Schools White Paper

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Monday 28th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

My hon. Friend raises a powerful point. We are considering a national professional qualification for special educational needs as well as early intervention. He will hear more about that from me tomorrow in the Green Paper announcement.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

Schools in Bedford and Kempston, like those everywhere else, have been through the most difficult period of disruption, and have had to do so on reduced budgets. Not once in any of the conversations I have had with heads, teachers or parents, who are desperate for support, has anyone asked for more targets. If targets were not being met before the pandemic, why does the Secretary of State think that increasing them is going to do anything but create more stress for children and drive more teachers from the profession?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I hope the hon. Gentleman was listening when I spoke about England rising up the international league tables around the world. That is because we are so focused on making sure that we back our teachers, train them well and then, of course, target our efforts, including on such successful programmes as the phonics screening check. I respectfully disagree with the hon. Gentleman: we need targets. That is why the primary target of 90% for achievement in maths and English and the GCSE average grade target going up from 4.5 to 5 are so important.

Budget Resolutions

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

It is always a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Ian Byrne). Since the Chancellor delivered his sprightly Budget, promising a real-terms rise in overall spending for “every single Department”, the emerging details have given us no cause for optimism. More money for public investment, for which my Labour colleagues and I have been asking for over a decade, is welcome. However, that every announcement was for the biggest sum in a decade only exposes how the Tories have starved every element of the public sector every year since they came to power.

My constituents have not forgotten the decade of Tory decimation of our public services. Although the Chancellor may finally have come around to Labour’s way of thinking, all his funding announcements have achieved in real terms, whether on education, local government or justice, is to take us back to pre-Tory Government spending levels. Despite his promises, public services will still be underfunded and under pressure. Given the Government’s habit of handing out profitable contracts to the private sector with little, if any, scrutiny or accountability, we cannot assume that any increases will ever reach frontline services.

The pandemic exposed how fragile local government services have become since 2010. From the public’s perspective, every public service is in crisis. Whether someone is trying to get a doctor’s appointment or a hospital appointment, trying to access the courts system, trying to get the police to come out to a burglary or anti-social behaviour in their community, or trying to access social care or council housing, the lack of investment in local government and public services has decimated communities and damaged the social contract between government and citizens. Taxes continue to rise, and people know that they are getting less in return.

The Chancellor promised bold action to address some of the problems caused by his Government, but the £5.4 billion from the health and social care levy will not kick in for three years. The social care crisis needs addressing now. The end of the public sector pay freeze is totally offset by the spectre of rising inflation and the looming cost-of-living crisis, with tax hikes for workers and tax cuts for banks and big business. What the Chancellor gave with one hand, he took away with the other, and the majority of us will take the hit for both.

One of the most astonishing aspects of the Budget was that, just days before the most important climate conference in a generation, the Chancellor failed to mention “climate” or “environment” once. Green transport is key to reaching our net zero targets, and a green rail network must be part of that ambition. The Treasury will continue to plough billions into the UK’s rail network to help train operators to cope with a fall in passenger numbers because of covid-19, but the funding falls way short of what is needed to level up local economies and decarbonise the transport system.

What a wasted opportunity it is that the Chancellor refused to commit to electrifying new rail infrastructure such as East West Rail from day one. Instead of encouraging domestic clean-energy rail use, he cut passenger duty on domestic flights and froze fuel duty. The Budget was a wasted opportunity to build a truly optimistic, sustainable future and meet the future needs of the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Vicky Ford]

The £3 billion education recovery interventions are largely targeted towards those children who need the most help. The catch-up and recovery premiums can be used flexibly by schools to support pupils with special educational needs, including those with dyslexia.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

Develop is part of a small not-for-profit organisation in Bedford providing personalised teaching and training to local learners. Many of its 31 students have special educational needs and disabilities and cannot attend a mainstream college, so can the Secretary of State explain why this incredible centre’s Education and Skills Funding Agency funding will be stopped in July and how it is to support its devastated students and families?

[Vicky Ford]

We have, of course, increased our high needs budget by nearly a quarter over the past two years and put additional funding, through the recovery and catch-up programmes, towards special needs, supporting those children who need to be in special schools and not mainstream schools, but I would be happy to meet the hon. Member and look at the specific case that he has raised.

Catch-up Premium

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

Just four months ago, we heard the Government make promises that every young person would be supported to catch up on their education and gain the skills and knowledge they need to be able to seize opportunities in future. After the catalogue of errors in dealing with the pandemic, with schools going back for just one day in January after the Prime Minister could not decide whether they were safe while hospitals were filling up with covid patients, it was encouraging to hear that the Prime Minister had hired the highly respected Sir Kevan Collins to step in and oversee the recovery from the biggest crisis our schools have ever faced.

Sir Kevan, knighted for his services to education, did exactly what was asked of him and led a comprehensive programme of catch-up aimed at young people who had lost out on learning during the pandemic. He estimated, with a strong evidence base, that £15 billion was needed to ensure that the nation’s children were not blighted by the huge hit to their education. Teachers agreed, parents agreed, but unfortunately the Prime Minister and the Chancellor did not. They gave away millions to friends and Tory donors for contracts that did not deliver, and they wasted billions on a test, trace and isolation programme that was a total failure when we needed it most, but when it comes to our children’s education, the purse strings are pulled tight, with just £50 per pupil per year to make up for the last 18 months.

Even today, because the Prime Minister failed to protect our borders, children are being sent home to isolate because of the delta variant. They are still being affected. The Government have offered just £1.4 billion, a pitiful offer to our children, who have had so much of their lives impacted. Their mental health and wellbeing have been severely challenged. Sir Kevan’s resignation letter to the Prime Minister says it all, really. He made it perfectly clear:

“I do not believe it will be possible to deliver a successful recovery without significantly greater support than the government has to date indicated it intends to provide.”

Certainly the teachers I have spoken to in Bedford and Kempston have told me that the funding announced by the Government will not scratch the surface in helping children to catch up. A primary school headteacher I spoke to yesterday told me that he is already trying to provide a quality, broad and balanced curriculum and to make up for the children’s time away from school on reduced funding. That was hard already, but the challenges posed in trying to provide what each child and family needs following the pandemic are monumental. That headteacher is ready, willing and able to offer interventions to give our children the best chance in life—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. Sorry, Mohammad, you have run out of time.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Monday 26th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct, as he would often say he always is; he is absolutely right on this issue. It is so important that employers look at the experience—what people have learnt over their careers—and the true value that they are able to bring to that company. We must not be trapped in the situation that so many companies get themselves into, whereby jobs are advertised as “graduate only”, when so many people who could be applying for that job would bring a level and depth of experience unequalled in so many other areas. I would happily work with the right hon. Gentleman to do more to ensure that all employers understand the value of a workforce of all ages.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

What assessment he has made of the potential merits of implementing a covid-19 recovery plan for disabled children and their families.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Vicky Ford)]

We are committed to helping all pupils and students, including those with disabilities, to recovery from any lost learning or development. We have already allocated £1.7 billion to support education recovery and have appointed Sir Kevan Collins, who has a wealth of experience on SEND, to lead our work to effectively target resources and support towards those with the greatest need.

[Mohammad Yasin [V]]

The Disabled Children’s Partnership says that the health of over half of disabled children has deteriorated due to delays and reductions in essential health and therapy appointments. The Government have advised that such appointments should be prioritised, but many families are not being reached. Will the Minister develop a cross-departmental therapies and health catch-up plan for disabled children and families as part of the wider covid-19 plan?

[Vicky Ford]

We have been very clear that schools and colleges remain open for therapists to attend, but some children will have missed some therapies during the pandemic. Schools can use their catch-up and recovery funding to purchase additional therapies, as I mentioned in my answer to an earlier question. Many schools, especially special schools, have done so already. I advise the hon. Member to ensure that he is in touch with local schools in Bedfordshire. In his own borough, we have increased the high-needs funding budget by 8% for this financial year, on top of an 8% increase last year. The funding should be there; please do get the therapists back into the schools and use that catch-up and recovery funding well.

Special Educational Needs

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Wednesday 21st April 2021 Westminster Hall

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) for introducing this much-needed debate.

For a number of years, the Bedford Inclusive Learning and Training Trust, or BILTT, has raised concerns about insufficient funding for its three special educational needs schools in Kempston: St John’s School, Grange Academy and Greys Education Centre. They are the most dedicated team of people, and they want the best for their pupils, but the current funding model means that their kids do not even get what is fair.

As hon. Members will be aware, the Education Committee’s report, “A 10-year plan for school and college funding” found SEND funding provision to be totally inadequate. Back in 2013, the Government announced funding for SEND pupils of £10,000 per place, with local authorities topping that up depending on pupils’ needs, typically via grants. Schools, like all parts of the public sector, have been affected by Government-imposed austerity over the past decade, but since 2013, mainstream schools have received funding increases from central Government. SEND pupils in Bedford, however, received no increases in either core funding or top-up funding between 2013-14 and 2019-20.

The DFE is deflecting its responsibilities for SEND pupils on to local government by suggesting that the increased funding has gone to local authorities, to be passed on to relevant schools—that has not happened. The local authority has only increased the top-up element in Bedford by 8.3%, which is the average for mainstream increases during the same period. That can be rectified only if central Government increase the core funding appropriately, so it is at least brought in line with the actual costs. As budgets have been frozen for seven years, and all costs—including staffing costs—have risen, it is impossible to balance future budgets.

As a trust, BILTT has cut back expenditure and staffing, but it cannot safely make any further savings. For the last two years the trust has set a deficit in annual budgets, but as a result of stringent financial management it has until now been able to deliver surpluses. In the Government’s extra funding offer for schools during the covid pandemic, schools with an in-year surplus were precluded from applying to cover the extra costs of the pandemic, which is completely short-sighted and patently unfair to the very children most at risk of covid complications. Reaching a surplus does not mean that the money saved is unaccounted for or not needed for planned future spending. Why are children in SEND schools being discriminated against in that way?

As the chair of BILTT told me,

“the funding situation continues to be wholly unsatisfactory, flawed and is continuously systemically discriminatory to pupils in Special Schools and Alternative Provision. These are the most vulnerable pupils in society, that are, increasingly, being underfunded by the current system.”

At a time when the Government are undertaking the long-overdue review of the special educational needs and disability system, the existing funding model for children with special educational needs is not fit for purpose. It is fundamentally unfair and needs urgent reform.

Support for University Students: Covid-19

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

It is completely unfair that teenagers just starting out in adult life are being expected to cover the cost of rental accommodation that they cannot even use in this pandemic. Will the Minister come up with an arrangement with landlords to allow students to leave or renegotiate contracts, and introduce means-tested maintenance grants to give the covid cohort some relief from the hardships they are bearing?

[Michelle Donelan]

We urge all accommodation providers, especially the large providers, to be as flexible as they possibly can and to have students’ best interests at heart, and we have seen the likes of Unite come forward and do that. The hardship funding we have allocated will help those who find themselves in hardship and not able to access any flexibility from their accommodation provider.

Educational Settings: Reopening

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

My hon. Friend is right that the Government want to see schools open. We believe that face-to-face education—being in the classroom, with their teacher—is best for the education of young people and their mental wellbeing, so we want to see schools open as soon as possible. As we have always said during the pandemic, schools will be the last to close and the first to open. We consult with stakeholders and advisory groups about the options for reopening, and we keep all those issues under review.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

There are children in Bedford and Kempston who still cannot access remote learning today because they do not have a digital device or broadband. So will the Government urgently tackle that inequality and put forward a long-term IT strategy for schools so that every child can learn from home and catch up after a year of disruption to their education?

[Nick Gibb]

Yes, I agree with the hon. Member. We have already purchased 1.3 million computers. They have been built to order, imported and distributed. We have distributed 876,000 of those devices, but it is not just about devices; it is also about data. We have partnered with the UK’s major mobile phone operators to provide free data for disadvantaged children to get online, as well as 4G wireless routers. I pay tribute to Three, EE, Tesco Mobile, SMARTY, Sky Mobile, Virgin Mobile, O2, Vodafone, BT Mobile and Lycamobile for working with us on this service-.

Remote Education and Free School Meals

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Monday 18th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

The shocking pictures we have all seen of the tiny portions of grated cheese, half-sliced tomatoes and, if lucky, half a pepper are a measure of the contempt that this Government have for low-income families. During the pandemic, we have seen the Government squander billions of pounds awarding contracts for failed systems and sub-standard produce to friends of the Tory party, whether qualified or not. Every tight-fisted parcel put together with as little food as they could get away with, and every carrot baton and half-cut fruit, is a symbol of the Government’s having been dragged kicking and screaming to do the right thing on free school meals every step of the way. They would have got away with the penny-pinching food parcels for our country’s poorest children if one parent had not posted a picture online.

It is a similar story with the laptops. Barely any of the promised laptops materialised last year. The Government had months to plan for the likelihood of the winter lockdown. Their reluctance to do so has meant that today kids in my constituency cannot access their online lessons because they do not have hardware. Schools and children are relying on charity to bridge the shortfall. I am extremely proud of the way the people of Bedford and Kempston have responded to the Government’s failings during the pandemic. I want to thank Susan Lousada, the High Sheriff of Bedfordshire, who is leading a fantastic campaign to get laptops to pupils, with Bedfordshire Learning Link, Bedford Modern School, Bedford Borough Council, local businesses and rotary clubs, donations from the Harpur Trust, the Blues Foundation, and the generosity of other charities and individuals. It has been truly inspiring and a world of difference from the cynical, can’t-do attitude I have seen from this Government.

The gap between the haves and the have-nots has never been wider. The digital divide has never been more obvious. It is not just low-income families who are really struggling; it is the just-about-managing, whom the Prime Minister’s predecessors identified but did nothing to help. If the levelling-up agenda of this Government was anything more than an empty slogan, the Government would support the motion and invest in our children, starting with a comprehensive review of free school meals. Food poverty is an entrenched, long-term issue that requires a considered, long-term solution. Getting free school meals right is a good place to start.

Covid-19: Educational Settings

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Wednesday 6th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

I would very much like to add my thanks to all the teachers in Telford, especially as one of my daughters is very privileged to be able to benefit from those teachers in my hon. Friend’s constituency. I echo her point that supporting children’s learning is not just about giving them a device; it is about how that device is used and how that child is supported, and the work we have undertaken over the past few months to support that through the Oak National Academy and the resources that are available is an important part of that. In terms of vaccinations and testing, we will always be pushing at the boundaries to maximise that for our education settings right across the country.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) [V]]

The Secretary of State has placed the decision about whether to open maintained nursery schools on governing boards. Will he make public health a priority, and guarantee full funding during this crisis to relieve boards such as the Bedford Nursery Schools Federation of the feeling of being coerced into remaining open to protect their future viability?

[Gavin Williamson]

We recognise that there are a lot of nursery schools that want to be in a position to open their doors. I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answers I gave earlier in this session about the reasons why we took that decision.