Oral Answers to Questions

Karen Bradley Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

What assessment he has made of the potential effect of the covid-19 pandemic on the Government’s policy to ensure that girls receive 12 years of quality education.

[Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to help ensure that every girl receives 12 years of quality education.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend, and reassure her that not only do we have a target of 40 million girls getting 12 years of education, but we want 20 million girls to become literate by the age of 10. With Kenya, we will be co-hosting a major summit in July this year to progress those goals. In January I was in Addis Ababa and had the chance to visit the Yeka Misrak Chora School, which showed me at first hand the incredible difference our aid budget makes.

[Karen Bradley [V]]

I welcome what the Foreign Secretary has said regarding the UK’s commitment to ensuring an education for girls. There is no doubt that the UK has world leadership on this issue, as we do on modern slavery and preventing gender-based violence, and of course it was the UK that worked to help stop Ebola becoming a global pandemic. Will the Foreign Secretary confirm his commitment not just to this area, but to maintaining overseas development spending on these very important issues?

[Dominic Raab]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about the importance of this issue. As we go through the difficult financial situation that we face, we have been very clear that girls’ education is a top priority to safeguard. On top of the money that we are putting in and the convening power that we are exercising with the joint summit we are hosting with Kenya, the Prime Minister has appointed my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant) as the special envoy on girls’ education.