Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to support and protect at-risk girls and young women in education settings, including against poor mental health and sexual harassment.

The department is committed to helping education settings provide the safe, calm, and supportive learning environments that promote good wellbeing and reduce risk of harm. This includes considering how we can best support girls and young women who may be at higher risk of sexual harassment or poor mental health.

The government’s Tackling Violence against Women and Girls Strategy sets out the actions that we are taking and the progress that we have made to prevent violence and harassment and protect victims. It includes the introduction of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the Enough communications campaign, and changes to the law to introduce new criminal offences, including up-skirting and revenge porn. We will also be publishing non-statutory guidance specifically focused on teaching about sexual harassment and sexual violence.

As part of the strategy, we are determined to make sure the right resources and processes are in place across the education system to support any victims of abuse who come forward. The department published strengthened statutory school safeguarding guidance Keeping Children Safe in Education in September 2021. The guidance has been further strengthened for 2022, ensuring schools have even clearer guidance on how to deal with reports of sexual abuse. Revised guidance includes the ‘Sexual violence and sexual harassment advice’, putting this on a statutory footing to give the issue the prominence it deserves. The department is also trialling the impact of supervision for designated safeguarding leads, with a particular focus on supporting them to respond to sexual abuse issues.

As well as supporting pupils to understand their mental health, the relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) curriculum in schools ensures all pupils are taught about respectful relationships. This includes learning that some types of behaviour within relationships are criminal, what constitutes sexual harassment and sexual violence, and why these are always unacceptable. The department has started a review of the RSHE statutory guidance and continues to develop standalone non statutory guidance to support schools to teach about these issues effectively.

Further education providers also have flexibility to offer aspects of RSHE. Providers should support students to access the support they need to have healthy relationships. The Ofsted Further Education and Skills inspection handbook includes personal development in its judgements, including students’ understanding of healthy relationships and how to keep themselves mentally healthy.

In higher education (HE), the department expects all providers to have robust policies and procedures in place to comply with the law, including the Equality Act 2010, and to swiftly address reports of harassment and sexual misconduct. The Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill includes a clause banning the use of Non-Disclosure Agreements to silence victims in cases of sexual misconduct in HE. The Office for Students (OfS) has also launched a consultation to make mandatory measures that will require providers to address student harassment.

The department supports education settings to take effective approaches to supporting wellbeing and mental health. In schools and colleges, we are providing grants to train Senior Mental Health Leads and rolling out Mental Health Support Teams which can improve access to support. In HE, we have an ambition for all providers to sign up to Student Minds’ University Mental Health Charter by 2026. The OfS have funded the online platform Student Space. The department has asked them to allocate £15 million to establishing better partnerships between universities and local NHS service and support transitions into university.