Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will bring forward legislative proposals to reduce the requirement on schools to serve three meat options a week.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
To ensure quality and nutrition in meals for the future, the department is acting quickly with experts across the sector to revise the school food standards, so that every school is supported with the latest nutrition guidance.
The review will consider all aspects of the school food standards. We intend to consult on these revisions and further details will be available in due course.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to ensure that free period products provided in schools are (a) certified organic single use disposables and (b) additive-free.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Nobody should have to miss out on education because of their period, which is why the department provides free period products to girls and women in their place of study through the Period Products Scheme. The scheme aims to remove periods as a barrier to accessing education and addresses pupils being unable to afford period products. Since the scheme began in 2020, 82% of eligible organisations in Devon have placed at least one order.
The scheme offers a broad range of products for organisations to choose from, including certified organic and chemical-free tampons and pads, as well as reusable options such as period pants. The Lil-Lets organic range, available on the scheme, meets recognised certification standards and is free from harmful chemicals.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to tackle period poverty through schools in Newton Abbot constituency.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Nobody should have to miss out on education because of their period, which is why the department provides free period products to girls and women in their place of study through the Period Products Scheme. The scheme aims to remove periods as a barrier to accessing education and addresses pupils being unable to afford period products. Since the scheme began in 2020, 82% of eligible organisations in Devon have placed at least one order.
The scheme offers a broad range of products for organisations to choose from, including certified organic and chemical-free tampons and pads, as well as reusable options such as period pants. The Lil-Lets organic range, available on the scheme, meets recognised certification standards and is free from harmful chemicals.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans her Department has to develop guidance for educational institutions (a) using and (b) procuring AI systems.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
To accompany the Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) policy paper, the department has published online materials to help educators use AI safely and effectively, developed in partnership with Chiltern Learning Trust and the Chartered College of Teaching. The materials are a toolkit for all educators, outlining the basic information that everyone working with young people should know about using AI safely, with some potential use cases, to help leaders address the risks and opportunities of AI, and how to consider AI as part of a wider digital strategy.
To help educational institutions procure safe and effective education technology (EdTech), the department wants to incentivise more evidence generation from EdTech companies by setting product quality standards and piloting how to assess products through the EdTech Evidence Board.
To ensure the safety of our children, the department announced the AI Product Safety Expectations in Education framework for technology companies, which sets out technical safeguards including prioritising child-centred design and enhanced filtering of harmful content.
The department will test an approach to quality assurance by engaging experts, such as company and sector representatives, data scientists, regulators, charities, academics and expert teachers, to assess edtech product evidence against set criteria and give judgements which could be made available to the sector.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of using non-deterministic AI in (a) marking, (b) admissions and (c) behaviour prediction on (i) schools and (ii) universities.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department aims to use evidence-based technology to reduce the time teachers spend marking, planning and form filling so their drive, energy and passion is fully focused on delivering change for children. The department provided £2 million funding to support Oak National Academy to develop artificial intelligence (AI) tools for teachers. Oak has launched an AI assistant called Aila that helps teachers create personalised lesson plans and resources in minutes, saving them hours each week.
In August 2024, the department announced the Education Content Store, a joint pilot with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, aiming to make the underpinning content and data that are needed for great AI tools available to developers. In parallel, the department has launched innovation funding to encourage developers to make use of the content store and stimulate the market to create high-quality marking and feedback tools.
Universities are independent and autonomous bodies responsible for decisions such as admissions, course content, teaching and assessment. They are responsible for designing and implementing their own policies and approaches to the use of AI as well as for taking steps to detect and prevent any form of academic misconduct by students including the misuse of AI, as set out in the Office for Students’ regulatory framework.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions she has had with stakeholders on (a) public, (b) cooperative and (c) non-profit models of supply teacher provision.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Supply teachers make an important contribution to the smooth running of schools across the country by filling posts on a temporary basis and covering teacher absences.
The department does not plan at this time to assess the potential merits of piloting a publicly funded national and regional supply teacher register. Schools and local authorities are responsible for the recruitment of their supply teachers and there are currently various approaches to providing supply teachers.
For example, local authority supply pools are one of the approaches to providing supply teachers and local authorities have the autonomy to decide whether to operate these supply teacher pools.
The department works closely with the Crown Commercial Service on supply teachers.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of piloting a publicly funded (a) national and (b) regional supply teacher register for England.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Supply teachers make an important contribution to the smooth running of schools across the country by filling posts on a temporary basis and covering teacher absences.
The department does not plan at this time to assess the potential merits of piloting a publicly funded national and regional supply teacher register. Schools and local authorities are responsible for the recruitment of their supply teachers and there are currently various approaches to providing supply teachers.
For example, local authority supply pools are one of the approaches to providing supply teachers and local authorities have the autonomy to decide whether to operate these supply teacher pools.
The department works closely with the Crown Commercial Service on supply teachers.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of the employment of supply teachers through private supply agencies on the (a) pay and (b) pension rights of early career teachers.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
No specific assessment has been made of the impact of the employment of supply teachers through supply agencies on the pay and pension rights of early career teachers.
The Teachers’ Pension Scheme (TPS) Regulations 2014, which set out the rules for the TPS in England and Wales, determine that for teachers to be eligible to join the scheme, their employment must be with an accepted employer, usually a school.
Where a supply teacher is employed directly by an accepted school, they will have the same participation rights as a permanent teacher, and they are eligible to participate in the scheme. Where supply teachers are self-employed, or employed by a supply agency and their services are provided under a contract for services, it is not possible for them to participate in the TPS as there is no organisation to undertake the employer duties required by the scheme regulations, these include paying contributions to the scheme and maintaining or remitting employment data.
The department has previously considered which categories of employer can be accepted into the TPS and ultimately determined that supply agencies should not be included. There are currently no plans to revisit this position.
If a supply teacher is employed by a private agency the employer can set the rate of pay.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what data her Department holds on the proportion of supply teachers employed through private agencies in (a) England and (b) the devolved Administrations.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The school workforce census does not identify supply teachers in England. However, teachers who are not directly employed by the school or local authority and who are in school on census day (early November each year) with a contract or service agreement lasting fewer than 28 days are recorded as ‘occasional’ teachers. In November 2024, schools reported 17,600 occasional teachers (headcount) on census day. This is up from the previous year when 15,800 were reported. The department only collects this information from state-schools in England. Education in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland is a devolved matter for the Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish Governments.
A survey conducted by the department in 2023 (“Use of supply teachers in schools”) found that 85% of supply teachers surveyed said they had obtained work through supply teacher agencies.
Just under half of all supply teachers surveyed (47%) wanted to stop working as a supply teacher within 12 months. 47% of those who wanted to stop working as a supply teacher wanted to leave in order to take up a permanent teaching position.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department (a) collects and (b) plans to collect data on the number of supply teachers leaving the profession annually.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
The school workforce census does not identify supply teachers in England. However, teachers who are not directly employed by the school or local authority and who are in school on census day (early November each year) with a contract or service agreement lasting fewer than 28 days are recorded as ‘occasional’ teachers. In November 2024, schools reported 17,600 occasional teachers (headcount) on census day. This is up from the previous year when 15,800 were reported. The department only collects this information from state-schools in England. Education in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland is a devolved matter for the Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish Governments.
A survey conducted by the department in 2023 (“Use of supply teachers in schools”) found that 85% of supply teachers surveyed said they had obtained work through supply teacher agencies.
Just under half of all supply teachers surveyed (47%) wanted to stop working as a supply teacher within 12 months. 47% of those who wanted to stop working as a supply teacher wanted to leave in order to take up a permanent teaching position.