Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Monday 21st June 2021 Commons Chamber

[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.

Education After Covid-19

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 23rd March 2021 Westminster Hall

[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.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Monday 1st March 2021 Commons Chamber

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

I welcome the reopening of schools and the long awaited introduction of school testing, but, with parental consent required, some schools cannot test up to half of their pupils, putting their peers and families at avoidable risk. Given the importance of school testing, should it not be opt out rather than opt in, ensuring that a far greater number of pupils are tested while retaining parents right to choose?

[Nick Gibb]

We give clear guidance, and we expect parents to give permission to the school to allow secondary school pupils to be tested twice a week. This is an important initiative that helps to minimise the risk of transmission in the secondary school estate. After the first three tests, home testing kits will be sent to homes with pupils, and we hope that the twice-weekly testing of pupils will continue for the foreseeable future.

Educational Settings: Reopening

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

I certainly join my hon. Friend in paying tribute to teachers in Cheadle. Combining teaching vulnerable children and critical workers’ children full time in school with providing high-quality remote education to pupils at home is a huge challenge. Of course, teachers also have to maintain the safety measures that are in place to ensure that we minimise the risk of transmission in school. I am aware of the very real challenges that teachers face. Ensuring that children who have not coped as well with remote education as they would in the class are able to catch up as swiftly as possible when they return to school is a key priority for the Department, and we will be saying more about that in the weeks ahead.

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

Schools need a return plan, but what about the children who are unable to learn remotely in the meantime? The Government are slowly distributing laptops that are unusable without connectivity, but 1 million children have only mum’s mobile as their connection and a further half a million have no connection at all and so cannot receive network data boosts. Nine months on, why has the Minister still not ensured that those children can connect from home so that they do not fall even further behind?

[Nick Gibb]

If I am allowed, I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for her assiduous work on remote education. We have purchased 1.3 million computers for children and young people in our schools and colleges at a time when there is huge global demand for those devices. They have been built to order, imported, shipped and distributed, and 876,000 of them are now in the hands of schools and pupils. It is also right to point to data. We have partnered with the UK’s major mobile phone operators to provide free data to disadvantaged children so that they can get online using, for example, their parents’ smartphone. They will not have to pay data charges for downloading educational material.

School Attendance: Covid-19

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Monday 2nd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Siobhain McDonagh]

If I remember the figures correctly, only 10% of households with an income of less than £10,000 have internet access at home, while over 90% of households with an income above £40,000 do, so deprivation is the key.

[Nick Gibb]

The hon. Member makes a good point, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North. That is why a targeted approach is important. The hon. Lady asked why that was not mentioned during the previous debate, but at that time no decision had been made about changes to the allocation of laptops and tablets.

In conclusion, I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North for starting today’s debate. Securing a high level of attendance for all children remains a priority for the Government. We have put in place a range of measures to support good school attendance, even in these challenging circumstances. It is right that schools and local authorities should have all the necessary tools to secure excellent attendance, which includes measures to support families, and sanctions where necessary.

Where children are not able to attend school because they are following clinical or public health advice related to coronavirus, we have been clear that absence will not be penalised. Given the profoundly positive impact that being in school can have on a child’s attainment and life chances, high levels of attendance in school have never been more important.

Remote Education: Self-isolating Pupils

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 20th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I am becoming increasingly aware of the fact that being poor means that people pay their bills differently, whether it is electricity meters or gas meters. They get their data from pay-as-you-go mobiles from providers other than the mainstream ones, such as giffgaff and Lycamobile. What is the Minister doing in those sorts of areas?

[Nick Gibb]

With permission, I will write to the hon. Member about that so that I get the facts absolutely right. We are very concerned about these issues, which is why we have provided more than 50,000 4G routers to homes and the other support that I referred to. I will write to her specifically about the point she raises.

We are funding expert technical support and training to help schools and to help set up Google or Microsoft digital education platforms. Schools can also access guidance and training from a network of schools and colleges across the country that are leading the way in the use of digital. They are our edtech demonstrator schools. They have already produced a library of resources and materials to support remote education arrangements, including support for schools that are less digitally able, alongside guidance about how to make use of Department for Education-funded digital platforms and devices. The programme is proving popular: well over 1,000 schools and colleges are receiving weekly tailored support, and more than 5,000 schools and colleges are attending livestreamed webinars.

To support the hard work of schools in delivering remote education, Oak National Academy, which the hon. Member referred to, was very quickly brought together —I think within two weeks of the pandemic leading to schools closing—by more than 40 teachers, and their schools and other educational organisations also helped them. The Department has made £4.84 million available for Oak National Academy, both for the summer term of the last academic year and for the 2020-21 academic year, to provide video lessons for a broad range of subjects for reception to year 11. Oak will remain a free optional resource for 2020-21. Since the start of the autumn term, half a million users have visited the Oak National Academy platform, and there have been 3.1 million lessons.

The Government are clear that the best place for children is in school, where they can be with their friends and teachers and can catch up with the education that they may have lost when schools closed to most pupils, but ensuring that that education can continue when schools are required to send children and young people home to self-isolate because of a confirmed case of coronavirus is also vital. We are providing the support and devices for the most disadvantaged, and we are providing £1 billion of catch-up funding to ensure that the current generation of school students do not have their long-term prospects damaged by the appalling pandemic that the world is confronting.

Question put and agreed to.

Cost of School Uniforms

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 9th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)]

rose—

[Siobhain McDonagh (in the Chair)]

Order. I was going to call the shadow Minister, but I have been corrected by the Clerk. The Opposition spokesperson cannot make a speech in a half-hour debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Gibb]

I will not because of the time; I am sorry.

No school uniform should be so expensive as to leave pupils or their families feeling unable to apply to or attend a school. One hon. Member raised the issue of the admissions code, which explicitly sets out that,

“Admission authorities must ensure that…policies around school uniform or school trips do not discourage parents from applying for a place for their child.”

It is for the governing body of a school to decide whether there should be a school uniform policy, and if so, what it should be. It is also for the governing body to decide how the uniform should be sourced. However, governing bodies should give cost considerations the highest priority when making decisions about their school’s uniform.

The Department publishes best practice guidance on school uniform, the latest version of which was published in September 2013. That guidance makes it clear that when schools set their policy on school uniform, they should

“consider the cost, the available supply sources and year round availability of the proposed uniform to ensure it is providing best value for money for parents”,

and on the important issue of games or PE kits, that schools should

“ensure that the PE uniform is practical, comfortable and appropriate to the activity involved, and that consideration is given to the cost of compulsory PE clothing”.

That is non-statutory guidance for schools.

The right hon. Member for Birkenhead is right to draw attention to the issue of school uniforms and VAT. EU law allows the UK to have a zero rate of VAT on clothing and footwear designed for young children which is not suitable for older people. Therefore, clothing designed for children under 14 years old has no VAT on it. Over time, as children grow, their clothing becomes indistinguishable from that of adults. HM Revenue and Customs needs to operate size limits for the VAT relief to comply with EU law. The limits are based on the average size of 13-year-old children, using data provided by the British Standards Institution. It is inevitable that some children within the intended age range—such as the child cited by the right hon. Gentleman—will require larger articles of clothing or footwear that do not qualify for the relief. The Government are unable, under EU law, to extend the relief to encompass children beyond the average size. That is one of the reasons that our guidance is so firm in saying that schools should ensure their school uniform is affordable. I know the right hon. Gentleman has strong views on the EU and he may well get his way on this issue in due course.

Our existing best practice guidance emphasises the need for uniforms to be affordable. In fact, we advise school governing bodies to give the highest priority to cost considerations when making decisions about their school uniform. Most schools already ensure that their uniforms are affordable. However, for the minority of schools that may not, the Government have announced their plan to legislate to put the school uniform guidance on a statutory footing to send a clear signal that we expect schools to ensure uniform costs are reasonable.

The hon. Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore) raised the issue of financial help and school funding grants. In England, some local authorities provide discretionary grants to help with buying school uniforms. Local authorities that offer such grants set their own criteria for eligibility, and schools may offer clothing schemes, such as second-hand uniforms at reduced prices. Schools may also choose to use their pupil premium funding to offer subsidies or grants for school uniforms.

The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) raised the issue of recycling, of games kits in particular. I remember that I wore a second-hand rugby kit in some of the years at my school, and that was significantly cheaper than buying the kit brand new—I was not a particularly good rugby player, so it would not have been money well spent.

To conclude, I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Birkenhead for raising this issue and to other right hon. and hon. Members for contributing to the debate. Important issues have been raised. I hope that he is content to some extent that the Government echo his concern and content about the steps that we have taken to underline the importance of the cost of school uniform in helping the most disadvantaged members of society to access to a good school place and a good education. We want to ensure that the cost of uniform does not act as a barrier to getting a good education and a good school place.

[Siobhain McDonagh (in the Chair)]

I apologise to Members for my mistakes in chairing the sitting. The faults were entirely mine.

Education

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Tuesday 22nd May 2018 Ministerial Corrections

[Siobhain McDonagh]

The Minister is aware that I am a supporter of Labour’s academisation scheme, whereby failing schools that cannot be fixed by the council became academies. The problem for my constituency and many others is that the number of good or adequate sponsors is now running out and schools are being forced to become academies, which is not always in the best interests of pupils.

[Nick Gibb]

I share the hon. Lady’s support for Labour’s academisation programme, which is why we expanded it from 200 academies to over 6,000. She is fortunate to have in her constituency the Harris Federation, which is one of the most successful multi-academy trusts and school sponsors in the country. She should also want to acknowledge that funding for schools in Mitcham and Morden will rise by 7.3% under the national funding formula, and that Merton will receive an extra £6.3 million by 2019-20—a 5.4% increase in funding.

[Official Report, 25 April 2018, Vol. 639, c. 929.]

Letter of correction from Mr Gibb:

An error has been identified in the answer given to the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) on 25 April 2018.

The correct response should have been:

School Funding

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Nick Gibb]

We take the education of children with special educational needs very seriously. My hon. Friend the former Schools Minister, Ed Timpson, reformed the system and introduced education, health and care plans, which is a much more streamlined and effective way of ensuring that those children get the right care and education. The hon. Lady is right to acknowledge that that has led to increased pressure on the high needs budget, which is why we have increased it, from £5 billion in 2013 to £6 billion this year. Those are very significant sums of money.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup) for bringing a dose of reality to the debate and correcting some of the points made by Opposition Members. She was right to welcome the 5% increase in schools funding for schools in her constituency under the national funding formula.

I am also grateful to the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) for pointing out that every school in her constituency is now rated “good” or “outstanding” by Ofsted, including the recently inspected Harris Primary School—it was rated “outstanding”. I congratulate all the teachers in her constituency on that achievement. The Government’s overriding objective has been to ensure that every local school is a good school, so that parents can be confident when they send their children there.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

The Minister is aware that I am a supporter of Labour’s academisation scheme, whereby failing schools that cannot be fixed by the council became academies. The problem for my constituency and many others is that the number of good or adequate sponsors is now running out and schools are being forced to become academies, which is not always in the best interests of pupils.

[Nick Gibb]

I share the hon. Lady’s support for Labour’s academisation programme, which is why we expanded it from 200 academies to over 6,000. She is fortunate to have in her constituency the Harris Federation, which is one of the most successful multi-academy trusts and school sponsors in the country. She should also want to acknowledge that funding for schools in Mitcham and Morden will rise by 7.3% under the national funding formula, and that Merton will receive an extra £6.3 million by 2019-20—a 5.4% increase in funding.[Official Report, 22 May 2018, Vol. 641, c. 5MC.]

My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson), in yet another highly effective speech on education, rightly pointed out that Dorset will receive a 4.2% increase and Poole a 3.8% increase under the full national funding formula. He also highlighted that England is rising up the PIRLS league table for the reading ability of our nine-year-olds. Reading is the basic fundamental building block, as the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins), who is sitting on the Opposition Back Bench, would acknowledge. This country’s adoption of phonics and the hard work of primary school teachers up and down the country mean that we have risen from joint 10th to joint eighth in the PIRLS world league table.

In her strong contribution, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), like my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole, effectively revealed Labour’s and the unions’ political motives for raising school funding. Lewes’s schools will see a 4.3% increase in funding under the national funding formula, but I will certainly come back to her on the three requests from the primary schools in her constituency.

Although I think there is some consensus in the House about the principles underlying the national funding formula, we disagree with the Opposition on the overall amount. Is the £42.4 billion we are spending this year enough, and can our public finances afford more? Last July, we announced an additional £1.3 billion increase in overall school and high needs funding, over and above the increases agreed in the 2015 spending review—£416 million more for 2018-19 and £884 million more for 2019-20. The Institute for Fiscal Studies says that school funding will be 50% higher in real terms per pupil by 2019-20 than in 2000.

However, we know that in the past two years schools have incurred increased costs, such as higher employer’s national insurance contributions and higher pensions contributions. Of course, both have applied to other public services, and higher national insurance has also applied to private sector employers. Those costs are all part of tax and revenue-raising measures that were introduced to help reduce the public sector budget deficit, which stood at £150 billion per year—10% of our GDP—when we came into office in 2010. That was unsustainable and would have been bankrupting if we had not addressed it. Thanks to the hard work of the British people and a series of difficult decisions, that deficit has reduced to £42.6 billion—2.1% of GDP—and is set to fall further.

Without that balanced approach to public spending and the public finances, we would not now have a strong economy providing young people with the job opportunities that a record number of jobs in the economy brings. Without that careful and balanced approach, we would not have been able to spend £42.4 billion on schools this year and allocate more than £23 billion to capital spending from 2016 to 2021, and we would not have created more than 800,000 new school places, with more in the pipeline; seen a rise in reading standards in our schools; helped schools raise the standard of maths teaching; allocated significant funds to music and the arts; ensured that 91% of 16-year-olds studied at least two science GCSEs, up from 62% in 2011; or seen 1.9 million more pupils in schools rated “good” or “outstanding” by Ofsted than in 2010.

None of that would have been achieved if we had taken the hard left-wing approach to the public finances set out by Labour during and since the general election. Labour’s spend, spend, spend plans would mean £106 billion more public spending, wiping out in one blow eight years of hard work on deficit reduction. Its plans to nationalise a raft of industries would add £176 billion to the national debt. Its other plans would bring the increase in debt to £350 billion, costing us another £8 billion a year in higher interest charges—an amount equal to nearly a fifth of the schools budget blown on increased debt interest charges to fund Labour’s spending plans.

What do we know about Labour’s statements and promises on spending? We know that they cannot be delivered without bankrupting the country. It would lead to a run on the pound, a flight of investment and a rise in unemployment—the hallmark of every period of Labour in office. That is why, no doubt, the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne, in a moment of candour, described Labour’s economic policy as “a bit of a” something “or bust” policy.

By contrast, because of our balanced approach to public spending, funding for schools under the national formula will ensure that every school attracts at least 0.5% more per pupil funding this year and 1% next year than in 2017, with thousands of schools receiving significantly more. It means that for schools that have historically had the very lowest funding, we can introduce a minimum of £3,500 per pupil for primary schools and £4,800 per pupil for secondary schools. It means that we can increase funding for special educational needs from £5 billion in 2013 to £6 billion this year.

Delivery, not promises, is what matters and this Government are delivering—delivering on the economy, delivering on jobs, delivering on school funding and delivering on academic standards.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House notes the Conservative Party manifesto pledge to make sure that no school has its budget cut as a result of the new national funding formula, the statement by the Secretary of State for Education that each school will see at least a small cash terms increase and the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s guarantee that every school would receive a cash terms increase; endorses the aim of ensuring that there is a cash increase in every school’s budget; agrees with the UK Statistics Authority that such an increase is not guaranteed by the national funding formula, which allows for reductions of up to 1.5 per cent in per pupil funding for schools; and calls on the Government to meet its guarantee, ensuring that every single school receives a cash increase in per pupil funding in every financial year of the 2017 Parliament.

School Funding (London)

Debate between Siobhain McDonagh and Nick Gibb

Wednesday 29th March 2017 Westminster Hall

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

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) on her brilliant exposition of the issues currently facing London schools.

In May, I will have been the MP for Mitcham and Morden—the place of my birth—for 20 years. One of the biggest and most satisfying things during those 20 years has been seeing the blooming of our schools. Schools that were universally performing so poorly have been transformed into schools that, in the main, although not exclusively, are doing really well. School buildings are now places that people would want to enter, rather than fearing to enter. I want to see that continue, and I want to see that mostly for those who have least. What concerns me is the number of teachers who come and see me at my Friday advice surgery from schools where children are in temporary accommodation and finding it difficult to get to school. As has been mentioned, more children than ever suffer from mental health problems and are self-harming. These demands on schools at this time make it difficult for them to cope from where they are, let alone if they lose any funds at all.

[Mr Gibb]

Let me gently point out to the hon. Lady that 96.2% of the schools in her constituency, Mitcham and Morden, gain funding under the new national funding formula. That amounts to a 6.6% increase once the formula is fully implemented, and that is £3.5 million. Schools should not be coming to the hon. Lady to talk about cuts in funding, because 96% of her local schools will see an increase in funding under this formula.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I invite the Minister to come to William Morris Primary School, in Pollards Hill, which is going to lose £487 per pupil, which is the equivalent of four teachers, or to Singlegate Primary School, which will lose £424 per pupil; or perhaps he would like to go to Morden.

[Mr Gibb]

Again, the hon. Lady takes the misleading figures from the National Union of Teachers, which is conflating the cost pressures that all of the public sector is incurring over this year and the next three years—amounting to 8% in total—with the national funding formula. The national funding formula is good for schools in the hon. Lady’s constituency. I hope very much that her local headteachers and she herself will support the new national funding formula, because it is fairer, and fairer for her schools.

[Mr David Hanson (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Siobhain McDonagh.