Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to reduce regional inequalities in the ability to access private tutoring.

The ‘Every Child Achieving and Thriving’ White Paper sets out plans to build on support at home with a stretching, enriching and inclusive school experience to ensure every child has what they need to get on in life.

We know that many schools use their pupil premium to fund tuition. Schools can use their pupil premium to provide peer tutoring and one-to-one or small group tuition when choosing support that will most improve progress, using the department’s ‘menu of approaches’, which is informed by evidence of how best to improve disadvantaged pupils’ attainment.

Through our AI Tutoring Tools Programme, we will be co‑creating and trialling curriculum‑aligned, safe‑by‑design AI tutoring tools with teachers, pupils and experts. This will support teaching, build evidence of impact on attainment and inclusion to ensure pupils, including those who often cannot access private tuition, benefit from high quality individual learning support.