The Cabinet Secretary for Education, Lynne Neagle, took part in a routine general scrutiny session on behalf of the Welsh Government with the Children, Young People and Education Committee (CYPEC) at the Senedd on 4^th February 2026.

This saw Ms Neagle, Vikki Howells (Minister for Further & Higher Education) and their officials responding to questions from Committee members on a range of educational issues. A number of Ms Neagle’s comments, some conscious, others possibly inadvertent, seem applicable to the Welsh Government’s present approach to the Children’s Wellbeing and School’s (CWS) Bill.

The Welsh government had originally hoped that the Senedd would vote the previous day, (3^rd February) on a Legislative Consent Motion (LCM) for permission to apply key clauses of the CWS Bill to Wales. The day before that vote was due to take place, it was noted on the Senedd business agenda this had been deferred until 9^th March. Various reasons for this decision have been given by different Senedd Members, with Ms Neagle stating in this session that “we had to postpone that because there were further amendments tabled in Westminster and we wanted to present a more complete LCM to the Senedd.”

Those amendments were however laid in the preceding weeks, and it would be a usual part of Westminster parliamentary process for additional amendments to be tabled at this stage, especially on such a wide-reaching, complex and highly controversial piece of legislation. However, the decision to defer the vote was seemingly only made, or at least made public, the afternoon before the vote.

Ms Neagle’s comment to Cefin Campbell “and I’m grateful to you and Natasha for your engagement on the LCM” may prompt readers to speculate hopefully about the nature of that engagement, especially in relation to the last-minute decision to defer the vote on the LCM.

Cefin Campbell, for Plaid Cymru commented that 13% of schools in Wales are in special measures, and it was noted that many of the schools in question had not been inspected for 8 years.

However, a number of comments made by Ms Neagle were remarkably ironic.

In terms of work on approaches to literacy, for example, Ms Neagle commented, “But what I didn’t want to do is rush this, because it’s too important”.

However, the reason Ms Neagle has previously given for “piggybacking” onto Westminster’s CWS Bill, (as the Attorney General had previously termed this) rather than developing Wales-specific policies or legislation, was “lack of time” because of being too busy with other legislation instead.

The assumption that “piggybacking” onto what had been devised as an England-only Westminster Bill would be “quicker” than using devolved powers was explored when Me Neagle gave evidence in May 2025 to the Legislation Justice and Constitution Committee (LJCC). Even Ms Neagle had to admit at the time that secondary legislation was neither a quicker nor a less demanding way to bring the desired legislation into place. She was also forced to acknowledge that secondary legislation is not a particularly effective way of legislating, being considered “inadequate for proper scrutiny”.

That LJCC meeting also revealed that the Welsh Cabinet Secretary for Education had not been involved in the development or drafting of the Bill, that she only “had very scarce information on the Bill up until its publication in December” and that she “only saw the detail of the Bill just after Christmas”. (i.e. at the second reading in the House of Commons).

It is ironic that the Cabinet Secretary for Education considers it important not to rush conversations with a literacy panel whilst seeming to be in such a rush to “piggyback” onto Westminster’s CWS Bill, having proceeded with such haste, such lack of awareness of the Bill and such lack of engagement with the rest of the Senedd or the people of Wales.  Perhaps Ms Neagle, in her reflections on literacy, is learning the lesson of the tortoise and hare in Aesop’s Fables? That pausing to reflect and evaluate rather than rushing in before information is fully available is usually the more prudent move?

Are the pressures of the forthcoming election, or any potential pressure from Westminster to agree to the Bill, influencing the timing of the attempt to seek assent of Senedd, rather than allowing sufficient time for due scrutiny and dialogue?

It is of course, notable, that the relevant clauses of the Bill at have been changed considerably by Westminster since the intention to apply these to Wales was first announced.

Would the Cabinet Secretary, and all who would be considering voting on this LCM, take the opportunity to review the increasing weight of evidence of the counterproductive and dangerous consequences of a range of the measures in these clauses?

 Would the Senedd also consider the strange juxtaposition of seeking for Westminster to legislate on a devolved matter on the one hand with calls by each political party for increased use of devolved Senedd powers on the other?

Speaking of her priorities at the start of the CYPEC meeting, Ms Neagle also commented “we have to listen to the voices of children in this work that we do”, However, no children or parents (as their advocates) in Wales have been consulted or engaged with on the decision to “piggyback” onto the English CWS Bill, nor on the contents and measures included in it.

Likewise, no children or parents were included, consulted or involved in the highly questionable Welsh Government-commissioned review of their EHE policy, the publication of which was timed to “inform” the debate on the LCM. Only the views of those employed and salaried by the local authority were “evaluated”, with no opportunity for the voice of even one child to be heard on how they and their family should be viewed and treated.

Further information on the Welsh Government commissioned “evaluation” of EHE guidance, questioning the methodology, tone, content and validity of the recommendations, can be found here:

Further irony was notable in the Cabinet Secretary for Education’s statement that:

“For me, that’s why things like children’s rights impact assessments are so important, because of all the groups in society, children don’t have that vote and we have to make sure that their voices are heard. Things like children’s rights impact assessments are ways of making sure that their needs get to the top of the list”.

Yet only this week, with the vote on the LCM at the Senedd rapidly approaching, the Children’s Commissioner for Wales had to remind Welsh Government that she has “urged that a full Children’s Rights Impact Assessment of the bill’s implications for Wales should be published”.

Note too the use of the indefinite article “a” rather than “the”, strongly suggesting that there is no Children’s Rights Impact Assessment as yet, not just that it has not been published. Yet the Welsh Government were hoping that the Senedd would have voted to approve the LCM by now in the absence of one and with the final content of the Bill not even established.

Ms Neagle also observed that “local authorities are not as good as they should be at self-evaluation,”

This is quite a remarkable and significant admission, given that the relevant clauses of the CWS Bill which she advocates offer no accountability for conduct and decision-making by local authority staff and departments. Unprecedented powers over normal well-functioning families would be given to council staff with no plans or duties for any independent appeals, mediation, advocacy, complaints or tribunal services.

Not only is there no provision or acknowledgement of need for accountability via self-evaluation or otherwise in the CWS clauses listed in the LCM, but there is also one remarkable omission.

The only amendment to the CNIS section of the CWS Bill that WG have not requested to apply to Wales is one which would place a duty on LAs to provide forums, twice a year, if parents request these, where families could provide feedback or question aspects of policy and practice. WG have sought that all the clauses that would assign to LA’s increased powers over normal healthy families be applied to Wales but refused to adopt a clause that would create a duty to at least listen to feedback from the community even without any duty to act on it. This is despite Ms Neagle being openly aware that “local authorities are not as good as they should be at self-evaluation”.

No reason has been giving for that amendment being the only one that the Welsh Government have not sought to apply to Wales.

Apart from these unintentional but revealing instances of irony which serve to highlight some key issues and problems with the CWS Bill, there was also brief but direct allusion to the CWS bill and matters relating to home education.

Nicola Edwards, Deputy Director of Equity in Education Division in the Welsh Government, described the CWS Bill as “designed to increase the oversight and the authority and the ability of local authorities to track those children, to know where they are, to be comfortable that they’re being safely looked after and safely provided with the education they should be. And, obviously, there are other provisions in that Bill as well that are also linked to looking after quite vulnerable children and learners”.

Cefin Campbell requested clarification of terminology.

In response, unfortunately Ms Neagle and her colleague repeated an inaccurate definition of CME (“Children Missing Education”) that was also promoted during the consultation on proposals for so called “CME databases”. A contradictory concept was cited, that children who are receiving a suitable education but not known to the local authority as being home educated are therefore somehow automatically “missing education,” even when the education they are receiving would be excellent and fully suitable,

Ms Neagle deferred to her colleague, Nicola Edwards, Deputy Director of Equity in Education, who unfortunately reiterated this mistaken but often deliberately perpetuated definition of CME. The correct use of the term “CME” applies to any cases where education is not being received, not to whether or not a child is on a council list. Having a name on the list doesn’t change what education is being received or the suitability of it. The education received by children identified by these CME database pilots did not suddenly become suitable by virtue of a name being added to a list, it was always suitable – or not.

Cefin Campbell had asked about “the suggestion” that the CME database proposals and pilot are “separate but aligned to the provisions in respect of children not in school in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill”, which Ms Neagle explained by alluding to the so-called “Swiss cheese” risk management model to “cover all bases”.

This is revealing, as during the consultation phase for the CME databases, the Welsh Government were adamant that these database measures were nothing to do with EHE children and families.

Ms Neagle also referred to the pilots of those “CME databases” as “particularly challenging”, interestingly commenting that this was “what we thought it might” be. Concerningly however, she is “looking forward” to the evaluation that she says is under way at present, and despite the challenges, she intends “to see how we could take that work forward”. Note the use of the term “how,” not “if”.

This would indicate that, even with the pilot uncompleted let alone final outcomes analysed, the Welsh Government have pre-decided to roll out the practice of mandatory and non-consensual data sharing on all children of CSA, gathering their information from healthcare sources without knowledge or consent of parent or child.

Not only does it appear that the decision has already been made about rolling out the pilot on a national level, but it is also worth noting that the “evaluation” of the CME database pilot has been commissioned from the same commercial company that produced the questionable “evaluation” of EHE guidance.

There was thankfully one small glimmer of hope and insight in the CYPEC meeting, however. When speaking about increased budgets for junior apprenticeships, Vikki Howells, Minister for Further & Higher Education, observed:

It is about getting that right fit for learners and recognising that a school environment isn’t the best fit for some of our learners”.  

Absolutely!