Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, in the context of the spread of the Omicron variant of covid-19, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of support provided to SEND schools for (a) compensating support staff for overtime worked and (b) ensuring provision of training.

Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, schools have continued to receive their core funding regardless of any periods of reduced attendance. Schools have the flexibility to make their own decisions on how to prioritise their spending to invest in a range of resources and activities that will best support their staff and pupils. Schools will be able to use their existing budgets to help with the costs associated with COVID-19 related absences.

The department re-introduced the COVID-19 workforce fund in the autumn term to provide financial support to eligible schools and colleges. The fund has been extended until spring half-term to cover the cost of term-time staff absences experienced between 22 November 2021 and 18 February 2022.

We recognise that special schools, alternative provision, and special post-16 institutions are often more impacted by staff absences and are less able to manage these absences using their existing staff and resources than mainstream schools and colleges. That is why we have set a lower threshold for special schools, alternative provision and special post-16 institutions for short-term teacher absences. We have also been more flexible in our criteria for support staff claims in special schools and alternative provision in recognition of this critical role in these providers in particular.

As well as covering funding for schools to employ supply staff to manage absences, the fund can also be used to increase hours of part-time teaching or education support staff, or to make amendments to support staff terms and conditions to enable them to take on additional responsibilities. Schools should give due consideration to workload and wellbeing and discuss any changes with the employee first.