First elected: 5th May 2005
Speeches made during Parliamentary debates are recorded in Hansard. For ease of browsing we have grouped debates into individual, departmental and legislative categories.
e-Petitions are administered by Parliament and allow members of the public to express support for a particular issue.
If an e-petition reaches 10,000 signatures the Government will issue a written response.
If an e-petition reaches 100,000 signatures the petition becomes eligible for a Parliamentary debate (usually Monday 4.30pm in Westminster Hall).
These initiatives were driven by Mark Pritchard, and are more likely to reflect personal policy preferences.
MPs who are act as Ministers or Shadow Ministers are generally restricted from performing Commons initiatives other than Urgent Questions.
Mark Pritchard has not been granted any Urgent Questions
Mark Pritchard has not been granted any Adjournment Debates
Mark Pritchard has not introduced any legislation before Parliament
Wild Animals in Circuses Bill 2017-19
Sponsor - Trudy Harrison (Con)
Events and Festivals (Control of Flares, Fireworks and Smoke Bombs Etc) Bill 2015-16
Sponsor - Nigel Adams (Con)
The security of Parliament and its Members is a priority for the Commission, and it expects everyone in the parliamentary community, including Members, Members’ staff and House Administration staff, to support this aim and manage sensitive information appropriately. As the Commission and parliamentary authorities have repeatedly made clear, unauthorised disclosure of confidential security advice can pose a direct risk to the security of those we are trying to protect.
The House of Commons Commission has not discussed sanctions on Members who share security advice. However, unauthorised disclosures may also amount to a breach of the Code of Conduct for Members, in which case it would be for the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards or the Committee on Standards to consider penalties on a case-by-case basis.
House Administration staff who make an unauthorised disclosure would be subject to disciplinary action as set out in the House of Commons staff handbook.
Staff employed by Members are not the direct responsibility of the Commission, as they are employed by their Member. However, the Commission would call upon the Member to set standards for conduct and behaviour, and to determine disciplinary action where appropriate. Unauthorised disclosure of confidential information by their staff could be considered gross misconduct.
Beyond formal sanctions, the Parliamentary Authorities engage extensively with Members, their staff and House Administration staff to ensure they understand the crucial role they have to play in the security of the parliamentary community, including information security.
We recognise that strong role models can be key in inspiring others, and in challenging harmful stereotypes.
My officials work closely with male business leaders and campaigners to help make the case that steps to improve equality benefit everyone. They also support work going on across government aimed at tackling gendered stereotypes.
In addition to this work, the Department of Health and Social Care is developing a Men's Health Strategy to address the leading health issues that affect men. The strategy will be part of the government's 10 Year Health Plan.
The Church Commissioners provide funding to pay for the dean and two canons as part of cathedral staff and have a Cathedral Sustainability Fund to which all cathedrals can apply. The role and funding of cathedral choirs is a matter for the dean and chapter of each cathedral, however during the pandemic the Church Commissioners made £1million available, match funded by the Cathedral Music Trust, to retain the skills of musicians throughout. As many will have experienced during the special events like the Coronation and over Christmas, cathedral music and the choral tradition in our churches is a unique part of the English cultural life.
A conference was held at Leicester Cathedral on November 14th 2024 organised by the Association of English Cathedrals and Cathedral Music Trust, which discussed many of the issues facing music in our cathedrals and explored ways forward. The Bishop of St Albans and the Bishop of Southwark have also raised the impact on cathedral choir schools of recent NI and VAT policy announcements, with Ministers in the House of Lords.
In Lichfield Diocese, the cathedral supports many good initiatives, and the choir is thriving. More information can be found about their activities here: https://www.lichfield-cathedral.org/worship-music/music-share
The House of Commons Administration is aware of the risks, and carefully considers hardware procurements, and any security implications of using Chinese manufactured IT hardware on the parliamentary estate. We work with government departments to ensure that we work in line with the latest advice and guidance. The procurement of much of Parliament’s IT hardware (i.e. laptops, printers, tablets and accessories) is managed by a UK-based company called XMA.
As set out in the Plan For Change, this Government’s first duty is to make the UK safer, more secure, and resilient against the growing and interconnected threats from state, state-linked and non-state actors. We are committed to working across Government, as well as with partners internationally and in the private sector and academia, to prevent harm; deter and disrupt threats; respond effectively to incidents; and recover swiftly.
Work is already underway across Government to deliver this commitment, and requirements for any new structures or groupings will be kept under review, including in the context of the ongoing development of the National Security Strategy.
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Question of 21st March is attached.
Both the UK and the EU allow for visa-free short-term travel in line with their respective arrangements for third country nationals. The UK allows EU citizens short-term visa-free travel for up to six months. Meanwhile, the Schengen Borders Code allows for certain third country nationals to travel within the Schengen Area for up to 90 days in any 180-day period; this is standard for third countries travelling to the EU. The UK Government will continue to listen to and advocate for UK nationals.
Most office-based civil servants are expected to spend 60% of their working time in the office, setting a consistent balance across the Civil Service. Departments, as individual employers, are responsible for any other measures.
I apologise to the Rt. Hon. Member for the delayed response to his question of 6 December.
The Online Safety Act, brought forward by the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology, introduced the false communications offence. This offence captures communications where the individual knows the information to be false and sends it intending to cause harm, without reasonable excuse.
Further legislative proposals on online media usage would fall within the remit of the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology.
The Civil Contingencies Act (CCA) 2004 and the associated Regulations deliver a single framework for civil protection in the UK. The legislation is deliberately broad ranging and sets out the requirements to consider all emergencies that threaten serious damage to human welfare in the UK; the environment of a place in the UK; or war, or terrorism, which threatens serious damage to the security of the UK.
The Government keeps this legislation under review. The Cabinet Office has a legal obligation to review the CCA every five years. The most recent review was published in March 2022 and concluded that the Act continues to achieve its stated objectives. It did set out recommendations to strengthen the system and its planning which are being considered as part of the Resilience Review.
Cosmetics products must comply with some of the strongest safety standards in the world before they can be placed on the GB market. Government works with local enforcement authorities to take effective action when products are identified that do not meet these safety requirements, ensuring unsafe items are removed from sale.
Government has introduced the Product Regulation and Metrology Bill, which explicitly recognises the role of online marketplaces to ensure consumers are protected from unsafe products. We intend to use the powers in the Bill to introduce requirements on e-commerce models to help prevent the sale of unsafe products online.
Local authority trading standards services oversee numerous pieces of legislation, including consumer protection, product safety, weights and measures, food standards, animal health and welfare, environmental protection, estates and lettings, and age-restricted products such as alcohol and tobacco, among other legislative responsibilities.
The Department of Business and Trade is responsible for the consumer protection function. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 updated and strengthened civil enforcement powers for public designated enforcers, including the ability for trading standards services to apply to the court for an enforcement order with a monetary penalty of up to 10% of turnover.
The government produces estimates of the levels of employee and self-employed jobs by industry sector on a quarterly basis (Mar, Jun, September and Dec). Data on the number of jobs by industry sector in December 2024 will be published on 20th March 2025.
UK product safety legislation requires manufacturers or importers placing products on the UK market, including e-bikes and e-scooters, to ensure those products are safe. Regulators have powers to require that unsafe products are removed from sale.
We will introduce a new Bill to ensure the product safety framework keeps pace with modern technology, digital business models and international supply chains. This will better protect consumers and support business growth.
The Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero looks forward to meeting the new US Energy Secretary to discuss our shared values and interests across a full range of energy issues.
Through the Review of Electricity Market Arrangements, we are exploring several ways to reduce energy bills by making more efficient use of the energy infrastructure we are building. As part of this we are considering zonal pricing, alongside options for further reform within our current national pricing arrangements. Government is considering these options carefully and will provide more information in due course.
Child online safety is of the utmost importance to the government. Under the Online Safety Act, user-to-user services likely to be accessed by children must protect them from harmful content. Ofcom’s draft codes of practice include recommendations for services to meet these duties, including ensuring that algorithms do not target children with harmful content.
Any attempt by malign state actors to interfere in the UK’s information environment is unacceptable. The Foreign Interference Offence is a priority offence in the Online Safety Act, it requires all in-scope companies to take action against a range of state-linked disinformation and interference online.
Government is committed to tackling the harm posed by the creation of non-consensual intimate images. We are bringing forward legislation to criminalise this behaviour in the Data (Use and Access) Bill. The new legislation will ensure that offenders face the appropriate punishments for this atrocious harm.
The sharing of or threatening to share a deepfake intimate image without consent is already a criminal offence under the Online Safety Act and was designated as a priority offence in November 2024. Companies in scope of the Act’s illegal safety duties will be required to proactively tackle this type of content, preventing its proliferation online.
Non-consensual sexually explicit deepfakes are degrading and harmful. We refuse to tolerate the violence against women and girls that stains our society, which is why we’ve brought forward legislation in the Data (Use and Access) Bill to ban their creation as quickly as possible.
The Home Office is funding the police to detect and remove illegal deepfake images and are working closely with them to improve officers understanding of this emerging threat.
The Independent Pornography Review assesses the effectiveness of current pornography legislation, regulation, and enforcement. It is an important area of interest for this government. The Review has now just concluded. The government is assessing its findings and the final report will be published in due course.
Under the Online Safety Act, publishers of pornography online and user-to-user services that allow sharing of pornographic content have a duty to use highly effective age assurance to prevent children from accessing this.
The Act requires Ofcom to produce and publish a report on in-scope services’ use of age assurance solutions, within eighteen months of these duties coming into force.
Ofcom has set out in its guidance on enforcement. This guidance includes the information Ofcom will generally publish when opening an investigation, including the identity of the subject and scope of the investigation.
The government acknowledges rapid evolutions in the global satellite communications sector. Monopoly rarely serves the public interest and a competitive market is important to ensuring public and private sector value. We are keen to secure UK leadership in commercial satellite communications, which is why the UK has:
The Online Safety Act 2023 places duties on user to user services to proactively mitigate the risk that their services are used for illegal activity or to share illegal content. This includes content that incites violence and content which stirs up religious or racial hatred. The Act is currently being implemented. Ofcom will have a broad range of powers to assess and enforce compliance with the Act, including issuing fines to services that do not comply of up to £18m or 10% of qualifying worldwide revenue in the relevant year, whichever is higher.
The Department regularly engages with Ofcom on a range of issues including the importance of a competitive and diverse broadcasting sector.
Ofcom has a statutory duty under the Communication Act 2003 to secure and maintain a sufficient plurality of providers of different TV and radio services. Ofcom also has a duty to review the operation of media ownership rules across TV, radio and press every three years. Ofcom published their latest review on 15 November 2024.
As a public service broadcaster that matters hugely to public life, the BBC must be responsive to viewers and listeners and tell inclusive stories about the lives of all people, in all parts of the UK. Under the current Charter, the BBC has an obligation to ‘reflect, represent and serve the diverse communities of all of the United Kingdom’s nations and regions’. The BBC is operationally and editorially independent of the Government in determining how it meets that obligation, and it is for the independent regulator Ofcom to hold the BBC to account.
As part of the next Charter Review, the Government will engage with the BBC and others to consider how to ensure the BBC thrives well into the next decade and beyond. This will include discussions on a range of important issues and will start a national conversation to make sure the BBC truly represents and delivers for every person in this country
The Government recognises the important positive contribution made by our creative industries, including our public service broadcasters, in informing, educating, and entertaining audiences. However, editorial decisions are ultimately a matter for individual production companies.
The Advertising Standards Authority co-regulates broadcast advertising under contract with Ofcom and its sister organisation, the Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice (BCAP), sets the advertising codes. The codes require that advertisements must not portray or represent anyone who is, or seems to be, under 18 in a sexual way and care must be taken when scheduling advertisements in or around children's programmes or programmes likely to be seen by significant numbers of children.
The Broadcast Advertising Code has a dedicated section on protecting children, with rules designed to ensure that adverts do not contain anything that is likely to cause children physical, mental or moral harm, and the ASA administers these rules robustly. All broadcast advertising is pre-approved to ensure it is compliant with the BCAP Code before it is aired, through a system known as Clearcast. Clearcast has well established processes to ensure advertising content is thoroughly checked before it appears on television and puts restrictions in place when necessary.
The GRA’s decisions are made independently of the government, which is important to ensure impartiality. The GRA’s age ratings serve to protect the public and empower people to make informed gaming choices, whilst also recognising and respecting adult freedom of choice within the law. The GRA regularly conducts UK research on aspects of the international PEGI classification criteria for video games.
In most cases, the GRA is able to address issues of potential harm by awarding an appropriate age rating or suggesting changes to a developer’s content to make the game acceptable. However, where this is not possible, a classification may be refused.
Even if material is not in breach of a specific UK law, the GRA may also refuse to classify content,
on harm grounds, when content contains:
● Material that promotes criminal activity, including drugs;
● Material that is illegal or has been created by the commission of a criminal offence;
● Portrayals of children in a sexualised or abusive context;
● Material which makes rape, or other non-consensual sexually violent behaviour, or
sadistic violence look appealing.
Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code includes rules intended to protect the welfare and the dignity of people under eighteen who take part or are otherwise involved in programmes. Revisions to the Code are a matter for Ofcom as the independent regulator.
The Advertising Standards Authority co-regulates broadcast advertising under contract with Ofcom and its sister organisation, the Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice, sets the advertising codes. The codes require that advertisements must not portray or represent children in a sexual way and care must be taken when scheduling advertisements in or around children's programmes or programmes likely to be seen by significant numbers of children.
The classification system has addressed these issues under successive governments, but decisions regarding the classification of films are made by the BBFC and the Games Rating Authority, not the BBFC, is responsible for the classification of video games. The BBFC’s decisions are made independently of the government, which is important to ensure impartiality. The BBFC’s age ratings serve to protect the public and empower people to make informed viewing choices, whilst also recognising and respecting adult freedom of choice within the law.
The standards underpinning the BBFC’s ratings are set out in their published Classification Guidelines, and are based on consultations every 4-5 years with experts and thousands of members of the public.
If the BBFC finds that a film raises issues or concerns that cannot be addressed through their classification system, they may require compulsory cuts or other changes as a condition of classification.
Since August 2022, Lichfield Cathedral has received £161,242 through the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme, and Hereford Cathedral has received £27,639.
The National Lottery Heritage Fund has also supported both of these Cathedrals. Lichfield Cathedral has received £1,707,762 since 1996.Hereford Cathedral has received £6,135,300 since 2003.
Departmental settlements have been set by The Treasury following the Budget announcement on October 30. Individual programmes will now be assessed during the departmental Business Planning process.
The Government is committed to doing more to ensure that everyone from all backgrounds have access to and benefit from quality sport and physical activity opportunities. Sport and physical activity is central to achieving our health and opportunity manifesto missions, with the biggest gains coming from supporting those who are inactive to move more.
The Government provides the majority of support for grassroots sport through Sport England - which annually invests over £250 million in Exchequer and Lottery funding. Sport England’s work focuses on increasing participation in sport and to boost diversity at a grassroots level to give more and better opportunities to all.
Sport England provides long term investment to the Lawn Tennis Association, the National Governing Body for tennis in Britain, which receives up to £10.2 million for five years to invest in community tennis initiatives that will benefit everyone.
No teacher should feel unsafe or face violence or abuse in the workplace. The department will always support teachers to ensure they can work in safe and calm classrooms. All school employers, including trusts, have a duty to take reasonable steps to protect the health, safety, and welfare of their employees.
Schools should have their own clear processes in place for dealing with issues of bullying or harassment from parents. All incidences of bullying or harassment by a parent should be reported immediately to the designated lead and head teacher or governing body or proprietor.
Should the incident constitute a potential criminal offence, it would be for the school to consider involving the police, having followed the advice contained in the ‘When to call the police’ guidance for schools and colleges by the National Police Chief’s Council, written in partnership with the department and Home Office.
For staff who are experiencing bullying or harassment from any source, support is available from sources including Education Support, a charity supporting the mental health and wellbeing of teachers and education staff in schools, colleges and universities.
The Prevent duty safeguards children and young people from extremist ideologies to prevent them from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism. The department publishes over 150 resources to support schools, parents and pupils in protecting children from extremism. These resources can be found at: https://www.educateagainsthate.com/.
For any new school building the department recommends a security risk assessment is completed which will set out any necessary safeguarding and security requirements, where they are suitable.
The department publishes comprehensive and well-established ‘Protective Security and Preparedness’ guidance which helps staff prepare for and respond to terrorist and other significant threats. This guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/protective-security-and-preparedness-for-education-settings.
The government will further strengthen the national security response through measures included in the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill. The Bill will require all education settings to take forward public protection procedures. This will establish a legal requirement which specifically relates to the response to a terrorist attack.
This government is committed to ensuring that children, young people and adult learners are safe from terrorist incidents and attacks. This is why the department publishes comprehensive guidance alongside a range of high-quality resources to support education settings in their protective security, and their preparedness and response to incidents and attacks.
The ‘Protective Security and Preparedness for education settings’ guidance, developed in collaboration with the National Counter-Terrorism Security Office, offers a comprehensive approach to enhancing safety and preparedness, ensuring that educational settings can provide a secure and supportive environment for learning. This includes planning for a number of different response options such as lockdown, evacuation and invacuation, communicating during an incident, having plans in place to respond effectively to different types of incidents and testing out those plans.
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education meets with a wide range of external stakeholders who represent children’s interests as part of her ministerial work. Details of ministers’ external meetings are published in quarterly ministerial transparency returns.
The government’s ambition is that all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or in alternative provision receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
At the Autumn Budget 2024, the government announced a £1 billion uplift in high needs funding in the 2025/26 financial year, providing additional support and improving outcomes for the more than a million children in the state sector with SEND.
Most children with special educational needs, including most with education, health and care (EHC) plans, are already educated in mainstream state-funded schools. All state-funded schools support children with SEND. All children of compulsory age are entitled to a state-funded school place that is free for parents. Where a private school place is necessary to support a child with SEND, the local authority will fund it through an EHC plan.
Local authorities have a statutory duty for ensuring sufficient state school places in their area. Local authorities routinely support children who need a state-funded school place, including where private schools have closed or where pupils move between schools. The department does not collect data on in-year school applications or admissions, but where local authorities are experiencing difficulties in ensuring there are enough school places for children who need them, the department will offer support and advice.
The department expects all schools admitting new pupils in-year to provide them with appropriate support, including where they have SEND. Schools will need to work with their local authority where pupils have additional needs that cannot be met within the school.
Schools with charitable status are required to demonstrate public benefit to retain their charitable status and engaging in partnership activities with state-funded schools is one such way to do that. This may in some cases include the sharing of private school facilities, such as sporting facilities. The government does not expect the introduction of VAT to reduce a school's obligations to show public benefit or for partnership activity to decrease.
The department’s home-to-school travel policy aims to make sure that no child is prevented from accessing education due to a lack of transport. Local authorities must arrange free home-to-school travel for eligible children of compulsory school age, who attend their nearest school and would not be able to walk there because of the distance, their special educational needs, disability or mobility problem, or because the nature of the route means it would be unsafe for them to do so. Schools are not required to arrange home-to-school travel for their pupils, but some choose to do so. We do not expect the removal of the VAT exemption on independent school fees to have an impact on the provision of home-to-school travel for children with SEND.
In 2022/23, there were 201 notifications where a child had died and abuse or neglect was known or suspected or where a looked after child had died, whether or not abuse or neglect is known or suspected. These statistics show the number of incidents notified in the period, rather than the number of incidents that occurred in the period and are based on one notification per incident, which can relate to more than one child in some instances.
Protecting children at risk of abuse and stopping vulnerable children falling through cracks in services are at the heart of the government’s landmark Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, introduced on 17 December. Reforming children’s social care is critical to giving hundreds of thousands of children and young people the start in life they deserve. This includes ensuring that every child is safe inside and outside of their home and has access to the right help at the right time.
This government’s vision to ensure children are kept safe is reflected in the legislative changes we are making in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. This includes:
The department continues to deliver whole-system reform to help families to overcome challenges, stay together and thrive, where appropriate, and to keep children safe and in stable loving homes, including when they cannot stay with their family. This includes through the roll out of the Families First for Children Pathfinder and Family Networks Pilot, which includes multi-agency child protection reforms. The ‘Local Government Finance Settlement’ policy statement also set out an additional £250 million through the Children’s Social Care Prevention Grant which will enable investment in prevention activity, and is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/local-government-finance-policy-statement-2025-to-2026/local-government-finance-policy-statement-2025-to-2026.
Tackling domestic violence and abuse is a priority for this government, and we are committed to using every government tool available to target perpetrators and address the root causes of such abhorrent behaviours. Cross-government delivery of the Opportunity and Safer Streets Missions is driving policy and practice improvements for child victims of domestic violence and abuse. The department is also working with other departments and the wider sector, including local authorities and schools, to ensure that children are recognised as victims in their own right in line with the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, and that the best use is made of available resources in the provision of universal, targeted and specialist support for child victims.
Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 places a duty on maintained schools, academies and pupil referral units to make arrangements for supporting pupils with medical conditions. The accompanying statutory guidance, ‘Supporting pupils with medical conditions at school’, makes clear to schools what is expected of them in taking reasonable steps to fulfil their legal obligations and to meet the individual needs of pupils with medical conditions, including allergies. Schools should ensure they are aware of any pupils with medical conditions and have policies and processes in place to ensure these can be well managed. The guidance can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions--3.
The guidance is clear that policy should include how it will be implemented, what should happen in an emergency situation and the role individual healthcare plans play in supporting pupils. The policy should set out how staff will be supported in carrying out their role to support pupils, including how training needs are assessed and how training is commissioned and provided. Any member of school staff providing support to a pupil with medical needs should have received suitable training.
Regarding equipment, in 2017 the Department of Health published non-statutory guidance to accompany a legislative change to allow schools to purchase spare adrenaline auto-injectors (AAIs) from a pharmacy without a prescription and for use in an emergency situation. This guidance is kept under review and gives clear advice to schools on the recognition and management of an allergic reaction and anaphylaxis, and outlines when and how an AAI should be administered for pupils in schools.
Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 places a duty on maintained schools, academies and pupil referral units to make arrangements for supporting pupils with medical conditions. The accompanying statutory guidance, ‘Supporting pupils with medical conditions at school’, makes clear to schools what is expected of them in taking reasonable steps to fulfil their legal obligations and to meet the individual needs of pupils with medical conditions, including allergies. Schools should ensure they are aware of any pupils with medical conditions and have policies and processes in place to ensure these can be well managed. The guidance can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions--3.
The guidance is clear that policy should include how it will be implemented, what should happen in an emergency situation and the role individual healthcare plans play in supporting pupils. The policy should set out how staff will be supported in carrying out their role to support pupils, including how training needs are assessed and how training is commissioned and provided. Any member of school staff providing support to a pupil with medical needs should have received suitable training.
Regarding equipment, in 2017 the Department of Health published non-statutory guidance to accompany a legislative change to allow schools to purchase spare adrenaline auto-injectors (AAIs) from a pharmacy without a prescription and for use in an emergency situation. This guidance is kept under review and gives clear advice to schools on the recognition and management of an allergic reaction and anaphylaxis, and outlines when and how an AAI should be administered for pupils in schools.
I refer the right hon. Member for The Wrekin to the answer of 11 November 2024 to Question 12804.
The VAT treatment of the hiring or letting out of facilities will not change as a result of the decision to impose VAT on private school fees. HM Revenue and Customs have published guidance on charging and/or reclaiming VAT on goods and services related to private school fees, which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/charging-and-reclaiming-vat-on-goods-and-services-related-to-private-school-fees.
In addition, in line with their charitable objectives, private schools demonstrate public benefit through partnerships with schools in the state sector. The government expects private schools to continue to work with schools in the state sector to demonstrate public benefit in this way. The government does not expect the imposition of VAT on school fees to reduce the efforts that private schools invest in their partnership working with state-funded schools.
The government’s ambition is that all children and young people receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life. The department is committed to improving inclusivity and expertise in mainstream schools, as well as ensuring special schools cater to children and young people with the most complex needs. This will help to restore parents’ trust that their child will get the support they need.
All schools have duties under the Equality Act 2010 towards individual disabled children and young people. They must make reasonable adjustments, including the provision of auxiliary aids and services for disabled children, to prevent them being put at a substantial disadvantage.
The department is committed to ensuring a steady supply of teachers of children with vision impairment in both specialist and mainstream settings. To teach a class of pupils with vision impairments, a teacher is required to hold the relevant Mandatory Qualification for Sensory Impairment (MQSI). There are currently seven providers of the MQSI.
Moreover, the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education is developing a new occupational standard for teachers of pupils with sensory impairment, which is expected to be available from September 2025. This will improve the supply of those qualified to teach this important cohort and further help to improve their educational outcomes.
Swimming and water safety is a vital life skill and that is why pupils are taught how to swim and be safe in and around water at primary school.
Swimming and water safety are compulsory elements of the Physical Education (PE) National Curriculum at Key Stages 1 and 2. For example, it includes teaching on how to perform safe self-rescue in different water-based situations.
The department is focusing on a number of measures to support teaching in this area, as part of its ongoing review of the Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) curriculum. The public consultation on the revised draft RSHE statutory guidance closed on 11 July 2024. The revised guidance includes a new section called ‘Personal safety’, which outlines that pupils should know how to identify risk and manage personal safety in increasingly independent situations including around roads, railways and water.
It is vitally important that teachers have clear guidance, which is why the department will be looking carefully at the consultation responses, re-engaging with stakeholders and considering the relevant evidence before setting out next steps to take the RSHE guidance forward.
The department is also working closely with swimming and water safety stakeholders such as the Royal Life Saving Society UK and Swim England to support schools in raising attainment in primary school swimming and water safety. Support and advice from Swim England includes resources for schools and parents, which can be found at the following links: https://www.swimming.org/schools/ and https://www.swimming.org/learntoswim/learn-to-swim-information-for-parents/.
Department officials have also worked alongside the National Water Safety Forum to develop free resources for schools to provide vital water safety knowledge that can go a long way to reduce drowning deaths. These resources can be found on the Royal Life Saving Society website at: https://www.rlss.org.uk/Pages/Category/water-safety-education.
Ofsted’s overall role is to make sure that schools provide high and rising standards for every child through its inspection and reporting process. The School Inspection Handbook does not set any specific expectations for schools regarding site security. However, if inspectors had particular concerns about the adequacy of the physical security of school buildings, those concerns would be reported on.