Covid-19: Road Map

Mark Fletcher Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I sympathise deeply with students who have had a time at university that no other generation has put up with. I sympathise deeply with their sense of unfairness, with the experiences they have had. They have been heroic, by the way, in the in which they have been able to bring the disease down in some university towns by obeying the guidance. We will do whatever we can to support them, working with the university sector, to make up for the experiences they have been through and to make sure, insofar as we can, that we help them to get compensation.

[Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con)]

I very much welcome the Prime Minister’s statement today and the sustainable way out of this situation. It is absolutely right that we prioritise the reopening of schools and getting all children back into the classroom. Does the Prime Minister agree that it is now essential we work with parents, teachers and schools to develop a long-term plan for pupils to catch up on the education they have missed out on, particularly in areas like Bolsover?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and that is why Sir Kevan Collins has been appointed as the education recovery commissioner. We will be setting out plans that are intended not just to remediate the loss that kids have suffered during the pandemic, but to take our educational system forward and to do things that we possibly would not have done before to find new ways of teaching and learning that will make up the difference for those kids and more.