Education Recovery

Baroness Bull Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bull (CB)]

My Lords, as the Statement makes clear, the educational impact has been felt most keenly by pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds and in areas hardest hit by Covid, further entrenching the attainment gap between private and state-educated students. I know that the Minister is engaging regularly with the Independent Schools Council about the role its members can play in supporting state sector students to catch up. However, does she agree that, while many excellent partnerships are in place between private schools and their local state school, the urgent need to address the geographical inequality we have heard about will not be resolved through partnerships based on colocation, given that state schools in the vicinity of fee-paying schools are often already among the better resourced? Will her department take the lead in brokering a strategic programme of digitally based partnerships between the independent and state sectors that would target support on those communities most in need and see the charitable status of independent schools put to good use?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

The noble Baroness is indeed correct that getting these partnerships right is important. We often see that the engagement is more strategic when it is between secondary independent schools and their local primary schools, where they can add enormous value. I am about to host a partnerships round table to see where they are successful and where we can spread that best practice. I am keen that we think outside the box. I thank her very much for that suggestion, because this is a time when there is such good will from the independent sector, but we have not managed to plug that into the right place, for various reasons. I will take back the suggestion to the round table.