The Education Workforce Council (EWC) is the professional regulatory body for the education workforce in Wales, covering school teachers, further education (FE) teachers and learning support workers in school and FE settings. From April 2017, youth / youth support workers and work based learning professionals will also be registered with the EWC.

The Council wishes to make a small number of points as follows:

1.       The Council highlights that this matter cuts across a number of disciplines, in particular health, social work and education. As such, it is essential that the Welsh Government ensures that it adopts a “joined up approach” in developing and implementing policies and programmes in this area. It is essential that government clearly identifies which professionals will lead and deliver each policy area and ensures that they are appropriately trained and upskilled to do so.

2.       The EWC is particularly interested in the final three bullets points in the invitation letter to provide evidence as these relate specifically to education. The Council invites the Committee to have due regard to important initiatives in Wales such as that in the Foundation phase which are relevant to these points.

3.       Following the extension of the Register of Education Practitioners in Wales, all teaching and learning support staff in maintained schools and nurseries are registered with the EWC. From April, the Register will cover some 80,000 education professionals in Wales. A number of these professionals are involved in provision which covers the “first 1,000 days” of a child’s life. The Welsh Government needs to ensure that it does not introduce regulatory, qualification or professional learning requirements that duplicate or cut across those already in place.

4.       Due to the EWC’s statutory responsibility to maintain a Register, the Council holds extensive data about the education workforce in Wales. We also undertook the first national workforce survey on behalf of the Welsh Government. The Council is able to assist the Committee and the Welsh Government in providing data about the workforce and invites the Committee to taken advantage of this intelligence.

5.       The Welsh Government has set out its intention to develop a million Welsh speakers by 2050. If this is to be achieved, it is important that children’s language skills are developed as early as possible in the early stages of their lives and also ensure that the relevant professionals have the skills to make this happen. This needs to be considered in developing policies and programmes for the first 1,000 days