Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, which university technical colleges have been visited by Ministers of his Department since 1 January 2020; and what plans he and his Ministers have to visit university technical colleges in the 2021-22 school year.

Since 1 January 2020, ministers have undertaken the following visits to University Technical Colleges (UTCs):

My noble Friend, the former Minister for the School System, Baroness Berridge:

• Virtual visit to the London Design and Engineering UTC – 18 Nov 2020
• Visit to Doncaster UTC and Ron Dearing UTC (Hull) – 13 May 2021

My noble Friend, the Minister for the School System, Baroness Barran:

• Visit to Plymouth UTC – Wed 1 Dec 2021.

Ministers plan to make further visits to UTCs during the current academic year, and these will be confirmed in due course. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, there have been significantly fewer ministerial visits to all types of education settings. Of those that have taken place, many were virtual.