Covid-19 Update

Ed Davey Excerpts

Wednesday 5th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point and the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation continues to keep fourth jabs under continuous review.

[Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

Parents, teachers and pupils are incredibly nervous that due to the unprecedented spike in covid numbers children might once again face hundreds of thousands of hours of lost learning. The reality is that due to staff shortages many of our schools are at breaking point, and an entire generation has already lost years of learning they might never get back. So will the Prime Minister do the right thing and properly fund a catch-up programme, starting by providing every parent with a £30 catch-up voucher for every day their child misses school? This Government are not only letting down millions of children, but, by short-changing them, are damaging the future of our country.

[The Prime Minister]

That is why it is so important to keep schools open and why it was so important to take the balanced and proportionate approach that we have. It is very important to ensure that schools are safe and I thank parents and teachers for everything that they are doing, but the right hon. Gentleman is wrong in what he says about catch-up. We are investing massively in catch-up. We have a £5 billion programme of investment in catch-up. We are innovating the whole time, particularly with investment in one-to-one tuition, or one-to-two-or-three tuition, for kids who need it. That is a huge development, which is of massive benefit to pupils up and down the country.