Young People: Sporting Activities

Baroness Gohir Excerpts

Tuesday 24th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Lord makes an important point: activity is important, but not every young person will want to do the same sport. Although, as we can see with the Lionesses, football has arguably become much more popular for girls, the focus has quite often been on traditional sports. This has meant that girls, for example, have not necessarily found the things that they would like to do to keep active. I can absolutely commit that it will be part of the Government’s intention, both through this partnership and more broadly, to ensure that there is a range of opportunities to enable everybody to find sport and activity that they enjoy, and to keep healthy.

[Baroness Gohir (CB)]

My Lords, can the Minister say what specific action the Government are taking to close the ethnicity gap with children in sport? Even within different ethnic groups, children access different types of sports. Addressing this gap will help with integration and community cohesion.

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Baroness makes a very important point. It partly relates to the extent to which we can provide a whole range of opportunities for people to engage in activity, and the way we use the new partnership arrangements locally to see what sort of provision is available and how we can link schools more easily to that local provision, which may well come from and be promoted by different parts of the community. This must be an approach that ensures everybody has the opportunity to benefit from the obvious advantages that come from being more active and taking part in sport.

Home School Education Registration and Support Bill [HL]

Baroness Gohir Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 15th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Gohir (CB)]

My Lords, I commend the noble Lord, Lord Storey, for proposing this Bill. I support mandatory home education registration—as well as the registration of those not in education, as highlighted by the noble Lords, Lord Watson and Lord Lucas—but this must be accompanied by mandatory checks to provide assurances that children are safe and receiving a quality education.

I understand that there is a legal obligation on parents to ensure that their child receives efficient full-time education suitable to their age and ability, including in the right format for those with special educational needs. Local authorities have a legal duty to establish that every child in their area is receiving a suitable education. However, how effectively is this happening? Do the Government have any evidence of how many inquiries local authorities have made and followed up? While I respect parental wishes on how to educate their children, and many parents will be providing a stimulating and safe environment and acting in the best interests of their children, this is not always the case, leading to lifelong barriers and affecting life chances.

When children are not in education and are home-schooled without oversight, they become invisible and vulnerable to various risks, such as domestic abuse, sexual abuse, female genital mutilation, poor mental health, forced marriage and so on. I asked the previous Education Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, about this. She provided a detailed written response back in February 2024. I will use some of the data in that letter to make some of my points.

The noble Baroness provided elective home education data which showed that the numbers in 2016 were 37,500. Since then, they have been increasing every year. By 2023, they had rocketed to 126,100 and may well be higher, as has been highlighted. That is a rise of 236%, if I have got my maths right. The proportion increases as children grow older; it is one-third in year groups 10 and 11—14 and 15 year-olds. Children from minority-ethnic backgrounds are overrepresented: for 26% the ethnicity was unknown, 51% were white British and 23% were from minority-ethnic backgrounds. This 23% is an overrepresentation since the minority-ethnic population is 18%. However, if you consider the unknown data, assuming that it follows a similar trend, the proportion of minority-ethnic children in elective home education is more likely to be 30%. I therefore welcome the recording of protected characteristics in the Bill. We cannot ignore these trends of rising numbers, older children and high numbers of minority-ethnic children. Are the Government concerned about these trends? They should be.

I also inquired into the reasons for home education in my letter. The noble Baroness, Lady Barran, shared that for 35% of the children the reason was unknown or the parents did not give one. Will the Government tackle the drivers of elective home education? Perhaps parents have no choice because schools are not meeting the needs of children and even pressuring parents to take their children out of school. Will the Government support this Bill or incorporate its recommendations into their future children’s well-being Bill?

Education: Early Years Attainment Gap

Baroness Gohir Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Lord is right that the quality of staff is fundamental, but so is the number of staff. We have a big challenge to ensure that we have sufficient staff in place by next September to deliver the outlined entitlement. We are working to provide additional training for staff. I take his point about the training and ongoing support that we need to provide for the staff who do such an important job at the beginning of children’s lives.

[Baroness Gohir (CB)]

My Lords, the largest number of nursery closures in recent years has been in the poorest parts of the country, particularly in areas with large minority-ethnic populations. Will the new and expanded nurseries that the Government are allocating be proportionately allocated in those hardest-hit areas?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Baroness is right that those are the areas where need is very great. In our recent announcement of £15 million-worth of investment in the first 300 nurseries based in schools, we will be encouraging applications from those where there is a particular need. We will be using evidence of those applications to ensure that we are able to improve the provision in the areas that need it most.