Schools: Online Teaching

Baroness Fall Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, all the large structural issues, such as extending the school day, extending the school year and repeating a year, are matters that need to be considered. As I have outlined, if those four children are all eligible for free school meals—as 1.3 million are—a school is able to allocate four devices. It is a matter for schools and FE colleges, and we trust them to be able to identify the right students who need access to devices.

[Baroness Fall (Con) [V]]

My Lords, the impact of school closures has hit a generation of children and has hit those who cannot access online resources hardest of all. We should have identified this problem right back in the first lockdown. But, looking ahead, are Ministers doing all they can to make sure that the surge of support from charities and businesses to offer laptops is going forward to children and not being hindered by red tape? Secondly, in recognising that digital poverty is unfortunately likely to stay with us for some time, can I ask that they consider that those children without access to online teaching should be eligible for face-to-face learning in case of a future lockdown?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, the students the noble Baroness outlines would be eligible to be classified as vulnerable children. We applaud the local and national campaigns, particularly those around refurbishing laptops. Obviously, the Government wanted to purchase new devices and did so in a very disrupted supply chain last year, and we are a huge customer for that sector. We applaud the Daily Mail campaign whereby businesses are giving refurbished laptops. Indeed, they are using the same distribution portal as our scheme so that schools can get access to those as well, which I hope deals with the red tape outlined by the noble Baroness.