Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I will certainly have a look at my hon. Friend’s proposal. As he knows, we have made real progress on the electrification of railway lines as part of our infrastructure investment. I was in his constituency recently with representatives of the Homes and Communities Agency to look at a vital road development that is opening up economic development there, but I would be happy to look at the electrification project as well.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Schools with outstanding academic results can go for years and years with no inspection of their child protection procedures. Is it not time to make child protection much more central to the Ofsted process, and to ensure that every school’s child protection arrangements are inspected regularly?

[The Prime Minister]

I will look carefully at the hon. Lady’s point. For many years, inspections were seen as almost too routine in outstanding schools that were delivering good results. We needed to focus more on the failing schools and those requiring improvement. She makes an important point, however. Child sexual exploitation is an issue that we need to address in this Parliament and beyond, as are the issues of forced marriage and female genital mutilation, and it is important to know that the right safeguarding policies are in place. Of course, these things can also be triggered by boards of governors or by concerned parents, rather than having to have a routine inspection, but I will have a look at her proposal.