Children with Allergies: School Safeguarding

Sarah Edwards Excerpts

Thursday 3rd July 2025 Westminster Hall

[Chris Bloore (Redditch) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of safeguarding children with allergies at school.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. First, I would like to declare that I am an officer for the all-party parliamentary group on allergy. To be clear, I am not the first person to host a Westminster Hall debate or an Adjournment debate on the topic; Members who have been in this place for a much longer time than me, most notably the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Rutland and Stamford (Alicia Kearns) have long called for improvements to allergy safety in schools, and I pay tribute to them.

Many of us have experience of allergies: one in three people in the UK now live with allergic disease. In fact, this afternoon my speech will be tempered by the fact that my own allergies have taken control this morning, so I apologise for the slightly laboured delivery. I have my own personal experience, too; my son suffered a severe allergic reaction to an over-the-counter medication. The terrifying car journey to the hospital, watching his whole body turn blotchy red and not knowing what was wrong, is a fear that no parent should have to endure. The months that followed were filled with anxiety about what else he might be allergic to, and constant worry about receiving a call from nursery with bad news.

I have experienced this on a small scale, compared with many parents who live with the fear every day. I will not be commenting on individual cases, for legal reasons and because of ongoing legal proceedings, but I want to make clear that any child who has been lost in our schools because of an allergic reaction is one too many. Hospital admissions for allergic reactions have risen by over 160% in the past 20 years, and 50% of children are now affected by at least one allergic condition. Every year, approximately 43,000 new cases of child allergy require care. The number of children diagnosed with allergic rhinitis and eczema has tripled in 30 years, with 3.9 million currently affected. Studies show now that incidents of food allergies in England nearly doubled between 2008 and 2018, with a prevalence of 4% among pre-school children.

Children spend at least 20% of their waking hours in school, and food allergies affect around two children in every classroom. It should come as no surprise that 18% of food allergy reactions and 25% of first-time anaphylactic reactions occur in the school environment. Given the amount of time spent at school and the proportion of children affected, it is vital that children and their parents feel that school is a safe place and prepared to deal with allergic reactions, but sadly that is often not the case.

[Sarah Edwards (Tamworth) (Lab)]

Parents want to know that their children can go to school safely, but they might equally have a reaction when they are not at school; 70% of parents of children with allergies report that they have experienced an absence because of an allergy. Does my hon. Friend agree that the vast number of difficulties faced by children with allergies and their parents merits the creation of a cross-departmental allergy tsar who could advise the Government on all the ways that allergies affect the sufferer?

[Chris Bloore]

My hon. Friend is a little ahead of the rest of my speech, but I completely agree, and I will give reasons for that. An allergy tsar who can cross Departments —Health, Education and others—could have a huge impact on how we deal with children with allergies.

SEND Provision

Sarah Edwards Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Ind)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered SEND provision.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. I am delighted to have secured this debate and to see such a packed Westminster Hall. I start by thanking all the parents and campaigners who have rightly put this issue high on the agenda, all the organisations that have provided briefings for MPs, and of course all the MPs here in a packed Westminster Hall.

Nearly 50 MPs have applied to speak today; I cannot recall anything like that for many other Westminster Hall debates. I hope that the Government and all those with a say over the parliamentary agenda take note and ensure time for a much longer debate on this vital issue very soon. This is an essential debate. The crisis in SEND provision is one of the biggest messes left by the previous Government—one that the new Labour Government will have to start to clear up quickly, as SEND needs are likely only to increase. That will require a radically different approach from the one currently failing so many children.

We cannot have this debate today without acknowledging how the crisis was deepened by an austerity agenda that tore up much of the social fabric that once would have offered pupils and their families much of the support needed. That dangerous idea has hollowed out councils’ budgets and severely restricted the services that they can provide. It has caused long-term harm to the NHS, including huge waiting lists for assessments and massive backlogs in mental health services. It has placed unbearable pressure on schools, which are asked to do more and more with fewer and fewer staff and resources. It has caused key public workers to leave due to stress, simply impossible workloads and low pay, further weakening services.

[Sarah Edwards (Tamworth) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing such an important debate in such a full Westminster Hall. Since 2010 schools have been grappling with chronic underinvestment by former Conservative Governments. We know that those with special educational needs and disabilities have borne the brunt of that. Schools are expected to pick up the pieces without the proper support. Does he agree that we need to build capacity and expertise in the mainstream system so that more children can access the universal and targeted support that they need?

[Richard Burgon]

My hon. Friend puts it very well; I could not agree more. There is an old saying that it takes a village to raise a child. Well, so many of the key services that we had in our communities to help support child development are on their knees due to austerity, and children are paying the price.

Every MP in this House is aware that the special education needs and disability system has gone beyond crisis and is in emergency.