looking at whether we can do something more systematic to ensure that there's wider coverage, less duplication and a consistent offer in as much of Wales as we can manage.

Rhianon Passmore, yn olaf.

Diolch, Llywydd. I do welcome the responses of the Minister to the Chamber, so thank you for making the statement. One of the driving forces entering active politics was seeking to tackle the scourge and impacts of poverty, providing equality of opportunity for all, not based on parental wealth, in education and the arts. There's little doubt that education is one of the most profound tools that we can equip citizens with in order to best safeguard them against experiencing poverty. But it does not, however, negate the need for the wider state to provide adequate welfare safety nets, good-quality social housing policy, or sound economic growth. I welcome the £46 million programme to tackle inequality and absence in schools, and I know that it will be very warmly welcomed in communities across Islwyn. So, thank you very much. Diolch yn fawr ichi.

We all know, though, that one of the core ingredients of success for children during their school years is to be able to attend in the first place. Too many of our poorest students now are facing huge, unprecedented pressures that undoubtedly impact on that ability. The data shows that attendance rates for this academic year sit at 83.9 per cent for those eligible for free school meals, compared with 91.4 for those better-off pupils. It is about transport, poorer health, having no coat, no shoes, period poverty, uniform costs, sports, music, food costs, caring and mental health—all of those impact, as does the extra money needed for school trips, which I know the Welsh Government is attempting in many ways to influence and impact. Poverty is often generationally endemic, Minister, and the challenges faced by us all to ensure equality of opportunity is not an easy one.

If I go straight to my question, then. Minister, children themselves, as well as educators, have highlighted the importance of schools being seen at the heart of their communities—truly community-focused schools. So, what can the Welsh Government do, working with local authorities, to ensure that twenty-first century school facilities are practically available to the wider community so that children feel that sense of genuine belonging to their community and also to their school? Thank you, Llywydd.

The Member makes a series of very important points. She talked about the importance of children's own experience of schools, and I think that listening and the hearing of the voices of young people in this is very, very important. The £40 million capital that I announced recently is intended to enable schools to make the kinds of adaptations that schools sometimes do—to fence off areas, to make areas more easily accessible, to reconfigure land and so on—so that the range of facilities in all of our schools, not simply those that have been funded through the sustainable communities for learning programme, are available to the community. That looks different in different schools. I saw a very good example yesterday of how different parts of the school were being used in different ways to support the local community. The reason it's so important is because it helps young people have a different relationship with school, and for those who feel a bit disengaged, it's also an opportunity, as well as being in the class, to be doing the taekwondo or the rugby or whatever it is, the dance, the range of things that through their local clubs they can then enjoy in school. That just changes and cements that relationship with school, which is really fundamental to the point that she started on, the challenge of ensuring attendance.

Diolch i'r Gweinidog.