Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the University of Manchester's blog entitled Addressing the UK’s heritage skills crisis: why we must act now, published on 23 January 2025, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of including (a) heritage skills and (b) the Sloyd method in the national curriculum.

The national curriculum focuses on the key knowledge that must be taught to children aged 5 to 16 years-old in maintained schools. The national curriculum provides a broad framework which ensures schools have flexibility to organise the content and delivery of the curriculum to meet the needs of their pupils.

The government has established an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review, covering ages 5 to 18, chaired by Professor Becky Francis CBE.

The Review seeks to deliver a curriculum that ensures children and young people leave compulsory education ready for life and ready for work, building the knowledge, skills and attributes needed to thrive.

The Review Group has now published a well-evidenced, clear interim report, which sets out its interim findings and confirms the key areas for further work. This highlights the successes of the current system, making clear that the most trusted and valued aspects of our system will remain, whilst setting a positive vision for the future. The report can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/curriculum-and-assessment-review-interim-report.

The government will consider any changes it wishes to make to curriculum, assessment and qualifications whilst the Review is conducted, and will respond to the final recommendations in autumn 2025.