Thank you, Chair. Good morning. Alastair, you've already mentioned about awareness raising and training, which will be key with educational professionals. How confident are you that teachers and others working in those educational settings will be clear about how to support the implementation of this Bill, if enacted?
Training requirements for all professionals in education settings are clear. The universal tier 1 training is there, and all local authorities in Wales will implement that. In that level of general safeguarding awareness and training, the infinite emphasis is on the duty to report. That will remain the same. The thresholds for social care, that's their responsibility. That duty to report will always be there. It says in 'Keeping learners safe', which is the bible in terms of education professionals, that there's a responsibility on the professional to make that referral and for that universal service. So, the more specialist safeguarding leads within the schools, who have become highly skilled professionals in terms of understanding what might be significant harm—because that's what we're talking about—they understand the legalities when a referral needs to be made. There's always the collation of safeguarding information, where there might be just general concerns about neglect and other areas, which combined would create a picture that there might be significant neglect or significant harm to the child, and then that referral would be made to the child care assessment team or the police. So, that awareness—it needs to be clear for educational professionals that that duty to report is always there. If they believe that that significant harm has happened then that report then goes to the child care assessment team. They will make the judgment on the threshold because they are the professionals. They have the multi-agency awareness of how that meets the threshold. But in terms of education, it'll be that awareness, making sure that there's clarity. If there's anything that professionals need to be trained additionally on, it'll need to go into 'Keeping learners safe', which at the moment is being rewritten. So, there would have to be some new possible information there relating to this. But as long as there's clarity, and once that implementation phase and the discussion has happened, as long as it's clear for professionals that the duty is always there and they feel a significant harm, then that report will always be there and will always need to be made. It's making sure—and I'll echo what my colleague said, Huw—that the services are key for families. Schools are absolutely fundamental in that support for the families. They have those relationships with the families. I know there was discussion around professional trust. On a daily basis, professionals are working on that trust with parents, because they are the ones that can engage with those families. The family support officers that are working on the ground with highly complex families, with multiple leads and supporting the children—they are fundamental, and investment in that level of support would also help our colleagues as well. So, anything that's preventative. That is already happening in schools and is effective, and is shown to be effective, and has an evidence base—we'd always support that that would continue to be invested in. So, that's really my answer.
Okay. And you were saying about how important trust is as well, but do you think that there's a risk that those in education settings will have a key role in referring more parents to social services, which some have said could cause potential harm to relationships and cause mistrust?
I don't think it's a matter of mistrust—it's a matter of, you know, if a professional believes, based on the evidence that they have, because they're working with that child every day, that there is significant harm to that child, they are under a duty to report that to social care. So, part of the work is with families, and most of the referrals we make are with parental consent. That consent is a key element of this, and conversation with our social care colleagues is usually, 'You need to speak to the parents again and have a conversation with them.' Some of the NFAs—the ones that don't get referred at threshold—it will come back to school for, possibly, some support from the family or a team around the family or some other aspect. So, I don't think—. The trust in the professionals—it's actually more important that we are seen to be upholding our duties under the all-Wales safeguarding procedures. That's what engenders trust in a professional workforce.