Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the role of play in supporting the (a) development and (b) learning of (i) children with special educational needs and disabilities and (ii) other children; and what steps her Department is taking to ensure that reductions in school break times do not limit opportunities for play during the school day.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises that play is critical to children’s wellbeing, learning and development. This is reflected in the early years foundation stage statutory framework, which supports early years practitioners to design a rich curriculum that includes regular opportunities for play-based learning.
Governing bodies (for maintained schools) and academy trusts (for academies) are responsible for deciding when sessions should begin and end on each school day. They are also responsible for deciding the length of each lesson and the timings for the morning session, the midday break and the afternoon session. The department does not collect data on the number of breaks, including lunch time, that schools schedule into their daily and weekly timetable.
Government guidance sets out the expectation that a school week is a minimum of 32.5 hours, inclusive of breaks. However, the department does not collect data on the amount of time provided.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department collects data on the amount of (a) break and (b) lunch time provided in schools; and what assessment she has made of the potential impact of reduced break times on (i) disabled children and (ii) pupils with special educational needs.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises that play is critical to children’s wellbeing, learning and development. This is reflected in the early years foundation stage statutory framework, which supports early years practitioners to design a rich curriculum that includes regular opportunities for play-based learning.
Governing bodies (for maintained schools) and academy trusts (for academies) are responsible for deciding when sessions should begin and end on each school day. They are also responsible for deciding the length of each lesson and the timings for the morning session, the midday break and the afternoon session. The department does not collect data on the number of breaks, including lunch time, that schools schedule into their daily and weekly timetable.
Government guidance sets out the expectation that a school week is a minimum of 32.5 hours, inclusive of breaks. However, the department does not collect data on the amount of time provided.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of reduced school (a) break and (b) lunch times on the (i) wellbeing and (ii) social inclusion of (A) disabled pupils and (B) pupils with special educational needs.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises that play is critical to children’s wellbeing, learning and development. This is reflected in the early years foundation stage statutory framework, which supports early years practitioners to design a rich curriculum that includes regular opportunities for play-based learning.
Governing bodies (for maintained schools) and academy trusts (for academies) are responsible for deciding when sessions should begin and end on each school day. They are also responsible for deciding the length of each lesson and the timings for the morning session, the midday break and the afternoon session. The department does not collect data on the number of breaks, including lunch time, that schools schedule into their daily and weekly timetable.
Government guidance sets out the expectation that a school week is a minimum of 32.5 hours, inclusive of breaks. However, the department does not collect data on the amount of time provided.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what guidance her Department provides to schools on ensuring that reductions in (a) break and (b) lunch times do not disproportionately impact (i) disabled pupils and (ii) pupils with special educational needs.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises that play is critical to children’s wellbeing, learning and development. This is reflected in the early years foundation stage statutory framework, which supports early years practitioners to design a rich curriculum that includes regular opportunities for play-based learning.
Governing bodies (for maintained schools) and academy trusts (for academies) are responsible for deciding when sessions should begin and end on each school day. They are also responsible for deciding the length of each lesson and the timings for the morning session, the midday break and the afternoon session. The department does not collect data on the number of breaks, including lunch time, that schools schedule into their daily and weekly timetable.
Government guidance sets out the expectation that a school week is a minimum of 32.5 hours, inclusive of breaks. However, the department does not collect data on the amount of time provided.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
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 quality of school lunchtime provision on the wellbeing of children.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The department is committed to raising the healthiest generation ever. Giving children access to a nutritious meal during the school day leads to higher attainment, improved behaviour and better outcomes. We are extending free school meals to all children from households in receipt of Universal Credit from September 2026, meaning over 500,000 additional children will receive a free and nutritious lunchtime meal.
School governors and trustees have a responsibility to ensure compliance with the School Food Standards. To support governors, the department, along with the National Governance Association, launched an online training course on school food for governors and trustees.
To ensure quality and nutrition in meals for the future, the department is acting quickly with experts across the sector to revise the School Food Standards, so every school is supported with the latest nutrition guidance.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress she has made on rolling out defibrillators to state-funded schools in England.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department’s defibrillator programme was the largest rollout of defibrillators across England to date. The programme provided over 20,000 defibrillators to almost 18,000 schools, ensuring that all state-funded schools in England have access to a device.
The department is working with the British Heart Foundation to understand the impact the programme is having. Since our rollout, the number of school defibrillators registered on the national database, The Circuit, has risen by 252%, with 66% of all schools in England now having at least one device registered. Our evaluation shows that defibrillators we provided have been available for use and deployed in over 12,000 emergency situations, where there has been a suspected cardiac arrest.
The department continues to work with the British Heart Foundation to evaluate and understand the impact of our programme and support schools in registering their defibrillators on The Circuit.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential implications for its policies of the finding on p.22 of the report by the Food Standards Agency entitled School Food Standards Compliance Pilot: Discovery Research, published in November 2023, on the awareness by schools of their responsibilities in relation to school food standards.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
It is important that children eat nutritious food at school and the department understands the value of compliance with the school food standards. We continue to work with the Food Standards Agency (FSA) following the findings of the compliance pilot run by the department and the FSA during the 2022/23 academic year.
School governors and trustees have a responsibility to ensure compliance with the school food standards and should work with the headteacher and the senior leadership team to ensure the school is meeting its obligations.
To support governors, in November 2024 the department, along with the National Governance Association, launched an online training course on school food for governors and trustees. This training is designed to improve understanding of the school food standards and give governing boards confidence to hold their school leaders to account on their whole school approach to food.
Additionally, to ensure quality and nutrition in meals for the future, the department is acting quickly with experts across the sector to revise the school food standards, so every school is supported with the latest nutrition guidance. We will consider approaches to compliance to ensure children receive the nutritious meals they need.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when the Natural History GCSE will be made available to students.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
I refer my hon. Friend, the Member for North West Leicestershire to the answer of 21 March 2025 to Question 36968.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to implement the recommendations of Reports to Prevent Future Deaths on (a) allergy (i) management and (ii) emergency response in schools and (b) other allergy policies.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell
Governing bodies must ensure that the arrangements they put in place are sufficient to meet their statutory responsibilities and that policies, plans, procedures and systems are properly and effectively implemented. This includes the duty under Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 to make arrangements for supporting pupils with medical conditions and the duties under the Equality Act 2010.
The department has included reminders to schools of these duties in its regular schools’ email bulletin. The department has also recently alerted schools to external resources from trusted allergy organisations. This includes the Schools Allergy Code, developed by The Allergy Team, Independent Schools’ Bursars Association and the Benedict Blythe Foundation, and Allergy School created by the Natasha Allergy Research Foundation.
Asked by: Amanda Hack (Labour - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of formally extending the scope of the Holiday Activities and Food Programme to include all children in households with below-average resources.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The holiday activities and food (HAF) programme supports disadvantaged children and their families with enriching activities, providing them with healthy food, helping them to learn new things, improving socialisation and benefiting their health and wellbeing during school holidays.
The HAF programme, although aimed at those children in receipt of benefits related free school meals (FSM) is not exclusively for them. As set out in the HAF guidance, while the majority of funding that local authorities receive should be used for holiday club places for children in receipt of FSM, local authorities have discretion to use up to 15% of their funding to provide free or subsidised holiday club places for children who are not in receipt of benefits-related FSM, but who the local authority believe could benefit from HAF provision.