Generative Artificial Intelligence: Schools

Steve Yemm Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2025 Westminster Hall

[Damian Hinds]

Funnily enough, I agree with the hon. Member, though not necessarily about statutory requirements. It is certainly true—in fact, he inadvertently leads me on to my next point—that we need to be careful and discerning in using these products. There are many risks, including the safeguarding risks inherent in technology, hallucinations, dud information and, as the hon. Member rightly says, biases.

There are some very direct and sharp risks to children. I am afraid that many misleading, unpleasant and cruel things can be done with AI. They can be done already but, as with so many other things, AI magnifies and turbocharges the problem. Some of those things can be done by adults to children; some of them are done by children to other children. We need to be very aware of those risks, some of which relate to existing practices and policy questions, such as how to deal with intimate image abuse and sexting. The problem further supports the case for a comprehensive school-day phone ban, to take cameras out of schools.

More generally, there is a need for media literacy and general discernment. I am reluctant and nervous to talk about media literacy, and more so about the phrase “critical thinking,” because it is too often conflated with the false dichotomy that occasionally comes up in the educational world: knowledge versus skills. Clearly, we need both. We need both in life, and we need to have developed both in school, but knowledge precedes skills because we can only think with what we know. However, it is really important in this context that children know how AI can make mistakes, and that they come to trust and know to look out for the correct primary sources, and trusted brands—trusted sources—rather than just stuff on the internet.

In the 2019 guidance on teaching online safety in schools, since updated, a fusion of the computing, relationships and citizenship curricula was envisaged. Children would be guided through how to evaluate what they see online, how to recognise techniques used for persuasion, and how to understand confirmation bias, as well as misinformation and disinformation. The new edition of “Keeping Children Safe in Education”, which came out yesterday, lists disinformation and misinformation as safeguarding concerns in their own right for the first time. The online safety guidance also included the importance of learning why people might try to bend the truth on the internet and pretend to be someone they are not. That was a start, but at this technological inflection point, it needs a huge scaling up.

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman share my concern about some of the dangers of using generative AI in the classroom, particularly around harmful content and activity? I read the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children’s “Viewing Generative AI and children’s safety in the round”, which gave examples of children creating deepfakes of other children in the class.

Does the right hon. Gentleman also share my concerns about children’s privacy and data protection, and the extent to which many of these edtech applications are created with the aim of minimising data protection? I understand he has concerns about regulation, but this seems to be almost entirely unregulated in the classroom. There is certainly a case for, at the very least, regulating data protection, data to third parties and—

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Yemm Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that incredibly important issue that we, as a Government, take extremely seriously, because no student should be subject to antisemitism on universities campuses or in any place in our education system. That is why we have committed £7 million of funding to address antisemitism in education. Half a million pounds of that has already been awarded to University Jewish Chaplaincy to support student welfare on university campuses. That runs alongside the new condition of registration from the Office for Students that will ensure we protect students from harassment and discrimination.

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

Given my experience of working with the Holocaust Educational Trust in schools in Mansfield, I ask the Secretary of State to confirm that the history of the Holocaust will be taught in schools following the passage of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which the Conservatives opposed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Yemm Excerpts

Monday 28th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Catherine McKinnell]

We absolutely support children to have the ability to play, and that is really important in school as well. We understand that some schools require additional support. We are working closely with the sector to ensure the best outcomes for all children, not just some children, as the previous Government focused on.

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

Local Conservative council candidates in Mansfield say on the doorstep that they want better funding for our schools. However, in the pursuit of restoring private schools’ tax breaks, which of these measures does the Minister think the Tories would cut first: new teachers, speech and language support, mental health counsellors, careers advice or work experience?

[Catherine McKinnell]

rose—

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Steve Yemm Excerpts

Tuesday 18th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Nick Timothy]

The Minister gave me a frown but she can intervene and admit the success of English schools in those rankings if she wishes.

It is why, when Michaela was once again selected—[Interruption.] Would the Minister like to intervene? No, apparently not. It is why, when Michaela was once again the best-ranked school in the country for progress, the Secretary of State could not bring herself even to congratulate Katherine Birbalsingh when I invited her to do so from these Benches. It is why the Education Secretary’s special adviser briefed the newspapers that Ms Birbalsingh is a liar, and why he briefed the newspapers against Amanda Spielman, former head of Ofsted, attacking her very personally as a “failure” and a Conservative.

As Margaret Thatcher, not just a former Prime Minister but a former Education Secretary, once said:

“If they attack you personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.”

And this is the truth: the Education Secretary does not have a single political argument for this disgraceful act of policy vandalism, but she is determined to ignore those who know better than her and push on. And the people who lose out, I am afraid, will be the children, from ordinary working families the length and breadth of the country, denied the best we can give them, unaware that a better and brighter future has been stolen from them thanks to nothing more than vindictive left-wing dogma.

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

It is an absolute pleasure to speak in support of the Bill, which delivers on the Government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity. The Bill will drive high and rising standards in school, cut the cost of sending children to school for my constituents and make life easier for families in my area. Its landmark reforms to safeguarding and children’s social care will stop children from falling through the cracks.

Apprenticeships and T-Levels

Steve Yemm Excerpts

Wednesday 20th November 2024 Westminster Hall

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher.

Making sure that our young people have access to a wide range of educational opportunities that can lead them on to high-quality, well-paid and secure employment is vital to the health of our economy. In fact, it is critical to towns like Mansfield, which are to some extent facing a brain drain due to poor investment in employment opportunities and a weak private sector. They also have the difficulties with productivity and gross value added highlighted by the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds); those are a real challenge in constituencies like mine.

In July, I was elected with a mandate for change locally. I stood on a platform to focus on five local missions that I thought would have a significant impact. One was to do everything I could to facilitate a stable and growing local economy and good-quality jobs for everyone in my constituency. Of course, a critical part of that is ensuring that there is a wide range of high-calibre academic and vocational education opportunities. I therefore welcome the debate.

Without a highly skilled workforce, areas like mine cannot attract the investment we need, and we know that investment brings prosperity for our communities. I am delighted that the Government made additional money available in the Budget for further education and have announced reforms to the apprenticeship system, with a new growth and skills levy. I welcome the progress and know that the Government have aspirations to do more over the coming months and years. I want Mansfield to be part of that conversation.

I have had a number of discussions with West Notts college and Nottingham Trent University about their funding streams and ways they feel they can work together more effectively to bring exactly those types of opportunities in the further and higher education sector to young people and adults in my constituency. As part of that, we have seen a £6.5 million education investment from Nottingham Trent University in my constituency, which is delivering specialist teaching and learning facilities to support local people to upskill and to access and retain employment in the local area. That includes really important opportunities in nursing, aligned with the local health authority, and in engineering, business, criminal justice and sports science. I congratulate both those parties on their work to enabled all of that to come to fruition.

I see latent potential to build on that collaboration between HE and FE in my constituency, which might be called “the Mansfield model”, across further education. By cutting red tape and streamlining the effectiveness of funding, like in the West Notts college and Nottingham Trent University joint campus in my constituency, it would be possible to unleash the power of further education provision. Given the success in my local area, I recently wrote to invite the Secretary of State for Education to Mansfield. I would be delighted to host a Minister from the Department, so that they can see directly how the local model could be used as a blueprint to improve skills and attract important private sector investment into towns like mine.