Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to (1) support access to computing and AI education for schoolchildren, and (2) address disparities in digital literacy across England.

The government has accepted the relevant recommendations of the independent Curriculum and Assessment Review to ensure that young people become more digitally literate through a refreshed computing curriculum, including essential AI content, that builds digital confidence from an early age. We are considering how digital content can be integrated across other subjects to build strong, transferrable digital skills, and will replace the computer science GCSE with a broader qualification reflecting the full computing curriculum.

Work is underway to develop the new curriculum, and the department will conduct a public consultation on the draft programmes of study in summer 2026. To increase the number of pupils who will benefit from the reformed national curriculum, we are legislating so that academies will be required to teach it, alongside maintained schools.

We are continuing to invest in the National Centre for Computing Education to support teachers to teach about these topics with confidence.