Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to extend the scheme, introduced in May, that provided access to laptops and the internet to care leavers and other vulnerable children to ensure that such children can access vital employment opportunities and remain digitally connected, active citizens.

The department has invested over £195 million to support remote education through laptops and tablets, internet provision, online education platforms and peer-to-peer support for schools using education technology.

In addition to over 220,000 laptops and tablets delivered during the summer term for disadvantaged children who would not otherwise have access, we have supplemented this support by making an additional 340,000 laptops and tablets available in the event that face-to-face education is disrupted as a result of local COVID-19 restrictions. Since September, over 100,000 of these have already been delivered to schools. This represents an injection of half-a-million devices by the end of the year. We have also provided over 51,000 4G wireless routers to support disadvantaged children to access remote education and vital social care services.

Laptops, tablets and routers are owned by the local authority, academy trust or school who can lend unused laptops, tablets and routers to children and young people who need them most, and who may face disruption to face-to-face education due to the COVID-19 outbreak. The targeting of laptops and tablets through this scheme has continually been reviewed to ensure that support is offered in the most effective way to reflect the numbers of schools disrupted and the number of laptops and tablets available at any time.

We are working with mobile network operators to provide temporary access to free additional data, offering families flexibility to access the resources that they need the most. As part of a pilot, disadvantaged families have been able to access a free mobile data uplift for this term. We are also working with mobile operators to provide a national service until the end of the academic year. We will continue to invite a range of mobile providers to support the offer.