Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding each primary school in Harrow West constituency has (a) applied for and (b) received as part of the fund to support remote education; and if he will make a statement.

It is vital that students have access to high quality and consistent remote education. The Department believes that through the hard work of teachers and staff, pupils will continue to receive the education they deserve, whatever the circumstances.

The Department is providing additional funding to schools, on top of existing budgets, to cover unavoidable costs incurred between March to July due to the COVID-19 outbreak that could not be met from their budgets.

Schools have been eligible to claim for: increased premises related costs associated with keeping schools open over the Easter and summer half term holidays; support for free school meals for eligible children who were not in school, where schools were not using the national voucher scheme; and additional cleaning costs required due to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases, over and above the cost of existing cleaning arrangements.

To support remote education, the Government has invested over £160 million to provide schools with laptops, tablets and connectivity, peer-to-peer support and digital learning platforms. This includes providing over 220,000 laptops and tablets and over 50,000 4G wireless routers during the summer term for disadvantaged children in Year 10, children receiving support from a social worker and care leavers.

Local authorities and academy trusts were allocated a number of devices based on the number of pupils eligible for free school meals. A breakdown of the number of devices delivered to each local authority and academy trust can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/laptops-tablets-and-4g-wireless-routers-progress-data.

The Department is now supplementing this support by making an additional 250,000 laptops and tablets available to schools in the event that face-to-face schooling is disrupted as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak. This Department is also working with the major telecommunications companies to improve internet connectivity for disadvantaged and vulnerable families who rely on a mobile internet connection.

The Government is funding expert technical support to help schools set up secure user accounts for Google and Microsoft’s education platforms. We are also investing £1.5 million of additional funding to expand the EdTech Demonstrator programme, which provides peer-to-peer support for schools and colleges.

New resources for staff, including a good practice guide and school-led webinars, will also be made available. This builds on the universal package already in place through the Oak National Academy, which provides video lessons across a broad range of subjects for every year group from Reception to Year 11. Children will have the flexibility to access free remote education in addition to their own school’s offer this year.