Schools and Colleges: Qualification Results and Full Opening

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Tuesday 1st September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

At every stage, everyone, whether in Ofqual or the DFE—across the whole education sector—has been looking at how we ensure fairness and the very best for every child in this country. That is what we would all expect to see and that is what we have been doing. Yes, we did have to make changes, but the right thing to do was to make those changes, because fairness for young people is the most important thing for me and all those who work in education.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

May I join my right hon. Friend in commending everybody in schools and all they have done to ensure a full return this week and welcome the clear message that, if there were to be future localised outbreaks, all possible measures would come before restricting attendance in education? Will he outline some of the contingency planning going into that so that, even if there were to be disruption, education would still continue? Will he confirm that although IT and online lessons may be a part of what needs to be considered, it certainly is not all?

[Gavin Williamson]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point about how this is not just about IT; it is about ensuring that youngsters are supported at home in their learning and that can be done through so many means other than just through a laptop. However, we have made the commitment of rolling out and increasing the purchase of laptops by another 150,000 to ensure that, where communities are in local lockdown, schools who have children from the most deprived backgrounds have access to that resource. But that has to be an absolute last course of action we take, because we know that nothing substitutes for the learning a child gets through being in the classroom with their teachers and being inspired by those teachers, who are giving the enthusiasm to learn. That is why this Government will do absolutely everything they can do to ensure that schools remain open at every stage of our response to dealing with the coronavirus pandemic.