Okay. We've come to the end of our time. We have probably got a few areas that we'll write to you about, if that's okay. Can I thank you for your attendance this morning? We will send you a transcript to check for accuracy following the meeting, but thank you again for attending. The committee will break until 10:20, but can Members not shoot off for a sec, please? Okay, can I welcome everybody back to our next evidence session, which is our sixth evidence session for our inquiry on education otherwise than at school? I'm very pleased to welcome Sarah Stone, executive director for Wales of Samaritans; Liz Williams, policy and communications officer at Samaritans; and Dr Ian Johnson, who is the manager of children and young people's mental health at Mind Cymru. Thank you all for attending. If it's okay, we'll go straight and questions. If I can just start by asking you what you think the main reasons are why we are seeing this increase in the numbers of children and young people being excluded from school.
I think you were going to—.
I think it's a very difficult subject, because, in many cases, we're not really sure what the data looks like. We get these things from quite a broad perspective, and we don't actually see the extent of the reasons why. If you look at, for example, the statistical release, then you get a sense of why people are being excluded, but they tend to be—. It's a very reductionist discussion, so you see reasons like persistent disruptive behaviour, verbal abuse or physical assaults, but you don't actually get the underlying factors that are influencing that. Now, we know that that information exists, because, obviously, schools don't exclude anybody lightly, and I speak as someone who's been until this academic year a governor on secondary and primary schools. So, there's a great deal of paper trail, but that doesn't seem to really find its way up to a higher level.
Okay, thank you. And how concerned are you about the trend that we're seeing of an increase in younger children being excluded, and what do you think the reasons might be for that?