Munira Wilson MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 3 Mar 2025 · Independent Schools: VAT and Business Rates Relief · Hansard source

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  It is an absolute pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell-Buck. I thank the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for introducing this debate and setting out the argument so eloquently. I also thank the almost 115,000 people who signed the petition, of whom 873 live in Twickenham. I start by apologising to you, Ms Lewell-Buck, hon. Members and people in the Gallery if I have seemed a little distracted over the past 45 minutes. I have just found out that my daughter got her first choice of secondary school—a state school, I should say—for this September, so I have been a little distracted. All her classmates’ parents have been messaging to find out, and I was trying to communicate with my husband to let our daughter know that she will be going where she wants to go. Forgive me, but I thought it was quite appropriate to mention that, given that we are talking about schools and independent schools. I am proud that my borough of Richmond upon Thames has outstanding secondary schools—in fact, all of them are outstanding or good—and some of the best primaries in the country, but that is not necessarily the case everywhere. It goes without saying that every person in this House, whatever their party affiliation, aspires for every child to receive an excellent education. Every child deserves the opportunity to reach their full potential, yet too many children are not being supported to achieve it. We Liberal Democrats believe in creating state schools that provide a rich curriculum together with rich extracurricular options—schools so high performing that parents do not feel compelled to send their children to the independent sector. That is why we set out an ambitious education offer in our manifesto last year; we see education as an investment, not a cost. However, as we all know too well, that is very far from the current reality of our state system. For too many children, our school system is just not working; too many are simply not getting the support they need and are entitled to, especially if they have additional needs. Teachers and other school staff as well as school leaders are struggling with ever tighter budgets to hire and keep the staff they need, especially in maths and science, with crumbling school buildings, and with a SEND system that is utterly broken. Is it any wonder that many parents, for some of whom it is far from an easy financial decision, choose an independent education for their children? They want to invest in their children’s future in the same way that I argue the Government should invest in our children, yet it is in that context that this Government have decided to tax independent schools and penalise families for making that choice. We Liberal Democrats oppose in principle the taxation of education, whatever form it takes—whether it is tutoring, higher education, nursery fees or music lessons. Even more, we believe this measure is counterproductive. Since the policy was announced, pupil movement out of the independent school sector has been three times higher than the Government predicted, with the fall being highest in transition years of year 7 and reception, at 4.6% and 3.9% respectively. The Independent Schools Council’s survey last year found that there were already 10,000 fewer pupils in independent schools. According to the ISC, this fall in numbers alone cost £92 million in state pupil funding, which is more than the Government will raise from business rates on independent schools that are charities. The majority of independent schools are small: 40% have fewer than 100 pupils. With apologies to the hon. Member for Windsor (Jack Rankin), we are not talking about the Etons and the Harrows here. What I really struggle with in this policy is that, as others have said, it is not the very wealthy who will be impacted by it. The Minister will be very pleased to hear that I have met some rather wealthy people who have told me that they agree with the policy—but they can afford it; they can absorb the extra cost. It is especially the parents who never deliberately set out to secure a private education for their children, but felt forced to for various reasons, who are bearing the brunt and will be priced out. The impact of Labour’s policy is to make our private schools yet more elitist, which is what the Government are waging a campaign against. I think the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) made this very point. I wish to talk about two groups who are particularly harmed by the Government’s policy. The first is families of children with SEND. As we have heard, there are in our independent schools almost 100,000 children with special needs who do not have EHCPs, and who, under this Government’s policy, are not exempt from VAT. Often, their parents opted for private schools as a last resort, after being continually failed by the state system and even rejected. This policy penalises parents for trying to do right by their children. One family in my constituency came in tears to a surgery last year, after it was announced that this policy was going ahead and would be implemented in January this year. Their son was in a local state primary school, but his challenging behaviour, which had manifested as a result of his additional needs, which the school could not support, had put him at risk of exclusion. His parents made the very difficult decision to move him to a local private school, where he is now thriving. They are paying an extra £18,000 a year on top of the basic school fees for the additional support he needs to learn and thrive. All those costs—not just the basic fees but the additional support fees—are subject to VAT under the Government’s policy. They do not know how they are going to meet the cost, but they know that if their son goes back into the state sector and to the primary he was at, he will be at risk of being excluded. I ask the Minister: why are the Government punishing families such as these? Arguably, they have saved the taxpayer a lot of money in terms of not just the child’s schooling costs, but all the further knock-on costs that we know result from a child being excluded from school. We all know that SEND provision in this country is utterly broken. Our local authorities and state schools are buckling under the demand, yet this policy threatens to place an ever-greater burden on the state SEND system, as parents are incentivised to battle the system for EHCPs—which many children probably could get if their parents tried hard enough—in order to secure the VAT exemption. Indeed, some parents of SEND children are simply being priced out of the independent sector and back into state schools, where the additional needs will need to be supported. I have repeatedly asked Ministers to monitor and report to the House on that particular impact of the VAT policy, and I ask again: will the Minister monitor and report on the impact on SEND provision for those children who do not have EHCPs and are not exempt? The second impacted group that I will briefly touch on is military families. Statistics from the Boarding Schools’ Association reveal that the Government’s new policy will have an adverse impact on military families using the continuity of education allowance scheme. Under the scheme, parents must make a minimum 10% contribution to fees, but even with the Ministry of Defence’s recalculation in response to the Government’s policy, parental contributions will have to increase by a further 18% on average, rising from £14,000 to £17,000 for a child in senior school. As my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) pointed out, that will be unaffordable for many families, and will impact retention in the forces. Those serving our country should not be financially penalised for doing so, and we should endeavour to provide service families with continuity and stability. I hope that the Minister, alongside his colleagues in the Ministry of Defence, will make a clear statement on how the impact of VAT will be monitored for CEA families, and the criteria by which they will decide to make further changes. I hope they will also commit to reviewing the CEA over the longer term to ensure that families are protected from the impact of VAT, or exempt CEA families from VAT all together. Aside from the two specific groups that I have talked about, who I think the Government have overlooked, I want to return to the wider principles. We Liberal Democrats would like to see independent schools routinely giving back to their community by way of recognition of the tax exemption they had previously benefited from, and that we believe should continue. Many of these schools already give back a huge amount to their communities through exemplary partnerships with local schools, where not only facilities but learning and experiences are shared between the state and the independent sector. Independent schools ran over 9,200 partnerships in 2024; each school involved in partnership worked with approximately 11 state schools and with 403 pupils in those schools. Examples of those partnerships include sharing sports facilities, theatre spaces, specialist teachers, mentoring schemes, cooking schools, higher education support and debating clubs, as well as bursaries and scholarships. The Liberal Democrats want to see that become the norm for every independent school, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Monica Harding) pointed out, the VAT policy will mean that greater partnership work is the first thing independent schools cut back on. In these debates, I have often referred to Hampton and Lady Eleanor Holles schools in my constituency, which have a brilliant partnership with a Reach academy in Feltham that is serving a disadvantaged community that has typically not had many children going into further or higher education. That school has seen its results soar and pupils accessing university and medical school as a result of the partnership. The headteacher of Hampton, Kevin Knibbs, said to me this morning: “While it’s too early to identify the immediate impact of the Government’s policies on our schools…it is deeply regrettable and a missed opportunity that independent schools elsewhere in the country will simply be unable to replicate the Reach-LEH-Hampton partnership model due to the new tax regime. Moreover, the imposition of a tax on education will compromise our and other independent schools’ ability to provide transformative, means-tested free places that are such excellent examples of social mobility in action.” I thought that was something that the Minister and his colleagues were all in favour of. We should be making the most of the benefits that independent schools can provide, opening them up to more children, not making them more exclusive and adding to the state system’s burden. I am coming in to land now, I promise. The Government have dismissed the stories of families affected by this tax, choosing to prize numbers over human experience. I fear they are being driven by ideology, but I am perplexed as to why Ministers have been hellbent on this particular policy, which hits parents’ pockets directly, and yet they have resisted my party’s attempts to amend the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill to ensure that private equity companies that are profiteering from private special schools are not being subjected to the profit cap that this Labour Government are imposing on children’s homes and fostering agencies that are often run by the same companies. They are making eye-watering profits, with margins of more than 20%, which local authorities have to pay. The Labour Government do not want to do anything about that, but they are attacking parents who want to send their kids to private schools. It makes no sense to me, and I hope the Minister will address that point. I understand that the fiscal situation right now is hard. Unlike the Labour party, during the election campaign my party laid out a whole host of areas where taxes could be raised fairly in order to invest in our children’s education and our country’s future. Whether that is properly reforming capital gains tax, reversing the Conservatives’ tax cuts for bankers or increasing the tax on big tech companies, we are ambitious for every child. We want to put a dedicated mental health professional in every primary and secondary school, to expand free school meals for all children in poverty and to ensure that those children who have fallen behind are supported through tutoring. That vision can be realised without penalising parents who are choosing to do what every parent naturally wants to do: to invest in their children’s education and future.

• 3 Mar 2025 · Ukraine · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Prime Minister’s statement expressing the United Kingdom’s unequivocal support for President Zelensky and Ukraine. In view of the Prime Minister’s cuts to the aid budget, and with the eyes of the world focused on Zelensky, Ukraine and Russia, can he please reassure the House that he will not forget about the middle east, and in particular the decision by Netanyahu’s Government to block aid to Gaza? What representations is he making on behalf of the Government to reverse that? It is a breach of international law.

• 25 Feb 2025 · Sudan · Hansard source

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  The Genocide80Twenty campaign group at Hampton school in my constituency recently met members of the Darfur diaspora who have fled the atrocities in Sudan, and they would like to know what the UK Government are doing to help those targeted simply for who they are. With a staggering 16 million children desperately needing food, shelter, healthcare and education, could I ask the Minister for assurances that we will not see any cuts to UK aid to the region, and what assessment has she has made of the impact of the Trump Administration’s cuts to US aid?

• 25 Feb 2025 · Sudan · Hansard source

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  16. What steps his Department is taking to support people affected by the humanitarian situation in Sudan.

• 25 Feb 2025 · SEND Education Support · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I congratulate the hon. Member for Suffolk Coastal (Jenny Riddell-Carpenter) on securing this important debate. Another week, another debate on SEND. Since the start of this Parliament, barely a week has gone by when we have not had questions or debates, either in this Chamber or the main Chamber, on special educational needs and disability provision. From what we have heard today—I particularly thank the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Jodie Gosling) for her courage in sharing her constituent’s moving story—we know that every Member’s inbox is bulging with casework from constituents about the dire crisis in SEND, which is why these debates are so oversubscribed. We are also getting report after report. In the last few months, the National Audit Office, the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Public Accounts Committee have all come out with the same damning verdict about a broken system, with money coming in but outcomes for children going down. These are some of our most vulnerable children and young people, and we as a society must do our best to meet their needs. We know that families face a postcode lottery, with delays that can last months or even years and vulnerable children missing out on the support that they deserve and need. With special schools full, mainstream schools struggling to provide appropriate support because their budgets are so overstretched, and spiralling high-needs deficits leaving many local authorities on the brink of bankruptcy, it is clear that urgent reform is needed. As we heard in a Westminster Hall debate just a few weeks ago, the process to get an education, health and care plan is often far too lengthy and far too adversarial. Families are increasingly forced to take their cases to tribunal, with the number of cases doubling since 2014. Local authorities lose almost all those cases, wasting annually over £70 million of public money that could be spent on supporting children and young people rather than fighting unnecessary legal battles. Given the huge rise in demand for support, and the previous Conservative Government’s failure to keep up with that demand, local authorities are too often struggling to meet their statutory responsibilities, forcing families to navigate a broken system to secure even the most basic support. As the former Education Secretary Gillian Keegan described it, it is a “lose, lose, lose” system for all. Ministers have repeatedly, and quite rightly, stressed the need for mainstream schools to be more inclusive in order to meet the rising need for special needs support. I recently visited Stanley school in my Twickenham constituency which, like two other nearby primary schools, has a specialist resource provision. Children with complex needs are able to spend time with dedicated teaching assistants for support, but they have the opportunity to play, socialise and participate, where appropriate, in lessons and other activities with children in the school who are not part of the SRP. As the hon. Member for Mid Cheshire (Andrew Cooper) referenced, we are seeing falling rolls in schools and space opening up. SRPs will be a key intervention in our approach to ensuring that mainstream schools can be more inclusive. However, finding and keeping the staff to support children in SRPs or other mainstream settings—or indeed in special school settings—is an ongoing challenge. SRPs need to be properly funded but, as things stand, the headteacher at Stanley explained to me, the maths just does not add up for him. He explained that his wider school budget is having to plug the shortfall in SRP funding. If we are to tempt schools to have SRPs, we are going to have to make sure that they have the resources to provide that SRP. Support staff costs have risen over the past two years, with unfunded pay increases and increases in employer’s national insurance contributions on the horizon. We know that local authorities, health services and schools are all struggling to recruit the number of staff that they need to meet growing demand—both to undertake assessments in the first place, when a child might be eligible for an EHCP, and then to meet that need in school. A national survey of headteachers found that only 1% of senior school leaders believed that they had enough funding to meet the needs of pupils with SEND. A report by London Councils on SEND inclusion in schools found that stakeholders from across the sector said that they would be able to be more inclusive if they had more funding. That is why the Liberal Democrats are calling for increased funding for local authorities to reduce the financial burden on schools. We know that the £6,000 per pupil notional SEND budget, which each school is meant to allocate before applying for an EHCP, is, frankly, a fiction in today’s school finances, given the pressures on budgets up and down the country. When I visited Stanley the other week, and when I visited a beautiful new school, Belmont school in Durham, last week, I was told by both headteachers that for many mainstream schools, the disincentive to take on children with SEND is the way that standard assessment tests and other public exam results are reported. Frankly, certain young people in those mainstream settings are not in a position to sit their SATs or GCSEs, yet their results, which will essentially be nil, are reported in the schools’ performance measures, which are available publicly. In a competitive schooling environment, where parents vote with their feet for the schools that typically have the highest grades, that sadly results in an incentive for too many schools to actively avoid taking SEND children on to their rolls. There are schools that are doing the right thing and including those children, but, as the Minister is considering how to make mainstream school more inclusive, I wonder what consideration she and other Ministers have given to this issue. I would like to spend a moment focusing on special schools. For children for whom a mainstream setting is not right, special schools should, and in many cases do, provide the necessary educational support. However, we know that in May 2023, two thirds of special schools were at or over capacity, and the impact of that is children with complex needs being inappropriately accommodated in the mainstream, where their needs cannot be met, which sometimes has a detrimental impact on other pupils and, indeed, staff. Many parents in those situations feel forced to home school. We know that parents who feel that they have had no option but to home school are concerned about what some of the provisions of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill will mean for their being able to ensure that their child is in an appropriate environment. The lack of specialist provision is being played out in the eye-watering SEND transport costs that local authorities are having to fund to send children out of area. Add to that the cost of private special schools, which are being funded by the taxpayer. I will return to that subject in a moment, but I want to take this moment to welcome the provision in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill that will allow local authorities to open new special schools. For too long, local authorities that have identified a need, and that want to bid for funding and open special schools, have been turned down. A number of applications from local authorities that wanted to open special schools were turned down during the previous Parliament by the previous Government, so I welcome that change in the Bill. Returning to private special schools, many private SEND schools provide an excellent education and are run as not-for-profit charities. However, the Minister is aware—I have raised this issue previously, not least in Committee on the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill—that private equity firms and other profiteering companies are increasingly entering the special school market, as they see it, at an extortionate cost. Councils are spending £1.3 billion on independent and non-maintained special schools, which is more than double what they spent just a few years earlier. The cost of an independent special school place is, on average, double the cost of a state special school place. Some private equity companies running these schools are making a profit of 20%-plus. Typically, the private equity-owned providers, not the other private sector providers, have the highest level of profitability in the sector. I feel that our most vulnerable children and our local authorities are being held to ransom by some of these companies, which are not behaving in the best interests of our children.

• 25 Feb 2025 · SEND Education Support · Hansard source

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  No. As a Liberal—I have said this many a time—I believe in a mixed economy in many of our public services. I was about to make the point that the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill contains important measures to stop profiteering in children’s social care. When I proposed an amendment in Committee to extend the profit cap to special schools, I explained that the private equity companies that are making a ridiculous amount of profit in the children’s social care sector are also running private special schools. Some are not making a huge profit, but I do not think a 20%-plus profit margin in a taxpayer-funded system is acceptable, which is why my Liberal Democrat colleagues and I proposed an amendment to the Bill to extend the profit cap to special schools. I was disappointed that Labour Members and Ministers voted against it, but I again urge them to consider the proposal. We know we are in a cash-constrained environment—we hear every day from Ministers, not least the Chancellor, about how little money there is—but savings can be found in this area, and we can invest them back into our most vulnerable children. My final proposal for Ministers, which the Minister has heard me talk about before, is that for our most complex children, we need a national body for SEND to fund those with exceptionally high needs who face a postcode lottery of provision across the country, and pose a particular risk to local authorities where those needs arise. That body could also have oversight of standards and budgets across the country. I know that SEND is high on the Minister’s agenda. We are still waiting to hear how the £1 billion announced in the Budget will be allocated, but I fear that, given the £2.7 billion of local authority SEND deficits, it will disappear into a black hole. We have been promised reforms later this year, but our children cannot afford to wait. Children missing out on an education will never get that time back. Every child, no matter their needs or background, should be given the opportunity to thrive and fulfil their potential, yet too many children with SEND are simply not getting that right now.

• 24 Feb 2025 · Antisocial Behaviour · Hansard source

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  Antisocial behaviour is a problem not just in our town centres, but in our parks. That is why my constituents are extremely concerned about plans to axe the specialist royal parks policing unit and subsume it into community support teams, given the £450 million shortfall facing the Met police. This means that Bushy Park in my constituency will undoubtedly get less police coverage. What assurances can the Home Secretary give my constituents that they will not see fewer police officers in our communities and our parks?

• 24 Feb 2025 · Breakfast Clubs: Early Adopters · Hansard source

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  With three in 10 children growing up in poverty, any measure to tackle child hunger is to be welcomed to enable them to learn and flourish, so I congratulate the 750 schools selected as breakfast club early adopters. The learnings from those pilots will be absolutely critical as the Government seek to scale up the programme. A number of questions that I have previously put to Ministers still stand, and I hope that the Secretary of State will address some of them. Many school leaders have raised concerns about the proposed funding rates, which are reportedly around 60p per child per day. If the pilots clearly show that those rates are insufficient, will Ministers commit to reviewing and increasing them? Schools simply cannot afford to make savings elsewhere, such as in teaching budgets. Will Ministers review school food standards to ensure that breakfasts are specifically addressed, as the recent House of Lords report on childhood obesity recommended? What consideration has been given to how the 30 minutes of universal free childcare provision will interact with existing breakfast club provision? Most commuting parents need more than 30 minutes of childcare in the morning. The Child Poverty Action Group has highlighted that breakfast clubs will probably secure only around 40% take-up. The most vulnerable children, especially those in temporary accommodation who travel long distances, may not make it to school in time for breakfast. The Children’s Society has argued, as have the Liberal Democrats, that where money is scarce, we should target resources at those who most need them. As such, why will the Government not prioritise expanding eligibility for free school meals—a hot, healthy meal in the middle of the day when children are guaranteed to be in school —so that all children in poverty, whether in primary or secondary, are being fed? Is it not high time that Ministers introduced automatic enrolment into free school meals for all children? Finally, on the Secretary of State’s childcare announcements, can she confirm how much of that money will go into plugging the gap left by the rise in employer national insurance contributions, which will put significant pressure on providers and push up costs for parents?

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Thirteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I certainly agree that there should be a principle in law that thresholds are uprated, by whatever mechanism or measure, because, as we have seen, the threshold has not moved since 2018 and more and more children in poverty are being left without a hot meal at lunchtime. The threshold is far too low. Both the previous Government’s adviser on food strategy, Henry Dimbleby, and the former Conservative Education Secretary, Michael Gove, have said the threshold should rise, ideally to all those households in receipt of universal credit, but with the public finances so constrained, at the very least to £20,000. Last week, the hon. Member for North Herefordshire, when speaking to the new clause about universal provision of free school meals to all primary children, set out the moral and economic case for expanding free school meal provision. I will not rehearse all those arguments again, but I say to her and other hon. Members that hunger does not end at the age of 11. Every primary and secondary school child living in poverty should be able to access a hot, healthy meal at lunchtime. All the evidence points to better concentration, better behaviour and better academic results for those children. While I would love to extend universal free school meals to all children in primary schools—that has long been a Liberal Democrat ambition and policy after we extended it in government to all infant children—we heard from a number of witnesses during the oral evidence sessions that resources would be better targeted at those most in need both at primary and secondary school. New clause 67 mirrors new clause 8 to a large extent. Frankly, auto-enrolment for free school meals should be a no-brainer for Government. As we have heard, too many are missing out at the moment due to administrative barriers and an unwillingness to apply. These new clauses seek to ensure that no eligible child is left behind. The exact number of how many children are missing out is unknown. In a recent response to a parliamentary question I tabled, the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Portsmouth South, admitted that the Department for Education had not made an estimate of how many children were missing out on free school meals since 2013, although estimates suggest that about 11% of children are missing out.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Thirteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I will press both new clauses 31 and 67 to a vote later.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Thirteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Sir Christopher, on our final day in Committee. I rise to speak to new clauses 31 and 67 on free school meals. New clause 67 largely mirrors the provisions of new clause 8, which the hon. Member for North Herefordshire has just spoken to. I will address the issue of auto-enrolment in a moment. New clause 31 seeks to expand the eligibility threshold for free school meals to children from households earning less than £20,000 per year, ensuring that no child living in poverty goes hungry at school. The Child Poverty Action Group currently estimates that some 900,000 children living in poverty are missing out on a free school meal, because free school meal eligibility in England is linked to specific benefits, with a household income threshold of just £7,400 per year, after tax, excluding benefits. That leaves many struggling families without support. The threshold was last uprated in 2018. We know the huge cost of living crisis that households have had to deal with since then. For those on low incomes, that has often meant the difference between heating and eating, and children turning up to school with empty lunchboxes. I saw a mother at my surgery last year who was having to skip her mental health medication to use the prescription money she saved to pay for lunch for her daughter, who is now at college.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Mental Health Services · Hansard source

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  With the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill being amended to include a panel that will involve psychiatrists who will determine whether a request for assisted dying should be granted, as well as a number of cross-party amendments rightly calling for the involvement of mental health professionals earlier in the process, what assessment have Ministers made of whether there is sufficient capacity in mental health services, which the Minister has just noted are overstretched, to meet those demands, and on the potential knock-on impact on both waiting times and treatments for those with mental health conditions?

• 11 Feb 2025 · Mental Health Services · Hansard source

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  2. What steps his Department is taking to improve access to mental health services.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I wish to press the new clause to a vote. Question put , That the clause be read a Second time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause. Clause, by leave, withdrawn. New Clause 36 Establishment of a National Body for SEND “(1) The Secretary of State must, within 12 months of the passing of this Act, establish a National Body for SEND. (2) The functions of the National Body for SEND will include, but not be limited to— (a) national coordination of SEND provision; (b) supporting the delivery of SEND support for children with very high needs; (c) advising on funding needed by local authorities for SEND provision. (3) Any mechanism used by the National Body for SEND in advising on funding under subsection (2)(c) should be based on current need and may disregard historic spend.”— (Munira Wilson.) This new clause would establish a National Body for SEND to support the delivery of SEND provision. Brought up, and read the First time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The Minister said “every school”. Will he clarify on the record that he means every primary and secondary school?

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Will he give us a timeline for that? This commitment has been made repeatedly, but we have heard nothing about when the services will be expanded.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I come at this new clause first and foremost as a parent before I look at it as an MP. Looking at it with both hats on, though, I have long supported the previous Government’s guidance to schools to try to ban mobile phones during the school day. For a long time, I have needed convincing that a legislative ban was required, but I have finally concluded that we probably need to move towards one, partly for the reasons that the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston outlined. Some heads and school staff come under a lot of pressure from parents to allow the use of phones during the school day, but if this were a statutory requirement, the Government would have to provide the support needed to implement it. Just this week, I talked to the headteacher of a secondary school in my constituency. He is very keen to implement a ban on phones during the school day, and he is trying, but kids are getting their phones out at various times and not staying off them. It is a fairly new school, but for some reason it was built without lockers, so there are no lockers. He has looked into purchasing lockers or Yondr pouches—the phone pouches that I believe the Irish Government have bought wholesale for every school in Ireland—and he said that that would cost him about £20,000, which he did not have in his budget. Putting the ban into statute would give headteachers and teaching staff the clout they need with parents who particularly want their children to have their phones during the school day, and the Government would need to resource the ban so that schools could implement it. I draw Members’ attention to subsection (2) of the new clause, which deals with exemptions, because that is a very important point. Proper exemptions are important for young carers or children with health conditions that need monitoring via apps. School leaders and teachers know their children best, and they know which children need exemptions. I would be interested to know what the consequences would look like—would they fall on the school? I do not think the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston touched on that, but I would be interested in discussing another time how he thinks this ban could be enforced. It is just one of a suite of measures that we as policymakers need to take now, given the harm that phones and access to social media are undoubtedly doing to our children and young people.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The end is in sight for all of us—we are on to the last column of the selection list. I will speak to new clauses 59 to 62, which are in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire. The new clauses all refer to support for kinship carers and children growing up in kinship care. In clauses 5 and 6 in part 1 of the Bill, we discussed and agreed a number of encouraging provisions on defining kinship carers, setting out the support they are eligible for and providing additional educational support for the subset of children growing up in kinship care. However, what we have already agreed in Committee falls far short of the ambition that I heard the Secretary of State herself set out at a reception for kinship carers just a couple of months back. At that reception, the right hon. Lady—unusually for a Secretary of State—called on campaigners and policymakers to keep pushing her. I think that that was in order to give her the clout in Government to go further. The four new clauses seek to do just that, and I hope Ministers will receive them in that spirit. New clause 59 would ensure that kinship carers are entitled to paid employment leave. New clause 60 would put into statute an entitlement to an allowance on a par with that for foster carers. New clause 61 would extend pupil premium plus to all children in kinship care, based on the definition the Committee has agreed. Finally, new clause 62 would prioritise those same children for school admissions. Kinship carers are unsung heroes, often stepping up at no notice to look after a child they are related to or know, because the parents can no longer do so. In oral evidence, Jacky Tiotto of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service told us that “the kinship carer’s life will not continue in the way it had before, in terms of their ability to work, maybe, or where they live. We know that local authorities are under huge resource pressure, so there is going to have to be something a bit stronger to encourage people to become carers, whether that is related to housing or the cost of looking after those children. People will want to do the right thing, but if you already have three kids of your own that becomes tricky.” –– [ Official Report, Children's Wellbeing and Schools Public Bill Committee, 21 January 2025; c. 34, Q78.] Time and again, we hear from kinship carers that they want to do the right thing—out of love for those family members—but financial and other barriers often stand in their way. One survey revealed that 45% of kinship carers give up work, and a similar number have to reduce their hours permanently, putting financial strain on the family. Those carers are disproportionately women and are over-represented in healthcare, education and social care, which simply exacerbates our workforce crisis in public services. Extending paid employment leave would enable more people to step up and provide a stable, loving home. On allowances, there are not just long-term savings to be made in terms of the well-evidenced better health and education outcomes for children; there are also immediate cost savings to be had for the taxpayer. Compared to the cost of the alternative—local authority care—the saving is approximately £35,000 a year. Every child we manage to divert from local authority care into kinship care can deliver that saving for the taxpayer immediately. Surely Ministers can tempt their colleagues in the Treasury with that immediate spend-to-save argument? In Kinship’s 2022 “Cost of Loving” survey of more than 1,000 kinship carers, one third said they may not be able to continue caring for their child as a result of financial pressures. I spoke to one kinship carer in my borough who had avoided putting the heating on and skipped all sorts of things, including food for herself, so that she could put enough food on the table for her grandson. Her story is far too common. A national, non-means-tested allowance would end the system of patchy means-tested allowances that reflect the postcode lottery of support that councils can afford to provide. Ministers have already recognised in the Bill the need for additional educational support for children in kinship care. Why are we not treating all children equally, so that it is not just those who were previously looked after who are entitled to additional pupil premium funding or priority admissions? The trauma and needs of children in kinship care are often similar to those of children who were previously looked after. We should extend the same provisions to all children in kinship care. I know that Ministers understand the sacrifices that kinship carers make and the trauma that children in kinship care have been through. The Schools Minister herself headed up a parliamentary taskforce on kinship in the last Parliament, and she was very active in the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care. I know that she is very familiar with these issues, and I hope she is sympathetic to the call in these new clauses. I hope to hear something positive and that Ministers—even if, as we know, they never accept Opposition new clauses in a Bill Committee—will seek to address these inequalities and support these unsung heroes, kinship carers, and the children they look after.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for her response. It is obviously disappointing that Ministers will not go further, particularly on allowances. The pilots that were set out in a tiny number of local authorities with a very small subset of kinship carers were not ambitious enough. On that basis, I would like to press new clause 60 on allowances to a vote, but I am happy to leave the others. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause. Clause, by leave, withdrawn. New Clause 60 Kinship care allowance (1) A person is entitled to a kinship care allowance for any week in which that person is engaged as a kinship carer in England. (2) For the purposes of this section, a “kinship carer” has the meaning given in section 22I of the Children Act 1989, as inserted by section 5 of this Act. (3) A person is not entitled to an allowance under this section unless that person satisfies conditions prescribed in regulations made by the Secretary of State. (4) A person may claim an allowance under this section in respect of more than one child. (5) Where two or more persons would be entitled for the same week to such an allowance in respect of the same child, only one allowance may be claimed on the behalf of— (a) the person jointly elected by those two for that purpose, or (b) in default of such an election, the person determined by, and at the discretion of, the Secretary of State. (6) Regulations may prescribe the circumstances in which a person is or is not to be treated for the purposes of this section as engaged, or regularly and substantially engaged, in caring for a child under an eligible kinship care arrangement. (7) An allowance under this section is payable at the weekly rate specified by the Secretary of State in regulations. (8) Regulations under subsection (7) may specify— (a) different weekly rates for different ages of children being cared for, or (b) different weekly rates for different regions of England. (9) Regulations under subsection (7) must specify a weekly rate that is no lower than the minimum weekly allowance for foster carers published by the Secretary of State pursuant to section 23 of the Care Standards Act 2000.— (Munira Wilson.) Brought up, and read the First time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time. I rise to speak to new clause 39, in my name and those of a number of my hon. Friends, which seeks to fulfil the second recommendation of the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse by establishing a child protection authority in England, which would be an arm’s length body of the Government on a par with organisations such as the National Crime Agency. As the inquiry set out, its role would be to “improve practice in child protection by institutions, including statutory agencies;…provide advice to government in relation to policy and reform to improve child protection, including through the publication of regular reports to Parliament and making recommendations; and…inspect institutions as it considers necessary.” I recently met Professor Jay and a member of the panel who was involved in that review, and they felt that there are certain gaps in the inspection regime across the country, so having this overarching national body with a focus on child protection is a really important recommendation and step forward. Indeed, it was the report’s second recommendation. The child protection authority would monitor the implementation of the inquiry’s recommendations. I am very grateful that the Government have already committed to implementing the recommendations, but I gently say to Ministers that this Bill, which we have spent several weeks going through in detail, already focuses on a number of safeguards and child protection measures. One of the many reasons that the previous Government gave for not implementing some of the recommendations was a lack of legislative time, which I struggle to understand given the number of times the House rose early in the previous Parliament. Given that the IICSA recommendation requires legislation and we are considering a very relevant Bill, I am not entirely sure that the Government are committed to implementing it as they are not legislating for a child protection authority. When we discussed new clause 15 this morning, the hon. Member for Southampton Itchen said that many of the crimes explored in the report are undoubtedly ongoing. Therefore, what could be more important than putting these provisions in place? I very much hope Ministers will seriously consider implementing this recommendation quickly and using the legislative opportunity. Even if they will not accept my new clause, there is time as the Bill progresses through Parliament to put into legislation one of Professor Jay’s key recommendations.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I wish to press the new clause. Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause. Clause, by leave , withdrawn. New Clause 31 Eligibility for free school lunches “In section 512ZB of the Education Act 1996 (provision of free school lunches and milk), before paragraph (a) insert— ‘(za) C’s household income is less than £20,000 per year;’”— (Munira Wilson.) Brought up, and read the First time. Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

• 11 Feb 2025 · Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time. The new clause seeks to introduce a tutoring guarantee so that every disadvantaged pupil who may have fallen behind gets the extra support they absolutely deserve. Members across the House will recall that on the back of covid, we had the national tutoring programme, which, according to all evidence, despite being beset with all sorts of challenges when it was rolled out, helped to boost attainment, confidence and school attendance. Sadly, the money for the national tutoring programme and the 16 to 19 tutoring fund ran out in July of last year.