Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will ban the DeepSeek artificial intelligence model in educational settings because of its built-in censorship.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government has a robust set of security policies in place to oversee how information is handled. We keep these policies under constant review to ensure they are applicable to new technologies.
The government's Generative artificial intelligence (AI) framework outlines that only corporately assured Generative AI tools should be used to process governmental information.
Everyone who works with government has a duty of confidentiality and a responsibility to safeguard any government information or data that they process, access or share, and all government departments are required to meet a range of mandatory security standards.
It is for educational bodies to make their own decisions on how to manage the use of Generative AI in their specific organisational and technology contexts.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of the work of Confucius Institutes on freedom of speech in the higher education sector.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
This government is committed to ensuring our world leading universities remain free from foreign interference.
Any international arrangements English higher education (HE) providers who are registered with the Office for Students (OfS) make, including Confucius Institutes, should be within the law and comply with OfS registration conditions. These include a commitment to the public interest governance principles, which include academic freedom and freedom of speech. The OfS may take regulatory action if HE providers allow foreign governments to interfere in free speech or academic freedom.
The department expects the UK HE sector to be alert to a range of risks when collaborating with international partners and to conduct appropriate due diligence to comply with legislation and consider risks, including potential threats to freedom of speech and academic freedom.
The department’s proposals regarding the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 have reinforced our clear expectations that HE providers must uphold the principles of freedom of speech and academic freedom. The OfS can request information from HE providers registered with them about overseas arrangements, including financial transactions, if they believe registration conditions may have been breached. The measures we are now implementing through the Act will further strengthen opportunities for the OfS, by providing a new focused way for complaints about foreign interference on academic freedom to be escalated.
The department is also carrying out a full and comprehensive audit on the breadth of the UK’s relationship with China. This government, through the ongoing China audit, will take a consistent, long term and strategic approach to managing the UK’s relations with China, rooted in the UK’s and global interests. We will co-operate where we can, compete where we need to and challenge where we must.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 on Confucius Institutes.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
This government is committed to ensuring our world leading universities remain free from foreign interference.
Any international arrangements English higher education (HE) providers who are registered with the Office for Students (OfS) make, including Confucius Institutes, should be within the law and comply with OfS registration conditions. These include a commitment to the public interest governance principles, which include academic freedom and freedom of speech. The OfS may take regulatory action if HE providers allow foreign governments to interfere in free speech or academic freedom.
The department expects the UK HE sector to be alert to a range of risks when collaborating with international partners and to conduct appropriate due diligence to comply with legislation and consider risks, including potential threats to freedom of speech and academic freedom.
The department’s proposals regarding the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 have reinforced our clear expectations that HE providers must uphold the principles of freedom of speech and academic freedom. The OfS can request information from HE providers registered with them about overseas arrangements, including financial transactions, if they believe registration conditions may have been breached. The measures we are now implementing through the Act will further strengthen opportunities for the OfS, by providing a new focused way for complaints about foreign interference on academic freedom to be escalated.
The department is also carrying out a full and comprehensive audit on the breadth of the UK’s relationship with China. This government, through the ongoing China audit, will take a consistent, long term and strategic approach to managing the UK’s relations with China, rooted in the UK’s and global interests. We will co-operate where we can, compete where we need to and challenge where we must.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department has given any funding to Confucius institutes since July 2024.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department has not provided any funding to Confucius Institutes under this government.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding her Department plans to provide for T-Level qualifications in each of the next three financial years.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
This government is committed to driving economic growth and supporting opportunity for all. To help achieve these missions, we announced an additional £300 million of funding in the 2025/26 financial year for further education at the Autumn Budget 2024.
T Level study programmes are funded as part of the wider funding for 16 to 19 education. The department is preparing the operational detail of the 16 to 19 funding rates and formula and the allocations timeline for the 2025/26 academic year. We aim to publish more information as soon as we can and will provide a further update in due course.
Future budgets are subject to the outcomes of the multi-year spending review which will take place later this year.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing the new Neffy treatment for severe allergic reactions to schools when available on the NHS.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Needle-free epinephrine nasal spray is not currently licensed for use in the United Kingdom. Consideration as to whether this could be used in schools would have to be taken once the medicine receives a marketing authorisation.
Since October 2017, the Human Medicines (Amendment) Regulations 2017 have allowed all schools to buy adrenaline auto-injector devices without a prescription for emergency use. The Department of Health and Social Care has published non-statutory guidance to accompany this legislative change, which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/using-emergency-adrenaline-auto-injectors-in-schools.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made a recent assessment of the adequacy of allergy guidance in schools.
Answered by Damian Hinds
It is vital children with allergies are safe in schools.
Statutory guidance makes clear schools should ensure they are aware of pupils with medical conditions, including allergies, and have policies in place to ensure these are well-managed.
The department recently reminded schools of legal duties and highlighted the Schools Allergy Code, which is available online at: http://www.schoolsallergycode.com/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has had recent discussions with (a) the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs and (b) representatives of higher education institutions on the potential impact of such institutions' collaboration with Chinese higher education bodies linked to the People's Liberation Army on national security.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The government takes the risk of foreign interference in our higher education (HE) sector extremely seriously, regardless of its source. The department has made it clear that it will not accept collaborations that compromise national security. The department recognises concerns about interference in the HE sector and regularly assesses the risks facing academia, working with partners across government. The department will continue to take steps to significantly strengthen the UK’s protections from overseas interference in our HE sector, helping to safeguard intellectual property and sensitive research.
The ‘Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023’ will ensure that universities in England have the tools they need to deal with interference with, and threats to, freedom of speech and academic freedom. The Act will enable the Office for Students to monitor the overseas funding of registered HE providers and their constituent institutions and student unions, and to take appropriate action.
The department expects Confucius Institutes at UK universities to operate transparently and within the law, and with a full commitment to the government's values of openness and freedom of expression. The department has taken action to remove any direct or indirect government funding from Confucius Institutes in the UK.
The ‘Integrated Review Refresh’, published in 2023, committed to launching a review of legislative and other measures designed to protect the academic sector, to identify what more the government could or should be doing. This is currently underway and is led by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology. This will include an assessment of the risks to research security as a result of collaboration with international bodies.
The department also works with the sector to improve HE providers’ overall resilience and economic security. The department has encouraged Universities UK to publish a number of guidelines and case studies to enable HE providers to assess risks associated with international collaboration.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many of his Department's grants for the training of senior mental health leads have been allocated to schools in Rutland and Melton constituency.
Answered by Brendan Clarke-Smith
In the 2021/22 financial year, 11 schools and colleges in Rutland and Melton constituency had successfully claimed a senior mental health lead training grant, out of 67 eligible schools and colleges.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if his Department will take steps to ban the use of surveillance cameras made by Hikvision and Dahua in schools in the UK.
Answered by Robin Walker
The department is not able to ban the use of surveillance cameras made by Hikvision and Dahua in schools. Any decision to install CCTV in schools should be taken after careful consideration by the headteacher and governors and after appropriate consultation with pupils and parents. Any CCTV installation must comply with all laws relating to its use.
In January, the government announced the provision of new guidance and support for UK public sector bodies, which will include schools, to exclude suppliers where there is sufficient evidence of human rights violations in any of their supply chains.