Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the effect of his policy of including as vulnerable those children and young people who may have difficulty engaging with remote education at home due to a lack of devices or quiet space to study on the projected infection rates of covid-19 in areas of deprivation (a) in Wirral and (b) in England.

Following my right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister’s announcement of a new national lockdown, the Department published updated guidance on 8 January for children of critical workers and vulnerable children who can access schools or educational settings, which is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-educational-provision/guidance-for-schools-colleges-and-local-authorities-on-maintaining-educational-provision. The Department also published updated guidance on remote education: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/950510/School_national_restrictions_guidance.pdf.

In the remote education guidance, the Department set out that some children who have difficulty engaging in remote education may be considered to be vulnerable children and, therefore, eligible to attend school. It is up to the child’s school or local authority to make this decision. The decision would be based on the needs of the child and their family, and a range of other factors, as set out in the guidance: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-educational-provision/guidance-for-schools-colleges-and-local-authorities-on-maintaining-educational-provision#vulnerable-children-and-young-people.

The updated remote education guidance also sets outs that, where pupils continue to experience barriers to digital remote education, we expect schools to work to overcome these barriers. This could include distributing school-owned laptops or supplementing digital provision with different forms of remote education such as printed resources or textbooks. This should be supplemented with other forms of communication to keep pupils and students on track, or answer questions about work.

The Department has also published a good practice guide, which provides advice to teachers and school leaders to support effective delivery of the curriculum remotely: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/remote-education-good-practice/remote-education-good-practice. This is part of our broader package of support for schools, which are able to be accessed through the Get Help with Remote Education page: https://get-help-with-remote-education.education.gov.uk/good-teaching-practice.html.