Educational Settings: Reopening

Debate between Derek Twigg and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

My hon. Friend is right to raise these issues, as he always does. We continually talk to stakeholders and advisory groups, and we discuss all options for how to open schools when the scientific advice says that it is safe to do so.

[Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab) [V]]

I would like to put on record my thanks to the teachers and support staff in schools for the tremendous job they are doing at the moment. Some teachers who have covid-19 are absent for not just a few days but many weeks. Will the Minister ensure that when schools reopen, resources will be available to cover long-term staff absence, to ensure that children do not fall further behind?

[Nick Gibb]

The hon. Gentleman is right to pay tribute to the teachers and staff in our schools. Sunday was International Education Day, and we should be paying tribute to staff in our schools, further education colleges, universities and early years settings. We should also pay tribute to parents during this time and to the resilience of children and staff. We monitor staff absence rates in our schools, and the regional schools commissioners’ offices will offer help and support to schools that are suffering excessive or high rates of staff absence due to covid.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Derek Twigg and Nick Gibb

Monday 19th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend is right. Authorities around the country, particularly those in the f40 group, have been underfunded for many years. As I said to the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson), we were the first Government to grasp the nettle and introduce a much fairer system to replace those historic, anachronistic and unfair national funding formulas.

[Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)]

Following last week’s announcement of the proposed funding formula, may I ask the Minister how it will help us to recruit and retain teachers, given that all but one of the secondary schools in my constituency will lose money as a result of the formula?

Careers Service (Young People)

Debate between Derek Twigg and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 13th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

As I just mentioned, the £200 million to which the right hon. Gentleman is referring would pay for two days’ interest on the debt left by his Government. In addition, we have put extra funding into tackling post-16 deprivation and providing help for those who need additional support: we increased that by a third, to £750 million. That is how those sums have been prioritised by this Government.

[Derek Twigg]

Following on from that point, will the Minister tell us what money is actually being given to schools to provide careers advice? I would particularly like to know the answer in respect of Halton, which is one of the most deprived areas. Does how good the careers advice is just depend on what money is in school budgets now? Is this a lottery?

[Mr Gibb]

Despite the appalling state of the public finances that we inherited, we have managed to ensure that school funding is maintained, in cash terms, at a consistent level over the next four years. That is despite the fact that we inherited a budget deficit of £156 billion. We have also allocated a significant sum to the pupil premium, which is worth at least £430 per pupil qualifying for free school meals this year, and the figure will rise to £2.5 billion by 2014-15. These are the extra sums that we are putting into schools, at a time when our public finances are in a dire state.

[Derek Twigg]

Let us be clear about this, because the Minister is trying to avoid the question and we should not forget that we are talking about £200 million. What extra is specifically being given to schools for careers advice?

[Mr Gibb]

This Government are not involved in ring-fenced budgets for schools. We have de-ring-fenced a large number of budgets into the dedicated schools grant, so that head teachers and teachers can decide how that money is allocated within the priorities of their school. That is the approach that this Government are taking to public spending in the schools sector.