Education: Return in January

Carol Monaghan Excerpts

Wednesday 30th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

I join my right hon. Friend in thanking the teachers and support staff who have done so much in his constituency of Harlow to keep children learning. The importance of school is why we continue to proceed with opening primary schools on 4 January. The importance of education is why we are rolling out the mass testing regime, to ensure that secondary school students across the majority of the country will be able to return to school. We know how important this is. Children need to be in school, which is why we will always do everything we can to resist knee-jerk reactions to close schools or colleges. We recognise how important it is for children’s life chances for them to be in schools.

My right hon. Friend raises the important issue of the impact of lost learning, and that is why we commissioned work with the Education Policy Institute and Renaissance Learning to do a close study on lost learning. We will be looking closely at the impact of that, especially among exam year cohorts, as well as on the wider school population, to ensure that that work is there to inform us in any future policy decisions.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP) [V]]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. I join others in recognising the work our teachers and school staff are carrying out in very challenging circumstances, and I hope they are managing to get some well-deserved rest over the Christmas break.

This new covid strain means that it is difficult to make concrete decisions and commitments for the future, but the problem is that Secretary of State is once again making last-minute decisions that leave schools with absolutely no time to plan. Will he therefore outline how his actions align with the advice received from SAGE?

Ongoing testing for school staff is welcome, but anyone who has spent any time in primary or secondary schools will know that these are busy, often tightly packed environments. According to Professor Neil Ferguson, this new strain hints at a higher propensity to infect children. We are therefore asking teachers, some with underlying health conditions, to work in a potentially risky environment. NHS and frontline care staff must of course be prioritised for the vaccine, but will the Secretary of State ensure that, following those groups, teachers are a priority for getting the vaccine?

Let me finish by saying that there is a massive difference between posting activities online and actual live online teaching and learning, with realtime interactions between a teacher and their class. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure that schools have the capacity and bandwidth to deliver proper online learning? Will he accept that he may need to amend his current strategy if the need arises?

[Gavin Williamson]

I thank the hon. Lady for her comments and for recognising that we are in a rapidly changing situation. We sometimes have to adapt our responses as a result of the changing coronavirus, and I know that the Scottish Government have faced similar challenges to the UK Government.

We recognise that this new strain means that we have to take a different approach. That is why we are saying that the mass testing regime we are rolling out in our secondary schools has to move from being optional and an offer to schools to being something we require schools to do. Schools are a unique environment, and it is important that we put as many protections in place as we can.

Like the hon. Lady, I want to see all teachers right up there in the best possible position to be vaccinated, so that they can carry on the incredibly important work of keeping children in education. I am incredibly pleased that we are in a position to ensure that primary schools are opening on 4 January and that secondary schools will be welcoming back children in the exam cohorts on 11 January and all other pupils on 18 January.