Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Written Statement of 15 December 2025 on Investment in high needs place, HCWS1163, what meetings her Department held with the mainstream free school projects prior to their cancellation.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department has engaged with trusts, local authorities and other stakeholders in relation to individual projects in scope of the review, including reviewing the evidence they have provided. As would be expected from a review of this scale, there have been a significant number of meetings
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the national safeguarding guidelines for (a) primary and (b) secondary schools.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Schools and colleges have a critical role to play in protecting children and keeping them safe. The department publishes statutory safeguarding guidance Keeping children safe in education (KCSIE) which all schools and colleges must have regard to when carrying out their duties to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.
KCSIE is subject to regular review to ensure it is kept up to date and relevant. We are proposing to make changes to KCSIE 2026 and plan to launch a public consultation very soon.
Asked by: Tony Vaughan (Labour - Folkestone and Hythe)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to improve early interventions in cases of childhood neglect.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department is driving major children’s social care reforms to strengthen and improve early intervention, including in cases of childhood neglect. These reforms are backed by £2.4 billion investment, robust statutory guidance ‘Working together to safeguard children’, and support for teachers, social workers and all safeguarding professionals to spot the signs of abuse and neglect more quickly.
Through the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, we will require local authorities and safeguarding partners to establish multi-agency child protection teams, enhance schools’ role in safeguarding partnership arrangements and introduce provisions that empower my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education to introduce a consistent identifier for children.
In addition, our Best Start Family Hubs will provide welcoming spaces that connect families to health, education, housing and parenting support, helping identify those who need more intensive help from family support and multi-agency child protection.
Our plans to establish a Child Protection Authority in England will also bring further focus to children who are experiencing or likely to experience significant harm, including neglect.
Asked by: Lord Black of Brentwood (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the importance of access to state boarding school facilities for the children of armed forces personnel.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The department maintains oversight of state boarding school policy, which is used to regulate standards in boarding provisions.
The Ministry of Defence oversees the Continuity of Education Allowance for eligible Service Personnel, which provides clearly defined financial support to ensure that the need for frequent mobility does not interfere with a child’s education. This includes supporting parents with the option of using a state boarding school.
Asked by: Lord Black of Brentwood (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have made an assessment of the long term sustainability of state boarding education.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The department maintains oversight of state boarding school policy, which is used to regulate standards in boarding provisions.
The Ministry of Defence oversees the Continuity of Education Allowance for eligible Service Personnel, which provides clearly defined financial support to ensure that the need for frequent mobility does not interfere with a child’s education. This includes supporting parents with the option of using a state boarding school.
Asked by: Lord Black of Brentwood (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have made an assessment of the impact and effectiveness of state boarding education.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The department maintains oversight of state boarding school policy, which is used to regulate standards in boarding provisions.
The Ministry of Defence oversees the Continuity of Education Allowance for eligible Service Personnel, which provides clearly defined financial support to ensure that the need for frequent mobility does not interfere with a child’s education. This includes supporting parents with the option of using a state boarding school.
Asked by: Liz Jarvis (Liberal Democrat - Eastleigh)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department plans to publish a timeline for improvements in the identification of young carers in the school census; and whether she plans to take further steps to support accurate reporting of young carers.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Information on young carers was first collected through the school census in spring 2023. Since then, we have seen year-on-year improvements in the identification of pupils who are young carers. The department continues to work closely with schools and their representatives to refine and strengthen the guidance provided and for the 2026 spring school census, we have introduced changes to data validation processes to support more accurate and complete reporting of this information.
The latest information about the number of pupils identified as a young carer is published in the ‘Schools, Pupils and their Characteristics’ statistical release, which is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/schools-pupils-and-their-characteristics-january-2025.
Asked by: Baroness O'Loan (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government what provision exists to ensure that training is provided to school staff on identifying and responding to severe allergic reactions.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Schools are required under Section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 to make arrangements to support pupils with medical conditions, including allergies.
They must have regard to the statutory guidance ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’, which sets expectations for training and emergency procedures. Governing bodies should ensure that staff receive suitable training to identify and respond to severe allergic reactions, such as anaphylaxis, and that policies and systems are effectively implemented. Ofsted assesses the effectiveness of these arrangements as part of school inspections.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the national curriculum in teaching British values.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
All schools are expected to actively promote fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance for those of different faiths and beliefs.
Schools are free to include a full range of issues, ideas, and materials in their curriculum.
Following the Curriculum and Assessment Review, the government will make citizenship statutory at key stages 1 and 2. Content at primary and secondary will include media literacy, law and rights, democracy and government, to enable children to be informed and active participants in society. Covering these issues in citizenship will ensure we continue to focus on schools’ role in developing fundamental British values, including mutual tolerance and respect.
Proposals will be consulted on from 2026 and we are working towards a first teaching of the new curriculum from September 2028.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of guidance on political neutrality in schools.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
School leaders and staff have a responsibility to ensure that they act in accordance with their duties on political impartiality. When political issues are discussed, schools must offer pupils a balanced presentation of opposing views and should not present materials in a politically biased or one-sided way.
The department has published clear and comprehensive guidance to help those working with and in schools to understand their legal duties on political impartiality and how to meet them, both in teaching about political issues and beyond the classroom. The guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/political-impartiality-in-schools/political-impartiality-in-schools.
The guidance includes advice on how schools can deal with complaints about political impartiality through appropriate local processes. Where parents and carers remain dissatisfied, they can raise a formal complaint in line with school complaints procedures.