Education

Alex Burghart Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2021 Ministerial Corrections

The following are extracts from the urgent question on 23 September 2021.

[Alex Burghart]

The challenges that we currently face are obviously substantial, but great improvements have been made. At the end of the previous term, attendance in school was at 75%; as of Thursday last week, attendance was at 91.9%, with 99.9% of all schools open…The hon. Lady asked about face masks; at some stages in the pandemic we have had face masks in corridors, strict social distancing and bubbles, but the evidence now says that we can move away from that.

[Official Report, 23 September 2021, Vol. 701, c. 427.]

Letter of correction from the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart):

Errors have been identified in my response to the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green).

The correct information should have been:

[Alex Burghart]

The challenges that we currently face are obviously substantial, but great improvements have been made. At the end of the previous term, attendance in school was at 76.7%; as of Thursday last week, attendance was at 91.9%, with 99.9% of all schools open…The hon. Lady asked about face masks; at some stages in the pandemic we have had face coverings in corridors, social distancing and bubbles, but the evidence now says that we can move away from that.

[Dr Spencer]

It is great to see my hon. Friend in his place at the Dispatch Box. I welcome the work this Government have done to make it a priority to keep schools open for face-to-face learning. In contrast, Labour equivocated over whether they were even safe to reopen. Does he agree that if Labour were in power, our schools would probably be closed for face-to-face learning and our children left behind?.

[Alex Burghart]

I thank my hon. Friend for his thoughtful question. We have been very clear throughout that we wanted to get schools open as soon as it was safe to do so. We have done that. We have managed to increase attendance from 75% at the end of last term to 91.1% at the start of this term.

[Official Report, 23 September 2021, Vol. 701, c. 431.]

Letter of correction from the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart):

An error has been identified in my response to my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer).

The correct information should have been:

[Alex Burghart]

I thank my hon. Friend for his thoughtful question. We have been very clear throughout that we wanted to get schools open as soon as it was safe to do so. We have done that. We have managed to increase attendance from 76.7% at the end of last term to 91.1% at the start of this term.

[Dame Diana Johnson]

Hull is one of the most disadvantaged parts of the country, and there will be no levelling up without catching up. Will the Minister commit to the necessary catching-up budget proposed by his adviser, Sir Kevan Collins?

[Alex Burghart]

As I have said a number of times, we have put in £3 billion, with £1.5 billion on tutoring for 6 million tutoring programmes—100 million hours of tutoring—and an additional 2 million tutoring programmes in 16 to 19 education.

Letter of correction from the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart):

An error has been identified in my response to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson).

The correct response should have been:

[Alex Burghart]

As I have said a number of times, we have put in £3 billion, with £1.5 billion on tutoring for 6 million tutoring courses—100 million hours of tutoring—and an additional 2 million tutoring courses in 16 to 19 education.