Student Loans
Georgia Gould Excerpts(5 days, 14 hours ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I beg to move
an amendment, to leave out from “House” to the end of the Question and add:
“recognises that the Government inherited the current broken student loans system, including Plan 2, which was devised by previous administrations; welcomes the Government’s commitment to make the system fairer and financially sustainable; further welcomes the support the Government is providing to young people through the Youth Guarantee; supports the Government’s target for two thirds of young people to achieve higher level skills by the age of 25, including reversing the decline in apprenticeships under the previous Government; and further supports the reintroduction of maintenance grants, which had been scrapped under the previous Government, to help ensure that background is not a barrier to opportunity for young people.”
I welcome the Opposition’s focus today on opportunities for young people, student loans and apprenticeships. I am pleased that the House has the opportunity to scrutinise this broken system devised by the Conservatives, who tripled tuition fees, introduced plan 2 loans and presided over a decade that saw a 40% drop in young people starting apprenticeships.
David Reed
We have heard the argument repeatedly that it was the Conservatives and the coalition Government that brought in these changes. I am someone with a plan 2 loan. I was in the generation that Blair told to go to university, and at no point did anyone in that Blair Government talk about how the jobs market would take on so many graduates or, most importantly, who would pay for those people to go to university. Does the Minister agree that the 50% of school leavers who went to university should be paid for by the 50% that did not?
Georgia Gould
I think it is really relevant to make sure that the public know who created this system—and not only created it, but froze those loans 10 times over the last 12 years—[Interruption.] I know that it is inconvenient for the Conservatives to be reminded of these truths, but we have lived through them.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
I must be suffering from some sort of political amnesia, because I was absolutely convinced that it was a Labour Government that introduced tuition fees in the first place. Maybe the Minister will correct me.
Georgia Gould
I was talking about plan 2—[Interruption.] The debate today that has been called by the Opposition is about plan 2 loans—a system that was created in 2012 by the Conservatives.
Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingley) (Lab/Co-op)
I have read the motion and the amendment. Students today are on a new loan—the plan 5 loan—and Conservative Members have completely forgotten current students. The Government amendment talks about the system in the round. Can my hon. Friend reassure me that the Government are going to look at the system in the round and not just at plan 2, so that all students and graduates have a fairer system?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for his advocacy on this issue. I know that he represents a number of students, and this is something that he has raised continually. We have heard the concerns about student finance, and it is something that we will be looking at. I am really happy to take that conversation forward.
Dr Murrison
My constituents are not interested in the past, particularly the distant past; they are interested in the future. They have heard what the Conservatives would do, but we have yet to hear from the Government of the day what they will do. Will the Minister enlighten us?
Georgia Gould
I think that the past is really relevant. I was a council leader during the last Government and I saw the cuts to local youth services, to early years support and to all our public services. We lived through that time when young people really were at the back of the queue, and we are rebuilding from that through investment in tackling child poverty, in youth services and in schools, and through the historic investment in special educational needs and disabilities provision. Those choices that we are making really matter, and are relevant to the discussion we are having.
In terms of what we are actually doing, we are increasing the threshold to £29,385 this year, which will help to support people this year after the threshold was frozen for four years by the previous Government.
Helena Dollimore
The Opposition talk about amnesia. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is they who have collective amnesia about the system they created? My generation certainly do not have amnesia about the debt repayments we made when Liz Truss crashed the economy and sent interest rates soaring—that is what the Conservatives presided over. We do not have collective amnesia about them abolishing maintenance grants for the lowest income students. It is this Government who are acting for my generation with the Renters’ Rights Act 2025—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
Order. I just remind Members that interventions need to be shorter than that.
Georgia Gould
I would be delighted to take the right hon. Member’s incredibly short intervention.
Sir Desmond Swayne
The Minister’s hon. Friend, the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel), asked a perfectly reasonable question about looking at the thing in the round, and her answer was that she would take the conversation forward. I think we need more than that.
Georgia Gould
We have acknowledged the issues and the unfairness in the system. The Prime Minister, the Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Education have acknowledged that, and we have said that we will look at it.
I will make progress. Under the last Government, the number of young people not in education, employment or training rose by 250,000. Today, nearly 1 million young people are not in education, employment or training. That is the legacy of the Conservatives, but this Government are turning that around. We are renewing the post-16 education landscape and celebrating routes into vocational education not by restricting university, but by opening up new high-quality vocational routes. We are introducing new V-levels and new foundation apprenticeships and supporting students to get excellent university education across the country.
The Opposition talk a lot about higher education and suggest that too many young people go to university. It is interesting that they can never tell us who should no longer go or which courses they should not study.
Georgia Gould
Did the right hon. Member tell me who should not go to university? I can tell the Conservatives that when they close the drawbridge, it is pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds who will end up not at university. That is the consequence. We are opening up access to apprenticeships and vocational routes not by closing down university routes, but by opening up other routes.
Dr Luke Evans
The Opposition have made the argument that 30% of courses leave people with a negative bank balance. That is the problem that we are trying to solve. We are not denigrating anyone for wanting to choose; this is about ensuring that the quality of the course means that people have a positive life outcome, not a negative one. Does the Minister agree with that principle?
Georgia Gould
We are absolutely committed to driving up the quality of all university courses, and we are acting on that.
Conservative Members have attacked arts and creative courses as the areas where they would like to see a reduction. We have just seen the British talent at the Brits and the Oscars. This is one of our highest-growth industries. We saw this in our schools when there was a reduction in education in the arts, and we are seeing it now as the Conservatives attack those courses in universities.
Graham Stuart
Young people in my constituency are looking for a bit of hope. How should they interpret the Minister’s answer to her hon. Friend, the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel), and the fact that the Chancellor has said that young people are at the back of the queue? From that very recent mood music, it does not sound as if there is much to hope for from this Government.
Georgia Gould
I have spent the last few months travelling around the country talking to young people about the investment that Labour is putting in to support young people with special educational needs and to support schools and youth clubs. That is what the Labour party is doing in power, and there is huge hope that comes from that. Those are the areas where we need to prioritise investment.
The chance to study in higher education for those who want to and who have the ability to changes lives. We are determined to support students who want to go to university to fulfil their aspirations. We must not lose sight of the value that student loans provide in enabling that and levelling the playing field at the point of access. They remove the up-front financial barriers to study and enable students to repay when they are earning.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Minister is making an excellent and powerful speech on the motion. One aspect of the broken student loans system is the maternity penalty. When someone is on maternity leave, the interest on a student loan continues to accrue, despite income dropping below the repayment threshold. That means that graduates with student loans who take maternity leave face a longer repayment period and a greater total loan amount. Will the Minister take that concern back? Will the Government have a look at this perceived inequality?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. As she knows, increasing security for women on maternity leave is a really important part of this Government’s agenda, and that is why we are taking forward the Employment Rights Act 2025. It is important to note that in the system, if income goes below a threshold and someone is out of work generally, they will not have to pay. That is very different from a commercial loan, but I will absolutely take her point back.
The student loan system delivers tuition fee funding—some £10.7 billion in 2024-25—to our world-class higher education sector, a sector that remains by any objective metric one of our nation’s greatest exports and a global beacon of intellectual excellence. It is important that we remember what is at stake here. From pioneering laboratories developing quantum computing and agritech to those at the forefront of advanced manufacturing and genomics, our universities are the primary engines of the research that will define the 21st century, and the impact of our universities goes beyond their pivotal contribution to the economy and the careers of individual learners. By exposing students to diverse perspectives and expanding their social horizons, these institutions help our young people to build the networks, resilience and life skills that define a person long after they have graduated.
Rosie Wrighting (Kettering) (Lab)
I have a creative arts degree. Not only did it give me the opportunity to meet people, importantly, it enabled me to access the fashion industry as somebody growing up outside of London. Does the Minister share my concern that removing those degrees would create London-centric creative industries?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for that powerful point. Her creative arts degree was of huge benefit in getting her to this place.
Dr Murrison
Does the Minister think that the creative industries are the exclusive province of universities? If that is what she thinks, can I invite her to visit Trowbridge college in my constituency—an excellent further education college—and see what it is doing with multimedia to give kids the skills they need, as part of the growth in the economy that the Government are sorely lacking?
Georgia Gould
Of course I recognise the critical role that FE colleges play in supporting children into the creative industries. That is why this Government are backing FE colleges after the previous Government failed to do so. However, we do not believe that closing down routes to university is the best way to support our creative industries. We can have both, and we can have opportunities for both.
Laurence Turner
Is it not also the case that kids from working-class backgrounds were increasingly shut out of traditional apprenticeship routes under the previous Government because of the artificial entrance requirements, which employers said were blocking them from hiring the best? Employers said that those requirements should be scrapped, but the Department for Education blocked that under its previous management.
Georgia Gould
We saw a 40% reduction in young people’s apprenticeships over a decade. That was the legacy of the Conservative party.
While the foundational principles of our higher education funding and student finance system might be solid, they are straining after more than a decade of neglect and mismanagement, on top of the structural flaws baked into the system by the Conservatives. First, a legacy of seven years of frozen tuition fees has contributed in no small part to a significant and growing number of English higher education providers facing financial challenges. Analysis published last autumn by the Office for Students indicates that without mitigating action, some 124 providers—45% of those included in the OfS financial sustainability report—could face a deficit in 2025-26.
Tim Roca (Macclesfield) (Lab)
The Minister is making an important point. The economics of higher education are actually quite complicated; there is a great deal of cross-subsidy, with the humanities and the arts effectively supporting science, medicine and engineering courses and so on. Does the Minister agree that we should be worried that the Opposition parties’ proposals would put jobs and the viability of universities at risk?
Georgia Gould
My hon. Friend makes an important contribution to this debate.
The Government have taken the tough, immediate action that is required, including by making the difficult decision to increase tuition fees by forecast inflation, balancing the need to give the sector stability with fairness to students and taxpayers. We are also asking more of the sector: we expect higher education providers to demonstrate that they deliver the very best outcomes, both for those students and for the country, in return for the increased investment we are asking students to make. To achieve this, this Government will link future fees increases to university quality, as I have said. This will protect taxpayers’ investment in higher education and incentivise high-quality provision for students without taking away opportunities.
Edward Argar (Melton and Syston) (Con)
The Minister is typically generous with her time and courteous in the number of interventions she accepts. May I gently take her back to lines 3 to 4 of the text of the Prime Minister’s amendment on student loans, which state that this House
“welcomes the Government’s commitment to make the system fairer and financially sustainable”.
To avoid this sounding like jam tomorrow and to reassure young people—I have a lot of respect for the Minister, and I will be generous—can she give one or two concrete announcements today of specific measures that she is bringing forward that will achieve that commitment?
Georgia Gould
We are lifting the threshold, which will make a difference this year for students. We have already announced that, and we have said that we will continue to look at this matter as we look at a wide range of issues. We accept that the system created by the Conservatives is not fair.
More broadly, this Government are resetting the contract for young people across the landscape. Beyond our new deal for young people who do not go to university, we will support more young people into work and training through a £2.5 billion investment in the youth guarantee and growth and skills levy over the next three years and—this is incredibly concrete—we will support almost a million young people and deliver almost 500,000 opportunities to earn and learn.
Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome this week’s announcement of the new deal for young people beyond university. One of the challenges in a seat like Peterborough is that not enough young people get to either apprenticeships or university. Does the Minister agree that one of the challenges we face is that we spend so much time in this place and in the media debating university routes as the path to success, but we do not spend half as much time as we need to discussing apprenticeships? The youth guarantee starts to put that right.
Georgia Gould
My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. We need to open up access to apprenticeships. That is why the Government are making this investment, and it is why we have set that ambitious target for young people to go to university and to access apprenticeships.
Robin Swann
On that point, does the Minister agree that there is another way? The Open University also allows people to earn and learn at the same time. The situation is not as simple as university or apprenticeship. There is a middle way and, as a former graduate of the Open University, I encourage the Government to support it.
Georgia Gould
We are committed to opening up those routes to lifelong learning, and we are setting out plans on that. I welcome that intervention.
Dr Murrison
With hindsight, does the Minister regret Tony Blair’s announcement in the late 1990s that more than 50% of school leavers should go to university? Would it not have been better to have said that all young people leaving school should either go to university or into high-quality apprenticeships or training?
Georgia Gould
Opposition Members were accusing me of talking about the past, but I think I was nine years old when that was going on. I do not regret the real focus on opening up access to university, because that opened it up to disadvantaged pupils who might never have had that opportunity. Today, we recognise that we need both those routes. There has not been enough investment or focus on vocational pathways. We absolutely agree with that, and we are putting that right. It is our ambition to have a more sustainable, more specialised and more efficient sector that better aligns with the needs of the economy.
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
The Minister is being generous with her time, and I thank her on behalf of Opposition Members. Does she believe that there is an oversupply of courses in higher education? She has spoken about trying to evolve and reform the model, and the concern among Opposition Members is that there seems to be pressure on a lot of children to go to university, even though they will not get a graduate bonus associated with that. A lot of us question the financial viability of HE. What are her views on that?
Georgia Gould
We want young people to have a choice: to go to university, to study, to take up an apprenticeship or to earn and learn. We want that range of routes to be available and for young people to have high-quality careers education, so that they know what the opportunities are in their local communities.
We want higher education providers to go further to give their students the best course and employment outcomes, ensuring that the sector remains globally competitive. The Government are committed to ensuring that higher education is open to all who have the ability and the desire to pursue it. In the 2028-29 academic year, we will be reintroducing targeted, means-tested maintenance grants of up to £1,000 a year, increasing the cash in students’ pockets without increasing their debt. To help students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds, we are already delivering on a commitment to future-proof maintenance loans by increasing them in line with forecast inflation every academic year to try to ensure that support keeps pace with financial pressures. In the academic year 2026-27, care leavers will become automatically eligible to receive the maximum rate of maintenance loans, which will provide vital extra support for one of the most vulnerable groups in society.
Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)
I welcome support for people from the most vulnerable groups who are heading to university, but will the Minister acknowledge that by enabling those groups to take the maximum amount of support, the Government are also enabling them to have the maximum amount of debt at the end of their university careers? A frequent problem throughout all this has been the fact that either the people in the middle who do not quite get the support that they need or those at the far end of the system who do need support are saddled with the most debt, because they will not have the parental assistance that would help them to leverage against the loan repayments for the rest of their careers.
Georgia Gould
I think it important to make it clear—some people watching the debate will be worried about this—that these are not normal loans, in that young people who are not earning, or are earning below the threshold, do not have to pay anything. In the long term, if they have not earned enough by the end of their careers, they do not have to pay the whole amount, and they do not have to pass that on to future generations.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
I thank the Minister for giving way: she has been very generous with her time. I think there is a point of principle in this debate, and I should like to hear the Minister’s thoughts on it. Does she believe that there is any degree offered by a university in which it is not fair to invest taxpayers’ money? If the quality is not good enough, surely it is not fair for the individual to be indebted. Will the Minister concede that there probably are some courses, across the country, that it is not fair for the taxpayer to subsidise?
Georgia Gould
I have made it very clear that we want to increase the quality of courses, and that is one of the conditions that we attached to increasing the fees in a fair way, but we want to do that by ensuring that those courses are of high enough quality, rather than scrapping the opportunity for young people to go on them.
Looking further ahead, I can tell the House that the Prime Minister’s ambition is to see two thirds of young people in higher-level learning by the age of 25. With the lifelong learning entitlement, which will be launched in January 2027—a policy that the last Administration failed, year after year, to deliver—we are transforming higher education from a “one-shot” opportunity into a flexible and responsive system with learners at its centre. As was mentioned earlier, the LLE will allow learners to fund individual modules and reskill throughout their careers, at colleges and universities alike.
We now have a responsibility to ensure that the benefits of higher education are maintained for future generations, and to clean up a student loan system in which interest rates have been allowed to spiral and students are confused about what is the right path for them. We absolutely recognise that there are failings in the system, but it is not a system that we built; it was a system that the Conservatives created. We know that student loan repayments are a concern for graduates, which is why we increased the plan 2 repayment threshold last year and why we are increasing it again next month, to £29,385. Borrowers who earn below that amount annually will not be required to make any repayments at all. This threshold is higher than the median graduate salary three years after graduation.
Graduates generally go on to benefit from higher earnings, and it remains reasonable for those who gain the largest financial benefits from their degrees to contribute more towards the cost of their studies than those who have not gone to university, or graduates earning lower salaries. Lower earners will still benefit from the unique protections that student loans offer. Any unpaid loan balance, including interest accrued, will still be cancelled at the end of the loan term at no detriment to the individual, outstanding debt is never passed on to a borrower’s family, and having an outstanding student loan is not a barrier to accessing a mortgage. Student loan balances do not appear on borrower credit records, although regular student loan repayments will be considered, alongside other living costs, as part of the affordability check for mortgage applications.
I want to say how seriously the Government take the cost of living challenges that young people face. Too often this generation have found their challenges ignored. We are working hard to tackle these issues by extending Government-funded childcare, reducing energy bills, freezing rail fares, rolling out free breakfast clubs, building new homes and introducing the Renters’ Rights Act 2025.
Before Conservative Members once again line up to criticise the decisions that we have made, I would like to take a moment to remind them of their track record on this matter. Plan 2 student loans were designed and introduced in 2012 by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, with a repayment threshold of £21,000 per year and interest rates of up to 3% above inflation. Those are the very interest rates that the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are now calling to be reduced. Having said that they would increase the plan 2 repayment threshold to reflect earnings, they froze it for four years. The Conservatives then froze it in 2016 and in 2017, and again from 2021 to 2024. In total, there was a decade of freezes by the opposition parties. It is their mismanagement that now necessitates a further freeze to the threshold. I do not remember any of this outrage from those Members when they created and built this system.
As we have heard, the Opposition’s solution is to cut courses and cut opportunities. We will not make reckless and unfunded changes to student loans. Student finance and higher education funding is a complex, interconnected system. We are considering a range of options to make the system fairer, but we must be fiscally responsible and consider carefully how change would be funded. Politics is about choices.
Tessa Munt (Wells and Mendip Hills) (LD)
Would the Minister consider doing something about the cost of accommodation in university towns and cities? Where I come from in north Somerset there is no university, and at the moment people do not really have the option to go anywhere except a city, which is incredibly expensive. Would she give some consideration to reducing those costs on ordinary working families?
Georgia Gould
I thank the hon. Member for that comment, and that is why we are supporting maintenance grants to help students with the cost of living.
I will conclude by saying that our approach to further reform of the system will be deliberate, evidenced and fiscally responsible. We are here not to tear down the house, but to repair the roof that was left to leak.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Education
Georgia Gould Excerpts(1 week ago)
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Rosie Duffield
… Unfortunately, the Government’s funding announcement in their White Paper is just a drop in the ocean compared with what is needed to radically improve SEND services in east Kent. Can the Minister tell me what other steps she will take to deliver urgently needed improvements in SEND provision in my constituency, as the funding looks likely to equate to only a few thousand pounds extra per school?
Georgia Gould
My hon. Friend will know that we have recently announced support to local authorities like Kent in order to address 90% of their deficits. We are building three new special schools in Kent and putting in place £3.7 billion in capital investment, and the allocation for Kent will be coming onboard shortly.
[Official Report, 2 March 2026; Vol. 781, c. 567.]
Written correction submitted by the Minister for School Standards, the hon. Member for Queen's Park and Maida Vale (Georgia Gould):
Georgia Gould
… We are building two new special schools and a new alternative provision in Kent and putting in place £3.7 billion in capital investment, and the allocation for Kent will be coming onboard shortly.
SEND Provision: Local Authorities
Georgia Gould Excerpts(2 weeks, 6 days ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I thank the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for his powerful and sobering speech, and for securing the debate. He and I have talked before about his research, which is heartbreaking and demonstrates powerfully the need for change. We have arranged a date for me to visit and speak to some of the families he is working with, and I am happy to make time after the debate to talk with the families who are here today. This is just unimaginable loss.
The hon. Member set out that he has gathered 200 stories, but I understand that there are thousands more stories in which children and families have been failed. I have travelled around the country to talk to families, and I have also heard so many stories.
Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for his truly emotional and very caring speech. While the Minister is travelling around the country, will she spend some time in west Somerset, where 2,500 children are on the crisis list?
Georgia Gould
I thank the hon. Member for inviting me to speak to families in her area.
The conversations that I have had have so often been about parents battling for years to get the support that they know their children need, as the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley said, and about the powerlessness they feel as they watch their children struggle and fall behind.
Kirith Entwistle (Bolton North East) (Lab)
At my online advice surgery yesterday, I met constituent Jenny Wilson, who has fought tirelessly for her son Maxwell to receive support from their local authority—he is without a formal diagnosis. Jenny and other parents in my constituency would like to know what more the Government are doing to help children who do not have a formal diagnosis and are still being denied EHCPs or any additional support.
Georgia Gould
I very often hear that exact story: too much support is locked behind a diagnosis that takes years, or behind a bureaucratic process. The reforms that we have set out move investment directly into schools and services that wrap around schools. We are introducing two new layers of support—targeted and targeted-plus—that will be available to children, without that battle for external validation. Teachers will be able to draw on that to support children in their classrooms. That is backed up by two new pieces of investment: £1.6 billion going directly into schools; and £1.8 billion into a new “experts at hand” service, to pay for speech and language therapists, occupational therapists, educational psychologists, specialist teachers and others who will support schools. Their support will be available for young people, including the one mentioned by my hon. Friend.
Chris Coghlan
I agree with what the Minister says, and it is good that all this provision is coming in, but I simply do not understand why, if she is so confident that these reforms will work, it is necessary to reduce children’s rights. I know that she is likely to say that the Government are not doing so, but it is the view of KCs—an authority I trust—that that is happening. In theory, if the reforms succeed, the demand to exercise those legal rights should naturally fall, because families should not need to use them, so whether or not those rights are there should be slightly irrelevant. However, if the reforms do not succeed, those rights gives families whose trust has collapsed the peace of mind that they can, in the worst cases, go to a tribunal and save their children’s lives.
Georgia Gould
It is really important to say to families that we are expanding their support and their rights. There will be new legal duties on schools to develop these new layers of support, which will mean that support is available earlier.
Liam Conlon (Beckenham and Penge) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for securing this debate. It is so important that the lived experiences of parents are valued by local authorities and other services, and too often they are not. In 2023, two of my constituents, Jo and Chris, tragically lost their son Leo to suicide. Leo was a bright, intelligent, inquisitive child. He was also neurodivergent and struggled with his diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. He is featured in the Times article that the hon. Member mentioned. The coroner’s report into his death found that he had been failed by multiple agencies over a sustained period. The hon. Member kindly reached out to Jo and Chris to learn more about what happened to Leo and the lessons that could be learned, and I am really grateful to him for doing so. Will the Minister agree to meet me, so that we can ensure the voices of parents like Jo and Chris are given the weight that they deserve?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for sharing that tragic story. Of course I would be willing to meet him to discuss it further. These are stories of failure, and we need to do better for these families and change things. We need a system in which every school is set up to support children with special educational needs and disabilities. We are making it mandatory for every teacher to be trained to support children with special educational needs and disabilities, investing directly in schools to provide that support and setting out new national standards and new accountability for schools.
The hon. Member for Dorking and Horley made a really important point about families still being able to apply for specialist support. Any individual who feels that their child is not getting the support they need through the targeted or targeted-plus offer will be able to have a needs assessment. If they are unhappy with the needs assessment, they will be able to go to the tribunal to challenge that decision, so there will be individual redress in the system.
But it cannot just be for individual families to hold the system to account, because that is the system we have at the moment, with families having to take on legal battles, and for those who do not have the resource, it is not possible to do that. We in the Department for Education and Ofsted have to hold institutions to account. We are really clear that we will provide more support for councils—we are supporting them with 90% of their deficits—but with that support comes much stronger accountability.
Chris Coghlan
I have repeatedly raised with the DFE over the last year very serious misconduct by Surrey county council, including concealing for over 14 months the fact that it had the highest number of complaints in the country and reclassifying complaints as inquiries to reduce complaint volumes. As far as I am aware, no disciplinary action has been taken. This is not a party political point, because it is a Conservative county council, and I know that, off the record, some Conservative county councillors feel exactly the same way about their own administration.
I worked with the Department of Health and Social Care on reforming the Mental Capacity Act 2005, and I was very impressed by its willingness to acknowledge misconduct and the need for accountability and transparency in that case. To be frank, all I have seen from the Department for Education is a culture of protecting one’s own and of cover-ups. When will serious action be taken against local authorities that commit misconduct on SEND and systematic lawbreaking? The Secretary of State for Education said that local authorities will be held to account, but given what has happened with Surrey county council, how can we have any confidence that they actually will?
Georgia Gould
Following the letters that the hon. Member and others wrote to the Secretary of State, she instructed further intensive activity in Surrey, including a number of deep dives into the issues that were raised, which will report back shortly. There are SEND advisers going in, and there is very close monitoring of what is happening in Surrey and the progress being made, but I take the wider point that families have made to me and Members across the Chamber that there needs to be greater accountability for local authorities. We recognise the challenging circumstances that local authorities have been in, but more investment is going in, and with that investment has to come stronger monitoring, accountability and intervention when there is failure.
As is set out in the schools White Paper, we are strengthening what we are able to do in a number of areas. We are very clear that if there is repeated and long-term failure, we will take SEND from local authorities. Working with the Disabled Children’s Partnership, we are setting out new conditions under which local authorities will need to learn from tribunal judgments, publish action plans on the back of them and show much greater transparency and action.
Mr Will Forster (Woking) (LD)
I thank the Minister for giving way, and I particularly thank my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for securing the debate and for the manner in which he introduced it. Since he has been in this place, he has been a strong advocate for SEND families, and I thank him for that.
The Minister has heard me talk about Sara Sharif before, and my hon. Friend has talked about her during the debate. We are clearly very concerned about children’s services in Surrey county council and I hope that we have shown that intervention is needed. The Minister may disagree, but I beg her to take away that we want to ensure that the culture of children’s services at Surrey county council is not transferred to West Surrey council or East Surrey council in the future. If the Government agree with my assessment that intervention is needed now, they need to intervene to ensure that that culture is not transferred, so that we have the fresh start that vulnerable children in our constituencies so desperately need.
Georgia Gould
As I set out, we have appointed a SEND adviser who is offering that challenge to Surrey county council. We will continue to monitor the situation very carefully and I await the outcomes of the deep dives. I will be meeting parents, along with the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley, to hear directly from them. I am committed to continuing to work with all the relevant MPs to ensure that children are getting the support that they need in Surrey. More generally, I am committed to ensuring that there is strong accountability and monitoring of performance, as well as putting in new investment and support.
I want to address the concern mentioned by the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley that some young people who had previously had support will no longer get that support under the new system. I refer colleagues to the draft annexes that set out the specialist provision packages. I hope that those annexes reassure them that, as well as looking at children who have physical disabilities and complex learning difficulties, two of the specialist provision packages focus on social and emotional needs, and the interface with mental health.
Chris Coghlan
I fully believe that the Minister’s heart is in the right place, but for me the test is what lawyers and KCs—not to big them up too much—are saying about the White Paper: specialist educational lawyers are clear that the White Paper is reducing children’s rights. I would love to support the White Paper, but our country desperately needs reforms in this area, as this debate has highlighted. If the Minister wants my support, she will have to satisfy KCs that there is no reduction in rights, and at the moment there is.
Georgia Gould
Attached to the schools White Paper and the SEND consultation document is our own analysis of children’s rights and all the areas where we are strengthening them. I want to be really clear that the intention of the reforms is to bring in more support earlier and to extend the rights that children have access to.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
The Minister is being generous with her time and I thank her for giving way. I want to reiterate the point about the families who have already gone through the system and who have fought for EHCPs, many of whom have had to go through tribunals and feel like they are having to do everything on their own. I come from a mental health background, and I am surprised that the system does not have what I would call a care co-ordinator to support families who are going through this difficult process.
Families are genuinely scared that the Government’s proposed reforms will lead to a stripping away of support. In my constituency, where we are served by Surrey and Borders partnership NHS foundation trust, it takes a year and a half to get an autism diagnosis, and even longer if people need medication for ADHD. I have raised that in this place with Ministers from the Department of Health and Social Care, but can the Minister reassure me that as part of the approach to SEND, she and her Department are looking at the interface between education and health? I understand what she says about the absence of a diagnosis not meaning that a child should not be supported—we could have another debate about that—but for many children a diagnosis is very important, and it needs to be timely and treatment needs to be quick and effective.
Finally, before I test your patience, Madam Deputy Speaker, may I invite the Minister to come to Meath school, a special educational needs school in Ottershaw in my constituency? It is an amazing place and every time I go there I learn so much, so it would be great if she could come along and meet the fantastic kids and teachers there.
Georgia Gould
I confess that I think I have committed to go to every constituency in the country, but I will do my best. [Laughter.] I cannot promise that every single ask will be responded to quickly, but I want to get to every community, and we will also be doing a number of online events as part of the consultation to ensure that everyone has the chance to feed in.
To respond to the hon. Member’s questions, first, it is important to make clear that we are not saying that children do not need a diagnosis. Diagnosis plays an important part in the system for children and young people, but it cannot and should not be a barrier to accessing support in the education system. Schools must have the tools to identify and respond to need, and the resource and well-evidenced interventions to wrap support around children without a diagnosis. However, we are committed to working with Health colleagues on improving the whole system, and the SEND consultation document is clear about that further work on accountability —not just for local authorities, but for integrated care boards. The hon. Member will know about the review of some of the inequalities in access to diagnosis.
The point about care co-ordinators and parental support is well made—that is something I have heard a lot from families. Within the consultation, we have asked a question about how that can be better delivered, and we are committed to doing more in that space. Lots of different ideas have come forward from different disabled children’s organisations and from parents, but I want to use the consultation to hear directly from parents about what is most helpful for them. In some models, parents who have been through the system are paid to support other parents, and the special educational needs and disabilities information advice and support service already exists. We want to look at all the different models, and I would welcome insights from across the House.
I want to provide some important reassurance to those parents who the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer) talked about who are concerned about the changes. First, any child at a special school will remain there for as long as they want. We have deliberately taken a careful and staged approach and are putting investment up front, so we are building a new system before we look to transition into it. We are also asking the Children’s Commissioner to take an independent view of system readiness. Secondly, we are clear that any child transitioning from an education, health and care plan must move on to an individual support plan, with the wraparound support I have mentioned.
Chris Coghlan
The Minister is being very generous with her time, and I am being slightly cheeky.
I have a horrendous case involving a child in Dorking who is 12 years old. I saw the mother in September, a week after the child’s second suicide attempt. The child and adolescent mental health services wrote to the GP one week later, saying that their risk of suicide was low, but there have been more self-harm incidents since then. This child has autism, and last week the county council rejected them from getting an EHCP, so I am literally at my wits’ end about what to do on this case. First, if I were to write to the Minister about this particular case, I would be hugely grateful if she could intervene. Secondly, how would she envisage this child’s situation improving after the reforms?
Georgia Gould
That is a truly tragic case. Of course, I cannot comment without knowing the full circumstances, but I encourage the hon. Member to write to me. There are two ways that the reforms could improve the situation. First, rather than having to wait for years, that support will go in a lot earlier. As well as the particular support for children with special educational needs and disabilities, we are working to bring more mental health support into schools to support children and young people. I mentioned the specialist provision packages and the drafts there, because I often hear from parents whose children do not get as much attention in the system because they internalise their social and emotional needs. Children who externalise those needs are sometimes not well supported either, but where they are internalised, those children get missed. We focused on those children and their need for specialist provision. For those children who can be supported in the mainstream, we want to put that support in earlier, but we want to have pathways into specialist support for those who need them.
Daniel Francis (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Lab)
I declare my usual interest, as my wife is a special needs co-ordinator and one of our children has an EHCP. I thank the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for bringing forward this debate. My constituents have seen our London borough of Bexley council have a safety valve agreement and an Ofsted inspection of systemic failings, which we are hopefully about to come out of. I have seen those things as a councillor and as a parent. I am the parent of twins, and I can tell the House that despite having an EHCP, the transfer for my daughter with an EHCP was so much more stressful than it was for my other daughter. I welcome the changes, as the Minister knows. There are still a few things we need to iron out in these conversations about transition, support for schools and the role of ICBs. Can the Minister commit that, through the consultation and legislative process, we will continue to hear those voices to get the package right? I know at first hand that the system is broken, and we have to get it right for these families.
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for his long-term advocacy on this critical issue and for how much he has inputted into our work to improve the system. I am glad that he asked that question, because I wanted to finish with the voices of children, young people and families. We are committed to the accountability that has been asked for, and we will shortly be writing to all local authorities asking them to develop SEND improvement plans. We will be monitoring that carefully and will ensure that the voices of families are part of the intelligence that we receive about performance.
Helen Maguire (Epsom and Ewell) (LD)
I apologise for being late for the debate; business was going more rapidly than I expected.
Many of us strongly believe that it is important that children are educated as close to home as possible. Unfortunately, I have a piece of casework in my constituency where one child is doing a three-hour round trip every single day just to get to school, which is unacceptable. With the new changes, will there be an option to change that? It would be helpful if the Minister could expand on that.
Georgia Gould
That is such a critical point, and we have heard too many stories about long travel times, and how having to be in transport provokes stress for children, which holds them back. We are determined that every community has access to that support, whether that is inclusive schools or a range of specialist places. That is why we have put £3.7 billion into creating those specialist places around the country, and it is also why we are working on specialist provision packages to ensure that each area has that range of provision. We are determined to build up local provision so that children can grow up close to their friends. I have spoken to young people who have been in the position that my hon. Friend describes. They come back to their communities at 18, and they do not have support networks or friends, and it is so hard to build a life. That has to change, and we are determined to do so.
We have set out our plans after more than a year of engagement, but we want to hear from the constituents of all the Members here and beyond. I am personally committed to travelling and speaking to different voices around the country. We have heard from all the different contexts how things work in rural communities and different parts of the country. It is critical that we get it right. This is a generational opportunity to make change for families who have been let down. I am determined that this will be a full and an open consultation. I ask everyone who is here today, and everyone who is listening, to help us to spread the word so that we hear the families’ voices. Having heard these stories, I feel very deeply—as, I am sure, does the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley—the responsibility to change things for those families, and I am committed to working with Members on both sides of the House to get this right.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
It be remiss of me not to extend an invitation to the Minister to visit St Edward’s school in my constituency of Romsey and Southampton North.
Question put and agreed to.
Oral Answers to Questions
Georgia Gould Excerpts(3 weeks ago)
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Yuan Yang (Earley and Woodley) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
On Monday, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education set out ambitious SEND reforms to ensure the system works better for families and children across England. It is clear that families, and the teachers and wider staff trying to support them, have been failed by the system, and that that has had a profound impact on children and young people’s education and wellbeing. We are determined to work with families and professionals around the country to build a system in which children’s needs are met quickly and families do not have to battle because the right inclusive mainstream and specialist support will be available in their communities. We want to hear from young people, parents, teachers and all those who support them, so I ask everyone in the Chamber to bring the voices of their constituents to our consultation.
Yuan Yang
Secondary school students with special educational needs have told me of their struggles with academy trusts in south Reading and Shinfield that have failed to properly prioritise inclusion. Will the Minister set out how the schools White Paper will address that on the part of multi-academy trusts? Will she consider visiting Hartland high school and Oakbank school in my constituency to see the progress they have made on that front?
Georgia Gould
Accountability is a key part of our reforms, which is why Ofsted is now focused on inclusion. We have also brought in Ofsted inspections for multi-academy trusts. I very much enjoyed meeting one of my hon. Friend’s local academies, which is doing brilliant work, but I recognise that we need to put in the right resource and accountability to ensure that that is happening everywhere. I am always delighted to see best practice.
Ian Roome (North Devon) (LD)
I thank the Minister for the Government’s decision to effectively write off about 90% of Devon county council’s SEND debts. I know that will reassure many parents in my constituency.
Will the Minister tell us how the new school curriculum will give schools the flexibility they need to support children with special educational needs across very different parts of the country, including rural areas such as North Devon?
Georgia Gould
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that we need to ensure that children with SEND have the right support everywhere in the country. That means that we need to ensure that we have the right experts wrapped around schools and that the curriculum meets children’s needs. The Government’s curriculum and assessment review sets out our modern curriculum, including a breadth of learning and enrichment for young people, but we know that it is important to have the right adaptations and flexibilities, and we will be moving forward with that as part of our SEND reforms.
Perran Moon (Camborne and Redruth) (Lab)
As the Secretary of State knows, there is much concern in my Camborne, Redruth and Hayle constituency about the off-rolling of children with SEND. Will the Minister elaborate on the reforms in the schools White Paper to ensure that mainstream secondary multi-academy trust exclusions will be measured, and that schools will be incentivised to provide the effective SEND provision that all our children deserve?
Georgia Gould
We are absolutely clear that every school has to support children with special educational needs and disabilities. Every teacher has to be trained to be a SEND teacher, and every secondary school will be expected to have an inclusion base. We need to have eyes on children to ensure that no child falls through the cracks. That is why the Department for Education will be more closely monitoring pupil flow, including off-rolling. We will work with trusts and local authority schools when we see large numbers of children who are being off-rolled or are out of education in other ways.
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
I spend a lot of time visiting schools in my constituency and speaking to the hard-working headteachers about the pressures they are under due to spiralling costs and teacher shortages. With the Government’s proposed reforms placing an additional responsibility on schools to create individual support plans, alongside an ambition for more children’s needs to be met within mainstream schools, how will the Minister ensure that schools do not have to make sacrifices that harm the education of every child?
Georgia Gould
When developing this policy, we learned from the best schools in the country. I visited schools that have individual support plans for every student and wraparound support; those children are absolutely thriving. We want to make sure that that happens in every school. We are investing in a new national digital individual support plan, and we are putting £4 billion into schools and the services that support them to make that a reality.
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con)
Last week, I asked the Secretary of State a specific question about SEND funding during her statement, which she failed to answer, so I will try again with the Minister today. The £4 billion for SEND announced last week, to be paid over three years, which the Secretary of State described as “new money”, is actually from within the Department’s existing spending review settlement, isn’t it?
Georgia Gould
Absolutely, yes; it is money that we have won to put into supporting children with special educational needs and disabilities. It is a priority that we take very seriously. I have seen the failure around the country where, for too long, these families have not been listened to, and too many children are out of education; we need to change that. As part of the spending review, we requested and managed to get new investment that we are putting into schools and the “experts at hand” service to wrap around schools on top of the £3.7 billion we are putting into new specialist places. This is generational reform that will make a huge difference.
We want to work in partnership with colleagues across the House, but we still have not heard from the Conservative party. What are its ideas, and what—
Mr Speaker
Order. You are in government, so you do not need to—[Interruption.] Order. When I stand up, please sit. I am trying to be helpful. All these Members are trying to get in, and it is a big day with a big statement coming.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Trust among families with special educational needs is at rock bottom. Their voices have often been ignored—sometimes with tragic consequences—so while many are open to reform, there is real concern that under the Government’s proposals tribunals will lose the ability to direct specific provision in a child’s best interest, with the risk that families will be trapped in an endless doom loop of dispute with local authorities. If Ministers are serious about tackling that adversarial nature, will the Minister confirm how she will prevent it and protect children’s and parents’ rights?
Georgia Gould
We are committed to the tribunal being a backstop for families. We want a much more collaborative system, but we have heard from families how important that backstop of legal rights is, so the tribunal will be there as a backstop if parents are unhappy with the assessment process or the specialist provision package that they have.
When it comes to school placement, hon. Members across the House will know that in many cases, places are being named at special schools that are already full and it is just not safe for them to take those children. Parents will still be able to go to the tribunal, which will be able to quash a decision if it is unhappy, and then the local authority will need to look at it again.
Ben Obese-Jecty (Huntingdon) (Con)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
The Department is providing targeted help for Cambridgeshire, including a specialist SEND adviser and sector-led improvement support from Islington council. We are actively monitoring Cambridgeshire’s recovery plan to reduce EHCP backlogs and secure better outcomes for children and families. On Monday, the Secretary of State set out our wider ambition for a SEND system that works better for children and families across England. I encourage parents nationwide to look at our consultation on how we will bring the change our children need.
Ben Obese-Jecty
The EHCP backlog in Cambridgeshire is a significant challenge. I appreciate what the Minister said about the help that is currently in place. Having read the SEND White Paper, I am struggling to see where the immediate impact will come. I had a letter from a constituent at the weekend who thanked me for helping her child get an EHCP after 74 weeks, and I can give examples that stretch up to nearly two years from an EHCP needs assessment being signed off. I am due to meet Cambridgeshire county council on Friday to discuss this issue in more detail. What advice can the Minister give it on how the SEND White Paper will help it to get on top of the EHCP backlog?
Georgia Gould
The hon. Member is right: the timeliness of EHCPs has been unacceptable, and it is something that we are taking seriously. That is why we have put the extra resource in—as part of the schools White Paper, we are putting £200 million directly into councils to support their capacity—but this is something that we will be monitoring closely. I am happy to talk to him in more detail about his concerns.
John Whitby (Derbyshire Dales) (Lab)
Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Ind)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
The Department has worked closely with NHS England to monitor, support and challenge Kent in making necessary SEND improvements following its area SEND inspections in 2019 and 2022. This has included regular review meetings, attendance at its SEND partnership board and commissioning the support of an expert SEND adviser.
Rosie Duffield
I recently hosted a constituency SEND roundtable with education leaders and officials from the Department, where teachers stressed yet again that years of underfunding and diminished support services had left schools on their knees, often unable to meet the needs of the most vulnerable children. Unfortunately, the Government’s funding announcement in their White Paper is just a drop in the ocean compared with what is needed to radically improve SEND services in east Kent. Can the Minister tell me what other steps she will take to deliver urgently needed improvements in SEND provision in my constituency, as the funding looks likely to equate to only a few thousand pounds extra per school?
Georgia Gould
My hon. Friend will know that we have recently announced support to local authorities like Kent in order to address 90% of their deficits. We are building three new special schools in Kent and putting in place £3.7 billion in capital investment, and the allocation for Kent will be coming onboard shortly. We have announced £4 billion of extra investment to wrap around schools, including for speech and language therapists as well as money directly into school budgets.
Mrs Elsie Blundell (Heywood and Middleton North) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I have talked to so many families who have had to watch their children fall further behind without the speech and language support they need. Alongside measures to address local authority deficits, we are providing £1.8 billion over the next three years for local areas to develop a new “experts at hand” offer, providing mainstream education settings with access to support from services including speech and language therapy.
Mrs Blundell
As the Minister knows, the SEND system is not working for children, families or local councils, and it has not been for some time. Despite the record of the Conservatives, we cannot allow children in need of speech and language therapy to lose out. Will the Minister assure me that when it comes to speech and language therapy, the new “experts at hand” service will be utilised effectively, so that each local authority will be able to provide all children with the support they need?
Georgia Gould
I am happy to reassure my hon. Friend and I thank her for her advocacy on this important issue. We are rebuilding support across the community. Best Start hubs in every community will be supported by £200 million for children with special educational needs and disabilities, and we are investing £40 million to train up new specialist speech and language staff and educational psychologists to ensure that this support is available in every community.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
On the subject of the provision of speech and language therapy for students with special educational needs, Westmorland and Furness council, in my area, was not one of the councils in financial difficulty—until last month, when the Government decided, for the crime of it being the most rural district in the country, to cut 31% of its budget over three years. What confidence can children with special educational needs and their parents in my community have that they are not going to be hit massively by these cuts, and what can the Minister do to put the cuts right?
Georgia Gould
We are providing dedicated support for speech and language therapists, educational psychologists and occupational therapists so that they are available to every primary and secondary school. In an average secondary school in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, we expect that that will amount to about 160 days of support a year.
Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
We are committed to investing in schools. Our plans include an extra £1.6 billion going directly into schools and £1.8 billion going into the wider “experts at hand” service, on top of increasing funding to the schools core budget. In this Parliament, we will continue to grow our investment in both SEND and schools to ensure that every child gets the best start in life.
Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)
Georgia Gould
I really appreciate the way in which my hon. Friend has been working closely with me on this issue. The Department sets clear financial management expectations for trusts through funding agreements in the academy trust handbook, and we are bringing in inspections of multi-academy trusts to ensure good governance and financial management.
Claire Hazelgrove (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Lab)
Georgia Gould
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s constituent, whose courage, commitment and care for others in the most impossible circumstances is truly inspiring. In the schools White Paper, we committed to consulting on changes to the school admissions code to promote fairness for all families. As part of that work, we will be looking at how to ensure that cases such as this are better supported through admissions policy in the future and, in the meantime, that schools and admissions authorities make use of the social and medical criteria.
Sir Ashley Fox (Bridgwater) (Con)
Georgia Gould
Children and young people often say to me that financial education is the big change they want to see in the curriculum. We are pleased that we are making that change as part of the curriculum and assessment review and including financial education at primary and secondary level. We are developing a new digital national curriculum to make things easier for teachers, and we are increasing funding for schools to implement these wider changes.
Douglas McAllister (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab)
Scottish colleges are struggling to cope with huge cuts to staff and funding, including West College Scotland in my constituency. The Scottish National party has cut funding by 20% in five years. What can the Minister do, working with other Departments such as Defence, to ensure that Scottish colleges become engines of growth and opportunity again, particularly for the young people of West Dunbartonshire?
Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Reform)
Does the Secretary of State agree that we should prioritise the promotion of British heritage in schools? If so, will she bring in a policy to ensure that every school flies the Union Jack outside its premises, and that a different pupil gets the chance to raise the national flag every morning?
Georgia Gould
We already teach British values, and we are proud to teach our British heritage and our past to set us up for the future.
Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)
Given that this is Colleges Week, may I take the opportunity to mention Stafford college, which is widely accepted to be the best college in the country? It already has 1,150 students on manufacturing courses, and works with 250 local employers in the sector. Does the Minister agree that if Newcastle and Stafford Colleges Group were made an advanced manufacturing technical excellence college, it could build on its excellent relationship with manufacturers locally?
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome the Education Secretary’s commitment to inclusion, but many children in York are not in school because of the disciplinary processes run by multi-academy trusts and the culture that ensues. What will she do to ensure that leaders in such trusts are held to account for that?
Georgia Gould
We think it is absolutely essential for all children to have access to an inclusive education. That is why Ofsted is now inspecting inclusion in all schools. As part of the schools White Paper and the special educational needs and disabilities consultation, we have set out new guidance on reasonable adjustments to support schools with that, and we will inspect multi-academy trusts on their decision-making.
Suella Braverman (Fareham and Waterlooville) (Reform)
Disgracefully, a pro-ayatollah students’ society plans to host a commemorative event on the campus of University College London in the name of “the fallen”—in other words, in support of those who backed the brutal regime of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Does the Secretary of State agree that it is utterly wrong that taxpayer-funded university resources are being used to propagate the murderous ideology of the Tehran regime, which has attacked UK bases, and with which we are effectively at war?
Young Children’s Screen Time
Georgia Gould Excerpts(1 month, 1 week ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir Jeremy, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Mr Charters) for his really powerful and heartfelt speech.
So much of what my hon. Friend set out today really resonated with me as the mum of a two-year-old. It can be a struggle to stay off the phone, and I would not really like to consider my own screen time, so it was brave of him to do so. He also spoke about the need to be present, the importance of messy outdoor play and the need for children to have protected childhoods, as well as how difficult it is to navigate this whole new world and, as a parent, to find the best advice and the right thing to do for our children. That is why debates such as this are so important, and why his leadership as a parent in this place is so critical. As he said, we want to harness the benefits of technology for education, but we want to protect children from harm.
Before I go into questions on screen time, I want to reflect on what my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Yeovil (Adam Dance) said about opportunities in childhood—the need to have good youth services and opportunities for children to play, to be in sports activities and to perform. That is why, as the Minister for School Standards, I am focused on the enrichment opportunities around school, such as outdoor learning, music performance, the opportunity to be in a sports team—those are the things that give joy to the school experience and to young people’s childhoods.
Anna Dixon
I am sure that the Minister is aware that it is the National Year of Reading. On the wider opportunities to get our kids off their screens, would she commend the work of the National Literacy Trust in trying to restore the joy of reading, and perhaps share her favourite childhood book with us? Mine was “The Very Hungry Caterpillar”.
Georgia Gould
My next sentence was going to be about the National Year of Reading. I have been travelling around the country visiting schools and it has been wonderful to see how they are embracing it. I have been hearing about schools putting on pyjama parties for parents and children to read together, and I have been at schools when parents have come in to read with children. That brings the joy of reading to life, and I hope that we will see a similar experience to Australia with bookshops full of children embracing reading. At the moment, my son is obsessed with the “Mog” series, so all we do in my house is talk about Mog.
I recognise the concerns that my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer raised about the impact of screen time on young children. Early childhood is developmentally critical and screen time can displace healthy behaviours such as physical activity and adequate sleep, which have complex interactions with mental health and wellbeing.
Alex Mayer (Dunstable and Leighton Buzzard) (Lab)
I recently did a survey with local schools. Perhaps the children were more willing to put on the survey how much screen time they had when they were not supervised by their parents, but I was enthused about the things that they said they would do if they were not on social media, including spending far more time outdoors and reading, as has already been mentioned. Does the Minister agree that we need evidence, so we are not doing just what is simple but what is right?
Georgia Gould
Absolutely. Evidence is so important because this is a struggle. It is not about judging parents, but about giving them the best evidence and the tools that they need to make decisions to support their children.
Adam Dance
I thank the Minister, as always, for replying to me. Only 18% of dyslexics have access to assistive technology. I know that she is passionate about getting that changed, so are we on the right road to get more assistive technology into our education system for dyslexics?
Georgia Gould
Absolutely. We are really committed to supporting assistive technology. We have introduced new lending libraries, as the hon. Member is aware, and we recently announced a £200 million investment into teacher training. As part of that training, we want to look at how we can best use assistive technology in the classroom, as well as what we are doing around edtech and how we are growing its use in the classroom. That shows that technology can be helpful when it is supporting learning, and it is important to take a nuanced approach.
From recent Government research, we know that the children with the highest screen use—of around five hours daily—at age two can say significantly fewer words than those with lower use. My hon. Friend the Member for York Outer referred to research that said that 98% of two-year-olds watch a screen daily. As my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Lola McEvoy) set out, it is critical that parents have the right information to be able to support their children.
That is why we announced in January the first ever Government guidance for parents on screen use for under-fives, which aims to provide practical, non-judgmental advice to help parents balance screen use with activities that support children’s development such as playing, speaking and reading. Parents want that guidance. Parents in this Chamber want it, and polling from Kindred shows that 40% of parents say that reducing screen time would help ensure their child is ready for reception, underlining the demand for practical, trusted guidance in the early years.
I, therefore, recognise the significance of the issue and the responsibility to get it right. For that reason, we have set up the early years screen time advisory group, a new expert panel chaired by Professor Russell Viner—former chief scientific adviser to the Department for Education, leading paediatrician and expert in children’s health—and Dame Rachel de Souza, the Children’s Commissioner for England.
The early years screen time advisory group will review the current evidence and existing advice on early years screen use to help inform the new guidance for parents. That group is holding its second meeting as we speak, which shows the urgency and seriousness with which the work is being taken forward. We want to hear directly from those with relevant knowledge and experience. We launched a two-week call for evidence on 2 February to ensure that the guidance is firmly grounded in evidence and expertise. I encourage hon. Members to share their evidence. My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Anna Dixon) mentioned work being done in Bradford, which I encourage her to share.
Lola McEvoy
The Minister is giving a brilliant speech to sum up this important debate. Will the work she mentions consider the link between the need for more speech and language therapy for early years and screen time pre-school?
Georgia Gould
We want to look at the evidence, including any impact on speech and language. We are seeing a far greater need for speech and language support, which is why we are investing in new early years support around speech and language. That is surely one of the areas that the evidence will address.
Engagement sessions with parents, children, early years practitioners and stakeholders are taking place across England, allowing them to share what works in real family life, and what support they need from guidance. The guidance will be published in April and made available to parents through the Best Start in Life website, giving the clarity and support they are asking for to navigate screen time with their youngest children.
More broadly, my hon. Friend the Member for Swindon North (Will Stone) raised the issue of protecting children from harmful content. The Online Safety Act 2023 requires providers specifically to consider, as part of their risk assessment, how algorithms could impact children’s exposure to illegal content and content that is harmful to children on their service. Services that are assessed as easily accessed by children must put in place measures to prevent algorithms from pushing harmful content to children.
As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer, there is a wider consultation—a national conversation—that will look at some of the broader issues. The Department for Education is committed to strengthening the evidence base on the impact of screen use and screen time on child development. Our set of longitudinal studies already gathers data on children’s screen and social media use, and will interrogate their relationship with mental health and cognitive development. We are funding a programme of research to better understand the impact of digital technologies on children.
We are in strong agreement with the overwhelming message from today: we cannot wait to act in this space. We have to look to protect and enhance our children’s lives online. It is right to continue to look at further action that could be taken, so I welcome today’s important debate. We will set out guidance, but it is important to have the national conversation, without blaming parents, to make sure that they have the information they need. When they want to get out and enjoy time with their children, we should provide the right activities and support to enable them to do so.
Question put and agreed to.
Education Funding: Distribution
Georgia Gould Excerpts(1 month, 3 weeks ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I thank the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings) for securing this debate on this important matter. I really appreciate her taking the time to meet me and lay out her concerns in person. We had a very constructive conversation. I echo her thanks to all the brilliant teachers and staff who work so hard in her constituency. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham), who came to speak to me about similar issues, the work of the f40 group, and the need to support not just schools, but, more widely, the professionals who wrap around schools in communities around the country.
I want to start where the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire ended, which is with the stories of families. I have travelled around the country speaking to thousands of parents and young people, and sadly, the experience she set out is all too common: parents’ fight for support, the exhaustion of having to navigate different systems, and parents having to give up their jobs to make a full-time job of trying to get support for their children.
Chris Coghlan
On the point about the terrible fight that families face, the Minister will know that I wrote to the Education Committee to pass on the testimony of 653 families from across 114 local authorities about harmful, unethical or unlawful behaviour by local authorities on SEND. These testimonies have 195 references to suicide. One of them said:
“My child now has ptsd, has lost the full use of their arm, is covered in scars from failed suicide attempts”.
The Education Committee wrote to me saying that these testimonies corroborated its findings about the failures in local authority governance. Does the Minister agree that, on SEND, there can be no case for weakening EHCP children’s rights, and that families’ trust in local authority governance has collapsed?
Georgia Gould
The stories the hon. Member has collected are unimaginably awful, and I commend him for listening to families and engaging with the Education Committee. We are taking its report very seriously; it is one of the documents informing our approach to reform. Conversations with families around the country are informing it, too. We have been clear that we need more support earlier. He talked about the critical nature of early intervention, and families have told us about that. We need greater partnership and earlier support, but families are also very clear that we need a system that protects their legal entitlement to additional support in education. What we have seen, and the stories we have heard today, show the failure to invest in early intervention.
The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire talked about the urgent need to bring forward the reforms. We said that we were determined to bring them forward in the first part of this year, and we are working very hard on that. However, we want to ensure that the voices of parents, young people and teachers are at the heart of decision making, and we have taken the time to do the further engagement. The proposals that we will take forward are strengthened by that engagement, and by the contribution of families and Members across the House.
However, we have not been waiting to invest and to take action. We have already invested in Best Start in Life hubs, and in leads on special educational needs and disabilities. We have put £740 million into capital for specialist places. We have announced a further £3 billion of capital for this year, and we will set out how that is to be distributed across the country. Just recently, we announced a further £200 million in support for teacher training, and we will make it mandatory for teachers to have continuous professional development on special educational needs and disabilities.
Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)
On the point about distributing funding across the country, does the Minister recognise that, under the current high needs block system, a pupil in Westminster receives £2,800, whereas a pupil in Devon receives less than half that amount? When designing the new system, would she ensure that it is less of a postcode lottery, and that rural areas like mine will not be certain to receive less funding?
Georgia Gould
We had to move quickly to bring extra funding into the system. Hon. Members will know that we have put an extra £1 billion into the high needs block, and we used the funding formula that was available. However, we will review that, to see whether it is in line with our reforms. We want to ensure that people get good-quality, consistent support, wherever they are in the country.
Despite the dire situation that we inherited, the Government have prioritised education spending. We have invested £1.7 billion in additional education funding in 2026-27. That is critical to support schools to give young people a positive mainstream education, but we recognise that we need to continue to work to make sure that we meet the needs of the future. We will be setting out more in the schools White Paper.
The issue of statutory override and the pressure on councils was mentioned. I am very aware of that, as I previously led a council. We need to recognise both the financial pressure on councils and the need for strong accountability for council performance. The size of the deficits that some councils are accruing may not be manageable with local resources alone, and we are going to bring forward arrangements to assist them as part of the broader SEND reforms. The Government will say more about that as part of the upcoming local government finance settlement in early February. The Government have been clear that SEND pressures will be absorbed within the overall Government departmental expenditure limit budget for 2028-29, such that the Government will not expect local authorities to need to fund SEND costs from general funds. We will set that out further in the future. I really appreciate the strength of feeling across the House and the cross-party working from everyone here.
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
We have already heard this evening about the difficulty of parents getting EHCPs. Even when they have got them—90% of parents who apply do eventually get them, despite the struggle—their provision is not guaranteed. The Government are spending record amounts on SEND, yet we are still not really solving the problems, so there is clearly something wrong with the system. We are eagerly awaiting the White Paper, but can we be assured that the system itself will be thoroughly examined to see how it can be overhauled?
Georgia Gould
I can absolutely assure the hon. Member that we are doing that work. We need to look at this issue at every level. We heard about the importance of early intervention. It is also critically important that we have strong partnerships across local authorities, schools and health, and that we look at the provision in every school and every community. The teacher training announcement was so important; our expectation is that every teacher in every school should be a teacher of young people with special educational needs and disabilities. We are also looking at the fabric of our buildings, the accountability systems and the support that is put in place.
Vikki Slade
A few weeks ago, I raised some of these very excessive charges, although I had a bit of pushback from some residents saying, “My child needs this very expensive school.” Can the Minister confirm whether the Government are looking at companies that are coming in and making profit at the expense of our children? We are talking about children who have very complex needs. For 78 children in one local authority in my constituency, the charge is more than £100,000 each. Thirty of those children are from one school alone.
Georgia Gould
We have put £3 billion into specialist places to ensure that there is high-quality provision across the system. Independent specialist schools play an important part in the system, but excessive profits should not be made from the care of children. We want the money that is going into the system to go into supporting children.
We also want to ensure that every child has the right to an education within their local community. I talk to too many children who have to travel, sometimes for two hours, to get an education. As I travel around the country to look at the system, I see two things. First, the system is absolutely in crisis; there is failure in every single part. I hear that from every single part of the system and we have heard some examples today. Secondly, there are dedicated people who are trying to make it work, including those mentioned by the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire. There are special educational needs co-ordinators and local partnerships who go the extra mile. There are schools that are thinking deeply about how to provide an inclusive education. That makes a difference; parents who are having a positive experience tell us that they can finally breathe because the support is in place. There are green shoots of that change—such as partnerships between special schools and mainstream schools—which we can build on.
We take this responsibility for generational change very seriously. My commitment is to work in partnership with everyone who cares about this issue. I appreciate the opportunity to continue these conversations and to continue to talk about the work we are doing. When we bring forward the schools White Paper, there will be a full consultation on the work we are setting out, and we have heard this evening, very powerfully, how important that work is. We cannot continue to fail children with special educational needs and disabilities and their families, and we need to give the right resources to the teachers, teaching assistants and health professionals who are trying to support them every day.
Question put and agreed to.
Oral Answers to Questions
Georgia Gould Excerpts(2 months ago)
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Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I know how hard students around the country work for their exams, and how important it is to ensure consistency and fairness. Ofqual, the qualifications regulator, secures the safe, fair and resilient delivery of qualifications by regulating awarding organisations. As Ministers, we work closely with Ofqual, when needed, to support its work.
Steve Yemm
At West Notts college in my constituency of Mansfield, a significant number of learners requested that their English papers be remarked, because an unusually high number of students missed their expected grades. In fact, more than 50% of the papers that were remarked were given a higher grade, with some improving by two grades. The exam board, Pearson Edexcel, told the college that this was due to human error and the marking of one examiner, but later said that it was more widespread. The exam board has now refused to carry out a wider remark of the papers. Will the Minister join me in urging it to ensure that all students receive the grades that they deserve?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for raising this issue; I am really sorry to hear about the uncertainty that it has caused students at West Notts college. He will understand that I cannot comment on individual cases, but I can say that Ofqual requires all awarding organisations to follow rigorous quality assurance procedures to ensure that marking is consistent and accurate. I understand that Ofqual issued enforcement action against three Pearson cases in December, resulting in a total of £2 million in fines.
Dr Danny Chambers (Winchester) (LD)
When I was studying for my A-levels, I had to work really hard to get the grades I needed to go on and study veterinary science at the amazing Liverpool University. Had social media existed at the time, I think it is really unlikely that I would have got the grades necessary, given that there are so many addictive algorithms that are distracting and bad for mental health. Will the Minister look seriously at the Liberal Democrat proposal to effectively ban social media in its current form for children? It is hugely distracting, and we want to ensure that every child can reach their educational potential.
Mr Speaker
That was a bit of stretch, I must admit. I do not know whether the Minister wants to stretch herself or not.
Georgia Gould
I cannot believe that you were not at university when social media existed—you look young enough to have been around—and I am amazed that you are able to concentrate in this Chamber. In all seriousness, we take the safety of young people incredibly seriously, which is why we are implementing the Online Safety Act 2023. We want to ensure that the opportunities of the internet are available to young people, but that they are kept safe online.
Mr Speaker
I gently say to the Minister that “you” refers to me. I certainly do not want to be held responsible.
Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)
Georgia Gould
Decisions about which GCSEs to offer are taken by independent awarding organisations, rather than central Government. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has written to these organisations to ask them to consider introducing a Ukrainian GCSE, and discussions are ongoing. Alongside that, we are also considering alternative ways of supporting Ukrainian language learning.
Joe Powell
I thank the Minister for her answer. Ukrainian children, including 2,500 under the brilliant Ukrainian St Mary’s Trust, headquartered in Kensington and Bayswater, have been warmly welcomed, yet they still lack access to formal qualifications in their language. Alongside educators and my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Andrew Lewin), I recently met representatives of the AQA exam board, who told us that some children even have to take exams in Russian, which obviously undermines their national identity and standards in their native language. Can the Minister look at expediting the welcome commitment to reintroducing the Ukrainian GCSE and explore giving formal recognition to some of the Ukrainian language classes already out there, and will she agree to meet me and Ukrainian educators to discuss this campaign further?
Georgia Gould
I am so grateful for all the brilliant educators who have worked so hard to welcome Ukrainian children to the UK, including the team at St Mary’s school. I was really pleased to hear about the positive conversations my hon. Friend has been leading, and I am grateful to him for championing this important issue. I would be delighted to meet him and educators to look at how we can support taking this forward.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Bath has proudly welcomed hundreds of Ukrainian refugees, and we stand in full solidarity with the people of Ukraine, especially in Oleksandriya, which is our partner city. It has been concerning to hear that, in some parts of the country, Ukrainians have been encouraged to learn Russian as a GCSE, which can retraumatise children, as we have just heard. Does the Minister agree with me that until a Ukrainian GCSE is rolled out, no Ukrainian refugee should feel pressured into learning Russian?
Georgia Gould
I absolutely agree that all children should get to choose their GCSEs. I also agree about the importance of pushing forward with qualifications that support Ukrainian children, which is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has written to exam boards asking them to consider this.
Mr Speaker
That was another good way of crowbarring something in, but I call the Minister.
Georgia Gould
We absolutely support the development of a British Sign Language GCSE. As I have said, we also support the development of a Ukrainian GCSE. We are taking this up with exam boards, and we will continue to do so.
Josh Babarinde (Eastbourne) (LD)
Does the Minister agree with me that any Ukrainian GCSE should also include teaching on the importance of national sovereignty and the international rules-based order? If so, does she agree that Donald Trump should be the first to sit that GCSE, so that in relation to Greenland, he can learn to keep his hands off a country that is not his?
Chris Bloore (Redditch) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
Where a council does not meet its special educational needs and disabilities duties, the Department will take action to prioritise children’s needs and support rapid improvement. The support and challenge offered are based on what works in SEND learnings and expertise from independent chairs, SEND advisers and SEND commissioners. The effectiveness of actions taken will be assessed by Ofsted monitoring inspections and robust monitoring by the Department.
Chris Bloore
I thank the Minister for her answer. She knows that Worcestershire county council has repeatedly failed children with special educational needs and disabilities and their families. Many parents report persistent failures to meet statutory duties and experiences of being dismissed or gaslit, causing prolonged distress to families already under extreme pressure. Can the Minister assure me and families in Redditch that, as part of the schools White Paper, she will be looking at how we can properly hold local authorities to account, and where there is failure, drive swift improvement?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend for raising this issue. I have travelled around the country talking to parents and, sadly, the story he has set out in his constituency of parents having to battle for support is one we hear in too many communities. We want to ensure that the voices of children and their parents are at the heart of reform, and we want a system based on partnership and collaboration, but we know that it has to be underpinned by robust accountability. In the meantime, we will continue to work closely with Ofsted to ensure that performance is monitored and, where it drops, that we are taking action.
Steve Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con)
In the Secretary of State’s letter to me of 11 January, she said that the much-needed special educational needs school, Lime academy in March, could proceed if the Lib Dem county council responds by 27 February to say that it is a priority. Could the Minister confirm from the Dispatch Box that funding will be allocated for that priority school if the local authority, run by the Lib Dems, confirms to the Government its desire to do so?
Georgia Gould
We have set out that that special school can continue. In most cases we have given local authorities a choice about whether they want to build a special school or come forward with places that would be fully funded. We can follow up with a letter, but our intention is to provide that support, which is why we have written to the right hon. Member.
Dr Beccy Cooper (Worthing West) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
The autumn Budget made it clear that future special educational needs and disabilities funding will be managed as part of overall Government departmental expenditure. We have subsequently set out new investment, including £3 billion for creating 50,000 new specialist places, and £200 million for SEND training for education staff.
Gregory Stafford
In Surrey, the high needs block deficit is forecast to rise to £165 million by 2027. Although Conservative-run Surrey county council has earmarked £144 million in reserves to ease that pressure, that cannot be a long-term solution. Can the Minister confirm whether and when Surrey’s safety valve agreement will be extended?
Georgia Gould
We recognise that the size of deficits that councils are accruing while the statutory override is in place might not be manageable with local resources alone. We will be setting out more information in the local government settlement this year.
Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for visiting my constituency last year, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education for visiting last week, when she came to see an expanded school nursery at Uplands primary in Sandhurst. She took the opportunity to speak to some fantastic hard-working teachers, and to hear their concerns about the level of SEND need and the need for more support. I welcome the announcement of £200 million extra funding for SEND training, which will be vital for teachers who need that extra support.
Georgia Gould
I was delighted to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency and to see some brilliant work, including a new SEND resource base that means children who would otherwise have to travel for miles are instead being educated in their community. As my hon. Friend sets out, I heard from teachers who wanted to put in more support but did not always have the tools to allow them to do so. I am delighted that we are able to invest in teacher training, which will support teachers in his constituency and across the country.
Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)
In Kirklees, where my constituency sits, three quarters of EHCPs—education, health and care plans—took more than 20 weeks. Some 46% took over one year, which is six and a half times higher than the 2024 national average of 7.3%. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure timely access to legally entitled support for children with SEND in Kirklees?
Georgia Gould
As I set out, we have heard that too many families across the country are having to fight for, and wait for, support. That is not acceptable, which is why we are bringing forward the investment in early intervention that we have talked about today: the £3 billion for specialist places, the £200 million for teacher training, and the Best Start hubs. But we know that more needs to be done, which is why we are having a national conversation about SEND and will be bringing forward reforms.
Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)
I note that the Minister has not been to Harlow yet. [Laughter.] Families in Harlow have completely lost faith in the SEND system that we inherited. I do not think that it is too much of a stretch to suggest that parents are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder after battling to get support for their children. Will she outline, based on the specialist places she mentioned in a previous answer, what the Government are doing to ensure that we have a system that does not pit families, and indeed education professionals, against a system that is broken?
Georgia Gould
I will make sure that that oversight is corrected as soon as possible—although, I am not sure that my hon. Friend has actually invited me to Harlow yet, but I know the Prime Minister has been. My hon. Friend has written to me with stories of parents fighting the system—I have heard many like them—completely exhausted and often having to give up their jobs in order to fight for support for their children. It is just not good enough. We recognise that support needs to be available much earlier, we are investing in it, and that is the basis of the reforms that we will be bringing forward.
Saqib Bhatti (Meriden and Solihull East) (Con)
I note that the Minister, in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford), said that the Budget gave much clarity, but the reality is that the Office for Budget Responsibility analysis highlighted a £6 billion funding gap. I almost feel sorry for the Education team, because the Chancellor has backed them into an uncomfortable corner with her own Back Benchers with nowhere to turn, but they do need to be honest with parents and teachers who rely on these provisions. So again we ask: how do they intend to fill the £6 billion black hole hanging over the Department? Will there be cuts to services or to schools?
Georgia Gould
The Chancellor and the Secretary of State have been crystal clear that any remaining deficits will come from across Government. Opposition Members know that but are seeking to spread fear among parents. As we have heard across the House, there is already enough fear about the system. As I have travelled across the country, I have heard from so many families who have been failed—failed for years under the hon. Member’s Government. That is the reality. If I was them, I would come to this Chamber with an apology or with some answers, but we hear neither. We are acting. We are putting £3 billion into desperately needed specialist places. We are putting £200 million into teacher training, which is something that has been asked for across the House. We have changed Ofsted. We are putting money into early intervention for children. We will back children and families across the country.
Rachel Taylor (North Warwickshire and Bedworth) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
Robust governance is crucial to achieving a strong schools system and helping every child to achieve and thrive. The Department has set out new guidance, including the academy trust handbook, setting out core expectations and providing essential support to governors, trustees and governance professionals in fulfilling their strategic and statutory roles.
Rachel Taylor
Financial mismanagement by the Arthur Terry Learning Partnership trust has led to disputes with the National Education Union and, currently, strikes, which is disrupting the learning of students across the west midlands, including at the Coleshill school and Curdworth primary school in my constituency. What steps is the Minister taking to ensure that academy trusts are well managed and build positive relationships with staff so that students and parents do not have to endure this disruption again?
Georgia Gould
I thank my hon. Friend and other colleagues who came to see me a few weeks ago about this issue and the impact it is having on their communities. We continue to work with the trust. The work of multi-academy trusts is crucial for children, families and school staff, and it is right that they are subject to transparent accountability. We are delivering our manifesto commitment by legislating to introduce Ofsted inspections of academy trusts and related intervention powers for the Secretary of State, which will support strong governance across the sector, ensuring that the interests of children always come first.
Sarah Dyke (Glastonbury and Somerton) (LD)
Pressures on schools to convert to academy trusts are considerable and widespread, but academising at all costs is not always in everybody’s interests. Some parents in Glastonbury and Somerton have told me that they are concerned that where decisions are taken across a number of schools, performance could diminish as a result. What steps is the Minister taking to monitor trusts and hold them accountable, especially where a school that has joined with an academy has failed to improve?
Georgia Gould
I have seen real benefits from collaboration in saving money and sharing best practice to support children in their learning. However, as I have just set out, it is crucial that there is strong accountability, and we are legislating to bring in inspections for multi-academy trusts to ensure that there is strong governance and accountability.
Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Ind)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
The Department for Education is currently reviewing the draft non-statutory guidance for schools and colleges on gender-questioning children, looking carefully at the consultation response. We are clear that children’s wellbeing must be at the heart of this guidance.
Rosie Duffield
The Secretary of State told the House that the guidance for schools would be published by the end of 2025, yet here we still are without the guidance anywhere to be seen. There is immense pressure on schools, colleges, children’s homes and other settings to socially transition children, often irrespective of parents’ wishes, with the obvious potential risks of long-term psychological harm to the children, many of whom, like Keira Bell and some taking part in the upcoming puberty blockers trial, will go on to change their minds over time. When can schools expect the guidance?
Georgia Gould
This is about the wellbeing of children and young people, and it is critical that we get it right. It is therefore important that we consider the consultation responses and evidence carefully alongside the view of stakeholders and the Cass review, in order to get the guidance right for young people.
Saqib Bhatti (Meriden and Solihull East) (Con)
That was a disappointing answer. The Government have been hiding behind the Cass review, which was published more than two years ago, for months. In April last year, the Education Secretary promised to publish the guidance by the end of the year, to give schools and teachers much needed clarity on these sensitive issues. That deadline has been spectacularly missed, and schools have been left in limbo to figure this out themselves. I implore the Secretary of State and the ministerial team to put ideology aside and finally act to protect our children. Will they do that?
Georgia Gould
This is a really serious issue that requires deep thought. We are working to ensure that we listen to the consultation and to experts to get this right for children. We make no apology for taking this decision carefully.
Daniel Francis (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Lab)
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I thank my hon. Friend for her efforts in so brilliantly representing the interests of visually impaired young people and the time that she has spent with me on this important topic. I am delighted to be attending a roundtable this week that she has organised with the Royal National Institute of Blind People to hear the personal testimonies of young people. All schools have legal duties to make reasonable adjustments for disabled pupils, and special schools must ensure that they cater for those with complex needs. I am really pleased that the teacher training announcement includes support for visually impaired children.
Marsha De Cordova
I welcome the work that the Minister is doing, and I look forward to our roundtable meeting. Research by Guide Dogs has found that 69% of non-specialist teachers said that they lacked the confidence and the skills to support disabled children, including children with visual impairments, so I welcome the Government’s new SEND announcement on teacher training, which I know will include blind and partially sighted children. However, training alone is not enough, so can the Minister set out what steps the Government are taking to ensure that schools and local authorities properly understand and implement their legal obligations on reasonable adjustments, so that blind and partially sighted children and young people are not put at a disadvantage?
Georgia Gould
We have commissioned research to strengthen the evidence base of what works to improve inclusive practice in mainstream settings, including for sensory impairment, and I look forward to discussing what more we can do together later this week.
Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
Blind and partially sighted children in the East Riding of Yorkshire receive lower funding through the higher needs block than anywhere else in the country, yet in the settlement the East Riding will receive the smallest increase in the country at just 2%, compared with an average of over 6%. How can it possibly be justified that children in the rural, coastal East Riding of Yorkshire, who are already the worst funded in the country, are going to see the gap widen? Minister, please explain.
Georgia Gould
Revenue funding for young people with complex SEND has increased by £1.8 billion since July 2024, bringing total high-needs funding to well over £12 billion. Will be setting out more in the schools White Paper around further funding and how that is distributed.
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
I thank my hon. Friend for our recent discussion about this issue. The £3 billion we are investing in schools is precisely for sensory rooms and other investments to make schools more accessible for young people. I would be delighted to join her on a visit.
Charlie Dewhirst (Bridlington and The Wolds) (Con)
Carla Denyer (Bristol Central) (Green)
Georgia Gould
The new guidance sets out inclusion for all children and the recognition of those relationships. As the hon. Member will know, that is mandatory in secondary school, and we continue to take that work forward.
Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)
Georgia Gould
We are committed to opening up access to school grounds and sports facilities; that is a key part of the school sport partnership work we are developing. I look forward to working with my hon. Friend to develop it.
Sarah Green (Chesham and Amersham) (LD)
The guidance for complaints in children’s social care was issued 20 years ago and has not been updated since. Those who work in the system say that it is out of date, and the ombudsman echoes their concerns. Will the Minister outline what steps the Department is taking to ensure that the guidance is up to date? Will he meet me to hear the concerns that have been shared with me?
Dedicated Schools Grant
Georgia Gould Excerpts(3 months ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
Today the Department for Education has published local authorities’ allocations through the dedicated schools grant for schools, high needs, central schools services and early years for 2026-27. Overall, core schools funding is increasing by £1.7 billion in 2026-27 compared with 2025-26, bringing total core schools funding to £67 billion next year.
For mainstream schools funding, the DSG allocations update the provisional national funding formula allocations that were published on 19 November 2025 with the latest pupil numbers from the autumn 2025 school census. Nationally, mainstream school funding in the DSG is increasing by 2.6% per pupil in 2026-27 compared with 2025-26. This will support mainstream schools with ongoing costs and deliver an excellent education for all, including pupils with special educational needs and disabilities.
High-needs funding for local authorities was increased by over £1 billion, or 11%, in 2025-26, and funding will continue at this increased level in 2026-27. This follows the announcements earlier this month of targeted funding for SEND specialists in Best Start family hubs to provide earlier intervention and support for children and families, and the Department’s announcement on 12 December of at least £3 billion of capital investment between 2026-27 and 2029-30 to deliver 50,000 specialist places, in addition to 10,000 places to be delivered through special and alternative provision free schools or alternative funding for local authorities.
Alongside the DSG allocations, pupil premium funding rates for 2026-27 have been published today. These rates are increasing by 2.23%, in line with the GDP deflator measure of inflation, as the Government continue to invest in closing attainment gaps and breaking the link between background and success.
The Government will publish the Schools White Paper in the new year, building on the work already done to create a system that is rooted in inclusion, where every child receives high-quality support early on and can achieve and thrive in their local school. The Government are undertaking a period of co-creation with families, teachers and experts from across the sector to hear their views and test proposals for reform. The White Paper will set out further details on the investment provided for SEND reform at spending review 2025—on top of the DSG allocations published today to deliver excellent, inclusive education for every child.
In setting their budgets for 2026-27, local authorities will need to continue to ensure that they fulfil existing statutory duties to secure appropriate provision for children with education, health and care plans in both mainstream schools and specialist settings, as well as support moves to make the education system more inclusive, in the run-up to wider reform.
We recognise that the size of deficits that councils are accruing while the statutory override is in place may not be manageable with local resources alone, and will bring forward arrangements to assist with them. The Government will provide further details on our plans to support local authorities with historical and accruing deficits, and on conditions for accessing such support, later in the local government finance settlement process. Support provided to local authorities will be linked to assurance that they are taking steps to make a reformed, inclusive education system a reality, in conjunction with the Government confirming the detail of SEND reform. Local authorities should not wait for these details to assess their current plans to ensure they are realising best outcomes and value for young people. Like all areas of spending, we continue to expect local authorities to make sure they are doing all they can locally to manage their system effectively, ensuring the money is being spent in line with best practice. This is a joint effort, with shared responsibility between Government, local authorities, health partners and schools.
Indicative allocations for the 2026-27 early years block of the DSG have also been published. The early years block funds Government-funded childcare hours, which are crucial to delivering our ambition for a record proportion of children to be starting school ready by 2028, as set out in the “Giving every child the best start in life” strategy. In 2026-27, we expect to spend over £9.5 billion on the early years entitlements—an increase of over £1 billion compared with 2025-26 that delivers an above-inflation increase to entitlements funding rates. Early years allocations are updated based on the numbers of children taking up the entitlements, with final allocations available in July 2027. This investment, alongside the hard work and dedication of early years educators, providers and local authorities, has ensured the successful expansion of Government-funded childcare, with the 30-hours roll-out saving working families an average of £7,500 a year.
The dedicated schools grant allocations are available at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dedicated-schools-grant-dsg-2026-to-2027
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Education
Georgia Gould Excerpts(3 months, 1 week ago)
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Baggy Shanker (Derby South) (Lab/Co-op)
Failed, humiliated and made to feel too much trouble for schools to look after—that is how one Derby mum says she and her son, who has cerebral palsy, felt when, after a staggering 14 months out of school, he was offered a school place that still did not meet his needs. Does the Minister agree that we urgently need to invest in schools to ensure that their facilities are fit to enable children with special educational needs to attend fully?
Georgia Gould
I am so sorry to hear that story. Sadly, I have heard too many such stories, of children kept out of education because schools are unable to meet their needs. That is the legacy we inherited, and that is why we are investing £740 million in improving the accessibility of our school buildings.
[Official Report, 1 December 2025; Vol. 776, c. 653.]
Written correction submitted by the Minister for School Standards, the hon. Member for Queen's Park and Maida Vale (Georgia Gould):
Georgia Gould
I am so sorry to hear that story. Sadly, I have heard too many such stories, of children kept out of education because schools are unable to meet their needs. That is the legacy we inherited, and that is why we are investing £740 million to support children and young people with SEND, including by improving the accessibility of our school buildings.
Village Schools
Georgia Gould Excerpts(3 months, 1 week ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)
It is a privilege to serve under your chairship, Ms Butler. I thank the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Manuela Perteghella) for securing a debate on this important matter. I share her commitment to investment in education; it is at the core of our opportunity mission, which is why we continue to invest in schools.
We have heard from the hon. Member and others about the importance of rural schools. We recognise the essential role that rural schools play in their communities. We know that to preserve access for young children, local authorities may need to maintain more empty places in schools in rural areas than in urban areas. Small schools generally receive more funding per pupil than larger schools, in recognition of the circumstances that they face.
Edward Morello (West Dorset) (LD)
The Minister says that rural schools receive more funding per pupil than urban schools, but one of my local headmasters, who previously taught in London, tells me that he received £10,000 per pupil in London but only £5,000 in West Dorset. That suggests that the Treasury funding model simply does not reflect the increased cost of living and of providing services in rural Britain. Will the Minister have conversations with the Treasury to get rurality included as a metric in its funding model?
Georgia Gould
The national funding formula accounts for the challenges faced by small schools in rural areas, both through the lump sum and through the sparsity factor. In 2025-26, primary schools eligible for sparsity funding attract up to £57,400, and all other schools eligible for sparsity funding attract up to £83,400. However, if the hon. Gentleman writes to me about the particular circumstances he raises, I will be very happy to look into them.
Today’s discussion has focused on the future of Great Alne primary school, a small rural school located on the edge of Great Alne, a village in Warwickshire. As I think the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon pointed out, it has been at the heart of the village for over 180 years, educating generations of families. It is known for its small class sizes and close-knit environment and offers a setting in which pupils receive individual attention. Its ethos, “responsible, respectful, ready”, reflects a commitment to nurturing well-rounded learners and positive values.
We believe that decisions about school closures always need careful reflection. They affect pupils, families and communities deeply. As part of this Government’s commitment to supporting every child to achieve and thrive, we want to ensure that every child has access to high-quality education in a sustainable setting. Great Alne primary school serves children aged between four and 11. It has an operational capacity of 105 places, but currently only 21 pupils are on roll, so just 20% of the available places are being used.
The Department has set out guidance to local authorities to support them in carefully considering whether school closure is appropriate. The local authority considers that it has followed the guidance and has actively sought to keep the school open. As the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon knows, the local authority has now progressed to the stage of consulting stakeholders on potential closure proposals.
Local authorities must ensure sufficient school places and manage the school estate efficiently. When school capacity data shows limited capacity in the immediate area for some year groups, the local authority has confirmed that spaces are available in neighbouring areas for any displaced pupils.
Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)
In my Hazel Grove constituency, the most rural area is Mellor. We have children from primary schools looking to go to Marple Hall, which is their nearest secondary school. Marple Hall has recently joined an academy trust, and of course different rules about admissions come with that. It is causing parents a lot of consternation about the future admissions policy. I wonder whether the Minister could comment on any plans that she and her colleagues have to look at how academies can set their admissions policy to ensure that all local children get a good local secondary place of their choosing.
Georgia Gould
As the hon. Member will be aware, local authorities have a responsibility to ensure that all children have a sufficient place. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which is progressing through the House of Lords, has some changes around admissions that we think will ensure that children get a place at a school that meets their needs.
The Department for Education recognises the importance of supporting rural schools and the educational offer in Warwickshire. We have worked in partnership with Warwickshire local authorities since Ofsted published an inspection report of “inadequate” in January 2023. Local authorities hold the statutory place-planning function, ensuring that there are sufficient schools to meet pupil needs. This includes collaborating with academy trusts and partners to balance supply and demand in line with changing demographics.
Markus Campbell-Savours (Penrith and Solway) (Ind)
It is not just about money. In my constituency of Penrith and Solway, we have seen the unrestricted change of use of properties from homes to holiday lets, which has led to the depopulation of villages and has undermined local schools. I understand that the Minister for Housing and Planning is currently deliberating on the regulation of the self-catering sector. Will the Minister raise this issue as part of those deliberations?
Georgia Gould
I thank the hon. Member for raising that critical issue. I would be happy to raise it to ensure that the impact on school places is taken into account as part of the decision making. I thank him for championing it.
We recognise these challenges. That is why we published “Running rural primary schools efficiently”, which examines how to run small rural schools effectively. Alongside it, “Opening and closing maintained schools” sets out statutory guidance for local authorities considering school closures. The guidance includes a presumption against the closure of rural schools. That does not, however, mean that a rural school will never close, but the case for closure must be strong and it must be clearly in the best interests of educational provision in the area.
I also want to respond to the points that have been made about home-to-school transport. We believe that it is critical for supporting children into education. I understand that Warwickshire county council has written to the Secretary of State with proposals to ask children to walk a greater distance, and the Secretary of State has responded very strongly against those proposals.
Tom Gordon
The home-to-school transport issue has affected people across North Yorkshire. One of the campaigners, Jo Foster, has been leading and working with the School Transport Action Group and has highlighted the inconsistency in the local authority’s approach. It used to be catchment-based, which makes sense in big rural areas that follow dales, rather than insisting that children must go to the nearest school geographically as the crow flies, which does not make sense. Will the Minister commit to ensuring that local authorities listen to parents on the ground and ensuring that children can get to the schools their siblings go to, on the routes that they used to be able to reach by public transport? That simply does not exist under these new provisions.
Georgia Gould
I thank the hon. Member for raising that issue, on which we are working with colleagues in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. If he writes to me about his specific concerns, I will make sure that they are raised as part of our ongoing work.
Ministers have no direct role in the local statutory process or decision-making arrangements for changes to maintained rural schools. These decisions rest with the local authority. We understand that Warwickshire county council has begun the pre-statutory process for a potential closure by 31 August 2026, which includes full consultation with parents, staff and the wider community. This is a significant decision, and we recognise the strength of local feeling. Our priority remains ensuring that every child receives the highest-quality education, and we will continue to work closely with Warwickshire county council throughout this process to achieve that goal. I welcome the specific points that have been made, and I will follow up on everything that has been discussed today.
Question put and agreed to.