Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that inclusion policies do not compromise (a) the safety of teachers and (b) the learning environment for pupils.

High standards, early support and meaningful parental engagement all play a crucial role in ensuring that every pupil can achieve and thrive in a caring, safe classroom.

The department is clear no teacher should feel unsafe or be subjected to violence in the workplace, and schools should take swift and robust action where such incidents occur. The ‘Behaviour in schools’ guidance states all schools are legally required to have a behaviour policy that sets out effective strategies to promote good behaviour.

To deliver a stronger inclusive mainstream system, we are investing £1.6 billion in an Inclusive Mainstream fund over three years to support early years settings, schools and colleges to become inclusive by design.

To underpin this, we are launching a new landmark training package on inclusion, with an investment of over £200 million over three years, to give all staff in early years settings, schools and colleges the training they need to better support pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) in mainstream settings. School leaders should consider early intervention strategies to address the underlying causes or any contributing factors towards pupil’s disruptive behaviour. This can include incidents where a pupil has SEND or unmet needs

We are also investing around £1.8 billion over the next three years for local area partnerships, including local authorities and integrated care boards, to develop a new ‘Experts at Hand’ offer. This new offer is designed to strengthen the capability of mainstream education settings so that more specialist expertise can be accessed by settings to support all children and young people thrive.