There are some issues bigger than party politics. Supporting children and young people with additional learning needs (ALN) is one of them.

The row over the Welsh Government's supplementary budget has generated plenty of party-political noise but it is the children and young people - some 1,268 pupils in Monmouthshire - with additional learning needs we should be focused on.

That's why Welsh Labour MSs voted against the Plaid Cymru supplementary budget when it failed to invest in supporting children with additional learning needs.

The UK Government's decision to invest in support for councils, schools and children with Special Education needs and disabilities meant an additional £327 million available to the Welsh Government this year—£550 million over three years.

The money was announced in March, shortly before the election and after the final budget was passed meaning the funding had to be left for decision after the election. As the former Cabinet Secretary for Education, I nevertheless made the case for money to be allocated to ALN but was told this was a matter for the incoming Government and the supplementary budget.

It is astounding the draft budget the Plaid Cymru Government published did not include a single penny for ALN. Our additional learning needs system is under extreme pressure with rising numbers of children and young people presenting with complex needs.

That's why every Welsh council of every political stripe and the teaching unions called for this money to go to education. The two trade unions representing headteachers in Wales have even declared a trade dispute with the new Welsh Government on ALN funding and pay. This is unprecedented.

Until Welsh Labour started calling for money to be allocated to ALN in the supplementary budget not a single penny had been set aside for it. As a result Plaid Cymru offered £40 million for ALN this year – just 12% of the funding from the UK Government. In our view - and in the view of local authorities and teaching unions - that was not enough. That was why we voted against it.

I took no pleasure in that decision. For me, this debate has been and will always be about getting more funding for children and young people with ALN in Wales.

The new Government has claimed we voted with Reform. We did not. We voted with children and young people with additional learning needs, and we voted for the school staff who support them, in the belief those children and school staff deserve more from this Plaid Cymru Government.