Department for Education

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Robert Halfon]

The hon. Member makes a powerful point. We want to ensure that everyone has the same opportunities to go to “good” and “outstanding” schools. The cost of living pressures that he mentions are powerful, and I am sure that the new Secretary of State is listening.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Further to my hon. Friend’s intervention, the other side of the coin for local authorities is finding temporary accommodation anywhere for families with children. I am sure that many families from London end up being placed in temporary accommodation in the right hon. Gentleman’s constituency. In my constituency, we are seeing more families farmed out to Kent or Essex, so staying on at a primary school is extraordinarily difficult, with over 124,000 children in temporary accommodation. Does he think that those issues should be taken in the round because of their impact on education?

[Robert Halfon]

As I said, I am sure that the Secretary of State is listening. Everywhere we look, there are all kinds of pressures on our education system. It is not just the things that the hon. Members mentioned; schools are paying huge amounts in energy bills, for example, and are not able to afford that. Instead of spending money on frontline teaching, they are having to pay energy bills. Those are big issues that the Government will have to deal with. I very much hope that, given that the previous Secretary of State had such a passion for education and that he is now the Chancellor, the education budget will see a significant increase in the autumn. That could resolve some of the things the hon. Lady talked about.

The Education Committee’s inquiry on the Government’s catch-up programme heard that, by summer 2021, primary pupils had lost about 0.9 months in reading and 2.2 months in mathematics. David Laws from the Education Policy Institute told our Committee of his concerns that vulnerable groups could be up to eight months behind in their learning.

The Government have invested almost £5 billion in catch-up and, following the recommendations in the Committee’s catch-up report, they have ended the contract with national tutoring programme provider Randstad and given schools more autonomy to organise catch-up programmes, at least from later in the year. They should reform the clunky pupil premium so that it much better targets those most in need of support. Data is available about education related to ethnicity, geography and socioeconomic background, but it is rarely cross-referenced to provide a richer analysis. By creating multivariant datasets, the DFE could facilitate a sophisticated view of which areas, schools and pupils need the most help. It could then reform the pupil premium using those datasets to introduce weighting or ringfencing to ensure that funding is spent on the most disadvantaged cohorts.

A further key measure that I ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to consider is provision of school breakfasts. The Government have rightly spent more than £200 million on the holiday activities programme, which is also funded and supported by Essex council in my constituency—I have seen that programme work, benefiting many children, and I support it—but more must be done on breakfasts. According to the Magic Breakfast charity, 73% of teachers think that breakfast provision has had a positive impact. Attendance increased in schools offering breakfast provision, with 26 fewer half-days of absence per year. I saw that for myself with Magic Breakfast on a visit to Cooks Spinney school in my constituency last Friday, where attendance has rocketed because the school ensures that the most disadvantaged children have a good breakfast when they start their school day.

The study also found that children in schools supported by breakfast provision made two months’ additional progress over the course of an academic year. An evaluation of the national school breakfast programme by EEF found a 28% reduction in late marks in a term and a 24% reduction in behavioural incidents. School breakfast provision should be a key intervention that the Secretary of State should look at more closely. Currently, the breakfast provision service reaches just 30% of schools in areas with high levels of disadvantage and invests just £12 million a year. By comparison, last year, taxpayers spent £380 million on free school meal vouchers.

Magic Breakfast proposes to invest £75 million more per year in school breakfasts, raised from the soft drinks industry levy—it is not even asking for more money—which would both provide value for money and increase educational attainment. It could reach an estimated 900,000 pupils with a nutritious breakfast throughout the year. That could complement other ideas, such as the deeper strategy for supporting family hubs, and go a long way to providing those children with the first step on the first rung of the ladder of opportunity.

Finally, I turn to skills, which I know the new Secretary of State is passionate about. As my Committee has heard in both our current inquiry into post-16 qualifications and our previous work on adult skills, the UK faces a worrying skills deficit. About 9 million working-age adults in England have low literacy or numeracy skills—or both—and 6 million are not qualified to level 2, which is the equivalent of a GCSE grade 4 or above. Although participation in adult learning seems to have grown since it was at a record low in 2019—44% of adults have taken part in some learning over the past three years—stark inequalities remain. Those in lower socioeconomic groups are twice as likely not to have participated in learning since leaving full-time education than those in higher socioeconomic groups. Our current inquiry into adult skills has heard that employer-led training has declined by a half since the end of the 1990s.

The Government have taken some welcome steps including the Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022, the £2.5 billion national skills fund, the £2 billion kickstart scheme, £3 billion of additional investment in skills and the lifetime skills guarantee. It is reassuring to see increased resource and capital funding for further education in the estimates, together with growth in the adult skills budget—although, in terms of further education, much of that is catch-up. We need to go further. Levelling the skills playing field is about how we teach as well as the financial resources that we put in.

During my Committee’s inquiry into the future of post-16 qualifications, we have heard about the need for a curriculum that not just imparts facts but embeds cross-cutting skills that will better prepare all young people for our fast-moving industrial future. On a recent visit to King Ethelbert School in Kent, I heard great things about the career-related programme of the international baccalaureate, but there are concerns about future approval for its funding. That seems to be at odds with the Government’s skills agenda. The Times education commission, in which I took part as a voluntary member, recently recommended a British baccalaureate-style qualification.

I am sure that my right hon. Friend knows my views on the baccalaureate-style system. Used by 150 other countries around the world, it combines academic and vocational learning, creating true parity of esteem between the two disciplines and adequately preparing young people for the future world of work. The Department has recently undertaken a consultation and review of the qualifications horizon, particularly to reform the BTEC system. The FFT Education Datalab found that young people who took BTECs were more likely to be in employment at the age 22 of and were earning about £800 more per year than their peers taking A-levels. I understand the need to review the system and prevent overlaps, but, just to be clear, I urge my colleagues on the Front Bench not to remove BTEC funding until T-levels have been fully rolled out and are successful.

I strongly welcome the grip that the previous Education Secretary had on the Department, and I welcome the fact that he had some success in the spending review in securing an additional £14 billion over the next years. However, we are still playing catch-up when it comes to education recovery and further education. The brutal fact is that the total budget for health spending will have increased from 2010 to 2025 by 40%, whereas education spending will have increased by only 3% in real terms for the same period. Ultimately, as for health and defence, what we need for education is a long-term plan and a secure funding settlement.

Every lever and every engine of Government should be geared towards returning absent pupils to school. I ask the Secretary of State to set out in her response the practical steps the Department is taking to address the issues faced by disadvantaged pupils who are not able to climb the ladder of opportunity. We are denying those children the right to an education. In my view, it must be the most important priority for the Department to get them back into school. It is unforgivable that there are 1.7 million persistently absent children and that 100,000 ghost children have been lost to school rolls. That number is growing. Previously, roughly 800 schools in disadvantaged areas had the equivalent of a whole classroom missing, but figures from the Department for Education show that now 1,000 schools do. That situation is wrong. It must be taken seriously, and efforts should be made to tackle it. As the Children’s Commissioner said to the Education Committee yesterday, by September every one of those children should be back in school.

The previous Education Secretary said he could not “hug the world” but I know his priorities truly were “skills, schools and families”. I am sure they are the priorities of the new Secretary of State. Our children, the workers of the future, will need technical skills but also the ability to think creatively, work across subject silos and, most of all, adapt. As our country and economy move towards the fourth industrial revolution, we must ensure our education system can adapt to meet those challenges.

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[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

I welcome the new Secretary of State to her place. I hope she has an ambitious plan for however many hours she will be in office before the downfall of her Government—but this is no laughing matter. The fact that we have had three Education Secretaries in three years tells us all we need to know about the Conservatives’ priorities. Theirs is a party with no plan, no ambition and no vision for our children. In contrast, education is so important to us on this side of the House that we say it three times.

Let us start with childcare and the early years, a time of indisputable importance with an impact that lasts a lifetime. The Government’s unforgivable failure to support early years providers shamefully saw 4,000 of them close over the last year. When parents are paying more on childcare than on their rent or their mortgage, the system is truly broken. The prohibitive cost of childcare means that many young couples face a choice between being priced out of parenting and being priced out of work. If they cannot afford the childcare costs to return to work, or if those costs outweigh the salaries that they bring home, work simply does not pay, no matter how many times the rhetoric is repeated at the Dispatch Box.

Ours is statistically one of the most expensive countries in the world in which to raise children, with net childcare costs representing 29% of income. We should compare that with 11% in France, 9% in Belgium and just 1% in Germany. If families cannot afford the childcare—for instance, the before and after-school clubs that boost children’s learning and development—the attainment gap grows. Those children will arrive at school to find that funding per pupil has fallen by 9% in real terms since the Tories came to power. That means that, by 2024, school budgets will have seen no overall growth in 15—yes, 15—years.

Meanwhile, many young people are still catching up from the lockdown school closures. Lockdown was temporary, but it could have a lifelong impact: the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned that students who lost six months of schooling could see a reduction in lifetime income of 4%. However, the catch-up programme does not even come close to meeting

“the scale of the challenge”.

Those are not my words, but the words of the Government’s own education recovery tsar, whose resignation a year ago is all the evidence that anyone needs when considering whether the scale of the challenge is really understood.

Why is it that our children, teachers and schools are treated as an afterthought at every stage by this Government? The crumbs of catch-up support that are available will let down an entire generation of young people and, on the Government’s watch, the pandemic’s impact on their education will be lifelong. In contrast, Labour’s children’s recovery plan will provide breakfast clubs and new activities for every child, small-group tutoring for all who need it, quality mental health support in every school, continued development for teachers—that is essential, given that a staggering 40% of teachers leave the profession within five years—and an education recovery premium, targeting investment at children who risk falling behind. Those are not just warm words. Under the last Labour Government, our rhetoric matched the reality: 3,500 Sure Start centres were delivered on time, offering a place in every community for integrated care and services for children and their families.

Now is the time to be ambitious about education in a post-covid modern society. I believe that we should be putting tech at the heart of learning, tailoring classrooms to the modern day by ensuring that every child has the kit and the connectivity to get online. We should be challenging the norm by considering qualifications in tech and coding, providing real-world work experience, and using our ability to connect and learn with and from others around the world. The 21st-century opportunities for children, for teachers and for education should be endless. If there were a competent and functioning Government to take on that challenge, we would be there; but we are not.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

We will now proceed to the winding-up speeches. I call Carol Monaghan.

Children’s Education Recovery and Childcare Costs

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I must pick up the hon. Gentleman on his first point, which, I am afraid, is simply not right. It is just not accurate, but we know that the Government have a habit of this kind of thing. On children’s recovery, I suggest that he looks at the work that the Government commissioned by Sir Kevan Collins, who we can all, right across the House, recognise as an expert in this. The long-term damage to our economy and the costs that our country will face if we fail to get this right now is £300 billion—that is the hit. I assure him that everything that we have set out has been fully costed and I will happily send him a copy.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

If my hon. Friend would like to find a way to find the £500 million needed on catch-up for children in our schools—not that she needs my suggestions—she could look at the Chancellor giving £800 to people who own two properties. If that was not happening, it would raise £660 million.

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend raises an important point, not least because, throughout the pandemic, we saw vast quantities—billions of pounds—of Government waste, with personal protective equipment literally burnt because the Government had failed to deliver what was necessary. Money was lost to fraud and money was lost in waste. We take our responsibilities on public spending incredibly seriously.

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[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Both you and I know, Madam Deputy Speaker, that academies were the policy milestone of a Labour Government, because we both had the opportunity to vote for them and see them introduced. So I suggest that we will take no lessons about academies from the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis).

The Government repeatedly argue that the best way out of poverty is work, and I for one would never disagree with that. I would go further. I think it is morally important. It is important for health. It is important for people’s children to watch them go out to work. The rhetoric is only ever as strong as the practical reality, however, and that reality could not be clearer. Prohibitive childcare costs mean that ever more women are being priced out of the labour market and out of the opportunity to make a better life for themselves and their children. As we have already been told, the average cost of a full-time nursery place for a child under two has risen by almost £1,500 in five years, and 40% of mothers now say that they have to work fewer hours than they would like because of childcare costs.

Against that backdrop, I was delighted to take up an invitation from the Social Market Foundation to join a new cross-party commission on childcare, co-led by the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose). Our aim is to analyse the stark impact of poor childcare provision on wages and poverty, and to consider cross-party the changes that are desperately needed. Today’s debate is timely, as our first research was released this week and reveals that women who had a baby in 2010 have in the decade since missed out on a staggering £70,000 almost. That is not their costs, but the income they have lost relative to what would have happened if they had remained childless—£70,000.

But should we be surprised? The charity Pregnant Then Screwed found that more than a third of mothers who return to work make a financial loss or break even, and that 62% of parents said that their childcare costs were the same as their rent or mortgage. If they cannot afford the childcare costs of returning to work, or if those costs outweigh the salaries they would bring home, work simply does not pay—no matter how many times the rhetoric is repeated at the Dispatch Box.

Meanwhile, this weekend’s The Sunday Times revealed that Britain shamefully leads the way when it comes to net childcare costs, which represent 29% of income. That compares with 11% in France, 9% in Belgium and just 1% in Germany. We are statistically one of the most expensive countries in the world in which to raise children. The problem is getting worse: the reality is that the number of women aged 25 to 34 who are not working has jumped by 13% in the last year.

The cost to women, children and society is about more than money. It is about missed promotions and career progression for women who cannot afford to return to work. It is about the consequential worsening of gender inequality. It is about the lost learning and the widening of the attainment gap because of the unaffordable costs of before and after-school clubs. Meanwhile, according to the Women’s Budget Group, the cost to economic output of the 1.7 million women prevented from taking on more hours of paid work due to childcare issues is a mind-boggling £28.2 billion every single year.

The importance of the early years must never be underestimated, but how far this Government have fallen. Under the last Labour Government, education was so important that we said it three times—and our rhetoric matched the reality. Some 3,500 Sure Start centres were delivered on time and offered a place in every community for integrated care and services for children and their families.

The situation is clear: we know the importance of the early years. We know that parents are being priced out of childcare and that an increasing number of women are not returning to work because they simply cannot afford to. We know that we have a problem in the entire economy with people withdrawing from the employment market and that the consequential cost to society is extortionate. If only we had a Government who recognised the importance of affordable childcare as the solution that threads so many of society’s injustices together.

Oral Answers to Questions

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Monday 14th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Through the spending review and the record £2.6 billion of investment in special school places, that will be delivered.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

4. What steps he is taking to help close the digital divide for children without access to the internet or adequate devices at home.

[The Minister for School Standards (Mr Robin Walker)]

We have delivered more than 1.9 million devices to schools, colleges and local authorities for disadvantaged pupils, as part of a £520 million investment during the pandemic. We have also partnered with the UK’s leading mobile operators to provide free data to help more than 33,000 disadvantaged children get online, and we have delivered more than 100,000 4G wireless routers for pupils without connections at home.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

When schools closed, the move to remote learning highlighted the digital divide in our society. Schools such as the outstanding Ursuline High School were already at the forefront of technology, giving every pupil a tablet and offering six lessons a day from home right from the start, but others did not have the kit required. For those still on the wrong side of the digital divide, every click widens the attainment gap. Aside from the emergency lockdown devices, what support is being offered to equip schools with the skills, time and kit to ensure that no child is left behind in our technological world?

[Mr Walker]

Let me join the hon. Lady in paying tribute to the work that the Ursuline academy did during lockdown. It is very important that schools reached out and provided the help where they could. It is important to recognise that the 1.9 million devices that were provided by the Department during the course of the pandemic were on top of around 2.9 million devices already with schools, so the kit is out there to do this. We will continue to work with colleagues at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that disadvantaged households get the technology that they need.

Government’s Education Catch-up and Mental Health Recovery Programmes

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Thursday 3rd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Quite simply, this debate could not be any more important. The inaction of the Government in catching up the lost learning of our young people will be felt by many of them for a lifetime. Why is it that our children, teachers and schools have been treated as an afterthought at every stage of the pandemic? We have seen the Government: closing schools without a second thought for those pupils who could not log in or learn from home; opening schools back up for less than 24 hours to encourage the virus to run rife; and leaving every announcement until past even the 11th hour—whether it be on exams, on testing, on vaccines.

When it comes to education, the contrast could not be starker. This Government think that they can cut corners on the months of lost learning, but, for Labour, education is so important that we say it three times. The catch-up programme does not even come close to meeting “the scale of the challenge.” Those are not my words, but the words of the Government’s own education recovery tsar whose resignation in June is all the evidence that anyone needs when considering whether the scale of the challenge is really understood. Sir Kevan’s essential proposals were watered down to the tune of less than 10% of the funding that he insisted was required. Why does the Minister think that this issue can be just brushed under the carpet?

While the Chancellor blocks the catch-up funding with one hand, he waves away wasted billions with another: £8.7 billion lost on PPE; £4.3 billion handed out to fraudsters; and a bonus £200 million thrown at the plans to downgrade St Helier Hospital to healthy, wealthy Belmont rather than keeping services where health is poorest.

We are eight months on since Sir Kevan’s damning indictment of the so-called catch-up plan. I take no satisfaction in saying that every word of his damning predictions has come true. It is a catch-up programme that is so inept that the national tutoring programme is even teaching to empty classrooms. An assistant headteacher at a school in Derby shockingly reports that her school was paying a tutor to sit with no pupils for an hour. It is scandalous. How is this possibly a good use of public funds, and how on earth does it help our young children to catch up? The failings are there for all to see. Only one in five headteachers in the north-east of England uses the programme. Many schools have found it impossible to enrol new children onto it, and the scheme is reaching less than 10% of its target pupil number. It is no wonder that tuition providers themselves have described it as shambolic.

Before lockdown, children on free school meals were leaving school 18 months behind their classmates and the gap was getting worse. Schools closed and a quarter of these children did less than one hour’s schoolwork a day. Lockdown was temporary but could have a lifelong impact, with the Institute of Fiscal Studies warning that students who had lost six months of schooling could see a reduction in lifetime income of 4%.

In primary schools, the unavoidable reality is of a covid gap of approximately two months’ learning in year 2 pupils and a widening of the disadvantage gap in attainment. Meanwhile, a quarter fewer poor pupils achieved English and maths GCSEs during the pandemic than their richer classmates, and the divide continues to grow.

There were 415,000 children off school with covid on 20 January, but only 2% of teachers working in schools, serving the most disadvantaged communities, said that all their pupils had adequate access to devices and the internet to work from home.Every click widens the attainment gap, which is why I am calling for every child on free school meals to have the catch-up kit and connectivity that they need to log in and learn from home. The Government may be distracted by the hangover of their party season, but their scant support for our students is no cause for celebration. The Government must address this issue with the gravity it requires or step aside so that we can get on with the job, because our children, particularly our poorest children, do not get a second chance.

Covid-19: Impact on Attendance in Education Settings

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Wednesday 30th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

We are very much wanting to go down that course of easing restrictions and ensuring that, as we come out this pandemic, children are one of the greatest beneficiaries. My hon. Friend’s mind and mine are very much in the same place.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab) [V]]

Children in the most disadvantaged areas are almost twice as likely to be those self-isolating, such as year 6 in St Mark’s Primary School in my constituency, but they are also likely to be on the wrong side of the digital divide, with 23 pupils at St Mark’s still without the kit and connectivity required to log in and learn from home when isolating. With every click widening the attainment gap, will the Secretary of State today back my campaign to ensure that every child entitled to free school meals has access to data and a device at home?

[Gavin Williamson]

This is very much why we invested hundreds of millions of pounds in the roll-out of 1.3 million devices to be able to support schools, but most importantly to be able to support children, as the hon. Lady set out.

Children from Low-Income Families: Education Support

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Wednesday 30th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Hollobone, for calling me to speak. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) on securing this incredibly important debate.

Right now, there are 385,500 pupils off school and isolating because of coronavirus, some of them for the second, third or even fourth time. That means weeks of lost learning after their already missing months of school through the lockdowns. For many of these children, being sent home means a return to remote learning, joining their isolating classmates behind a computer screen, but children on the wrong side of the digital divide will be isolated not just from their classroom but from their education. Why does this matter? It matters because those who were the furthest behind before the pandemic have fallen even further behind their peers during the lockdowns, with every click widening the attainment gap. Sir Kevan Collins has indicated that in September, 200,000 children will make the transfer from primary to secondary school unable to meet their reading age or target.

The Minister and her colleagues have regularly pointed to the Government’s tech roll-out—the Secretary of State for Education did so yet again in the answer to today’s urgent question—but that roll-out was so ineffective that almost a year after schools first closed, the Daily Mail had to run an emergency campaign to secure more laptops for the children who were being failed by this Government. Before the Minister points to the success of the roll-out, may I remind her of the utterly damning National Audit Office conclusion that the Department for Education did not even aim to provide equipment to all the children who lacked it? Meanwhile, the latest data reveals that 80,224 of the devices provided in the roll-out arrived after schools had reopened in March.

With hundreds of thousands of school pupils now isolating, the problem of the digital divide has clearly not gone away. In my constituency, the children in year 6 at Saint Mark’s Primary School have all been off school from Friday because of coronavirus, but 23 of them are still without the kit and connectivity required to log in and learn from home. How does the Minister expect these pupils to join their classmates in remote learning? The answer is simple: they will not; they will simply fall even further behind.

We know that it is not just Mitcham that is affected. The front page of The Daily Telegraph today unsurprisingly reveals that youngsters in the most disadvantaged areas are almost twice as likely to be forced to self-isolate as their peers in wealthier areas. However, these children are also the most likely to be on the wrong side of the digital divide, with 8% of children aged between five and 15 not having access at home to a desktop computer, laptop or notebook that is connected to the internet. I ask the Minister in her winding-up speech to specifically address what support is available for the children in year 6 at Saint Mark’s today, and indeed for any children who are self-isolating and who do not have the kit or connectivity required to log in and learn from home.

This is not just a problem for the 10 days of self-isolation. The days of pen and paper are long gone and the technological age that we now live in is here to stay. Homework, research, resources, catch-up—so much is now online. The consequence for children on the wrong side of the digital divide is that they are now even more disadvantaged than before. Today’s debate is on support for the education of children from low-income families, and I am calling for every child entitled to free school meals to have internet access and an adequate device at home. Free school meals may not be a complete measure of need, but I believe it is the best measure we have. This would be a huge step forward in closing the digital divide across our schools. Social mobility, levelling up—call it whatever you want, but surely the pandemic has taught us that no child should miss out on their education in our tech-reliant society simply because they are on the wrong side of the digital divide.

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

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) on securing this important debate.

Children from lower-income families have been at the centre of my Department’s policies since the day this Government took office in 2010. Our ambition has always been to promote a world-class education for every child, irrespective of their background, that sees them fulfil their potential and get set for a successful adult life. Some pupils face greater challenges at school, including looked-after children, children with special educational needs and disabilities, and many of those from lower-income homes. We are committed to levelling up opportunity and outcomes for all pupils.

The best way to open up opportunity for children is to give them the education and skills that can set them up for life. We should never forget how much the last Labour Government failed to do that. Back in 2010, only 68%—two out of three—of our schools were good or outstanding. That figure is now 86%—nearly nine out of 10. The majority of disadvantaged pupils now attend a good or outstanding school. That is not a coincidence. Since 2010, we have taken a dual approach to tackling the attainment gap. First, we have prioritised levelling up the standards in teacher training, because research shows that excellent teaching has a disproportionate positive benefit for disadvantaged pupils. At the same time, our reformed qualifications ensure that all pupils access only the best, most worthwhile qualifications, and the underpinning curricula.

At the same time, we have directed extra funding and support towards those from low-income backgrounds, in recognition of the additional challenges that they often face. For example, we introduced the pupil premium, which gives additional funding to schools to improve the academic attainment and wider outcomes of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds. We introduced the national funding formula, which ensures that core school funding better reflects the socioeconomic context of each school, and we introduced and sustained the opportunity areas programme, which brings together local partners to break down entrenched low social mobility and educational achievement.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Will the Minister explain why, if her Government’s policies have been so successful, children on free school meals leave school on average 18 months behind their classmates, and will she address the issue of the 200,000 children transferring to year 7 and secondary school in September who will not meet the reading level required?

[Vicky Ford]

Let me come exactly to those points. Let us look at what children on free school meals are achieving today compared with what they were achieving a decade ago. Last year, one in five of our children on free school meals was successful in their application to university—a 53% increase over a decade. On reading skills—

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Will the Minister give way?

[Vicky Ford]

Let me just make this point: one of the most important things that we can do for children’s reading skills is invest in their early education. This Government introduced the two-year-old offer, which provides 15 hours of free childcare a week for 38 weeks a year to disadvantaged two-year-olds and children with a disability or special educational needs. Children who take up those 15 hours a week of free nursery or pre-school are likely to have better educational outcomes, and that early experience in their youngest years can have a positive impact on their educational attainment throughout their entire school career, even at secondary school.

However, the proportion of eligible two-year-olds using that offer of free early education varies hugely across the country. The hon. Member for Slough introduced the debate. In Slough, in January 2020, before the pandemic, the proportion of two-year-olds taking up that incredibly generous offer from the Government was only 49%—the fourth lowest of the 151 local authorities in the country. The take-up in Leicester East—the hon. Member for Leicester East (Claudia Webbe) spoke today— is only 57%. I say to the hon. Member for Slough and other hon. Members that if they really care about the educational attainment of children in their constituencies, they should start from the very earliest years and invest their effort in getting out to their constituents and encouraging parents on the lowest incomes to take up the Government’s generous offer of 15 hours of high-quality early education experience in their local nursery or pre-school. We fund it, and it will benefit their kids for the rest of their academic career.

I am enormously proud that the last time we assessed our five-year-olds, nearly three out of four of our country’s children were achieving a good level of development by the end of reception.

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[Vicky Ford]

The hon. Lady has said this again and again, and it is simply not true. Let us look at the facts, okay? This Government, when I became the Minister for children, and over the past 10 years, had already extended free school meals to more children than any other Government during the past 50 years. We set up the national voucher scheme during this pandemic—a thing that had never been done before—to make sure that, when schools were closed to most children, they could still access food at home.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Will the Minister give way on that point?

[Vicky Ford]

I have many points that I want to make, but—

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Can she indicate the last pandemic that required a voucher meal scheme?

[Vicky Ford]

Mr Chairman, let me please set the record straight, because I personally—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Vicky Ford]

I would be delighted if the hon. Lady sent me a copy of the report. We know that early language skills are so important. Indeed, of the £1 billion catch-up package that we announced this month, £153 million will go into teaching and training for early years staff, including to expand the level of knowledge of our brilliant early years staff in things such as speech and language early development. We are also improving the curriculum in that area.

The evidence shows that supporting a child into reception and primary school with early language skills helps them to pick up reading. As we know, reading has improved significantly over the past decade, partly since we introduced mandatory phonics training in schools. Clearly, without the early language skills, learning to read through phonics can be really challenging. I urge the hon Lady to visit one of the primary schools in her constituency that is delivering the NELI programme. I would love to hear her feedback.

We want to do even more, and we are doing so. We are introducing significant reforms to technical education and creating high-quality options for young people aged 16 to support their progression, as well as meeting the needs of employers. We are also introducing the holiday activities and food programme across the country this year.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Will the Minister give way?

[Vicky Ford]

No. I have taken many interventions, and I am going to speak about the holiday activities and food programme. It provides healthy food and enriching social activities and has been particularly targeted at supporting those from more disadvantaged backgrounds. We have been trialling it for the past three years, and we have structured it in a way that suits what parents and families want. The evidence from the past three years is that taking part in the holiday activities and food programme improves children’s wellbeing and helps them to make a better start when they come back to school in September for the new term, so it helps to close the attainment gap that I have spoken about.

The hon. Member for Slough will be interested to know how much is being invested in his local area—I noticed that he did not mention the holiday activities and food programme much in his speech. In Slough, the investment is £587,720. We are working with authorities such as Slough—indeed, with all 151 local authorities across the country—to help them to prepare and build capacity as we get towards the summer, because we want every single part of the country to have a really rich mix of provisions—different offers—for our children and young people and to really engage and excite them to have a very enjoyable summer.

This summer we are also funding face-to-face summer schools, focusing in particular on children and pupils transitioning into secondary schools. The hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) mentioned year 6 pupils, whom the summer schools will be particularly focused on.

[Vicky Ford]

Let us look at the detail of what the hon. Gentleman says. I mentioned the NELI programme, which is working in 40% of the schools in the country. We have offered it to any school that wants to sign up. It is for any child from reception that needs it. Schools have identified a quarter of a million children for screening, and they are screening them and finding out which ones will benefit from the programme and then offering it to them.

In terms of wider education catch-up, we have already invested in the teaching and tutoring elements, because we know from the evidence that those bits benefit children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds most—this debate is obviously about children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds. The hon. Gentleman will know, because we have said it many times, that we continue to look at the time element—should we increase the length of the school day? There are mixed views about that. The evidence is less well known, and that is why we launched a consultation. So, again, I encourage him, instead of saying that it is not enough, to get his teachers to look at the consultation and give their views, because that is exactly why we are doing it. We have invested record amounts in our schools.

The Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn, used very strong words when speaking about early years funding. Members should remember that it was a Conservative-led Government that introduced that the 15 hours of free childcare for two-year-olds and the 30 hours of free childcare for three and four-year olds when the parents are working. That is a significant, £3.5 billion investment in early education because we know that it has such benefit for our children. It is a huge increase on what was ever invested during the last Labour Government.

The hon. Lady also mentioned the changes we made to the census date for the pupil premium. The census date has changed to give schools more certainty about what funding they will be getting over the entire financial year. It has been subject to significant media reporting over recent months, much of which has been both inaccurate and deeply misleading. The total pupil premium funding is increasing to more than £2.5 billion in 2021-22, up by £60 million from last year. It is not being cut. Furthermore, pupils who became eligible for free school meals between October and January will still bring pupil premium funding with them, starting in the following financial year, and will continue to attract funding for six years.

The impact of this census change should not be viewed in isolation. The ambitious education recovery programme that has gone hand in hand with it is worth £3 billion to date—many times more than the impact of moving the census date. That includes £302 million for the recovery premium, with £22 million to scale up proven approaches. That £302 million is further to support disadvantaged pupils with their attainment.

I say to Opposition Members that we are speaking about children. Children have had a very difficult time, and it is incredibly important that we do not mislead them, we are accurate in our allegations and we do not scaremonger.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

May I ask the Minister who used these words?

“The support announced by Government so far does not come close to meeting the scale of the challenge and is why I have no option but to resign from my post…When we met last week, I told you that 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.”

[Vicky Ford]

I thank the hon. Lady for quoting those words back to me. I say again that we are hugely grateful to Sir Kevan for his work in helping pupils to catch up and recover from the effects of the pandemic. The funding that we have announced this month, since his work, supports his recommendations on tutoring and teaching improvements. As I have just discussed, we are consulting on the time-based element of his proposals.

I would again like to thank the hon. Member for Slough for the opportunity to discuss this subject. I have endeavoured to lay out all the different elements of what has been, and continues to be, a very extensive programme over the past decade to support children from low-income backgrounds.

There is no doubt that this pandemic is the biggest challenge this country has faced in my lifetime and since the second world war. By staying at home during lockdowns, respecting class bubbles and limiting their contacts with friends, our nation’s children have saved lives. They should be so proud of what they have done in the past 18 months. We will stand by them as we all recover from this.

Oral Answers to Questions

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

As tempted as I am to pre-announce that list to the hon. Gentleman, I am afraid I am not in that position. I would be very happy to meet him to discuss some of the challenges that he has. The reason that we have announced a commitment to the rebuilding of 500 schools, admittedly over a number of years, is so that we are able to have proper sight of some of the challenges that high schools and primary schools face, have proper information on their condition and have a proper understanding as to where that priority sits as part of a broader national priority. I would be very happy to sit down with the hon. Gentleman to discuss that in further detail.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

What plans he has to implement the recommendations of the UK Committee for UNICEF and the Carnegie UK Trust's report entitled “Closing the Digital Divide for Good”.

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

Over 1.3 million laptops and tablets and 75,000 4G wireless routers have been distributed to schools and local authorities. We are building on the Department’s significant investment in devices, platforms, training and digital services to develop an evidence-based strategy for the most effective long-term approach to digital technology in education.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Before the lockdown, children on the wrong side of the digital divide were already leaving school behind their classmates. Schools closed, and despite the Government’s tech roll-out and the great community effort right across the country, a quarter of children on free school meals did less than one hour’s school work a week. This is not a problem for the past; closing the digital divide will be critical to genuinely levelling up our tech-reliant society. Will the Government support my campaign calling for every child entitled to a free school meal to have internet access and an adequate device at home?

[Nick Gibb]

I read the joint article in The Times this morning by the hon. Member and my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) about the UNICEF report and her objectives, and I agree with much of what they have both written, particularly about the importance of closing the digital divide. I am grateful for the acknowledgement in that article of the much needed support to disadvantaged children that the provision by this Government of 1.3 million laptops and tablets gave. One should not underestimate the size and scale of that procurement: 1.3 million devices built to order, shipped, configured and delivered to schools and local authorities, all at a time of peak international demand for such computer equipment.

Catch-up Premium

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

It is impossible not to be angry in this debate. The resignation of Sir Kevan Collins is a damning indictment of the Government’s so-called catch-up plan. Let us be absolutely clear: the measly crumbs of support on offer will let down an entire generation of young people and, on this Government’s watch, the pandemic’s impact on their education will be lifelong.

While the Government kick the catch-up can down the road, the impact is being felt right now. More than 200,000 pupils will move from primary to secondary school this autumn without being able to read properly—a monumental increase on previous years and a problem that a sticking plaster would not even begin to solve. We already know that, if pupils start secondary behind, they stay behind. Does the Minister understand why parents and teachers across the country are so furious that their children are getting less than 10% of the investment that the Government’s own education recovery commissioner called for? The temerity of the Treasury to challenge Sir Kevan’s ideas undermines a lifetime spent improving outcomes for children.

Meanwhile, one conservative estimate puts the long-term economic cost of lost learning in England at £100 billion. Last week, the Prime Minister labelled one-to-one tutoring as a catch-up tool for hard-working parents. I wonder whether the Minister can tell him about 10-year-old Abi in my constituency. In lockdown, she secured entry to Tiffin Girls’ School, one of the most prestigious grammar schools in the country, working in a cramped homeless hostel, with only a refurbished phone donated by Tesco Mobile to get connected. Social mobility, levelling up, call it whatever you want: the impact will be lifelong.

There are legions of hard-working parents who cannot afford tuition, but who can see their child slipping behind. A lady came to see me because the bailiffs were coming. Instead of paying her council tax, she paid for a tutor so that her son would catch up and achieve the 11-plus. Of course, I do not support her council tax decision, but I absolutely recognise that she is desperately trying to plug the support gap that the Government are failing to fill.

We need a catch-up plan for every child who has fallen behind—extending the school day for education curricular activities; breakfast clubs; small group and one-to-one tutoring—and to close the digital divide. It is absolutely no time to delay.

Support for Children Entitled to Free School Meals

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Wednesday 26th May 2021 Westminster Hall

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

Patricia Gibson will be speaking at the end of the debate as one of the Front-Bench spokespersons, so I call Siobhain McDonagh.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

I am sorry, Chair, but I wondered if I could be delayed slightly?

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

We have Jim Shannon, who has just made it over from the main Chamber. Are you ready, Jim?

--- Later in debate ---

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

Thank you for your indulgence, Dr Huq. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) on securing the debate. At the heart of this issue, Marcus Rashford scored the most important goal of his career, using his platform to highlight that food poverty is not restricted just to school term times. It was a campaign of which any left winger wearing red would be proud.

I will argue that support for children who are entitled to free school meals should be about far more than just the food, because when schools closed, it was not just lunch that disadvantaged children missed out on, but connectivity. Through the lockdown, millions of children started the day with Joe Wicks’ online exercise classes. They completed schoolwork sent remotely by their teachers, and they joined their classmates in live remote-learning lessons. It was not perfect, but it was an extraordinary feat, achieved thanks to the dedication of our teachers and to the support and patience of home-schooling parents. However, the lockdown exposed the digital divide in our society.

About 30% of private school pupils attended four or more online lessons per day during the first lockdown, but just 6.3% of state school pupils did the same. That is no surprise considering that one in five children did not always have access to a device for online learning while schools were closed. How does the Minister think those children logged in and learnt from home? The simple answer is, they did not. Those without have fallen behind even further.

The Government’s roll-out of devices was nothing short of shambolic: 5% of teachers in state schools reported that all their students had a device, compared with 54% at private schools. The Minister may point to those devices that finally were distributed, but the conclusion of the National Audit Office in March was utterly damning. The Department for Education did not even aim to provide equipment to all children who lacked it. Every click simply widened the attainment gap. So much for levelling up!

With schools open and lockdown lifting, this is no problem of the past. The days of pen and paper are long gone, and the technological age we now live in is here to stay. Homework, research, resources, catch-up—so much is now online. The consequences for those children on the wrong side of the digital divide is that they are now even more disadvantaged than before.

This afternoon, we debate the support that should be provided for children entitled to free school meals. I say to the Minister that support must be about more than just food. I am calling for all children entitled to free school meals to have internet access and an adequate device, so that they can log in and catch up from home. I recognise that free school meals are not a perfect indicator, but it is the best we have. Compared with the vast sums squandered through the pandemic, this is a low-cost, straightforward and tangible step forward. It is no silver bullet, but it would make a life-changing difference to children on the wrong side of the digital divide.

Take 10-year-old Abi in my constituency. In lockdown, she secured entry to the Tiffin Girls’ School, one of the most prestigious grammar schools in the country. She was working from a cramped homeless hostel, with only a refurbished smartphone to get her connected, one of 140 given to me by Tesco Mobile. Social mobility, levelling up—call it whatever you want—the impact for Abi was lifelong.

[Catherine West]

I put on the record my hon. Friend’s excellent work on the digital divide during the pandemic. It was right at the beginning, when highlighting it made such an impact. Of course, we all jumped on it when she raised the matter, but I wanted to put on the record the huge impact that had for so many children and learners in our society. A debt of gratitude is owed by so many families to her work.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I thank my hon. Friend. So many people got involved in providing devices, such as football clubs like my own AFC Wimbledon, which has now donated more than 2,000 refurbished laptops. I thank all those charities that did such work. While it was brilliant work, however, it cannot be enough—the Government need to step in.

I hope that the Minister will consider the merits of my proposal to provide devices and an internet connection to all children on free school meals. I would be delighted to meet her to discuss how it could be rolled out in practice. It took the intervention of a premier league footballer for Ministers to agree that no child should go to bed hungry. What will it take before we all agree that no child should be left behind because of their internet connection?

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

A good bit of lateral thinking in that speech, but it made it worth the wait. We now come to the three Front Benchers. We start with the SNP.

--- Later in debate ---

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

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Huq. I understand that at least one Member had endeavoured to speak in this debate, but had technical challenges. I thank you for raising that issue with the Speaker’s Office so that we can address it for future debates.

I thank the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) for securing this important debate, which enables us to continue the debate that we started on Monday. I said then, and I repeat, that this Government are absolutely dedicated to supporting all children and families, especially the most vulnerable. That is even more important during the pandemic, which has brought so many challenges to so many people.

During term time, the Government provide more than 1.6 million free school meals, providing pupils from the lowest-income families with a free, nutritious lunchtime meal. That helps them to concentrate, learn and achieve in the classroom. The Government have extended free school meal eligibility to more children than any other Government in the last half-century. We extended free school meals to all children in their infant years, and to eligible children in further education institutes. Last year, we expanded that free school meal offer to many families who normally have no recourse to public funds whatever.

As well as free school meals at lunchtime, the Government fund breakfast clubs in more than 2,450 schools in the most disadvantaged areas of the country. That supports more than a quarter of a million children. We have just announced another £24 million to continue that successful support for even more children.

The hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) talked about the devolved Administration’s approach in Scotland. School food and free school meals are fully devolved, and all the devolved nations have a range of different food provision in place, including free meal support for families on welfare benefits. However, in England, we provide free school meals and milk to the children of those who are out of work and on the lowest incomes, and we have our national school milk subsidy scheme, universal free milk provision to all infant schools and our breakfast club programmes. We also have the school fruit and veg scheme, which we jointly fund with the Department for Health and Social Care and, of course, our fantastic holiday activities and food programme.

These days, the use of cashless payments in schools is normal. It is widespread, which means that free school meals pupils are not identifiable among their peers, which helps to remove decades of stigma. In terms of wider support, the Government are completely committed to levelling up for not only adults but people of all ages. That includes helping to raise the educational attainment of pupils from all income backgrounds, and especially those from lower-income backgrounds. We therefore ensure that those in greatest need of support have every chance to realise their potential. Investing in education is a key route to levelling up the playing field for all, so our pupil premium fund is additional support for children who have claimed free school meals at any point in the last six years, as well as children and young people who are in care or who have recently left care.

In 2020-21 alone we distributed £2.4 billion through the pupil premium, and that supported almost 2 million disadvantaged children across the country. School leaders know their pupils best, and schools have the autonomy to use the funding in the most effective way for their learners. That can include a mix of educational interventions and pastoral support. We know that working in that way has had a real impact on attainment. Against a background of rising school standards, disadvantaged pupils have been catching up on their non-disadvantaged peers. The attainment gap has narrowed at every stage from early years to age 16, and the majority of pupils from lower-income backgrounds now attend a good or outstanding school. Our education reforms and the focus provided by the pupil premium have supported that improvement.

From next year we will base the pupil premium on the October 2020 census instead of the January one, which will provide schools with greater certainty about future funding levels earlier in the year, helping them to plan ahead. It also brings the pupil premium in line with how the rest of the core schools budget is calculated. However, the change does not mean that the pupil premium is decreasing. On the contrary, we expect pupil premium funding to increase to more than £2.5 billion in this financial year. As a result we expect a typical school to see an increase in pupil premium funding from the last financial year. In addition, the £300 million recovery premium will be paid out for the same pupils as the pupil premium.

The Government also use the schools national funding formula to distribute mainstream school funding more fairly by looking at the needs of schools and their pupil cohort. In this financial year, 2021-22, the funding is increasing by 3.5%, or £1.27 billion. The NFF continues to target funding to schools that have the greatest numbers of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds, providing £6.4 billion in funding for pupils with additional needs in this financial year, or 17% of the formula’s total funding. On top of that, we are providing the largest cash boost to schools in a decade, with core school funding increasing by £2.6 billion in the last financial year, by £4.8 billion this year, and by £7.1 billion in the year ahead. That also includes significant additional funding for children with special educational needs and disabilities.

Members who have spoken in the debate might be interested in the impact on their own constituencies. The national funding formula allocation this year has increased in Hornsey and Wood Green by 2.3%, or £2.7 million; in Barnsley East by 4.5%, or £2.8 million; in Leicester East by £3.5 million, or 3.4%; in Mitcham and Morden by £0.8 million, or 1.3%; in Lewisham East by £2.1 million, or 2.7%; and in Hampstead and Kilburn by £1.2 million, or 1.9%.

Beyond the classroom, we also fund free home-to-school transport for children eligible for free school meals. Because we know that families also welcome support during the school holidays, I am delighted that our holiday activities and food programme has been expanded across England for 2021. I completely refute the allegation by the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq), who speaks for the Labour party, that the Government had to be dragged kicking and screaming to do something for children in the holidays. We started these programmes three years ago. We have been piloting them, perfecting them, working out what parents and children want. It was a manifesto commitment of this party that we would increase holiday wraparound care, and that is why we have introduced them. The programme launched in Easter and will run across England during the summer and Christmas holidays year. It provides engaging and enriching activities for children across the country.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Was Marcus Rashford making it up, then? Did he have nothing to do? Was it just something in his own paranoid state of mind?

[Vicky Ford]

The holiday activities and food programme, which we announced, during the spending review—this is a really important point—had been piloted by this Government for three years. We had a manifesto commitment to launch it, and we have launched it and delivered it. It is being funded by this Government and has been delivered in every single local authority in England.

We are working hand in hand with Conservative councils, with Labour councils, with Liberal Democrat councils, with councils with no overall control, with independent councils, even with a Green council. We should not play party political games with holiday activities and food, which are vital not only to our children’s food but also to their educational attainment, because we know that when children are engaged in enriching activities during the summer holidays, they come back more ready to learn in September and it helps to close that attainment gap. I ask hon. Members to get behind these clubs, work with their local areas, go and volunteer, take part and enjoy the children having fun.

During the pandemic, the Government have taken exceptional steps to support children to learn when they are in the classroom, but also when they had to stay at home. More than 1.3 million laptops were delivered. It was a massive procurement project, at times one of the largest in the world, and that was on top of an estimated 2.9 million laptops and devices already owned by schools before the start of the pandemic. We have provided extra funding for local transport authorities to procure dedicated additional transport capacity to enable children to travel to school and, in addition to the usual funding that schools receive for free school meals, during the period when school attendance was restricted, we funded almost £0.5 billion of food vouchers, so that children continued to be able to access free lunchtime meals while learning from home.

Right now, our focus is on building back better. We announced the £1 billion covid catch-up package last year, which has already enabled schools to directly tackle the impact of lost learning. Some £650 million was distributed directly to schools. In addition, the £350 million national tutoring programme specifically targets the most disadvantaged young people and enables them to access high-quality small group or one-on-one tuition, which we know helps accelerate academic progress and will help them to tackle the gap between them and their peers.

One example is the Nuffield early language initiative, which supports children in reception year, to which 40% of schools have signed up. The majority of those are schools with above average rates of free school-meal eligibility. Nearly a quarter of a million children are being screened under the programme, and 60,000 children are getting that one-on-one or small group help. It makes a massive difference to those children at the start of their education journey and it is just one part of this amazing national tutoring programme.

The hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green asked about support for other bills. As well as the furlough scheme and more than £7 billion in covid-related welfare measures, the Government have provided an additional £260 million of local welfare funding to local authorities in England. The key focus is to support disadvantaged children and their families, including children who have not yet started school, with food and other essentials, such as the utility bills that the hon. Lady mentioned, during both term time and school holidays. It covers food and fuel, and it keeps children and their families warm and well.

In terms of childcare bills, over the past decade we have made unprecedented investment in childcare. We introduced 30 hours of free childcare for many three and four-year-olds from working families, which can save parents up to £5,000 a year. The 15 hours of free childcare for two-year-olds from lower-income families is also a significant help. We know that when a two-year-old attends an early years setting it helps them to develop social skills and communication skills that can set them up for life.

Education After Covid-19

Siobhain McDonagh Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd March 2021 Westminster Hall

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

One year on from the first lockdown marks an entire year since schools first closed, so perhaps it is time for the Department for Education’s performance review. We could reflect on the exam results fiasco or the free school meals U-turns, or even the utterly irresponsible decision to allow schools to open for just 24 hours in January, enabling the post-Christmas virus to circulate far and wide, driving up infection rates. However, I will instead focus on the remote education support scheme, which will be of vital importance for the topic of today’s debate —improving the education system after the pandemic.

After the uncertainty of the opening months it quickly became clear that the pandemic would have a long-term impact on education, and that connectivity would be vital to continue learning. So, back in June, MPs, charities, unions, past Education Secretaries and even a former Prime Minister all joined me in writing to the Secretary of State to call on his Department to ensure that no child would be left behind because they could not access the internet or a device at home.

Ten months on, this week’s results in the National Audit Office report are damning. The Department did not even aim to provide equipment to all children who lacked it. How does the Minister think that children on the wrong side of the digital divide have been able to log in and learn from home? The answer is simple: they have not. Every click has widened the attainment gap. The Government pledged 1.3 million devices, without connectivity, but there are still 300,000 missing. Where are they?

It is now March 2021 and I am still driving around Mitcham and Morden, dropping donated devices to my local schools. Although I am very grateful to all the individuals and organisations who are donating devices, stepping in where the Government have failed, there is still far to go. St Mark’s Academy needs 303 devices, Harris Academy Morden needs 100, William Morris Primary School needs 50, Stanford Primary School needs 15, Liberty Primary School needs 50 and St Teresa’s RC Primary School needs 52.

Before the pandemic, children on free school meals were leaving school 18 months behind other children and the gap was getting worse. How far behind will those on the wrong side of the digital divide have fallen now? This is no problem for the past; we are now well and truly a digital society and there is no going back. The focus has to be on how these children will catch up, and closing the digital divide is an imperative first step.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Gibb]

The £650 million, of course, is allocated to schools on a per pupil basis—£80 per pupil—and most of that money has now been distributed. For the £300 million that we announced as part of the £700 million, again, the recovery premium is being allocated to schools on the basis of the pupil premium eligibility in those schools, so that will be allocated to schools to use at their discretion. The national tutoring programme is run by the Education Endowment Foundation, and we have approved 33 tutoring companies: we wanted to make sure that the quality of tutoring was there. So far, 130,000 pupils have been signed up for the programme, but we envisage reaching significantly more—something like three quarters of a million students—in this coming academic year.

Through the get help with technology programme, the Government are investing over £400 million to support access to remote education and online social care services, including making 1.3 million laptops and tablets available for disadvantaged children. The hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) raised this issue today, as she has done in other debates. She will be aware that we are procuring 1.3 million laptops that have to be built from scratch. They have to be ordered, shipped in, checked and have software added. On top of the 1.3 million that we have acquired and procured, there are the 2.9 million devices in schools ready to be lent to pupils that schools had before the pandemic.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

The Minister will know that 1 million of those laptops have been distributed. Where is the balance of the 300,000? Where are they right now? How does he address the matter of the 880,000 households that do not have any internet connection, given that only 45,000 MiFis or other routers were provided?

[Nick Gibb]

Actually, 1.2 million of those computers have already been delivered and the remainder will be delivered before the end of March. The hon. Member will also be aware that we have worked with mobile operator companies to provide free uplift data to disadvantaged families who do not have access to wi-fi in their homes. They can use their mobile phones to get some educational material without paying the hefty charges for data use. We have partnered with the UK’s leading mobile operators, as I said, to offer free data, as well as delivering over 70,000 4G wireless routers for pupils without connection at home. The programmes I have outlined are focused on helping the most disadvantaged pupils, targeting them for support.

Alongside those catch-up programmes, we also continue to learn and understand what more is needed to help recover students’ lost education over the course of this Parliament, and we will ensure that support is delivered in a way that works for both young people and the sector.

We are also concentrating on the quality of teaching and making sure that teachers are supported in the early years of their careers through the early career framework. We are transforming the training and professional development that teachers receive at every stage of their careers to create a world-class teacher development curriculum and career offer for our teachers. That is one of the most important things we can do as we support schools in recovering.

Ultimately, the Government want all pupils to make up for the education they lost as a result of the pandemic. We are doing everything in our power to ensure that pupils get the opportunity they deserve to redress the balance. We are absolutely determined as a Government that no child will suffer any damage to their long-term prospects as a consequence of this terrible pandemic that we are all fighting to defeat.