Higher Education (Fee Limits and Student Support) (England) (Coronavirus) (Revocation) Regulations 2020

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Thursday 29th October 2020 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Baroness Berridge]

That the Grand Committee do consider the Higher Education (Fee Limits and Student Support) (England) (Coronavirus) (Revocation) Regulations 2020.

Relevant document: 30th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I will remind us of the background to these regulations and the circumstances leading to the introduction of student number controls. On 4 May 2020, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education announced a package of stabilisation measures for the higher education sector in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. One such measure was the introduction of temporary student number controls.

As noble Lords may recall, following the onset of the pandemic, it was expected that fewer international students would travel to start their first year of study in England in the academic year 2020-21. This was in addition to an already known demographic low of 18 year-olds, and the risk of a high number of deferrals from domestic students. The real risk at the time was that our world-renowned higher education sector would have suffered a drop in fee income, which would have had significant financial implications for many providers.

Further, in the early part of this year, we became aware of aggressive recruitment practices being employed by some higher education providers, as they sought to make up the potential shortfall in student numbers and income by offering places to students to whom they would ordinarily not have made offers, for example, by making wholesale unconditional offers in March. While it is understandable that individual higher education providers would seek to ensure their own financial stability, this strategy could have had serious and detrimental consequences for the sector. It would have caused an uneven distribution of students, leaving some providers with even fewer students and income than they would have planned for, putting their financial sustainability at risk.

To counter this, higher education providers in England were allocated an individual student number control—a set number of students we believed constituted a fair maximum share of student recruitment for this academic year. To accompany this, we also made the Higher Education (Fee Limits and Student Support) (England) (Coronavirus) Regulations 2020. These regulations, which were the subject of rigorous debate in the House, provided that if providers exceeded their individual number, they would face a reduction in the maximum tuition fees they could charge for the academic year 2021-22. The purpose of this was to address the consequences of providers exceeding their allocated numbers, and thereby reducing the tuition fee income available to the sector as a whole, by reducing the sums available to the offending provider through the student finance system in the subsequent academic year.

Additionally, providers in the devolved Administrations which provided courses to English-domiciled loan-funded students were also allocated an individual student number control applicable to those students in the academic year 2020-21. In this case, the regulations provided that recruitment beyond this would result in a reduction in the maximum tuition fee loan available in the academic year 2021-22. The regulations—which we seek to revoke by the instrument we are debating today—set out in law what those reductions in the maximum tuition fee and tuition fee loan amounts would have been. These were short-term measures, to be in place for one academic year only, and were a necessary targeted response to the unprecedented circumstances caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, as noble Lords will be aware, there were unexpected issues with the A-level grading, resulting in the decision to use centre assessment grades, where those were higher than the calculated grades that were initially awarded, so as to avoid some students receiving grades that did not accurately reflect their performance. It then became clear that an unexpectedly high number of students had met the grades required to meet the conditions of the offer for their first choice place at university. This was in large part an issue of timing, with the move to centre assessment grades coming shortly after higher education providers had allocated the majority of their places. As a result, many providers were oversubscribed and would have been at risk of exceeding their student number control if they honoured these offers, through no fault of their own. We therefore announced our intention to remove the temporary student number controls for the coming academic year, a decision that was widely welcomed by the sector and Members across both Houses.

The introduction of these regulations, revoking the original regulations, means that the temporary number controls that were previously notified to providers will no longer apply, nor will the financial consequences of exceeding their student number controls, which would be unfair in these unique and unprecedented circumstances. I beg to move.

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[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I am grateful to noble Lords for their contributions this afternoon. In the time available, I shall seek to deal with the many issues that have been outlined.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, in relation to capacity for teaching, a £10 million capital fund was made available, recognising the issues that she outlined with physical capacity. The Office for Students oversees that funding, and universities are allowed to ask for additional funding. A number of noble Lords referred to the costs of teaching. Additional teaching grants have been given to subjects that are high cost, such as medicine, nursing and STEM subjects. However, it is important to note that a record number of disadvantaged 18 year-olds, at 23.1%, have gone to university this year. We pay tribute to their hard work.

In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Loomba, we are regularly in touch with the devolved Administrations. As the matters are devolved, there are still some funding arrangements and number controls separate to the student number caps in these regulations which are relevant in that regard. In relation to exams next year, on 12 October we announced that there would be a three-week delay. Next month, we anticipate further guidance and information on contingency plans in relation to next year’s exams, should there be a wave of the virus. We regularly discuss matters with the devolved Administrations.

On the points raised by about finance, particularly by my noble friend Lord Forsyth—I pay tribute to his work on the Economic Affairs Committee—we must remember that universities are autonomous institutions; they are not like schools. Fees are a contractual arrangement between an institution and students—but, of course, the Office for Students is there as a regulator. My noble friend will be aware that only high-earning borrowers repay all the interest on their loan. The majority of borrowers do not fully pay back their loans, with borrowing written off at the end of their loan term. That means that reducing the interest rates would in practice benefit only higher earners and reduce the progressive nature of the student loan system.

On the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, we want to see an increasing number of students going to university and taking advantage of that offer when it is appropriate for them. I am pleased to say that we have the admissions data for this year and more than 371,000 English-domiciled students have taken up a place at university.

Once again, I am sad to say, I have to disagree with the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. Universities have a variety of structures: many of them, as noble Lords will be aware, are charitable in their foundation and have great endowments, and they award degrees and have degree-making powers. Many universities do collaborate, and that is not just something we see with the Russell group. There are many regional collaborations between universities, and many of them are involved very closely with LEPs and institutes of technology and are playing their wider part in the system. Of course, at the moment—this perhaps goes without saying, but I do want to say it—they are at the front line of trying to find a Covid vaccine for us, and they deserve our support.

This is the first time that I have had the pleasure of hearing the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, address your Lordships’ House, to which I welcome her. As we know from schools, there is no replacement for the face-to-face nature of teaching, and I commend the work of the University of Buckingham, which is one of our private universities. In answer to the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Storey, I say yes: any other institutions in the higher education sector that were regulated by the Office for Students, including private providers, were subject to the cap. The noble Baroness is right that the blended offer is the best offer, and we commend that best practice to other institutions.

On the question from the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, unfortunately we cannot provide guarantees and certainties in any area of life at the moment, but we did bring forward millions of pounds of tuition fees to help the cash-flow situation of universities. We do not know what position we are currently in formally. Obviously, we know the admissions data for English-domiciled students, but, as noble Lords will be aware, many international students start their courses in January, so we do not know the full position of universities’ finances. Along with the Office for Students, we are monitoring this, and there has been the offer of restructuring—thankfully, at the moment, no institution has come forward needing that support. As part of the wider post-18 education review, the Government are carefully examining the Augar report and its recommendations. We are considering our response to that along with the spending review, and the upcoming further education White Paper will be part of our response to that. Hopefully, this will give some certainty to providers and students.

Regarding the behaviour that we saw earlier in the year from some institutions, it is important to remember that one of the fundamental concerns of government was that this was not in the best interest of students, who, at that point in time, were put under pressure to accept an unconditional offer, which perhaps might not have been the one they wanted. We wanted to guard against that.

On the mental health and welfare of students, which many noble Lords have mentioned, the Minister for Universities in the other place, Michelle Donelan, has written to universities outlining their responsibilities in relation to the mental health and welfare of students, particularly those who are self-isolating. There has been £256 million of funding for this academic year in relation to students’ mental health.

Of course there are no maintenance grants anymore, but there is a comprehensive system of maintenance loans, and, as I say, the figures for disadvantaged students going to university mean that we have not seen a drop-off in the numbers of people going to university from those backgrounds, which is of course very important.

Finally, I turn to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. Yes, there will have to be particular arrangements in relation to Christmas, but, as I say, we do not know the situation in relation to overseas students. We are in dialogue with the devolved Administrations on the various matters, and we commend all the work that universities have been doing in order to make the offer. Many universities and students have shown enormous resilience. Obviously, this current situation is not ideal for them to study in, but, unfortunately, every sector in our society has been drastically affected by the pandemic, and we are doing what we can to support the sector, offering advice, guidance and restructuring, should any institution need that, as I have said. Therefore, it is right that we take this action to revoke the fee limit regulations in relation to student numbers. I commend these regulations to your Lordships.

Motion agreed.

Free School Meals

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Woolley of Woodford]

To ask her Majesty’s Government, following the announcements of the Welsh and Scottish Governments, as well as local councils, whether they will end the free school meals postcode lottery and provide free school meals for eligible children in England during the school holidays until Easter 2021.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are determined to ensure that children are supported throughout this pandemic. We recognise that these are unprecedented and difficult times for some families and that is why the Government have significantly strengthened the welfare safety net. We have put in place additional measures worth around £9 billion this financial year. Further to that, we have provided £63 million in welfare assistance funding to local authorities to support families with food and other essentials.

[Lord Woolley of Woodford (CB)]

My Lords, as a humble Cross-Bench Peer, I passionately believe that the issue of 4.1 million children living in poverty—the vast majority in working families and the subject of free school meals—should not be embroiled in this presently poisonous political space. While we entrench our political positions and are afraid to say on either side that we might have got this wrong, our kids go hungry, families descend into despair, and, as my good friend Dame Louise Casey has stated, destitution beckons. Does the Minister agree with me that as a matter of urgency in this Covid crisis, we must show leadership and create a unified party group to form a strategy—for today, tomorrow and, indeed, the long term—which includes young, dynamic men such as Marcus Rashford and organisations such as FareShare, the Trussell Trust and others?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that all noble Lords, whether politically aligned or not, will agree that we want to help those children who are in need and that working together is the way to find a solution. The suggestions and recommendations put forward by the new child poverty task force convened by Marcus Rashford, whose activities we commend, will be considered as part of the forthcoming spending review.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I was in receipt of free meals throughout my entire school career. My mother was a single woman and her only income was the contributions of the national assistance. We lived in one room. I remember very clearly—I can still taste and smell it—the mounting panic ahead of school holidays, because the income we had could not stretch to feeding two boys and a mother in that day. Marcus Rashford and I have this, and probably only this, in common: we remember, not in our heads but in our whole bodies. An old Etonian, of course, cannot be expected to have had the same experience. Some local councils will draw money in the way that the Government are suggesting, from allocations they have received. Other local authorities will not. Some communities will rise to the challenge. Other communities will not. Some children will get through. Most will not. Will the Minister give us some reassurance—not hide behind global figures—and understand that postcode lottery is not a formula that is destined to help the well-being of our children?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

Many noble Lords of all parties and none can recall circumstances in which their own needs, whether that be housing or food, were not met through the circumstances of their family. There are indeed—it is not a postcode lottery—1.4 million children in England who are entitled to free school meals, saving their families over £400 a year. Additionally, particularly through the soft drinks levy, the Government have been funding breakfast clubs in nearly 2,500 schools to provide children with healthy food.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, perhaps I may say gently that I realise that passions on this subject run high, but could Members please keep their supplementaries reasonably short?

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[Lord Storey (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the Prime Minister said yesterday that no child should go hungry. We have heard from the Minister that the Government have made available £63 million to be given to vulnerable families’ local authorities. What she did not say was that the guidance said that the money should have been spent within 12 weeks. So that money could not be used for free meals, and it was certainly not ring-fenced for providing meals during holidays. I have a straightforward question for the Minister: can the Government promise that every vulnerable child will get a meal during the holidays?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, on the local authority welfare assistance fund, the noble Lord is correct that the 12-week period ends at the end of October/beginning of November. It does cover the relevant period. Due to the unprecedented circumstances in which schools have closed, we have provided support to pay for free school meals while they were closed. However, as most schools were back—approximately 89% of children were back in school—the traditional method of delivering free school meals before half-term was back in action.

[Baroness Fookes (Con)]

My Lords, given that schools are usually standing empty during the school holidays, in the longer term would it not be more sensible to open them up so that they can serve nutritious meals to the children who really need them and, just as important, provide educational opportunities, many of which have been missed during this pandemic?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes, indeed. Many schools in 17 local authorities are open during the holidays, and the Government have provided £9 million to fund holiday clubs that include food as well. At the moment, however, given how hard all staff in our schools have worked, I do not think that anyone is suggesting that we want the school kitchens open in that traditional manner during the school holidays.

[Lord Harries of Pentregarth (CB) [V]]

I recognise that the Government have given significant sums to strengthen the welfare of children but would the Minister not agree that the most focused and efficient way of supporting the most vulnerable members of our society—the children—is by paying for school meals during the holidays, as has been recognised by the Scottish and Welsh Governments? That would be the most focused and efficient way of doing it.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the method used by the Scottish and Welsh Governments is, in fact, a similar methodology to the local authority welfare assistance fund, as it is through local councils and does not expect schools to deliver it. This is a time, during the pandemic, when all of us—government, communities, faith communities, families and charities—need to come together to support everyone.

[The Lord Bishop of Bristol [V]]

My Lords, although I agree with the Government that free school meals are not the long-term solution for holiday hunger, the reality is that it is now half-term and children are going hungry. Does the Minister agree that although the current crisis demands short-term solutions, there is also a much bigger question at stake? Will she tell us what sustained support the Government will be offering to address the concerns up to Easter 2021, and their plans to tackle the underlying and increasing issues of child poverty in the longer term?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the main way in which the Government fund, outside free school meals and breakfast clubs, is through the universal credit system. It may seem like a big figure—£9 billion—but that has meant an increase in universal credit or working tax credit of over £1,000, which is significant in addition to the increase in local housing allowance that has been given. When we look globally through the Anglican Communion we see that we are fortunate to live in a country that, while it is not perfect, does provide a welfare safety net for its citizens.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, in June, the Minister rebuffed my call for an extension of free school meal vouchers to cover the summer holidays, saying:

“There is support out there for those who need provision.”—[Official Report, 10/6/20; col. 1745.]


Days later, the Government U-turned, and the Minister explained that by saying:

“We have listened, we recognise the pressures that families will be under … due to the Covid crisis, and we have responded to that.”—[Official Report, 17/6/20; col. 2180.]


But lessons were not learned and today, despite the funding mentioned earlier by the Minister, children across the country are going hungry. During a pandemic, how can the most vulnerable children in our society not be a priority for support? Will the Minister now urge her Government to show compassion and agree to fund free school meals for all school holidays until spring 2021?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I do apologise if the noble Lord felt rebuffed. But, as he will be aware, in addition to the support that has been given to disadvantaged children, there are now over 500,000 devices. So the needs of disadvantaged children are a priority for the Government, and £350 million of the catch-up fund is directed to disadvantaged children. In addition to that, although again it sounds like a big figure, we will never know how many children have avoided needing free school meals thanks to the £53 billion of taxpayers’ money that has been used to support businesses during this period, which paid for the furlough scheme and other schemes.

[Lord Rennard (LD)]

My Lords, I too am one of the few Members of the House of Lords who depended on free school meals, and it never made sense to me that you got this sort of support in term time but nothing in the school holidays. Can the Minister tell the House when Ministers will stop saying publicly that they agree with Marcus Rashford while voting down his proposals? Is it not time to do the right thing?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have an overall principle that the best way for families is to be in work, but, when they are not in work, the universal credit system provides funding for those families. That has been the traditional means, so we have not expected all schools to be open during the holidays to provide those meals. It is a free school meal, and the vouchers were given because of course schools were closed during term time. Supplementary programmes such as holiday and breakfast clubs have been in addition to that.

[Lord Lucas (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on holding to the principle that people should be responsible for looking after their own children. None the less, does she not recognise that in this pandemic we need special measures, that free school meals were a special measure that was proven to work and that we made work when schools were not operating, and that it is really difficult to create new forms of support in the middle of a pandemic? Would it not be most sensible to go back to providing free school meals as the most practical short-term alternative?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, we are indeed living through a time when special measures have been needed. However, for the reasons I outlined, it would not be right to expect schools at the moment to be open outside term time to provide meals. Although we offered a voucher system, it was important that schools could have their own local voucher system that could be redeemed in local shops. The system we had to stand up in special measures was only for national supermarkets, whereas the costs of local schemes could be reclaimed and local shops could be included.

[Baroness Watkins of Tavistock (CB) [V]]

My Lords, it appears that there is a policy vacuum in England regarding the provision of nutritious food for children. Can the Minister explain whether Her Majesty’s Government accept that there is a clear correlation between children’s cognitive development and proper nutrition, and, if so, how can they stand by and let children in Scotland and Wales receive free food school vouchers equivalent to school meals and deprive our children in England? How does this help level up society in the UK, which was surely a key manifesto commitment? No child, whether in a city, town or rural community, should be hungry during the school holidays.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, in relation to children in England, I have outlined the local government welfare assistance scheme. When schools came back properly, the box of fruit and vegetables scheme was also back running. The Government have extended free school meals; about 17% of children in England qualify for them. During the pandemic we extended eligibility to the children of parents who had no recourse to public funds, and in 2014 we introduced universal infant free school meals and free school meals for those in FE. The Government have not stood by but have supported, through other taxpayers’ taxes, vulnerable children during the pandemic.

[Baroness Morris of Yardley (Lab)]

My Lords, while I do not for a minute doubt the Minister’s personal understanding of this difficulty, I think she is wrong to say that it is not a postcode lottery. Today is half-term, and whether children will get a free school meal will depend on where they live. There are only two ways of making sure that that does not happen at Christmas: either to make it a statutory duty, which is the case with free school meals, or to offer ring-fenced funding. Unless the Government do one or the other of those things, this will continue to be a postcode lottery. Can the Minister assure us that the solution that the Government come forward with for the Christmas holidays will adopt one of those two solutions?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, who I thank for her comments, raises a wider issue. When power is devolved, whether to councils, combined authorities or different nations, we have to live with the fact that we will see different responses in different parts of the country. In relation to Scotland, it did not pay for free school meals during the recent October half-term. However, I will take away the noble Baroness’s comments.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Bates) (Con)]

My Lords, I am afraid that the time allowed for this Private Notice Question has now elapsed. Before taking the economy update Statement, we will take a couple of minutes so that the Front Benches can change places safely.

Covid-19: Disparate Impact

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hussein-Ece (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the Covid pandemic has disproportionately impacted women. The Women’s Budget Group found that women are twice as likely to be key workers. It said that 77% of high-risk workers are women. They are being paid poverty wages. These inequalities are pronounced and exacerbated across the country, especially for those marginalised by other factors, including race, ethnicity and disability. We know that people with disabilities have been hardest hit, with an unacceptably high mortality rate. What support will the Government commit to providing women facing particular hardships due to the Covid pandemic and to address these glaring inequalities?

In addition, many thousands signed a petition urging the Government to establish a Covid race equality strategy. Back in June, I asked the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, whether the Government would consider establishing this strategy. This was urgent in June; it is now the end of October, and the evidence in the Statement clearly shows that these groups are still suffering hardship, are still in the front line and are still disproportionately affected. The pandemic has shone a light on inequalities that, sadly, already exist in our society. We need urgent action, not further reviews.

Recent statements on Covid in the past few months have said little about how people from BAME communities can be better protected. Will the Government now establish and develop a proper Covid strategy to address the inequalities that have already been mentioned? We do not need further reviews. The evidence is overwhelming. When can we expect action and implementation of the numerous reviews to address the inequalities that this terrible virus has unfortunately visited on sections of society that are not best placed to protect themselves, due to the nature of their lives, where they live, their households, their jobs and their health problems? I ask the Minister to answer that and what resources are being put in place to address this.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome this review and quarterly report, which has been published and sent to the Prime Minister, who has endorsed its recommendations, as the noble Baronesses said. First, I pay tribute to the enormous number of NHS workers from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. Unfortunately, it is not the case, as outlined by the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, that we know the evidence. We know that there are disparities but, even now, we do not fully know the cause of them. We know much more about the disease and those disparities than we did three months ago, but the picture is not complete. With £4.3 million, we have funded six further research projects, because we need to understand what is causing these disparities.

I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, that the healthcare plans for the NHS, facing the second wave of the epidemic, particularly the plans for the extremely clinically vulnerable, will take into account the evidence from this report and the PHE review of the disparities. It is important and has been accepted that death certification must include data on ethnicity. There is cross-government data sharing on this now, which is how some of this data will be used. That group also works with PHE and the Office for National Statistics, which is our expert on statistical data. We are monitoring the policies of at least 10 departments to see how they are affecting ethnic minority communities.

We have been listening to local government and we are aware that public health is part of local government’s responsibility. Some £25 million is going to be targeted to specific local authorities where we are aware that the public health messaging has not necessarily penetrated to grass-roots level. In addition to the action that has been taken, we are funding community champions with links with the grass-roots to build on those communities and ensure that the message is getting out, because communication and awareness is so important here. The Government have also reached 5 million people through social media influencers to try to ensure that black and minority ethnic communities have awareness raised. Billions of pounds has also been given to local government, much of which is not ring-fenced.

On the review of the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, I pay tribute to her work. I will be sending that review to the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, which has a call for evidence at the moment and is dealing with other matters of structural inequality. Many of the recommendations made in that review have already been enacted: the NHS, for instance, has purchased over 2,000 powered respirators so that healthcare clinicians, such as Sikhs who wear turbans, can be protected when wearing a mask is not possible. Much of what is outlined in risk assessments in the workplace is already in health and safety law and enforced through the Health and Safety Executive. However, there have been two updates since the public health report in June on guidance in the workplace—one in July and one in September—outlining the responsibility of employers to risk-assess their workplaces to ensure that precautions are taken in relation to Covid risks.

We have also responded to specific risks for black and minority ethnic populations, for whom disparities are caused by socioeconomic and geographical factors but also by occupation. That is why it is now compulsory to wear a face covering in a private hire vehicle; that specific protection was changed. Also, the advice relating to the hospitality sector has changed, so specific action has been taken.

Of course, there are other groups in society for whom there are disparities. The two main factors associated with Covid are age and gender, but there are issues around those with disabilities. Dr Emran Mian is leading the wider piece of government work on Covid disparities. I will have to write to the noble Baroness about the specific timing of the local government light-touch review so that we can learn from best practice. There is a specific health adviser in relation to LGBT issues.

As I outlined at the start, unlike in most workplaces, where the workplace itself is assessed, the NHS is assessing staff, particularly BAME staff, who are at the front line. Over the summer, 95% of BAME NHS workers have been individually risk-assessed, so the NHS is taking its responsibility seriously.

On public health information, there has been increased language translation of public health messaging, particularly the recent “Hands, Face, Space,” which seems to have reached different communities better.

Unfortunately, it would not take just a few weeks to publish risk assessments of all employers on a government portal; we are talking about millions and millions of workplaces. When I send a report to the commission, I will look at the recommendation from the Lawrence report. It is not a simple overnight fix. The work of the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities remains open and that information will be passed on.

Turning to the questions raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, about women, there have been significant support schemes. There are 1.7 million self-employed women in this country, and there have been specific initiatives such as self-employed income protection and investment in businesses started by women. We have seen a greater take-up of investment in companies set up by mixed gender groups. In fact, it accounts for 82% of the Future Fund, which is £720 million. By way of comparison, the Female Founders Fund report said that only 10% goes to mixed gender groups. So, we are focused on that issue.

On the question of women and the pandemic, we have given enormous support to the childcare sector. The entitlements money, £3.6 billion a year, has been given to those providers regardless of the number of children who are actually going through the door. That is carrying on until the end of the year to support those businesses, many of which are female-owned.

So, we have taken action on this issue; we have not rested on our laurels. We have more evidence now as to the cause of these disparities but, as I say, the picture is not yet complete. I will update the House further when there is more evidence.

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[Baroness Coussins (CB)]

My Lords, according to a Written Answer that I received in July, the Government were not even considering then that the lack of Covid information in languages other than English might be a possible factor in the death rate of certain ethnic minorities, so I am glad that this report recognises the importance of communication in relevant languages. I ask the Minister to reassure me that community champions will be multilingual, that all translated materials in all formats will be promptly updated whenever the English versions are, and that an urgent review will now check whether all the right languages are included so that no minority group, including asylum seekers, is disadvantaged.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. In fact, £4 million has been spent on communications translating public health information, along with 600 targeted publications to ensure that the messages reach various communities. Local authorities with those specific communities will be targeted, but I will take back the noble Baroness’s concern about making sure that materials are translated promptly. Every avenue is being looked at to ensure communication with different communities. We have also been making use of stakeholder groups, charities, community groups and places of worship; indeed, a task force has been set up because obviously, a very high proportion of black and minority ethnic people attend a place of worship. My honourable friend Kemi Badenoch has even written to a number of high commissioners in London about their diaspora, asking them to help communicate the information to their communities. We are seeking to get the evidence out through traditional means and using social media influencers where we can.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, the Welsh Government have explicitly included Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children along with other minority ethnic groups in their list of groups that are particularly vulnerable to Covid-19. That is absolutely right, both because of their legally recognised ethnic minority status and because of such data as exists on the disproportionate impact of the virus on the communities, reflected in my noble friend Lady Lawrence’s excellent report. What attention have the Government paid to these communities? Will their specific ethnicity be recorded on death certificates and elsewhere?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. As Minister for Women, one of my specific concerns is the underachievement of Gypsy Roma in most categories. The Government are firmly committed to delivering a cross-government strategy to tackle these inequalities. I will have to come back to her on the specific point about BAME; I presume that BAME registration would include that as an ethnicity but I will double-check. My noble friend Lord Greenhalgh, who is the MHCLG lead on this issue, wrote to local authority chief executives in April to point out the specific support that those communities might need in terms of services such as water sanitation and waste disposal on their sites. We have been working closely with the various representative organisations to ensure, again, that the message gets out to communities that might be harder to reach than others.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, in April the Government produced statistics on the furlough scheme on a local authority and parliamentary constituency basis, and then they stopped. First, will the Minister find out why? Secondly, can she see whether it is possible to produce up-to-date data on that basis so that decision-makers at national and local level can work out whether there is a correlation between access to furlough payments and infection rates?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, we are working closely with the Office for National Statistics and analysts from PHE. I will have to check with them and will write to the noble Baroness in relation to the specific data, which I have to confess I was not aware was out in that form and then not out in that form.

[Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB) [V]]

My Lords, the Statement does little to address the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on minority communities. We already know that ethnic differences linked to diet and lifestyle are important, alongside other causal factors emanating from racism, including crowded housing and economic disparities, leading to a preponderance of black and ethnic minorities in poorly paid jobs in hospitals, the care sector and other overexposed front-line services. Does the Minister agree that the Government should do more to focus on already clear areas of disadvantage, rather than spend millions on more and more costly academic research into the glaringly obvious?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I hope that I have been clear that what is glaringly obvious is the disparities. The answer to the next question, which is why there are those disparities, is not so glaringly obvious, and we must be careful not to jump to conclusions. As I said, they are partly explained by comorbidities—pre-existing health conditions—but that does not explain them fully. Some of them are explained by socioeconomic and geographical factors. That is why we have issued guidance on multigenerational households and areas of population density where people cannot socially distance properly. However, that does not fully explain the picture. For instance, a British black African man is 2.5 times more likely to die of Covid, but a British black Caribbean man is only 1.7 times more likely to die of Covid. Therefore, unfortunately, there are still gaps in understanding, not of the fact that there are disparities but of what is causing them. Unless we know that, we cannot address them.

[Viscount Waverley (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I express my compliments to the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence. She is to be thanked. Healing, respect and reconciliation are needed for a divided kingdom of nations. Will the Government take the initiative and establish a root-and-branch royal commission on an integral strategy fit for a caring nation to address systemic failures of structural discrimination, covering the health service, race and ethnicity, housing, education, skills and training as a starter? Fast-tracking this is a matter of priority and appropriate for consideration to bring forward in the upcoming Queen’s Speech, as it would deliver dividends many times over. On a practical measure, since the wearing of masks is necessary and mandatory, will the Government care to consider distributing masks and hand gel at no charge as a practical gesture in what could become a situation of real need?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Viscount. It might not be a royal commission, but the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities has been set up by the Government, building on the Race Disparity Unit. It is reviewing inequality in the UK, focusing on areas such as poverty, education, employment, health and the criminal justice system. Again, we know that there are disparities, and we want to know why and what the causes are. If the noble Viscount would like to submit evidence, there is a call for evidence at the moment. I have not read of any government policy on distributing hand gel and so forth, but there has been most impressive work in transport interchanges and so on, and a lot of institutions, including Parliament, have taken it upon themselves to make those kinds of precautionary measures available.

[Lord Mann (Non-Afl)]

The Statement looks forward to the availability of a vaccine, which will be—when it happens—warmly welcomed in this House, of course, as well as across the country and indeed the world. But one ethnic minority group will have a kickback at that time. A report I have just released, a copy of which has gone to the Minister’s department for her personal perusal, shows how the anti-vaccine movement is deeply embedded with anti-Semitism. Some 79% of the anti-vaccine groups organising in this country publish vehement anti-Semitism in their discussions; for example, categorising Bill Gates as Jewish, talking about the Zionists being responsible, blaming Israel for the creation of coronavirus—the Rothschilds and the new world order. Those are the same old conspiracy theories. Does the Minister agree that we need to take on the extremists on the far right and the far left of the anti-vaccine movement both now and in advance of a vaccine being available? Their conspiracy theories are garnering too many views online, and perhaps too many supporters, with deeply worrying anti-Semitism at their heart.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord and I am sure that I will give his report my personal perusal and respond to it. Of course, we need to ensure that the public health messages going to communities are accurate and truthful. Obviously, there are various laws around correcting information and making sure that it is truthful. Conspiracy theories need to be debunked so that people have the information on which to make their decisions. We are all looking forward to a vaccine, but it is also apparent that not enough black and minority ethnic individuals are coming forward to the NHS Covid-19 vaccine registry. The honourable Kemi Badenoch MP has written to every MP asking them to encourage their constituents to come forward to ensure that the vaccine, when we get it, is effective among black and minority ethnic people.

[Lord Willis of Knaresborough (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the main conclusion of the report that

“a range of socio-economic and geographical factors”

are the principal causes of higher infection in ethnic minority groups was, quite frankly, blindingly obvious six months ago, as the noble Lord, Lord Singh, rightly said, and was entirely predictable. The real research should have been on the “excess risk” which this report says these groups face. Given that in September, 30% of all ICU Covid patients were from BAME communities, doing this research over the coming months will simply not do; it is urgent now. Will the Government seek the support of the regional NIHR Applied Research Collaborations—I declare an interest as the chair of the Yorkshire group—to use their unique position combining regional research in universities and major teaching hospitals on this mission? Spending £4.6 million on research based at the heart of large BAME communities in the regions surely makes good sense.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I can only reiterate that it is important for us to know what factors are the causes of these disparities; that was not clear earlier, and as I say, there are still gaps in what is causing these disparities. I will take away the suggestion of using the regional network referred to by the noble Lord, but I am happy to say that research has also been commissioned by the Chief Medical Officer that we are taking forward to build a risk profile model for healthcare.

[Lord Touhig (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome the commitment to widen future Statements on the disparate impact of Covid to include people with disabilities. Yesterday, in a briefing organised by Sense, we heard from the parents of disabled children about the devastating impact that the sudden withdrawal of support services has had on their lives. The National Autistic Society, of which I am a vice-president, has also produced a report called Left Stranded, which makes similar points. I ask the Minister to examine the Forgotten Families campaign by Sense to reinstate community support, as well as looking at the Left Stranded report. Will she write to me setting out how the Government will respond to this cry for help from some very desperate families?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord raises a very difficult issue. Many of us will have seen footage of the situation for many families when outside support was removed during the period of lockdown: it is incredibly moving, as well as incredibly distressing. The Government have tried to support families with children with additional disabilities—obviously, with a school place, if that was appropriate, and with more funds being given to the family fund. I will, of course, write as the noble Lord requests when I have received the report he mentions, and, as I say, I will draw it to the attention of Dr Emran Mian, who is doing the wider work on disparities and Covid.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, in response to the Front Bench contributions, the Minister said we do not have evidence of the reason for these disparities. I am sure she is aware of the report published by Citizens Advice in June that nearly 1.4 million people in the UK have no access to welfare payments because they have a “no recourse to public funds” status. Research conducted by the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford found that “no recourse to public funds” falls disproportionately on people in the BAME community. Some 82% of people who were helped with a “no recourse to public funds” issue by Citizens Advice in the last year were from a BAME background.

People with “no recourse to public funds” status have difficult choices: they have to risk exposing themselves or simply having no money. Is there not clear evidence that “no recourse to public funds” is discriminatory, and is indeed a structurally racist policy? Further, do the Government have, or are they planning to secure, data on the death and infection rates for people with “no recourse to public funds” compared to those for otherwise similar individuals?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, noble Lords will have heard me earlier make reference to the fact that the children of many people who have “no recourse to public funds” have been able to access free school meals. The furlough scheme and the job retention scheme are not counted as public funds, so those in the category that the noble Baroness outlines were able to access them. No one in this country is charged for testing or treatment for Covid-19, and certain services, including primary care and A&E, are free to all. It is very clear that, if there are charges to be applied, treatment that is considered by a clinician to be urgent or immediately necessary must not be delayed or withheld. We have made essential healthcare available to all people who are within the boundaries of our country.

[Lord Bilimoria (CB) [V]]

My Lords, men have a higher risk of death and account for just over 70% of Covid ICU admissions. People with obesity account for more than 30% of those in intensive care. When it comes to ethnic minorities, Dr Chaand Nagpaul, the BMA council chair said:

“As we sit amid a second wave of infections, we know that about a third of those admitted to intensive care are not white—showing no change since the first peak.”


Some 15% of the population are from an ethnic minority, so this is double the proportion. Can the Minister explain the situation? Furthermore, the IPPR’s Dr Parth Patel, a research fellow, commenting on the government report said:

“The government should be acting to address the underlying structures behind ethnic disparities … Failure to act quickly will lead to thousands of unnecessary deaths during this second wave—this is about public health as much as it’s about racial justice.”


Does the Minister agree?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes. As I have mentioned, one of the other factors in the disparity is that working-age men are more likely to die of Covid than working-age women. In relation to obesity, the Government published in July, I believe, the obesity strategy, and we are aware that dealing with that issue is important in terms of co-morbidities. We are working closely with PHE, the Office for National Statistics and the BMA, which gave the advice in relation to taxis and private hire vehicles which led to masks being made mandatory in those vehicles. Yes, we now know more about exposure: black and minority-ethnic people are in certain densely populated areas and multigenerational households, so we have been taking action to try to reduce the risk. We will continue to act going forward.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)]

My Lords, all speakers have now spoken.

Covid-19: Catch-up Premium

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Carrington (CB)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper and declare my educational interests as in the register.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, understanding the impact of Covid disruption on attainment and progress is a key research priority for the Government, and we have commissioned an independent research and assessment agency to consider catch-up needs and monitor progress over the course of the year. Alongside the £650 million universal catch-up premium, we have announced a new £350 million national tutoring programme for disadvantaged pupils, which will increase access to high-quality tuition for the most disadvantaged young people.

[Lord Carrington (CB)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her reply. However, could she explain why, at the same time as announcing the catch-up premium for schools, the Government have stopped the year 7 catch-up premium? Extra funding for this stream recognised that, even in normal times, additional effort was needed in poorer catchment areas to get relevant students ready for secondary school. In some schools, subtracting this from the one-off catch-up premium significantly reduces the additional funds that they will receive and spells a reduction in income over time, thereby putting the disadvantaged in danger of not reaching their full potential.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the low prior attainment year 7 sum of money that the noble Lord is referring to was increased by £49 million, so nearly £1 billion of the national funding formula recognises low prior attainment, and it is spread across all five years at secondary level. That £49 million represents the year 7 low prior attainment figure, so there has been no reduction: it is included in the wider additional needs section of the national funding formula.

[Baroness Blower (Lab) [V]]

I listened carefully to a previous answer to my noble friend Lady Blackstone. However, on 16 October, Schools Week ran the following headline:

“£140m of tuition catch-up cash remains unspent.”


Of course, much of that will have been destined for disadvantaged students. Can the Minister assure the House that there is no intention to reconsider this funding and that it has not become reliant on the next funding review? Does she agree with Tom Richmond, from the EDSK think tank, that schools want to see this funding

“handed out as a matter of urgency”?

Will the Minister also provide a timetable for the delivery of the promised but as yet undelivered laptops to young people who need them for ongoing learning as well as for catch-up?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the £350 million is made up of three sections: early years, 16 to 19, and two elements to the schools funding programme. As of November, we will see the first mentors entering our schools, and tuition partners will be announced as a result of the programme.

[The Lord Bishop of Durham [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register. I welcome the Government’s ongoing support of pupils through the catch-up premium and encourage the Minister to continue to give attention to disadvantaged pupils, who require significantly greater support than the average pupil. Given the specific difficulties relating to digital access for remote learning, can the Minister explain why access to computers for home use appears to have been drastically reduced just as schools have been legally required to provide online learning for those who have to stay at home?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the number of laptops made available was 250,000 and it is now over 300,000, so the number has increased. Over 100,000 of those have been delivered. The allocation is now responding to the data so that disadvantaged students who do not have a laptop have access to one. However, we need to prioritise disadvantaged students who do not have a laptop, are currently not in education and who are self-isolating at home. We are responding to the data; that describes about 4% to 5% of secondary school pupils and 12% of primary. We have to get those laptops, and that is why these changes have been made to get them to pupils who need them today.

[Lord Storey (LD) [V]]

Disadvantaged and vulnerable pupils have been the hardest hit during this pandemic. The right reverend Prelate raised a point about the announcement from the DfE that there would be an 80% cut in laptop allocations. I was interested when the Minister said that that cut was so that laptops could go directly to those young people at home; is that the case? Can the Minister assure the House that every pupil who is in need of a laptop, particularly those from disadvantaged and vulnerable backgrounds and children in care, will receive one?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the laptops are being delivered to young people either via the local authority, if they are in a maintained school, or via the academy trust. The change is that we have responded to the data to make sure that disadvantaged students without a laptop, who are currently self-isolating or at home, can get access to a laptop. If there are any other exceptional cases, where schools have that situation, then I urge them to contact the department, but we are trying to ensure that laptops get to those students who are already outside of school face-to-face tuition and need remote education.

[Baroness Fall (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome the money available from the Covid catch-up premium, which acknowledges what we all know to be so true: that a generation of children have been hugely damaged by Covid, especially the most disadvantaged. Will the Minister consider whether we should be encouraging a generation of new graduates, who are having difficulty finding jobs in such a difficult time, to support these kids who have such a lot of catching up to do by funding a programme of Saturday schools across the country for our most disadvantaged pupils?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the Government already give £9 million to fund holiday activities. In relation to the catch-up fund, Teach First is one of the delivery partners which are recruiting the mentors who will go to schools in our most disadvantaged areas to provide a mentor, or maybe more than one, per school. I anticipate that Teach First will be recruiting just the type of person my noble friend outlines.

[Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB) [V]]

My Lords, if properly used, the pupil premium can make a huge difference to an individual’s life chances once they are in school. Does the Minister agree that, for maximum impact, it is equally important for parents and carers to be encouraged, and helped if necessary, to boost the attendance, self-esteem and aspirations of those from disadvantaged backgrounds?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

We all know the importance of parents’ aspirations for their children. Of course, we also want to make sure that disadvantaged students are given every assistance, so £2.4 billion is given in pupil premium, but the Education Endowment Foundation also makes available to schools the best research on how to spend that money effectively.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it spoke volumes about this Government’s attitude to poverty that last week their MPs were ordered to vote against a Labour motion to provide food vouchers for disadvantaged children during school holidays. Even the Secretary of State for Education and the Children’s Minister supported sending them into further hardship. With almost one-fifth of the school year completed, the Covid catch-up premium is barely under way, while the national tutoring programme—as the Minister confirmed a few moments ago—has not yet begun. How can parents and teachers have any confidence in the Government developing a properly funded long-term strategy to support disadvantaged pupils suffering from lockdown, when its short-term strategy is in such disarray?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I have already outlined the considerable support that is given through the pupil premium. Over the course of the pandemic the Government spent £380 million on food vouchers, but most schools are back now—approximately 89% of children are back in school—so the traditional way of delivering free school meals via the kitchens in the schools has been up and running and responding to those pupils who are self-isolating. I assure the noble Lord that 25% of the £650 million has been allocated to schools, and the reason why 100% has not been allocated is because we want to do that on actual pupil numbers, not on pupil-number data that is out of date.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

We are a far cry from the Liberal Democrat pupil premium policy, which really targeted disadvantaged children. Can the Minister say what support is being given to teachers to enable them to give more face-to-face time to hungry, disadvantaged pupils without proper technology to help them to catch up on all the education they missed during lockdown?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, part of the catch-up fund is £650 million that is going directly via schools, with an increased allocation, of course, to AP and to special schools. That assists in the delivery of education, and it is up to schools that we trust the most to be able to deliver that. As I say, it is a tribute to teachers and school leaders that approximately 89% of students are back in school.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed.

National Curriculum

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Woolley of Woodford]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to ensure that the national curriculum reflects the diverse history of the United Kingdom.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, as part of a broad and balanced curriculum, pupils should be taught about how different groups have contributed to the development of Britain. The flexibility within the history curriculum means that there is the opportunity to teach about the United Kingdom’s diverse history across the themes and areas in the curriculum. Events such as Black History Month can support teaching all year round and help schools celebrate the contribution black Britons have made to society.

[Lord Woolley of Woodford (CB) [V]]

Does the Minister agree that we can have a truly inclusive 21st-century British patriotism built into our national curriculum, one that is honest about our history: the good—of which there is a lot—the bad and the very ugly? To prepare our children for the global stage and to ensure that they are comfortable with themselves, all students, including those from black, Asian, Roma, Traveller and white working-class communities need to read books with their experiences from our teeming diversity. More than half a million pupils will sit AQA GCSE English literature exams. Sadly, there are no African or Caribbean writers on the syllabus. In Black History Month, will the Minister commit to convening a series of meetings so that we can have an honest dialogue that will review and fantastically reform our national curriculum?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that of course the history and English curricula should reflect the diversity of the population, with teachers being given flexibility in relation to how they teach the curriculum. Obviously, they should take into account the needs of all their pupils. In relation to AQA, for instance, the history curriculum currently includes an option on migration, empires and the people, so there is flexibility for teachers to include texts and periods in modules of history at their discretion.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I suspect that the noble Lord, Lord Woolley, was offering something far more radical than the reply we have just received. However, this whole question is like peeling an onion. What plans do the Government have to ensure that those who deliver the national curriculum accurately reflect the diverse population of the land? Secondly, what plans do the Government have to ensure that the training of teachers—taking the noble Lord’s suggestions into the discussion, perhaps—equips them to deliver a properly balanced national curriculum of the kind described by the noble Lord?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the requirement is for all schools to deliver a broad and balanced curriculum, and that is what Ofsted inspects against. In order to qualify as a teacher, the person must have satisfied the teaching standard, and the minimum requirement is, obviously, that they understand the needs of the children who they are teaching. However, the noble Lord is correct that the teaching population should reflect the population, and we are pleased that BAME staff increased from 7% to 10% within the teaching staff between 2010 and 2019, but we recognise there is further to go, as, currently, 26% of our students are from black and minority ethnic backgrounds.

[Lord Storey (LD) [V]]

For black lives to matter, they need to be reflected in our school curriculum. In the whole of our school history curriculum, there is only one mention of a black person, and that is Mary Seacole in a key stage 2, non-statutory section, where either Mary Seacole and/or Florence Nightingale can be chosen. Can the Minister give an assurance that she will look again at our school syllabus so that it can truly reflect our multicultural country?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the suggestions made in the national curriculum are the minimum for schools, and, obviously, we expect them to go beyond that. In relation to key stage 2, it is also suggested that pupils study the experience of Rosa Parks, and, at key stage 3, it is suggested that they learn about the empire. However, of course, there is the flexibility for teachers in the classroom to include all kinds of different people within their teaching.

[Baroness Hooper (Con)]

My Lords, I sympathise very much with what has been said so far, but I have a very specific issue that I wish to raise in the world context. I point to the failure of the national curriculum to include anything about the United Kingdom’s historic links to, and support for, the independence movements throughout South America some 200 years ago. For example and among other things, few people are aware that a British regiment followed Simón Bolívar across the Andes, and I think the name of George Canning, the then Foreign Secretary, is better known in Argentina and, indeed, the wider region, than it is over here. At the time, this led to a lot of British influence and trade and left a legacy of good will.

This becomes important today in the context of links with educational institutions in Latin America and providing a better background for new trade and investment opportunities there. Furthermore, there are now millions of people of Latin American origin living and working in this country, some working here in your Lordships’ House, whose children could benefit from at least an option for Latin American studies, apart from more teaching of the Spanish and Portuguese languages. Can my noble friend give me some hope?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for her tenacity in raising the profile of Latin America within your Lordships’ House. The flexibility that I have outlined for teachers means that they can include matters surrounding our involvement with Latin America, but, in particular, the suggestion is made at key stage 2 that, when looking at a non-European civilisation, the 10th-century Maya empire should be looked at, so it is included to some extent in the suggestions for the curriculum.

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB) [V]]

My Lords, if we really want to honour the diverse make-up of our nation, surely we should acknowledge the creative contribution to music, witness pop musicians, rap artists, the Chineke! Orchestra and the Kanneh-Mason family? Most of them could not afford private music lessons and attribute their success to music lessons in schools. Yes, the hubs have done fine work, but they are not a substitute for the ethos of everyday music in schools. Please will the Government consider putting music back on the national curriculum?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, music is indeed on the national curriculum and is compulsory in maintained schools for children between the ages of five and 14, and they should be offered one subject at GCSE beyond that. However, £500 million has been invested in hubs and other schemes to ensure that young people, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds, have access to music.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, is the Minister as shocked as I was that research from Teach First shows that a child can still get through their entire GCSEs without studying a single book by a black author? What is she going to do to change that? Will she consider encouraging a scheme whereby schools get pupils more engaged in selecting books by black authors and topics that reflect black British history?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, as I have outlined, it is open to teachers, whether they are teaching the national curriculum in maintained schools or in academies, to include literature from a variety of authors. There are suggestions in the national curriculum that they choose authors from black and minority ethnic backgrounds.

[Baroness Benjamin (LD)]

My Lords, Black History Month was established 33 years ago, and this year there has been a real desire to find out more about our diverse British history. The year 2020 seems like the beginning of the age of enlightenment, when the shackles were broken and eyes were opened. So how do the Government plan to further that interest? Will they consider broadening exam specification choices to include a wider range of topics that cover our untold history and for exam boards to facilitate this through high-quality resources?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes, as I have outlined, teachers are encouraged to use their flexibility to meet the needs of all the pupils in their classroom and to choose from a diverse range of sources to educate those children in accordance with the context they are living in and the history of this country.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

Does the Minister agree that it is essential to understand the genocidal and ecocidal impacts of the British Empire, from the late-Victorian famines, and many others, on the subcontinent, to the destruction of the Australian natural environment and aboriginal societies, recently set out in books such as Dark Emu, if you are to have an understanding of modern economics, ecosystems, societies, international relations—in fact, almost any subject?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the value of history in helping us to understand today and to learn from the past is one of the purposes of educating children. The only compulsory element on the national curriculum is the study of the Holocaust but, of course, that leads to teachers being able to talk about wider discrimination and prejudice to avoid such events happening again.

[Lord Caine (Con)]

My Lords, I strongly support a curriculum that reflects our diverse history and teaches children our national story, warts and all. But does my noble friend agree that it is profoundly unhistorical to teach and interpret the past entirely through the prism of today’s values, and it is wrong to demonise figures from history simply because they held views which, at the time, were the norm in society?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, history, of course, is not just events—history can be that of values, principles and mores. I agree with the noble Lord, who I am sure will be reassured that the guidance sent out by DCMS on the controversial issue of statues is to consider those figures in their context and contextualise the involvement of that person in our history.

[The Senior Deputy Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed.

Gender Recognition Act 2004

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 19th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Ministerial Statement by Baroness Berridge on 22 September (HLWS457), what further advice they intend to give to public bodies following the conclusion of the review of the Gender Recognition Act 2004.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government recently announced our response to and the results of the consultation on the Gender Recognition Act. We are now focusing on digitising and streamlining the process, and reducing the fee. We hope these changes will make the process less bureaucratic for transgender people. At this stage, we are not proposing further legislative guidance, but we will keep this under review.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that in sensitive discussions about the interaction between the Gender Recognition Act and the Equality Act, those most affected, namely women and transgender people, should have freedom to speak, and that intimidation and no-platforming are not acceptable? Will the Government reiterate their belief in the importance of single-sex places provided by the Equality Act, and make it clear to public bodies that it is not acceptable to insist on gender-neutral services at the expense of providing women-only safe spaces in refuges and rape crisis centres?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that freedom of speech in this area, on all sides, needs to be conducted in a manner that is respectful of people with very differing views. Yes, the Equality Act has an exemption, so that single-sex spaces can be provided and, where justified, somebody can be refused access to that space.

[Lord Triesman (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am sure that, today, the Minister will explicitly commit the Government to sticking to the statutory definitions required for collecting data on sex discrimination and will guide ACAS to do so. Since gender identification would not provide reliable data for the statistical analysis needed to understand historical patterns, what advice will the Government give to ensure complete clarity in the data required to comply with the legislation? Given the comparable difficulty in defining gender if it relies solely on self-identity, will the Government commit to advising the NHS on the specific rights of women who do not have male bodies to access single-sex wards and medical facilities?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, as I have outlined, the NHS, as a public body, knows that it is the Equality Act that outlines its provision of services, and so single-sex wards can be provided. There is specific NHS guidance that, at present, states that transgender people should be accommodated according to their presentation but that decisions need to be made in the best interests of patients. We leave it to front-line clinicians, who are aware of the circumstances on their wards and in their hospitals, to make those decisions.

[Lord Cashman (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome the statement by the Minister, particularly on freedom of information. Trans women and men have found themselves vilified, deeply misrepresented and defamed, and seen, in total, as a threat, when all they want to do is get on with their lives, harming no one. Great harm has been done to them and their families—and, sadly, by some Members of your Lordships’ House. Therefore, I ask the Minister this: given that many trans people face routine discrimination in public services, what steps will she take to ensure that public services are equipped to support trans people, including through staff training?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, it is deeply regretful that there has been vilification on both sides of this debate. We hope to move on from this consultation and that both sides can respect the differing views. The consultation made it clear that health service provision was a concern; there is specific training now through the Royal College of Physicians to ensure that medical practitioners are more alert to the issues of transgender people.

[Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the excellent educational material on sexual education for children in schools, which her department recently published. En passant, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, on her nomination as the next chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission. This material brings into sharp relief the previous advice that the Government seem to have been given by the Equal Opportunities Commission, which led the Department for Education to publish a decade-long sequence of materials, which vary greatly from the current new guidance. Is the Minister willing to have a meeting with me to discuss the detailed points of issue that I have raised?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, on her appointment. I would be happy to meet with the noble Baroness. It is key to remember that the relationships and health education guidance that the department has put out was put out partly in response to the IICSA inquiry, which recommended that relationships education was a way to protect children so they would know what was a healthy relationship and when someone was perhaps approaching them for ulterior motives.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, the Question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and the terms in which it was asked, emanates directly from a campaign supported by, among others, the Heritage Foundation in America, which intends to deny trans women in particular the equality and dignity that they deserve. Can the Minister tell the House whether there is any evidence—as opposed to assertion—that public services are in any doubt about how to ensure the safety of women and trans women in public services under the terms of the Equality Act as it exists now?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the data is not collected centrally. A number of providers, including public providers, are making use of the single-sex space exemption. It must not be forgotten that people are electing a gender-specific service—a single-sex toilet, for example—each and every day, and in the overwhelming majority of situations there is not a problem. The Government do not want to interfere with that.

[Lord Herbert of South Downs (Con)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my interests as set out in the register. I welcome the Government’s improvements to the healthcare of trans people. In drawing up policy in relation to this sensitive issue, can the Minister ensure that the Government will always be guided by a careful assessment of the evidence, including the global evidence of best practice in this area and a proper regard to the human rights and dignities of every individual, and will always reject any invitation to fight or join in a culture war on this issue from whichever side, such as we have seen far too often in debate over the last few months?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I can only agree with my noble friend and thank him that he is to chair the international conference for LGBT, which was in the manifesto. I hope that we can exhibit at that conference a manner of disagreeing respectfully with one another when views differ on each side.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson (CB) [V]]

What advice will Her Majesty’s Government give to sports bodies, when national policies differ from those of international federations?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the Equality Act made a specific exemption, as I am sure the noble Baroness is aware, so national sporting bodies could set their own criteria for participation in sport. We are not currently aware of any disparity between national and international guidance and governing bodies, but if the noble Baroness knows of specific examples, can she please write to me? I will then endeavour to see whether the UK Government have a role in that.

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the consultation strongly favoured legislative reform of the Gender Recognition Act 2004, yet the Government have failed to take steps towards a process of gender recognition for trans people that is straightforward, accessible and de-medicalised. What assurance can the Minister give that, in digitising the gender recognition application process, the Government can ensure that the medical component of the process is streamlined and focuses on the legal requirements of the Act, removing the need for intrusive, degrading and unnecessarily detailed medical reports that are so distressing to the trans community?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are keen to streamline this process and make it as kind and fair as possible. I hear the comments made by the noble Baroness regarding medical evidence; that is a matter for clinicians. But she is correct that we do not want an overly complex paper system to become an overly complex digital system, so part of this is ensuring that the process is simplified before it is digitised.

[Baroness Grender (LD) [V]]

Is the Minister aware that some local authorities have withdrawn trans-inclusive guidance to schools because of threats of judicial reviews? Does she agree that the safety and welfare of schoolchildren should never be used as a political football by campaigns, and is she concerned that some such campaigns do just that and do not declare their sources of support and funding?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the department has put out comprehensive resources for health education in primary schools and health and sex education at secondary schools, has resourced teachers, and had a commitment in the manifesto in relation to avoiding bullying. We hope that as a result of this consultation, both sides can live in peace with one another and disagree properly without undue recourse to the courts.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed.

Social Mobility

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Thursday 15th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, we welcome the Social Mobility Commission’s report and its contribution to the evidence supporting our levelling-up agenda. The report confirms that education plays a key role in spreading opportunities so that every child in every part of the country has a fair chance. That is why we have announced the biggest funding boost for schools in a decade, giving schools more money for every child, and established opportunity areas in social mobility cold spots.

[Baroness Bull (CB)]

My Lords, the Government’s investment in opportunity areas is indeed welcome and is making a difference. Nevertheless, this report reveals that in one in every six local authority areas, two boys born into equal disadvantage will have vastly different earnings as adults. In those areas, only two-thirds of the pay gap can be explained by education; it is simply about where they grew up. Many of those places are designated opportunity areas, but many are not. Given their commitment to levelling up, can the Minister say whether the Government will increase opportunity areas funding, and will they extend the programme to reach all the cold spots identified in this report?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, each of the 12 opportunity areas have already been encouraged, because of their positive outcomes, to twin with an additional area. In addition to the £90 million we put into the opportunity areas, £22 million was put into essential life skills, so there was an additional initiative, but the continuation of the opportunity areas is obviously a subject for the spending review.

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, I welcome this report and it is good to hear the Minister welcome it too. Deprivation is an issue that goes to the core of natural justice, and therefore our common good as a nation. Does the Minister accept in particular the report’s findings that employment interventions are as critical as educational improvement in addressing systematic inequalities and levelling up? What additional steps do the Government propose to take to improve employment opportunities, particularly when facing the current recession, in the cold spots that the report identifies across the nation?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the report was co-commissioned by the department and uses the longitudinal educational outcomes data the department has been collecting. Yes, in addition to skills, social mobility obviously does not end at the age of 18. That is why we have made level 3 qualifications fully funded from April next year—available to everyone, regardless of age. We are looking at digital training and digital boot camps in areas of the country. There is a whole effort in reskilling at the moment.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Wyld, has withdrawn, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Singh of Wimbledon.

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[Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB) [V]]

My Lords, the report of the Social Mobility Commission usefully reminds us that widespread social disadvantage can be successfully countered by carefully tailored interventions. Does the Minister agree that a school ethos that encourages aspiration, such as that of the Guru Nanak Academy in Hayes, which has well above average results in GCSEs and A-levels, despite pupils coming mostly from a deprived background, is also important in enhancing life chances?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes, the report highlights how important education is, but says that it is not the only factor, particularly in areas with great disparity in household income. I agree with the noble Lord on the ethos in schools. That is why, in addition to the opportunity areas, a specific school programme called Opportunity North East is being run by the department, focused on secondary schools in the north-east, where we see that primary school attainment is around the national average, but it drops off at secondary school, so we are intervening directly in schools as well.

[Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, this is a very sobering report, which recommends a place-based approach that, yes, has education interventions but much more than that. We know that the pandemic has made things much worse for children in poor families and their communities. Can the Minister assure us that there will be further place-based interventions where the money is awarded with integrity, based on sound data and not, quite honestly, with the bad taste of political interference that still lingers over the last round of the Towns Fund?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I can assure the noble Baroness that local enterprise partnerships are, as the report outlines, one of the solutions here in opportunity areas. They are funded by a grant to the local authority, so it is up to the local authority to then put the stakeholders around the table, and the LEPs are very much involved in that. We are also trying to support disadvantaged children nationwide by developing a national tutoring programme.

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the report makes clear that both place and education have significant impacts on social mobility. What assessment have the Government made of the additional impact of Covid in further exacerbating such differentials?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is correct. In terms of the impact of Covid, we have recently commissioned Renaissance Learning to assess children as they return to school, and that is being evaluated by the EPI. One reason that is very positive is that it will not be an additional burden on teachers. Renaissance Learning is a tool that schools already use, so they have baseline data and, as they begin to use the same tool again, we should have an assessment as soon as possible of where children are in their education.

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I must declare my interest as the promoter of university technical colleges, which are major agents of social mobility, as we have a very challenging intake. I give just one statistic. In July of this year, our UTC in Tower Hamlets, the Mulberry UTC, had 78 leavers, mainly girls, most with English as a second language, and generally within the school, 40% come from deprived homes. Of its 78 leavers, 69 went to universities to study STEM subjects in health—88%. If you are born in Tower Hamlets, your chance of going to university is just 12%, so 88% compared to 12% is quite good for social mobility.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I pay tribute to my noble friend for his tenacity and perseverance with university technical colleges, and thoroughly enjoyed the recent round table that I hosted on UTCs. We are indeed seeing more children from disadvantaged backgrounds going to university: 23.1% went into higher education, the highest proportion since records began. We also know that 59.1% of black students are now entering higher education, so, along with the efforts of UTCs, I pay tribute to the efforts of schools, which are paying dividends.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the Social Mobility Commission report looks only at boys, and apparently the model cannot be adjusted for part-time work. What work is being done in government to look at the impact of gender inequalities on social mobility, including issues such as part-time work, increased caring responsibilities and low pay? That way, we can properly judge the policy changes needed to address inequality and social mobility issues for boys and girls, particularly post Covid.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

As noble Lords will be aware, I also hold the privilege of being the Minister for Women. Unfortunately, the link data that the LEO relies on does not contain women’s data at the moment, but we are aware of the increased caring responsibilities that women are taking on, particularly during the pandemic. Subject to consultation, there will be an employment Bill that will make flexible working the default option, unless there is good reason otherwise. There is also a proposal for a £1 billion childcare fund, so we are aware of the importance of that issue for women in the workplace.

[Viscount Colville of Culross (CB) [V]]

The commission’s report says that,

“a long-run shift to further homeworking would open up new opportunities that could spread … high-quality jobs more widely across the country”.

What are the Government doing to ensure that residents in deprived areas can easily access well-paid public sector jobs by working from home? That is particularly important in this time of Covid.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that the noble Viscount is aware that, even before this current situation, the Government had a specific initiative in relation to their workforce in Whitehall to look at moving as much as possible of the government function outside London. Around half the Department for Education’s workforce is outside London, and we are major employers in places such as Darlington. In relation to opportunity areas, teaching is obviously not a work-from-home job, but this has been about attracting teachers to those opportunity areas, and in many of them it has been successful.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. We now come to the fourth Oral Question.

Apprenticeships (Alternative English Completion Conditions and Miscellaneous Provisions) (Amendment) (Coronavirus) Regulations 2020

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Berridge]

That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 10 September be approved.

Relevant document: 27th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, apprenticeships have an important role to play in creating employment opportunities post pandemic and support employers to meet their skills needs to maintain their businesses. The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme was launched in March to protect jobs and businesses from the worst of the pandemic, and it enabled workers who were still employed to be furloughed. The Government have made financial support available to employers and targeted relief at the hardest-hit sectors. To enable apprenticeships to continue during the pandemic, we introduced a number of measures and flexibilities to enable apprentices to undertake remote learning and complete their end-point assessment.

We all know that, sadly, young people starting their careers have been severely affected by this pandemic. As we build back stronger, we will need to ensure that apprenticeships play a key role in creating jobs and boosting the skills that employers need. To ensure this, the Government are already taking action. For example, our plan for jobs set out new payments for employers who hire a new apprentice between 1 August and the end of January next year. Where that apprentice is under 25, the employer will receive £2,000, and they will receive £1,500 where the apprentice is aged 25 or older. This is a strong encouragement for employers to create new apprenticeship opportunities in their businesses. Additionally, for young people seeking the skills to enter the labour market, we are tripling the number of traineeships we make available and rewarding employers for offering work placements. For those at risk of long-term unemployment, we are subsidising employers to create new short-term roles as part of the Kickstart Scheme.

However, the scale of the economic impact of the pandemic means that apprentices are not immune from redundancy. While employers are doing their best to protect and retain existing apprentices, sadly, many have cut their workforce and made the difficult decision to make them redundant. To help apprentices through this difficult time, we launched in August a new support service for redundant apprentices. This provides individuals who have been made redundant, or who are at risk of redundancy, with advice and guidance on the impact of redundancy on their apprenticeship. It also enables them to access wider support services, such as careers and financial advice and well-being support. More importantly, it helps them to find new apprenticeship opportunities with employers as part of our vacancy sharing service. We must remember that apprentices have valuable skills, often transferable to different industries and sectors.

It is wonderful and encouraging to see that more than 700 employers have come forward to support those apprentices who have been made redundant by providing them with the chance to apply for the range of opportunities available across all sectors and regions. We have received positive feedback from a number of employers who have shared their vacancies and successfully recruited redundant apprentices via this service.

We hope that any apprentice who is made redundant will be able to secure new employment and continue their apprenticeship. Sadly, we know that this will not always be possible. We now require training providers to produce a record of part-completion where an apprentice has to stop their apprenticeship as a result of redundancy. This sets out the knowledge, skills and behaviours that the apprentice has acquired prior to redundancy, helping the apprentice to secure future employment. It is important that, where individuals have made a commitment to their training and where the end goal is in sight, they are not prevented from completing their training due to redundancy. However, we want to go further by giving more apprentices who suffer redundancy the opportunity to complete their apprenticeship should they not find new employment immediately. That is the key reason why these regulations are being debated today.

There have been significant changes to apprenticeships. We have introduced higher and degree apprenticeships, which are of a longer duration. As a result of this, the average duration of an apprenticeship has increased: more apprentices are starting longer programmes. Apprentices on longer programmes who are made redundant do not always benefit from the current policy, where they can continue to be funded if they are six months or less from completion. We now propose to go further. We want those who have completed 75% or more of their apprenticeship to be funded as well. This could mean that an additional 8,000 apprentices can complete their programmes in the event of redundancy. I think we all recognise that apprenticeships are not just training programmes. The unique benefit of an apprenticeship is that it is a real job, and the training consists of a mixture of on-the-job and off-the-job training to achieve occupational competence.

To conclude, having taken steps to encourage employers to offer new apprenticeship opportunities, we are now taking further steps to extend support to existing apprentices seeking to complete their apprenticeship in the face of redundancy. We believe that these regulations strike the right balance between supporting these apprentices and protecting the quality of the apprenticeship experience they receive and the endorsement it provides to employers of their knowledge, skills and behaviours. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions to the debate. I am delighted that the valuable contribution that apprenticeships can make to individuals’ careers and businesses’ productivity was so clearly recognised.

In July, the Chancellor recognised the value of apprenticeships when setting out the Plan for Jobs. The payments we have introduced for employers hiring a new apprentice will help to promote many more apprenticeship starts before the end of January next year. Now, we are going further in supporting redundant apprentices. I welcome noble Lords’ support for the steps that we will introduce to protect apprentices from further redundancies.

It was wonderful to hear about the family history of the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, in apprenticeships and to see that he has transferred his skills from his telephone days. It was also wonderful to hear him agree that the Government are correct to make this earn-while-you-learn approach a priority.

The apprenticeship levy for this year is £2.5 billion. In answer to a query raised by many noble Lords, if an apprentice is made redundant, they have a 12-week period in which to find new employment where their training is paid for anyway. Obviously, we hope that they will receive a new apprenticeship in that period.

We consulted on the 75% figure that many noble Lords mentioned. There is no precise science to it, but a balance had to be struck. The point of an apprenticeship is that you have occupational competency, so on balance, someone on, say, a three-year apprenticeship probably has the competences after 75% of it to go on and be employed in that sector. Anything less than that will affect employers’ confidence in apprenticeships. The whole point of this provision is that once 75% of the apprenticeship is completed, it will complete without the need for an employer. The training carries on even if the apprentice cannot find a suitable employer to transfer to. It is about that balance—the training carries on but without that valuable part of being on the job. As I say, it is not a precise science, but it was felt that for the longer apprenticeships, 75% was the appropriate point from which the person could go on and gain employment, while the employer could be confident that the apprentice had the skills and knowledge that they should. As for whether it should happen at an earlier stage, it was not to do with cost but was rather—as the noble Baroness properly asked the Government—to do with this balance of ensuring that an apprentice is a competent employee in that sector and field.

I can confirm to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and other noble Lords that if an apprentice has part completed and transfers to a new employer, that new employer is indeed entitled to the new payments, whether £2,000 or £1,500, depending on the apprentice’s age. That creates the incentive for other employers to take on a part-completed apprentice. We are doing as much as we can to address the situation in which someone experiences, as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, said, the excitement of getting an apprenticeship and then finds that they lose it due to the pandemic.

As many noble Lords mentioned, this is the time when, thankfully, the Government, the Secretary of State for Education and the Prime Minister have been talking about FE and skills and want to level up the parity of esteem, so that an apprenticeship is seen as a valuable way to earn and learn. This year there will be an investment of £200 million in our FE colleges.

As I say, we consulted on apprenticeships with the employment ambassadors, the AOC, the AELP and the provider reference group.

It is wonderful to hear my first speech from my noble friend Lord Vaizey. Other help has been given to apprentices through remote training and the apprenticeship service, and this support is being brought in now because, as many noble Lords will be aware, there will be a transition from the furlough scheme into the new support for jobs. At this point, we expect that employers will make those decisions about any apprentices they have furloughed, so it is important that we introduce this support now.

I was pleased to hear my noble friend Lord Vaizey talk about the technical skills that apprentices can have and develop, and I assure him that that passion is shared in the department by the honourable Member Gillian Keegan, the Minister for this area. I believe she is the only Member of Parliament with a degree apprenticeship, so she is passionate about this area.

On the levy, we have been doing more to enable levy payers to transfer their levy down their supply chain. I am grateful that my noble friend, despite being a levy sceptic, has appreciated that it has been a success. But it is not perfect and we know that we need to do more to make it even more flexible for levy payments to be sent to small and medium-sized employers. It has been vital to the whole scheme that employers are there, developing the standards, so that when people complete their apprenticeship, they know that they have the necessary skills to be an employee in that sector.

Of course, the future is with tech apprenticeships, as the noble Lord outlined in relation to Facebook, but we are also looking at flexibilities in relation to culture, the other sector he mentioned. We recognise that in culture and media there is often not a traditional single employer for which someone will work; we are looking at flexibility so that an apprentice could have a number of employers, as is the nature of the sector. We are trying to develop this so that we can meet the needs of all the different sectors.

On the Whitehall apprenticeship scheme the noble Lord mentioned, I am pleased to note that I have a meeting tomorrow with a DfE data apprentice who is sorting out some data in the school sector for me. So, yes, we are looking at meeting the commitments we made, and the levy has enabled us to invest more in apprenticeships.

On the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Storey, about the Kickstart scheme, we are all working hard to try to ameliorate as many of the effects of the pandemic as we can on the career prospects of young people, whom we know are more affected during this pandemic. I have received his inquiry on the Kickstart Scheme. We must have some kind of criteria for entry to the scheme. I will write with further clarification but, as I understand it, only the DWP holds the necessary data on young people to know whether they will be vulnerable to being NEET and whether they are in employment. That is why that scheme is being run out of the DWP, with which we are working closely. As I say, I will refer any further details on that.

I can say to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, only that the apprenticeship service is being used by hundreds of employers and redundant apprentices. It is aimed at all sectors and has been made available hopefully in advance of the decisions that have been made on furlough. There have also been other announcements such as the free level three entitlement to qualification.

Skills are an enormous focus. The Government have launched a skills toolkit, and we now have a national productivity board so we can know at a national level what skills employers will need.

In supporting these regulations, we hope we can increase the number of apprentices who can complete their apprenticeships in the event of redundancy, recognising the sustained commitment that these individuals have made to their training over a period of months or years. It will make a huge difference to those individuals and ensure that they can make a full contribution to our businesses and help the country to recover and thrive in future. I commend the regulations to the House.

Motion agreed.

Lifetime Skills Guarantee and Post-16 Education

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Tuesday 6th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, this is very good news. I do not have to sit on the Bishops’ Bench to say, hallelujah. As the chief executive of the Association of Colleges said:

“For many years, further education colleges have not received the recognition they deserve.”


In fact, for 20 years or more, we have allowed further education and vocational education to wither. The skills gap is huge: you have to look no further than the Grenfell inquiry, which daily produces examples of people carrying out tasks and supervision far beyond their skill level, with catastrophic consequences. The forthcoming building safety Bill will impose big requirements on design, construction, supervision and regulatory personnel, who will need CPD in-service training, plus a stream of incoming trained starters. There are critical safety gaps at present.

The Chancellor’s scheme of £3 billion to spend on retrofitting energy improvements to homes—which, by the way, is to be done by next April—opens up another huge gap. Most small jobbing builders do not have the full range of skills needed and there are not enough energy performance assessors to prepare or supervise them. Of course, the loss of EU workers is keenly felt in London and the south-east. The work visa plan is unworkable for an industry in which peripatetic working around different jobs with different employers is normal. There is no evidence that anybody has a grip on these issues. That is why this Statement is critical and we hope that “rolled out as promised” or “build, build, build” will be a joke.

An entitlement to a fully funded level 3 qualification and more flexibility in levels 4 and 5 are important steps forward, as the Government begin to implement the Augar review. We very much welcome the proposals on apprenticeship, which have lost their way in recent years. We welcome more training funding for small and medium-sized enterprises and more flexibility on how the levy-paying employers can use their funds. Can the Minister tell us whether the apprenticeship measures will be funded from the existing £2 billion a year apprenticeship budget?

The Minister will be familiar with the recommendations of the independent Commission on Lifelong Learning, convened by our former leader, Vince Cable, so this is something that we very much welcome. We would be glad of the opportunity to talk to the Minister about it. What consultations have already taken place with the sector about the detail of the plans, how they will look and how they will be rolled out in practice?

I am sure that people working in adult education and skills will welcome the ambitions that the Government are setting out. It sounds like they are being asked to alter ways of working and upscale capacity massively with a few months’ notice and during a pandemic. They need to be thoroughly consulted on these proposals and supported with the practicalities of delivering them.

We welcome the commitment to fund courses for anyone who left school without an A-level or its equivalent. It is, of course, essential to ensure that the benefit of this new plan is felt by those who need the support the most. As an aside, it seems that we are getting nearer to the day when GCSEs will no longer be needed.

Given the pace of change in the jobs market due to AI and automation, and the number of job losses being projected as a result of the pandemic, the Government should consider more ambitious proposals to give funding support to more people, with the introduction of universal personal education and skills accounts.

There is no mention of university technical colleges, which have done an excellent job. Does the Minister see an enhanced role for them? No doubt the noble Lord, Lord Baker, will pick up this point. In addition, in reply to a Written Question from me a couple of days ago, the Minister revealed that there are now 390,109 young people on education, health and care plans. Will these young people be supported through the FE sector with the resources that they need? Finally, although this is not mentioned in the Statement—I raised this last time—I want to write to the Minister, if she does not mind, about the Kickstart programme and how it is not involving 16 and 17 year-olds.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for welcoming the Statement. I believe that when I was at the Dispatch Box for the first time, I mentioned that this had for too long been the Cinderella of the sector, but it no longer is. The paucity of investment in this sector has been going on for decades, as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, outlined. However, £1.5 billion of capital investment is going into the FE sector for buildings, which have also been neglected.

There are skills shortages. That is why one hears that, at the heart of the institutes of technology, apprenticeships and the review of levels 4 and 5, there is a need for employers to lead on these technical qualifications to ensure that they fill the skills gaps which both noble Lords mentioned.

As the noble Lord, Lord Watson, outlined, the newly funded courses at levels 2 and 3 are FE courses. Obviously, they are generally more flexible, so, although there is a need for learner support—to pay the costs of travel and, perhaps most importantly, the costs of childcare for people undertaking those courses—they are not funded in the same way as higher education maintenance loans. More often than not, this training is done by people who are already in some kind of employment and are reskilling. Of course, that is not always the case, as some people are claiming universal credit. However, we are fully funding courses, and funding for training will no longer be restricted to those aged 23 or under. That restriction has been removed, so any adult who does not currently have a level 3 qualification will have their tuition paid. That is a dramatic change, recognising that, as I think the Augar report mentioned, if you do not have a level 3 qualification by the age of 18, you will almost certainly not get one.

In relation to support for SMEs and the apprenticeship levy, we have previously made it easier for the larger levy payers to transfer the levy down their supply chain, often to SMEs. We have opened up the apprenticeship service to all SMEs and are looking at further initiatives to try to ensure that SMEs have access to it. We have changed the number of reservations that apply to SMEs. Previously, they could reserve three places; now, they can reserve 10, so that they get the opportunity to hire. We also announced that £2,000 would be made available per young person hired as a new apprentice, in addition to the £1,000 that was previously announced. Only if we ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises can hire the apprentices they need will we see the beginning of the recovery.

I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Watson, has his beady eye on the procurement part of our work. In fact, procurement began this week of the 30,000 traineeships announced in July.

The level 3 offer will begin in April 2021, and we are encouraging FE colleges to take this up as soon as they can. It is intended to enable them to build the capacity they need to build at that level. However, the new digital bootcamps are available immediately. They started last month in the West Midlands and other regions, and provide flexible, intensive training aimed at getting people into that type of work in their region. We have put another 62 courses on to the Skills Toolkit. I went on it myself to see what training is available online. It provides digital skills and numeracy training. Therefore, there are things immediately available to people who currently need to retrain.

On the consultation that the noble Lord outlined, as I said, employers are at the heart of all the initiatives I have set out. Our response is not lethargic—we recognise that a need exists. There is also the Kickstart fund of £2 billion, which the noble Lord mentioned. It will mean that jobs are guaranteed for young people, so there is no lethargy in this regard. We obviously need to assist people while they are at a point of transition and uncertainty in their lives. I will welcome any further input or ideas from either noble Lord, as we need to work together to ensure that people are supported.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Bates) (Con)]

Before we commence with 20 minutes of questions from the Back Benches, I point out that a number of Members, both remote and present, have dropped out of the debate so it may be helpful if I read out the order in which I will call speakers. I will first call the noble Lord, Lord Baker of Dorking, then the noble Lord, Lord Knight of Weymouth, then the noble Baroness, Lady Garden of Frognal, followed by the noble Lords, Lord Empey and Lord Aberdare, the noble Baronesses, Lady Bennett and Lady Warsi, the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, and finally the noble Lord, Lord Lucas.

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

My Lords, I fully support the speech made by the Prime Minister a week ago in Devon, when he set an ambitious target of equalising practical and technical education with academic education. That is a very ambitious target which no Prime Minister since 1945 has had or indeed implemented, and it has my full support. I am very grateful for the mention of the colleges that I support, the university technical colleges. At the moment, they are by far the most able and successful technical schools in the country. We are having a record year in recruitment and we have incredible destinations. Last year, one of our colleges on the north-west coast of England produced 90% apprentices, which is absolutely incredible when the national average is 6%.

The speech that Boris made had a Boris flourish in it:

“Now is the time to end the pointless, snooty, and frankly vacuous distinction between the practical and the academic.”


Of course it is. The trouble is that, since 1945, there has been a huge drive to send people to universities, which is good for social mobility but it means that graduates have had disproportionate esteem, disproportionate political influence and disproportionate reward compared with those who make things with their hands. This is the time when we have to elevate the intelligent hand: to train not only the brain but the hand as well.

I am particularly concerned about the level of youth unemployment today, which for 18 to 24 year-olds is 13.4% and likely to rise to 20%. Nothing could be worse for an 18 year-old than to start their lives on the dole: it is a blemish that will affect them all their lives. My proposal is that, instead of being on the dole, they should engage in a year’s or perhaps two years’ further training for a higher national certificate or diploma, through which they will get skills that will help them to get a better job a year later. At the moment, the youngsters who do that have to take out a loan of £6,000 to £8,000. That should be stopped for the next two years, and these courses should not only be free but should have maintenance grants to help students with their living costs, because they will not be eligible for unemployment pay. I will set out the details when I have more than a minute or two to speak.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I too pay tribute to the work of my noble friend. It was my pleasure to host a round table of UTCs which have been particularly successful. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, mentioned them as well. In fact, a new UTC was opened in September in Darlington. The colleges have been particularly involved in the T-levels, which were introduced to give parity at the age of 16 between A-levels and T-levels, and to make sure that such attitudes are a thing of the past—that those with technical skills or who make things with their hands are viewed with the same esteem as those with academic qualifications. Indeed, 81.6% of our 16 to 18 year-olds are in education or apprenticeships, which is as high as it has ever been.

However, we are aware that it is the young who could be hit hardest during this crisis, which is why there is additional support for employers to take on young apprentices. The Kickstart scheme is open to those who are young and claiming universal credit, and there are 30,000 traineeships, which the department has just begun to procure. These are a work-based progression for young people, to make them ready for work or an apprenticeship. I am sure that I can get a response to my noble friend’s proposal that levels 4 and 5 should be free, but that is not what is being offered at the moment. What is being offered is level 3 tuition fees for anyone who does not have a qualification at that level.

[Lord Knight of Weymouth (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, this announcement is welcome—as far as it goes. It is logical to start with the unqualified, but what of the many with middle and higher-level skills who are being squeezed by technology and finding that universal credit is catastrophic for them and their families? They cannot fund their reskilling. Has the Government’s National Skills Fund got anything to offer the squeezed middle?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, in relation to reskilling, there are, as I have outlined, the digital boot camps that we have offered so that people can gain training as they do that work. If they lack that level 3 qualification, they will be able to do that, but, as I say, there has been a particular focus on young people, who are more vulnerable to the effects of what is happening at the moment.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a vice-president of City & Guilds, for whom I worked on vocational qualifications and skills for 20 years. Statements like this have been made by successive Governments for very many years, yet little has been done to promote vocational, practical and technical education and training in schools, where the message must start. Can the Minister say whether league tables will cease to be based on A-levels and GCSEs? Will schools be encouraged to celebrate their apprentices, BTEC and work-based leavers with the same enthusiasm they give to their university entrants? Until schools are proud of all their successes, there is little hope of any real change.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, these are not just statements of intention; today, I have outlined that the numerous initiatives that have been started by the Department for Education and the Department for Work and Pensions are matched by funding. They will be a reality—some of them are already. The noble Baroness is completely right: in relation to the UTCs, which are important in promoting technical education, there is now a duty on the local authority and on schools to make sure that young people are made aware of that offer. The careers service has a link with employers locally so that they are brought into schools to outline the needs and skills that they have.

Teachers have been assisted to make sure that they are also aware of the apprenticeship offers because, unfortunately, as the noble Baroness will know from a Select Committee we both sat on, many teachers have not gone through these routes. We have been helping and training them and giving them the links so that they can make people aware of these offers. We want a greater take-up of level 3 and, particularly, levels 4 and 5 qualifications and for them to be validated by employers as making people qualified for jobs.

[Lord Empey (UUP)]

My Lords, I broadly welcome the trajectory of the Statement, but, speaking as someone who had responsibility at home for skills and both further and higher education, I assure my noble friend that simply giving people training on its own is not enough. If it does not lead to a job, there is demoralisation and the young people find themselves going round in circles doing different courses and getting demoralised as they go. Important though apprenticeships are, for employers, it is not simply about money: unless there is an outlet for that apprentice, there is no job.

I personally believe that the biggest problem we face in our broader education sector is snobbery. It has been referred to, and we can call it whatever we like, but that is what it is. We do not value vocational education the same as academic education. When will the noble Baroness tell us what steps will be taken to ensure that those young people do not have their morale destroyed by not having some role? If those people cannot find a job, will her department consider the idea of reintroducing the old-style ACE scheme, where at least people had employment in a social enterprise to tide them over until such time as a job in the private sector became available?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I assure the noble Lord that there is no snobbery in the Department for Education; we want to promote parity of esteem for vocational and technical qualifications across our sector. The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State are behind this Everybody has a role to play in ensuring that these skills are seen and respected; television programming over the last 10 years has shown the importance of construction in many of the programmes that they have chosen to produce. We have also invested £900 million in work coaches, who are essential to getting alongside people on a one-to-one basis to help them into work. There is £17 million for the new workplace academy programmes, which are helping people with their CVs and job interviews.

The noble Lord is correct: one of the things we have to do for young people is this review, particularly of level 4 and level 5 qualifications, of which there are over 4,000. I remember sitting with the noble Baroness on a Select Committee and seeing the plethora of avenues and qualifications that were there, so that the pathway is clearer for young people and they get a qualification that an employer says is relevant and equips them for the job that they want. I can only draw attention, once again, to the £2 billion for the Kickstart scheme, which is about jobs for young people who find themselves on universal credit at the moment.

[Lord Aberdare (CB) [V]]

My Lords, the Statement sets out a range of laudable and important aspirations and I very much hope that, unlike so many previous attempts, these will actually be delivered. I have two questions for the Minister. First, the Statement includes funding for extra careers advisers. Can she assure us that this will form part of a comprehensive approach to investing in professional high-quality careers advice and guidance to all who need it, from primary school children to adults of all ages without the gaps that currently exist? Secondly, what will the Government do about the perverse incentives that currently lead schools to try to keep young people in formal education rather than encouraging them to consider apprenticeships?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes, the funding that has been announced for the National Careers Service—that is the adult careers service. The Careers & Enterprise Company is available in schools and I know that additional funding has been given to that to ensure that young people are made aware of those opportunities. In relation to apprenticeships, as I have already outlined, through the Careers & Enterprise Company we are assisting schools to promote those. Fire It Up was our campaign to make sure that young people are aware of those apprenticeships. We are encouraging schools to know their destination data: it is important to know where those young people go on to, so that the best opportunity for the young person is put first by our schools and colleges.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I can only express my pleasure that the Government have suddenly been converted to lifelong learning after a decade of slashing the funding and support for it. The Statement refers to the risk that jobs will no longer exist because of technology. I would add that that is also the case because of environmental factors, Covid and many other changes in our society. I have two questions for the Minister. Would she acknowledge that narrowly focused job and skills training is not the right way to operate in this fast-changing landscape, and that employer-focused training that teaches for the jobs of today, rather than preparing people, particularly young people, for decades in a fast-changing workplace, is not the right way to go? What we need is creativity to encourage a love of learning and curiosity. The teach-to-the-test ethos pushed in our schools, focused on exams, is absolutely the wrong direction. What we need is to encourage an enthusiasm for soil, for growing food and other plants, for repairing things, for upcycling and recycling—something like, perhaps, the national nature service that the NGOs have been promoting. Do we not need that broader focus?

We should also acknowledge the fact that so many of our jobs now wear people down. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, referred to the construction sector, where 60% of manual construction workers are self-employed. Just the grind of getting through the day, of finding jobs, of getting an income, makes it very difficult for people to engage in training. We need to look at the broader issues that can keep people from training even if it is available.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

The noble Baroness is correct that, obviously, for many people, the concept of a job for life is a thing of the past. People have numerous careers or jobs during their working life. I can assure her that the curriculum taught in our schools is knowledge-based and it is rich. Young people are encouraged to explore nature and to use the outdoors. I know that many schools, whether it is forest schools or woodland schools, et cetera, have adopted that. Obviously, teaching about the environment is an important part of that.

She is entirely right, as well, that employers need to be at the centre of this. That is why there has been this transference on to employers. The institutes of technology will be a partnership of employers, universities and FE colleges. Apprenticeships are employer-standard led, and also there are local skills advisory boards that bring together local employers, the LEPs and others. There will now be a national skills and productivity board, so that we have a structure around employer engagement in these qualifications.

[Baroness Warsi (Con)]

My Lords, I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the register of interests.

I welcome the Statement, particularly the announcement of a flexible lifelong learning loan. Picking up a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Watson, I ask my noble friend this question, of which I gave notice: when do the Government anticipate this loan becoming available? As we come to the end of the furlough scheme, where many sadly will lose long-term jobs and possibly seek to retrain, do the Government see the necessity of speeding up the consultation process and the legislative process to implement these announcements?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, as I have outlined, the level 3 entitlement will begin in April next year. I assure my noble friend that we will consult and legislate as necessary as fast as we can. We recognise that the changes happening out there in the workplace are swift, and we will act as soon as we can.

[Lord Curry of Kirkharle (CB) [V]]

My Lords, my interests are as recorded in the register—in particular, as far as this debate is concerned, a keen interest and involvement in rural issues and agriculture. I have been assisting and sponsoring the establishment of an institute of agriculture and horticulture tier, which receives valuable support from Defra and the Department for Education, and we hope that this will create a vehicle through which the Government can help to deliver its ambitions.

I would like to ask three questions, if I may. First, it is great that the Government have recognised that improving skills is a continuous process, but I would like reassurance from the Minister that the department appreciates the huge potential that remains unlocked within the rural space due to a lack of appropriate skills and fragmented delivery. Can the Minister confirm that rural businesses are involved in the bootcamp pilots that are being arranged?

Secondly, on the rural economy, we have heard from the Minister already that the role of SMEs will be recognised. However, in the rural space we have a much higher proportion of SME businesses; we have a very small number of large businesses, and tens of thousands of very small businesses. This represents a particular challenge in the application of the apprenticeship scheme and the use of the levy. Can the Government be as flexible as possible in the use of the levy to allow greater uptake in these small sectors within the rural areas?

Lastly, the role of LEPs in supporting the Government’s new ambitions in encouraging the uptake of opportunities to improve skills is hugely important. Can the Minister confirm that the LEPs will be playing their part in supporting this agenda?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, yes indeed. As I have just outlined, the LEPs play their role in the skills advisory board at local level, and we are looking to be as flexible as possible with regard to SMEs and the use of the levy. I can assure the noble Lord that bootcamps are being done in various regions, including, in the next lot, areas such as south Derbyshire. On the question of rural spaces, I will have to write to him in relation to the figures that he required.

[Lord Lucas (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate the Government on this Statement and on the commitment it exemplified. Will my noble friend confirm that within this policy we will be supporting the Inspiring Digital Enterprise Award, from idea.org.uk? The award is designed to help people who have had to change career, or who are coming back after a period of unemployment, to realise that they have the potential for a career in the digital sector and to hone their enterprise and employability skills at a basic level—all of which is free. Will my noble friend also confirm that the Government understand that many people, particularly if they have lost a job in a sector that is contracting, will need to start to retrain at a level below that at which they are qualified? They may have a degree and need to go back to level 3 or 4 training to find a new place. Will taking a step back to make a new life going forward be something that the Government will fund?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend. This is precisely why it is a four-year offer, so that those who have a degree might then be able to take level 4 or level 5 training. I regret that, despite copious briefing here, I have not heard of the specific award that my noble friend mentioned, so I will write to him to outline what the department is doing in relation to that.

House adjourned at 8.25 pm.

Covid-19: School Students Learning From Home

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 5th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McDonagh]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact on primary and secondary school students’ ability to learn for those students (1) who have digital connectivity, and (2) who do not have such connectivity, when learning from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have already invested over £100 million to support remote education, including 250,000 additional devices for children who cannot attend school or if their school is closed. Understanding the impact of Covid disruption on attainment and progress is a key research priority for the Government. We have commissioned an independent research and assessment agency to consider catch-up needs and monitor progress over the year.

[Baroness McDonagh (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for that Answer. The department needs to do more. Before the Covid outbreak, we had heard already this year from the Education Policy Institute that young people on free school meals were leaving our schools 18 months behind other young people. For the first time in a decade, we saw the widening gap among primary school children between those from poor families and those from wealthy families. We know from the Government-appointed Children’s Commissioner that 50% of secondary school children and 60% of primary children had no access to online education. It just seems too little. Can the Minister give us more information about the assessment, research and dates, and how attainment will be measured?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the mention of the EPI, because it will do the data analysis. Renaissance Learning has won the contract, which is, as I am sure the noble Baroness is aware, an assessment platform that schools already use, so there is baseline data; we are not in the process of putting an additional burden on schools—as they use the platform, they will monitor that. The EPI will analyse the data that we get from this. We know it is important to know as much as possible about how children have fallen behind and how they are progressing to catch up.

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her Answer and for what the Government have already done. Before the pandemic, 23% of children in socioeconomic groups D and E lacked home broadband and access to laptops, et cetera. Does the Minister agree that we now need to measure data poverty and its effects more carefully? Will the Government commit to legislating for household digital access to be treated as a utility on an equal footing with the right to access for water and heat—a change supported by the general public?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the right reverend Prelate is correct that access to a computer at home is essential for children’s learning. On laptop and device provision, 470,000 devices are now being made available to disadvantaged children. They will be distributed by local authorities and academy trusts. Alongside that, we have provided 4G routers for children who do not have access, and there has been work with BT to ensure access for 10,000 disadvantaged families where they are relying on the mobile phone network to get broadband. There is now a universal service obligation under broadband of 10 megabytes per second.

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con) [V]]

When schools are disrupted or closed by Covid, the Government’s policy is that remote education will be provided immediately. That is impractical and virtually impossible. Last week in Hastings, the most deprived coastal town in the south of England, an academy had to close suddenly; 1,000 students and many others did not attend for 10 days. In Hove, 11 teachers could not turn up—education disrupted. In Kent, nine teachers could not turn up—education disrupted. How can disadvantaged children possibly catch up on four months of lost education and new stuff in the remaining 29 weeks before GCSEs next summer? I beg the department to have a plan B alongside the possibility of GCSEs, involving moderated teacher assessment and possibly assisted by internal mock exams which could measure student absence against learning. If it does not do this, hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged students will be treated unfairly.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord will be aware that next year’s exams were the subject of a consultation by Ofqual; we will have an announcement on that shortly. On support for remote education, which includes online and offline, last week we opened a new central hub on remote education to assist teachers. Some 2,800 schools have accessed the new teacher resource on the Oak National Academy, which the department funded. Many schools—I pay tribute to them on World Teachers’ Day—are doing a great job on standing up remote education as soon as they can.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, this is an important subject, but I ask Members to please keep their supplementaries short. I call the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, although the share of households with internet access in the UK is now at 93%, we hear too many stories of real concern about sharing devices and lack of computers, even with connectivity. Under what precise conditions are the Government currently supplying computers to the neediest? Should they not now pledge a dedicated school computer for every child, particularly considering that any child or whole class may at a moment’s notice have to switch to online learning?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

The Government are distributing these laptops to the most disadvantaged students. This batch will be delivered to disadvantaged children in years 3 to 11, to any child shielding and to any child in a hospital school or a further education college doing key stage 4. We rely on local authorities and schools to know who those disadvantaged children are; free school meals are a measure, but they know who the disadvantaged children are, and we must rely on them to distribute to those in need.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, we are four weeks into the current term, yet the Government are talking about delivering this equipment and the remote routers. Can the Minister tell us what proportion of local authorities and schools, many of which are reporting that the equipment promised was late in arriving and insufficient for the number of children needing it, have queried their allocation since the start of the current term? Of those allocations, what proportion has actually been received by schools? Can she assure us that this will not be allocated by algorithm?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the 220,000 devices delivered last term were all delivered at speed. At points, we were delivering thousands of laptops within 24 hours. The expectation is that this term, when schools and local authorities put in their order, they will receive the devices within 48 hours. I will reply by way of a letter to the noble Lord’s more precise questions.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

I call the noble Lord, Lord Storey. Is there no Lord Storey? I call the noble Lord, Lord Pickles.

[Lord Pickles (Con) [V]]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that the last 10 years have seen an increase in social mobility and that Covid-19 isolations threaten our progress? To be without digital connection puts a pupil at great disadvantage. However, I was forcefully reminded by a recent meeting with students that, even with good digital connections, technology is not a cure-all. There is no substitute for classroom teaching and face-to-face tuition. Does this not reinforce the necessity of keeping schools open to offer the best choice in life for pupils?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I could not agree more with the noble Lord that face-to-face tuition is, of course, the best for students. I am pleased to say that, as of 24 September, 88% of children were in school, so that is a remarkable feat. In relation to social mobility, that is why we have aimed £350 million, through a national tutoring programme, at the most disadvantaged to help them catch up.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, as my noble friend Lady McDonagh said, the coronavirus lockdown exposed the digital divide in education, with around three-quarters of a million disadvantaged young people missing schoolwork due to a lack of a computer or internet access at home. The Government’s announcement last week of 100,000 more laptops, welcome though it is, in that situation is really quite inadequate. Yet, seemingly oblivious to that point, last week the Government also announced that schools and colleges were to be given a new legal duty to provide online education to students at home on the same basis as in the classroom. Can the Minister say whether sanctions will be brought to bear on schools unable to fully deliver online education, even where that is as a result of the Government failing to provide adequate connectivity to students?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the direction is to provide remote education, and the announcement was a further 250,000 laptops, so 470,000 laptops have been delivered. It was to give certainty and assurance to parents in relation to the provision of remote education; a lot has been provided but sometimes it has not been consistent. There will obviously be supportive conversations to help schools deliver. We have also given thousands of schools the source of the platforms that they need and the training, through demonstrator schools, to enable them to do this, but there will be a supportive conversation if they are not meeting the requirements of the direction.