Okay, thanks. And then, how do you respond to concerns that learners are avoiding studying the Welsh bac— where they can, that is—by attending institutions in England or institutions that do not offer Welsh-medium provision?
Well, it's interesting, isn't it, about where children choose to study and whether they are motivated by the avoidance of the Welsh bac? People make decisions about where to study for a whole host of reasons, and it's difficult sometimes to quantify what those are. So, for instance, we often hear this along the border that, because—. The geography is not easy, but it can be relatively easy to go across into the English system and therefore you don't have to do this. Now, the reasons for that could be very variable. It could be about the nature of the offer. We know that, in some of our rural schools, the secondary sixth forms aren't able to offer a wide variety of A-levels, and perhaps, by going to a different institution, a larger institution across the way, then you can get that combination of the A-levels you want to do, which simply isn't possible if you do it in your home school. Or, we do have some consortia arrangements where A-levels are delivered across a wide variety of schools, which require students to travel. Some students don't want to do that; they don't want to do their A-levels in three different schools, but they'd rather go to an institution where they can do it all under one roof. And that means, sometimes, moving across the border or, in the area I live, children making the decision to go to Merthyr college, because its a lovely, beautiful new building, the facilities are absolutely fantastic and a wide variety of A-levels is available under one roof. We looked at, in particular, also, the perception of quality. So, if we take the example of King Henry VIII School in Abergavenny, a school where, in the past, there have been, I think, within the community, some concerns about the quality of that school—whether it's regarded as a good school. And, from that particular location, you can quite easily get to Hereford college—a college that has a fantastic offer, does very, very well and has a beautiful building. What we do, if we look at the tracking of the students who have been retained in King Henry VIII, as that school has been on its improvement journey and has done better and better and better, the number of students that they are retaining into their sixth form has grown. So, the perception is, 'This is a good school, I'm going to get a good-quality experience here', and more and more students are choosing to stay in that school than perhaps make the decision to travel somewhere else. We also have to recognise that, for some students, staying in the sixth form isn't what they want to do; they want a different experience, they want to go to an FE college. They want a different experience. So, we have to take into consideration that students could be motivated by a wide variety of subjects, and there's no hard-and-fast evidence that it is avoidance of the bac that is the sole driver for some of these choices.
Siân, on this.
The evidence that we've had from one of the teaching unions—robust and clear evidence—is that this is happening, that is, that young people are leaving Wales to go over the border to schools in England in order to avoid the Welsh bac. That's exactly what was said to us. But you don't accept that evidence.