Relationship Education in Schools

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Tuesday 1st April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Helen Maguire]

It is vital that we start to address what is going on with social media, as we have been calling for. The social media tech giants have to take on that responsibility.

One in four women and one in six men will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime, and domestic abuse starts young: those aged 16 to 19 are the most likely to experience it. We need to focus on prevention to stop this at the root. Sadly, my Epsom and Ewell constituency has felt the devastating reality of violence against women and girls far too acutely in recent years, and the impact on families, friends, students and entire school communities has been profound.

Let us be clear, however, that violence against women and girls extends beyond my community; it is a national epidemic. In January, the National Audit Office reported that one in 12 women are victims of gender-based violence each year. Despite the increasing political attention, sexual assault rates among women aged 16 to 59 rose from 3.4% in 2009-10 to 4.3% in 2023-24. A key issue is that prevention has been an afterthought rather than a priority. That must change.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Lady for securing this important debate. I serve on the Public Accounts Committee, which looked at the NAO report on violence against women and girls. In West Yorkshire, the police have developed a brilliant prevention programme —the hon. Lady touched on the need for prevention—called Pol-Ed, which goes into schools and teaches young people, both boys and girls, about some of the danger signs around spiking and inappropriate imagery, as well as about consent. Does she agree that it is important to educate children, both on prevention—what the danger signs are and what an unhealthy relationship is—and on what a healthy relationship looks like?

[Helen Maguire]

I thank the hon. Member for that intervention; it is absolutely key to understand both, and to understand what the signs of an unhealthy relationship could be. We need to stop treating violence against women and girls as something that can be addressed only after the fact—after a woman has been assaulted, coerced, or has lost her life. We need to act before it happens, and that starts with education and empowering our young people with the knowledge of what a healthy relationship is.

The recent Netflix series, “Adolescence”, has brought national attention to the dangers facing young people today. It follows a 13-year-old boy accused of murdering a female classmate, sparking difficult but necessary conversations about online misogyny and extremist online communities. Teachers and parents are struggling to keep up with the ever-evolving nature of those threats. Teachers need greater support to tackle these issues in schools. Too often, they are simply ill-equipped and unprepared to teach relationships, sex and health education. Fifty per cent of pupils reported that power imbalances and pornography were not covered in their lessons, and 56% said that what a healthy relationship looks like was not covered either. Surely that should be absolutely key.

Incels, the red pill and the manosphere are relatively new terms, but the attitudes that they promote are not new. It is sexism and male chauvinism repackaged for the digital age, amplified and spread faster than ever before. That is why we must ensure that our education system evolves to counteract this harmful narrative before it takes root in young minds.

The Centre for Social Justice’s latest report, “Lost Boys”, highlights that boys in the UK are struggling in education, more likely to take their own lives, less likely to find stable employment and more susceptible to being drawn into crime. It also notes the increasing appeal of right-wing and regressive ideologies among young men. We must address the core challenges that our young men face and understand how misogyny is evolving, educating parents, teachers and, most importantly, young people themselves—we need to support them.

A whole-school approach is essential in addressing these issues effectively. This approach encourages schools to review their existing procedures and culture, to ensure that they model respectful relationships and gender equality practices across the entire school community. By embedding those values into the fabric of the school environment, we create a culture that actively challenges harmful stereotypes and promotes positive, healthy relationships. Yet last year, we saw the RSHE review become unnecessarily politicised and hijacked by sensationalist headlines and anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, serving only to fuel division. We cannot afford to play politics with the health, safety and wellbeing of our children. The focus of any review of RSHE should be on how we can equip young people with the knowledge and tools that they need to navigate the modern world safely. It should address the urgent need to tackle the rise of online misogyny, the increasing prevalence of violence against women and girls, and the damaging impact of pornography and exploitative media on young people’s perceptions of relationships.

I recently heard from a young constituent, Maddie, who is here today. She was deeply affected by the loss of a teacher in our community and wrote to me expressing her frustration that while the conversation on violence against women and girls often focuses on policing and reporting, prevention is often overlooked. She told me how her cousin, a newly qualified teacher, was asked to deliver RSHE lessons despite feeling completely unprepared to do so. She is right to be frustrated. Young people overwhelmingly support strong education on relationships, with 87% saying that there should be more teaching about relationships, abuse and sexual health. We owe it to them to listen.

RSHE is often an afterthought, added in as an extra and delivered by teachers who are not specifically trained for it. Many are simply given a sheet of paper to read from and do not know how to answer the follow-up questions. That is why I am calling for urgent reforms to RSHE, including: updating the outdated 2019 guidance to reflect the realities of young people’s lives today; extending RSHE up to key stage 5 so that it reaches 16 to 18-year-olds; making RSHE a key component of initial teacher training, ensuring that new teachers are properly equipped to deliver it; and investing in training for school leaders, teachers and governors to understand the online spaces that young people navigate today.

We cannot afford to wait until another young woman becomes a statistic. We must act now to equip the next generation with the knowledge and resilience that they need to build safe, healthy relationships. Teaching children about harmful gender stereotypes, consent, respect and healthy peer relationships from the earliest stages is key to preventing violence against women and girls. I urge the Government to prioritise prevention, invest in education and listen to the voices of our young people who are asking us for change. The time for action is now.

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[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship for the second time this afternoon, Sir Jeremy. I thank the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) for securing this important debate. A couple of weeks ago, at Prime Minister’s questions, my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Anneliese Midgley) noted the significance of “Adolescence”, the series produced by Stephen Graham and starring Christine Tremarco that I think has touched all hon. Members. I strongly support my hon. Friend’s call for screenings in schools. It is crucial to spark conversation, education and urgent change around online male radicalisation, and violence against women and girls. Like, I hope, everyone in this Chamber, I was assured and pleased by the Prime Minister’s response.

I recognise that a real and abhorrent problem is being perpetuated in our society. We are experiencing an epidemic of gender-based violence. We have had a disjointed approach to tackling that epidemic, and that approach has failed. We have failed to protect women and girls from violence, failed to improve outcomes for victims and failed to combat deep-rooted sexism and misogyny across the UK. Instead, I see from my casework an increase in peer-on-peer abuse cases in primary and secondary schools.

Schools should be safe spaces and provide a secure environment for children to learn—places that parents should feel comfortable sending their children. We need to ensure that safeguarding is in place to ensure that protection. Children going to school and experiencing abuse is despicable and inexcusable. We need to urgently look at how we address these issues, and the curriculum must ensure that exposure to social media and online platforms providing violent, misogynistic, racist and homophobic content can be properly countered.

I want to briefly mention the family of Holly Newton—a constituent of mine who was tragically murdered by her former boyfriend—who campaign tirelessly to raise awareness around recognising signs of domestic abuse. I associate myself with the calls from Holly’s mum for lowering the age that teenagers can be considered domestic abuse victims. When I look out my office window on Beaumont Street in Hexham, there is a wonderful installation of ribbons dedicated to victims of domestic abuse, with a single ribbon for Holly of a different colour, to emphasise that she is not counted in those statistics. It is something incredibly moving whenever I look at it.

Since I was elected I have worked with Northumberland domestic abuse services, which provide valuable support to some of the most vulnerable people across England’s most sparsely populated county. I have spoken to many people in this Chamber about the rural issues we face with addressing those unique challenges. The staff and volunteers at NDAS are truly some of the most inspirational people I have met in my short time in this House.

When I go out and visit schools across the constituency, whether in the more urbanised parts of the Tyne valley belt, or in the far-flung north or south of the constituency, one of the things that teachers express to me is a concern that male students are being bombarded with this toxic view of the world. I was born in 1991, and I consider myself to be relatively young. I grew up when Facebook was still a new thing, and for someone to get their first Facebook account they almost had to have a chat with their mum and dad about it to get their sign-off.

I was exposed to what we thought was an online revolution, but it was a drip feed compared to the tsunami that this generation are exposed to. For this generation to have been through the pandemic, and now to go through this, is incredibly concerning and shocking. It makes me realise how much the world has shifted under our feet in the decade and a half since I was in the education system.

[Anna Dixon]

Did my hon. Friend hear Gareth Southgate talking in the Richard Dimbleby lecture about the fact that boys need positive male role models in the real world—people like football coaches, scout leaders, youth club leaders and more male teachers? I wondered if my hon. Friend would agree that having real-world role models would help boys in the face of that tsunami of online abuse?

[Joe Morris]

It will probably not surprise my hon. Friend to know that I have seen everything that Gareth Southgate has said since he left being England manager. My fiancée had to talk me into taking down a mocked-up Time “Man of the Year” Gareth Southgate work of art, shortly after she moved in—I think I am getting dragged slightly off course.

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[The Minister for School Standards (Catherine McKinnell)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you as Chair, Sir Jeremy. I congratulate the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) on securing this debate on relationship education in school, and I thank her for highlighting the vital role that education plays in preventing violence, including violence against women and girls. I know that she has fought long and hard for justice for victims of violence and domestic abuse, and that she recently spoke about these issues in this main Chamber. She stood alongside members of her community after the tragic murder of her constituents Emma and Lettie Pattison, and I take this opportunity to offer my sincere condolences to everyone affected by that.

As a schools Minister and a mum, I know it is vital that we reach children early, before harmful attitudes take root. The classroom must be a place where they learn the values of respect, equality and consent from the very start, and the aim of relationship education is to support all young people to build positive relationships and to keep themselves and others safe. That education must equip them for adult life, and to make a positive contribution to society. It really is a top priority for the Government, and it is central to our mission to make the country’s streets safer.

I want to get straight to the heart of the problem and acknowledge the important role of not only schools, but all services that support young people to thrive. The Government’s opportunity mission is dedicated to setting up every child with the best start in life, helping all children to achieve and thrive in school, and building skills that will allow young people to forge happy, healthy and fulfilling lives. “Opportunity”, “thriving”, “belonging” and “purpose” are not just nice words; they are the foundations of healthy individuals and a healthy society, and they are the best tools we have for helping young people to build healthy relationships and for combating violence and prejudice, including misogyny.

Misogyny is not innate. It is learned behaviour, which is why I agree that we must not talk as if boys and young men are the problem. The rise of misogynistic influencers online is a symptom of a number of wider issues that we must address. As part of this mission, we will equip our young people and children with the skills they need to form strong, positive relationships. We will support them to learn about kindness and respect. We will equip them to navigate a world in which 79% of young people have seen violent pornography before they turn 18, in which social media platforms routinely expose young people to misogynistic and violent content, and in which more and more of our social interactions are online. Our review of the statutory guidance for relationship, sex and health education has young people and their wellbeing at its heart, and we are working as quickly as we can to publish revised guidance as soon as possible this year.

We have spoken to teachers, experts and young people, and we are determined to harness their collective wisdom and change the conversation about relationships. Young people have told us that they want their relationship education to be interactive and participatory and to reflect the real complexities of building positive relationships. Experts have told us that they need support to help young people to develop the skills for healthy communication, empathy and emotional regulation. Telling young people about consent is not enough. Telling them about the law is not enough. Young people deserve better than that. They deserve to have teachers who will role-model honest and kind communication about sex, emotions, empathy and kindness.

Let us not pretend relationships are easy. Children need support, starting in early primary, to develop the skills they need for handling disappointment, for paying attention to the needs and boundaries of others and for understanding their own needs and feelings. In secondary schools, teachers must step up to the challenge of opening difficult conversations with their pupils. We know that many teachers already do that brilliantly.

Young people need to learn that romantic and sexual relationships are about care, kindness and generosity and about communication, listening and connection; they must also learn that pornography is not a true representation of sex. Our revised statutory guidance will ensure that relationships and sex education reflects the reality of young people today. Artificial intelligence, the dominance of social media, the availability of pornography and the rise in online misogyny—we cannot ignore the impacts of these trends on young people. Our revised statutory guidance for RSHE will be clear that teachers must be equipped to open conversations with boys and girls about what positive masculinity and femininity mean today and to help young people to develop positive role models that support their self-esteem and their sense of purpose.

[Anna Dixon]

Parents of LGBTQ+ children are concerned that the 2024 guidance that the previous Government consulted on is providing a hostile environment and preventing conversations about trans and non-binary children from happening. Would the Minister would consider reverting to the 2023 guidance?

[Catherine McKinnell]

We will publish our RSHE guidance as soon as possible, and it will be focused on keeping children’s wellbeing at its heart.

Education can support young people to develop positive attitudes towards people who are different from them and to exercise critical thinking when they encounter situations involving harmful behaviour and harmful sexual violence. These are conversations that we need to have collectively; without stigmatising boys or treating them as the problem, we must recognise that good relationship skills benefit everybody—boys and girls, men and women.

Our intention is that the revised guidance will spark a culture change in the delivery of RSHE and that it will signal our high aspirations for RSHE. We recognise that schools and teachers need support to have these conversations with young people, and we are exploring how best to provide that support in the current tight financial circumstances. That work is a central part of the Government’s ambition to halve violence against women and girls within a decade. We cannot achieve that without a significant culture change around equality and our conceptions of masculinity and femininity. Culture change goes beyond schools, but it can germinate from the ideas that children are exposed to in schools, the ways they learn to relate to those who are different from them and the sense of purpose and belonging that schools can provide.

I cannot emphasise how much I welcome the renewed focus on violence against women and girls following the release of the new Netflix drama “Adolescence”, which many Members mentioned. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) for providing the opportunity to continue that conversation in this debate.

It is not a new issue for any of us. In 2020, Everyone’s Invited started to collect the testimonies of young people who had experienced sexual violence and sexual abuse, and in 2021, Ofsted published its review of sexual abuse in schools and colleges. Everyone’s Invited has shown us that rape culture and misogyny are increasingly appearing in primary schools, and we will publish a new tackling violence against women and girls strategy later this year, which will set out what further actions we will take as well as the progress that we have made so far.

Turning the tide on misogyny will not be a simple task, and we all need to keep talking about it. We need to keep learning, we need to keep challenging and we need to ensure that boys and young men remain part of that conversation.

Mental Health Support: Educational Settings

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bloore]

I think that is the first time the hon. Gentleman has intervened on me, so I feel very honoured. I absolutely agree with him, and I will talk about other affected groups later in my remarks. I thank him for his intervention.

I hope this debate can be about how we support our schools and education professionals, but I also hope that the discussion raises awareness about the challenges facing young people. I know that some people like to hand-wave away any discussion about mental health problems among children and young people. Since the announcement of this debate, I have read previous debates elsewhere, and a few people have whispered in my ear that they do not believe that children are resilient enough these days. Well, I simply do not buy that argument. I know it makes some uncomfortable when young people talk about their mental health challenges, but it can only be positive that awareness and the mainstreaming of mental health conditions have given so many across society the confidence to have honest conversations about how they are feeling and the impact that others’ actions can have on their mental health.

What do the statistics tell us about the state of our young people’s mental health? NHS statistics show us that about one in five children and young people aged eight to 25 had a probable mental disorder in 2023, and that the number of urgent referrals of children and young people to emergency mental health services has tripled since 2019. The uncomfortable truth is that waiting lists for children and adolescent mental health services can be a postcode lottery. For instance, in November last year, the average waiting time for a child to receive a referral for a first appointment in Hereford and Worcestershire was seven weeks, compared with the national average of five weeks. From freedom of information requests, we know that one child waited almost two years for an appointment. Referrals at the Hereford and Worcestershire health and care NHS trust have increased by 118% in the last five years—a trend that is reflected across the country.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this Backbench Business debate. That statistic of one in five young people having a mental health condition must concern us all. I hear from my own constituents in Shipley that they are waiting a long time to get their children seen on the NHS—whether for an attention deficit hyperactivity disorder assessment or to get medication—and during that time the children are unable to participate in school. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is vital that children and young people get access to mental health support and that we get waiting times down so that they can participate properly in school?

[Chris Bloore]

I absolutely agree. This is about parity between mental and physical health. We would move heaven and earth if those children had physical injuries, and we must do more to assess and treat the mental health conditions from which young people are suffering.

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[Chris Bloore]

I thank my hon. Friend for that important contribution to this debate and I pay tribute to the group she mentioned. It is such a critical issue to the future of our young people. I congratulate anyone who comes into this space and makes a positive difference to the outcomes.

Despite the best efforts of many teachers, education settings are yet to have much of that dedicated support. The experience of some young people and their families shows that the support on offer in some schools is not sufficient. The Mental Health Foundation works with whole families to support them in developing their mental health together. Ahead of this debate, it asked two of the participants in one of its programmes in London, Bemi and her daughter Ayo, to share their own experiences. Bemi said that the Government

“say are going to invest in children’s mental health, but this isn’t happening. There is a lot of pressure on children”

these days. She said that

“it is having a toll on children’s mental health, and as a parent, I am also feeling this strain of seeing the constant breakdowns”

and the failure to access support. Her 13-year-old daughter Ayo suggested that schools needed to be much more proactive in asking about children’s mental health:

“Nobody is asking how we feel and never attempting to get to the root cause of things; they only pick up on when you are behaving irrationally but never try to figure out why you feel this way.”

School staff are often the first point of contact when a pupil struggles with their mental health, so they need to feel confident to support their pupils and be able to spot the signs of difficulties. Education Support, a charity supporting the mental health and wellbeing of teaching and education staff, found that 74% of staff often help pupils with personal matters beyond their academic work. Educators are filling in where there are gaps, further highlighting the need for joined-up and embedded services.

[Anna Dixon]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend that schools and teachers are at the forefront of the mental health crisis facing our children. I recently visited a local primary school, Burley and Woodhead Church of England primary, and I pay tribute to the staff there for the excellent work they do to support the young people with their mental health and to make it much easier for them to talk about it. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is vital that schools have adequate resources to provide such support?

[Chris Bloore]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention; I absolutely agree. It is not just young people who are struggling. The additional workload of carrying out wellbeing checks, sometimes in distressing situations, is taking its toll on staff: 78% of all staff are stressed in education settings, rising to 84% among senior leaders. No one can do their best at work if they are mentally depleted, and healthy teachers can better provide high-quality support for their pupils.

What else can we do? We cannot ignore the other factors that have a significant impact on a young person’s wellbeing, which is why we need a whole-of-Government approach. Children and young people might be experiencing poor-quality housing and overcrowding, family members in low-paid and insecure work, or the inability to get a GP or NHS dentist appointment when they need it—all challenges that I am glad this Government are taking action to remedy.

But we can go further. “A Mentally Healthier Nation”, a report unanimously endorsed by mental health charities, calls for the roll-out of anti-bullying programmes across the country. Crucially, the evidence shows that these programmes work best when delivered in a “whole school” way. That is, rather than taking a narrow approach based on discipline, the student and staff body understands what constitutes bullying and its impacts, stands against it and has tactics to prevent it. These programmes have been tested and shown to be effective. They create healthier school environments, prevent mental health problems in the future and lead to economic gains. The costs of picking up the pieces of childhood bullying in later life are enormous, as are the losses to the labour market it can cause, as well as the toll of bullying in the here and now.

Young people can text Shout, a crisis line, for help when they are being bullied. Those who run the service report texters struggling with suicidal thoughts, urges to self-harm, insomnia and feelings of depression and anxiety. Some referred to the anger, shame, fear, confusion, vulnerability, hopelessness and frustration that resulted from being bullied. Others spoke about their lack of focus and poor performance at school as a result of their bullying.

We also need to look at innovative ways that have been developed to address the threats our young people are experiencing. In a world where so-called influencers like Andrew Tate can get their claws into our young men’s minds, we need to look to at work such as the Mental Health Foundation’s “Becoming a Man” programme. Currently operating in Lambeth and Islington, it works with young men aged 12 to 16 who face disadvantage and inequality that put them at greater risk of developing mental health problems. It creates a safe space for young men to come together and discuss issues about their lives, taking into account their lived experiences and the often difficult environments they navigate. It helps them to develop strengths such as integrity, self-determination, positive anger expression and respect for women. Early evaluations of this work are promising, and Government support is needed to grow the evidence base.

Schools have a vital role in understanding young people’s online experiences and how they might impact their mental health. The Girlguiding girls’ attitudes survey found that one in eight young people aged 13 to 18 had seen sexual threats directed at women and girls online, including those of rape. One in eight girls said that they had received sexual threats online from strangers or someone they knew.

Over a year after the passing of the Online Safety Act 2023, suicide, eating disorder, race hate and incel forums remain easily accessible, and it is not clear if and when action might be taken against them. Given Ofcom’s permissive approach, it is likely that school staff will need to understand what sorts of communities pupils are involved in and the impact they are having on them. At a time when 36% of boys say they have had Andrew Tate content shown to them by a friend in school, the onslaught against young girls’ self-confidence, value and worth goes further than being content on a screen; it is putting them at risk.

How do we pull all this together? Preventive mental health initiatives, perhaps overwhelmed by the complexity of the challenge, are scattered and rarely appropriately funded, and they often do not learn from each other. Sometimes, we even use localism as an excuse to neither fund systems nor hold them accountable. We must create a public mental health infrastructure. The Mental Health Foundation describes it as having a clear road map, led by evidence, in which every part of the system knows its own responsibility for reducing mental health problems, and is funded and held accountable for its delivery. That means re-examining the public health grant, which despite a welcome uplift this year is still well below 2015 levels. It means ringfenced funding for schools and the NHS tied to specific outcomes. It also means the roll-out of England-wide mental health support teams and counsellors in each school.

The Children and Young People’s Mental Health Coalition responded to the NHS 10-year plan consultation, calling for the plan to financially support integrated care systems to deliver a comprehensive road map for mental health for 0 to 25-year-olds. The Association of Colleges found that more than 30% of colleges are not involved in their local suicide prevention plan, and 65% stated that they do not have a joint provision with their local NHS trust. It is clear that to keep children well and safe, our NHS services and their commissioning bodies must be fully integrated into mental health support in educational settings. Schools, colleges and universities should be included in local mental health strategies, and data should be shared freely.

I am excited by the Government’s pledge to roll out Young Futures hubs, which aim to bring local services together, deliver support for teenagers at risk of being drawn into crime or facing mental health challenges, and, where appropriate, deliver universal youth provision. These initiatives could represent the start of such an infrastructure and an implementation plan for a national network of these hubs. The Royal College of Psychiatrists states that the hubs have the potential to support some of the most minoritised children who might not be able to access CAMHS or school-based services consistently. I am pleased to see that the NHS remains committed to expanding access to children and young people’s mental health services, and that the operational planning guidance recognises that early intervention improves outcomes for children throughout their lives, reduces long-term pressures on health services, and benefits the economy and wider society.

I urge the Government to seize this moment and see if they can create a true network of mental health support across the country by getting anti-bullying programmes in place, following the evidence and committing to relentlessly drive down levels of poor mental health, and thereby build mentally healthy communities in our schools and beyond. Prevention, early help and treatment can help young people to deliver positive outcomes. Yes, many of the measures I have referred to today and those already announced by the Government will require significant investment, but the cost of inaction and the knock-on impacts on education and children’s social care would far outweigh any initial outlay. Now is the time for action.

Oral Answers to Questions

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Monday 9th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Janet Daby]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his very good question. It is important that kinship carers, as well as the children they are looking after, have the support they need. Through the process of family group decision making, families will come together to have conversations about how best to support children in kinship care. Respite and other related matters will be discussed to ensure that the right provision is in place. This Government are committed to getting it right for children, especially where the previous Government failed.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking to reform skills training.

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

10. What steps she is taking to reform skills training.

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[The Secretary of State for Education (Bridget Phillipson)]

The previous Government left behind a skills system that was fragmented and failing: falling numbers of apprenticeships for young people; adults unable to find the training courses they need; businesses confused; and no plans to equip people with the skills for the economy and opportunities of tomorrow. We are turning the page by establishing Skills England to unify that fragmented landscape, and bringing forward a plan for post-16 education and skills, which will deliver the education and training pathways that our economy, employers and learners need.

[Anna Dixon]

Some 3.8 million people aged 19 and over benefit from skills education in England every year. I pay tribute to all the hard-working professionals employed in further education, including at Shipley college in my constituency. However, businesses in Saltaire tell me that they struggle to recruit people with the digital and tech skills that they need locally. I welcome steps taken by the Government to address skills shortage vacancies. Will the Secretary of State assure me that the benefits of Skills England will be felt by businesses in Shipley?

[Bridget Phillipson]

I join my hon. Friend in paying tribute to the staff at Shipley college. She is right that it is time that we, as a country, took skills much more seriously. We were left with skills shortages in many key areas, including those she identified. We will be giving businesses the flexibility they have been asking for, to unlock growth and drive opportunity through the reformed growth and skills levy.

Home-to-School Transport: Children with SEND

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

It is an honour to speak under your chairmanship, Sir Mark, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jen Craft) for securing this debate.

As a member of the Public Accounts Committee, I have had to scrutinise the National Audit Office’s report on SEND. According to that report, local authorities spent some £1.4 billion on home-to-school transport in 2022-23—an 80% real-terms increase since 2015-16. I am delighted that this Government have brought forward an additional £1 billion in the recent Budget for SEND funding, which will go some way to covering the high costs faced by local authorities, but we know that we need to change the provision.

In Bradford, the council’s travel assistance service spends £54,000 per day on home-to-school taxis alone. Those numbers are eye-watering. Only through prioritising SEND support in our mainstream local schools will we alleviate those financial pressures on local authorities, and I welcome the priority that the Government have given to that. The main point that has been made in this debate is that it would help all the many families in this situation if their children were in local schools. That would not only reduce expensive transport costs, but improve outcomes for disabled children and their families.

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[Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con)]

It is pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Mark. I congratulate the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jen Craft) on securing this important debate and on her very good speech. This subject impacts families up and down the country every day, and I am glad that we have been able to debate it. We have heard about the need for local provision, more specialist schools and a well-funded system, with access to education a common theme.

As Members have acknowledged, under the Education Act 1996, local authorities are under a duty to provide free school transport to eligible children. That was intended to mean that no child is prevented from accessing education due to a lack of transportation, a view that I believe is shared by everybody here today. However, demand is growing, and as the hon. Members for Leigh and Atherton (Jo Platt) and for Southampton Itchen (Darren Paffey) identified, the ballooning numbers really are a problem.

I will run through the numbers, as they set out the problem we face. Nationally, council spending on SEND transport increased from £728 million in 2019 to £1.4 billion in 2024. It is projected to reach £2.2 billion by 2027-28, an increase of 57%. The average cost per SEND pupil nationally for transport has also risen by 32% between 2018 and 2024, and the number of pupils requiring transport is also growing. Councils transported an average of 1,300 pupils in 2023-24, up from 911 in 2018-19, which is an increase of 43%. I know that the Minister will be thinking about the cause of the demand, as well as what we need to do about it. I hope she can provide an update for us today on Government thinking in this area.

As Members will know, the local government financial settlement for next year is looming. I must correct the Lib Dem spokesperson, the hon. Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted (Victoria Collins), on this point. She should look at what happened to local government funding when the Lib Dems were in government and then what happened after they left. It is important to emphasise that the Conservative Government increased the high needs budget by over 60% in 2019-20 to £10.5 billion and put in place a statutory override so that SEND-related deficits did not overwhelm council budgets. With that set to expire in 2026, what is the Secretary of State’s message to local authorities, particularly in rural and county areas, where these pressures are most acute?

[Anna Dixon]

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

[Laura Trott]

I want to make sure that there is time for a wrap-up, and we are quite close to the end of the debate, so I will continue, if the hon. Lady does not mind.

Is the Secretary of State pushing the Chancellor to extend that protection or for deficits to be written off? How are the Government supporting local authorities to explore innovative solutions, such as shared transport services or alternative models, to help to manage rising SEND transport costs more effectively? Can the Minister also update us on what the total cost will be to local government of the national insurance contributions increase announced in the Budget? What is the cost of the national insurance increase specifically for home-to-school transport? Will local authorities be fully compensated for those costs?

The hon. Member for Bicester and Woodstock (Calum Miller) mentioned the need for capital funding. Many Members here will remember the 15 specialist schools pledged in the last Conservative Budget. Can the Minister confirm that those will be going ahead?

I am conscious of the time, so this will be my final word. I pledge that we will be a constructive Opposition. I think everyone here today will be clear that we support local provision, support for parents and more capital funding, and we will support that with the Government if they bring it forward.

[The Minister for School Standards (Catherine McKinnell)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jen Craft) on securing this incredibly important debate—its importance clearly marked by the number of contributions. I know how passionate my hon. Friend is about the need to secure the right support for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Indeed, she and I made a wonderful joint visit in her constituency to a fantastic school that demonstrates what brilliant education delivered inclusively for the whole community can look like. I know she works really hard in her area to make sure that that is available to as many children as possible. That is a vision that the Government very much share with her, because as a Government we are absolutely committed to creating opportunities for all children so that they can achieve and thrive.

I think we all agree that no child should struggle to get to school because of lack of transport. The testimonies that we have heard show the remarkable job that hon. Members have all done in putting forward so powerfully the voices of their constituents in only a minute. To be able to accommodate 30, or just under 30, speakers in a debate of just an hour on this incredibly important issue is quite a feat, so I think everybody should be commended. Their constituents will need to understand the constraints of these debates and that they have done an incredible job in the circumstances. It has come across so strongly how important it is that the transport system supports all young people to access educational opportunity. This is something that I am very keen to look at in the role I now have in the Government. I thank all Members for their contributions today, and you, Sir Mark, for keeping such good order.

I apologise in advance if I am not able to respond to all the individual issues raised. Some of them relate to local authorities and need to be addressed in the correct way to local authorities, where there are the right people to respond to these issues. Others will be for the Department, and we will do our very best to follow up—if we do not, please contact us, because I am really keen and genuinely committed to making sure that all the voices that Members represent here today are heard as we look at how this system is working and how we can fix it.

As has been mentioned, the Department’s home-to-school travel policy is aimed and designed to ensure that no child is prevented from accessing education by a lack of transport, but the challenges in that regard are significant and have been well set out today. There are also particular rights for low-income households to have support in order to exercise choice. Local authorities are obliged to arrange free travel for children of compulsory school age—I appreciate that hon. Members have raised concerns about pre-school-age children and post-16 children, and I will do my very best to address those concerns in the time that we have available—but we know that local authorities are really struggling to fulfil their duty to provide free transport, even for currently eligible children, and the cost of doing so has escalated sharply in recent years.

We thank local authorities for the work they do to try to support children to get to school. We know they provide a valuable service for the children and the families who can access it, particularly if those children have special educational needs and disabilities.

However, there are many reasons for the steep increase in costs in recent years: fuel price inflation and shortages of drivers, passenger assistants and transport operators have all pushed up costs in the market. But we also know that this huge increase is related to challenges within the school system itself, and specifically the way that the school system currently educates children with additional needs.

More children have an educational, health and care plan, and more of those children have to travel long distances to go to a school that can meet their needs. In addition to their journeys being longer, which in itself obviously makes them more expensive, there is a reduction in opportunities for economies of scale. Fewer children are likely to travel on a particular route, which means that more individual journeys need to be made.

Local authorities also try to help young people aged between 16 and 19 to access education or training. That help is extended to the age of 24 if a young person has a special educational need. We recognise that there are similarly significant financial pressures on the transport budgets for post-16 students. The cost and availability of public transport can also be an issue for some young people between 16 and 19 if they are going to travel to sixth form.

[Anna Dixon]

Will the Minister give way?

[Catherine McKinnell]

I would like to, but I also want to respond on many of the issues that have been raised, so I apologise that I am not able to take an intervention.

Many local authorities offer subsidised transport and there is also the 16 to 19 bursary, which is intended to provide support to young people in households with the lowest incomes. However, we know that for far too long far too many children have been let down by a special educational needs system that is not working. We are determined to fix it and to restore parents’ trust that their child will get the support to flourish and have their needs met within the education system.

As hon. Members have said today, we urgently need to improve the inclusivity and expertise of our mainstream schools, so that as many children as possible can go to their local community school with their peers. In and of itself, that would reduce some of those transport pressures. However, we must also ensure that support is available for those children who have more complex needs and need special schools. Fixing the system will also help to fix the home-to-school travel challenges that we are seeing. Ensuring that children can be educated locally will reduce that pressure, so it is a key priority for this Government.

However, there are no quick fixes. This issue is absolutely core to our opportunity mission; addressing special educational needs and disabilities must be part of ensuring that every child has the barriers to opportunity broken down for them. We need to work together with parents, schools, councils and the expert staff who we know go above and beyond every day to support these children, but we recognise the challenges in the system.

Home-to-school travel is obviously an absolutely core part of ensuring that children receive the education that they need and that will help them to thrive. However, we know that the eligibility criteria have been unchanged since the 1940s. Clearly, they are meant to ensure that children can access education and that lack of transport is not a barrier to children accessing education, but I am really keen to understand how they are working in the modern context and how we can change the education system to reduce the pressures and ensure that we have a transport system that is fit for the modern age.

Post-16 eligibility has been raised a number of times today. I have mentioned the bursary fund; more than £166 million of bursary funding has been allocated to institutions for the 2024-25 academic year. It is intended to support young people with travel, books, equipment and clothing, if needed. An additional £20 million is also specifically allocated to support vulnerable students: those in care, care leavers and those supporting themselves or in receipt of social security funds. Those funds should be available, but clearly they are not always getting to the children who need them. In addition, local authorities have discretion to make the transport arrangements that they deem necessary for post-16 students in their area, taking into consideration local circumstances, local budgets and local priorities.

I recognise all the challenges that have been identified today and I urge hon. Members to work with their local authorities to try to improve the situation on a local level, just as we are clearly working to do so on a Government level.

We know that children’s earliest years make the biggest difference to their life, which is why we recognise the importance of early years and early education. We know that that is how to deliver the best outcomes for children. Having access to those appropriate childcare settings in the early years is key to meeting those early years development goals and to breaking down any barriers that may arise later on in life. We know that special educational needs access in particular, and identifying needs at the earliest stage possible, is key; many Members have outlined the challenges that transport can pose to making sure that children have access to those opportunities.

We absolutely want children and young people to receive the support they need to thrive. We want local authorities to be able to provide suitable places for children and young people. We know that the capital funding for high-needs places is a key concern for Members, and we will set out plans on that funding shortly. I am out of time to respond, but if I have not addressed a particular issue, I ask hon. Members please to get in touch.

I thank hon. Friends again for bringing this matter forward, for ensuring that everybody had the opportunity to speak, for being so respectful in this debate, and for allowing everyone to put their constituents’ views forward. I know that this is a challenge that far too many face, and that we have to work together in our determination to fix this system to give every child the best start in life.

SEND Provision

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Dr Shastri-Hurst]

My hon. Friend is entirely right; the delays in EHCP assessments are a hindrance to a child’s access to the national curriculum. We are failing them by not doing those assessments in a timely manner, and we need to improve on that. I agree with her comments entirely.

A constituent has told me that the nearest school with the necessary facilities for her son is 31 miles away. That means that she and her child have had to settle for a school that is not fully equipped for his needs, simply due to geography. My constituency surgery, like those of other Members, is regularly visited by parents with similar cases. Evidently, the current system is not working.

Therefore, I wish to propose three changes that I believe will lead to a significant improvement for schools and families affected by SEND provision. The first is something that everybody in this room is already leading on: raising awareness of SEND. It is heartening to see so many Members engaging with this topic, and it is only by doing that, and by educating ourselves and others, that we can hope to make a change for the better.

The second is identifying children with special educational needs at an early age, which is vital to maximising their life chances. That is why I would like to see better training and resources provided to teachers to help with earlier detection.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Dr Shastri-Hurst]

I will not give way, purely because of the amount I have to get through in the time.

Aside from family members, children spend most of their developing lives with their teachers. It is important that the teaching curriculum is sufficiently flexible to enable children to reach their true potential.

I would also like to make special reference to those military families whose children suffer from special educational needs. Having served in the military myself, I know of several families who have encountered adverse effects as a result. With regular school moves, often between different local authorities, there is an inevitable need to reapply for an EHCP, thereby delaying access to the provision that is so desperately needed.

My final request to the Minister comes as no surprise: to achieve all these improvements, it is important that local authorities receive the funding they need. In particular, I ask that my own council receive its fair share of funding, because Solihull council presently takes in SEND children from Birmingham but receives much less funding per pupil. That matter needs to be rectified.

Those three things—awareness, training and funding—will have a real, tangible impact on young people, their families and their life chances.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Betts. What a mess—young people broken by a broken system. The Children and Families Act promised so much, but without people, money and the rest of the system to back it up, it could never deliver. When the wait for the diagnosis is over, the battle for the EHCP is won and masses of resources have been spent, the demand is still not being met. Staff do their very best, but still people are falling out of the system.

I have spent the past year digging deep, looking at the local, the national and the international to bring best practice to this space. I have looked at the environment, the community and the child. On the environment, I say to the Minister, “Go back to the Department and rip up the behaviourist approach to education. It creates a world where neurodiverse children—those with anxiety or mental illness—and even the timid cannot survive.”

Instead, we should adopt a therapeutic, nurturing approach so that all children can thrive. In York, where schools have done so, all gain from recognising the need for every child to be safe, valued and included. It is a happy place where a child will strive for excellence and the whole child will be able to navigate their way through this world, rather than an obstacle course of micro-traumas, stress and anxiety. Let us not build bigger and bigger schools, but create more therapeutic and intimate spaces that belong to the children and where they can thrive. We should bring children out of home schooling, out of their bedrooms, off the streets and back into the classroom. School must be safe for all those children.

We also need to recognise, as the Government do, the failed nature of the curriculum. Let us build space for our brains and our bodies. Are we really shocked that young people are failing when only half of them is engaged? We have cut out arts, music, sports, nature, dance, play, exploration, wonder and fun. Yet all children, especially those with SEND, benefit from that balance.

When I visited Sweden, I went into schools to hear about what they were doing. They brought people into the heart of the school, not prescribing from an EHCP but taking a whole-child and a whole-school approach, using the skills of psychologists, teachers, occupational therapists, physios and speech therapists for all children. Let us recognise that school community and ensure that we value its members. Our teaching assistants do so much of the work, yet their pay is so poor—that must be addressed.

[Anna Dixon]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Rachael Maskell]

I am going to continue.

As for parents, I have seen them pushed away and gaslit, when they should instead be integrated into the heart of the school, as they are in Sweden, leading on what their child needs. When it comes to the children themselves, let us review the purpose of education: preparing children for the world today, not breaking and testing them. Children with SEND struggle in that environment just to satisfy the need for data for Governments and to meet different goals. We need every child to flourish, and that is why we need to think again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Fred Thomas (Plymouth Moor View) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon) for securing this important debate. We have heard from many Members how dire the situation is in their constituencies, but can we for a second celebrate the incredible staff who already put so much effort and passion into the provision they arrange for children? My first visit as an MP was to Mill Ford school in Ernesettle in Plymouth, which supports children and young adults with complex needs. I have to pay tribute to the incredible staff there and congratulate Mill Ford school on recently being rated as “outstanding” by Ofsted.

I am pleased that we are moving away from one-word Ofsted ratings, because it is impossible to capture what Mill Ford does for people in just one word. While visiting Mill Ford, we stopped by their daily singalong in the hall. Pupils from all age groups were having an incredible time, singing in various tunes and volumes and quite literally jumping for joy. It was a fantastic scene. Despite this, huge challenges remain. For example, at that school the corridors are so narrow that two wheelchairs cannot be wheeled past each other.

The situation in Plymouth is similar to that in many hon. Members’ constituencies, but some statistics we have already heard do not match quite how dire it is. In Plymouth, 18.5% of pupils have a SEND need—well above the national figure of 13%. The number of children and young people with an EHCP in Plymouth has increased since 2010 by 125%—more than doubled. We know that there is no quick fix for the crisis in SEND. Special educational needs are complex and wide-ranging, so they require complex and wide-ranging solutions. We need to listen carefully to education professionals, support staff and especially those with lived experience of SEND as we move forward. I am proud that I ran for Parliament on a manifesto that pledged to take a community-wide approach to special educational needs, improving inclusivity in mainstream schools as well as ensuring that special schools are fit for purpose.

[Anna Dixon]

As in my hon. Friend’s constituency, in Shipley the number of pupils with SEND has increased again this year. It is putting huge pressure on our teachers and teaching assistants in mainstream schools. Does he agree that the cuts to school funding under the previous Government have contributed to the problem, and that further steps need to be taken to ensure appropriate training for all our school staff, particularly those in mainstream schools?

[Fred Thomas]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend’s point about the funding cuts. I was going to respond to a point made by the right hon. Member for Tatton (Esther McVey), but I removed it from my contribution due to the time constraints. She asked earlier whether the Government had conducted feasibility studies on the removal of VAT exemptions from private schools. I would respond by asking whether the previous Government, which we had since 2010, conducted feasibility studies on SEND when they made deep cuts to education.

I started by speaking about the fantastic Mill Ford special school in Plymouth Moor View. Expanding capacity at Mill Ford is central to Plymouth city council’s plan to address the SEND crisis, but it is much harder to access funding to replace or rebuild a school than it is to build new schools. Will the Minister commit to working with me to help expand capacity at Plymouth Moor View’s special schools?