Educational Settings

Baroness Grender Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. I reiterate that this will be a fair and just situation for all students. It is good that we are aware of factors such as underpredictions; all these matters are being taken into consideration. At the moment, I am not able to give details on the building blocks, but I expect that tomorrow’s guidance will give the noble Baroness the answers she requires.

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a chair of governors at an inner-city primary school. I want to share some of the questions that my head teacher seeks clarification on.

First, only in the last hour have we had a communication from a social worker who is now working from home; they are attached to a vulnerable child but will be unable to see them. They are therefore asking the school to be the lead player in this relationship, rather than them. If the Minister does not have answer on this, it would be very helpful to have clarification soon on who leads in such a relationship. Whether people are working from home, or vulnerable families are self-isolating at the moment, who is the key worker who owns that relationship? If it is the school, then by all means it is the school, but we lack clarity on that at the moment. We already have a specific problem there.

My second question is about those families who are not in the free school meals category but are in-work poor. What are we going to do about them? For instance, would the Minister allow a head teacher discretionary powers to determine which families should get additional support, rather than the statutory voucher version of free school meals? Where is the ability for a head teacher, who knows the community well and can identify the children they know will not have a decent meal during this period, to use their discretion?

[Baroness Berridge]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. I invite all noble Lords to keep these specific questions coming. We want to hear about the issues on the ground. I will confirm to the noble Baroness who the key worker is when the social worker is at home. In relation to head teachers, we are in collaboration with local authorities and expect them to use their discretion as they know their communities best. I will have to come back to her to clarify whether all those costs are covered by the reimbursement of free school meals provision that the Secretary of State announced yesterday.