Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many laptops, iPads and other IT and broadband support has been given to schools and other education providers during the covid-19 outbreak.

The Government is investing over £400 million to support access to remote education and online social care services, including making 1.3 million laptops and tablets available for disadvantaged children and young people. The Government is providing this significant injection of laptops and tablets on top of an estimated 2.9 million already owned by schools before the start of the COVID-19 outbreak.

To date, over 1.2 million laptops and tablets have been delivered to schools, academy trusts, local authorities and further education colleges. We are making further deliveries on an ongoing basis, and any school that has not yet ordered their allocation of devices can still do so.

Laptops and tablets are owned by schools, academy trusts, local authorities or further education colleges who can lend these to the children and young people who need them most, during the current COVID-19 restrictions.

We have also partnered with the UK’s leading mobile operators to provide free data to help over 30,000 disadvantaged children get online as well as delivering over 70,000 4G wireless routers for pupils without connection at home.

We are grateful to Asda mobile, BT Mobile, EE, giffgaff, iD Mobile, IQ Mobile, Lebara, Lycamobile, O2, Sky Mobile, Smarty, Tesco Mobile, Three, Virgin Mobile and Vodafone for supporting the mobile data offer.