Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
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Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 91, in my name and the names of the noble Lords, Lord Storey and Lord Knight, and the noble Baroness, Lady Cass, and Amendment 106, also supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron.
I am conscious that I am the warm-up act for the debate on Amendment 94A, in the name of my noble friend Lord Nash, which is also in this group. However, it is right and appropriate that, before we discuss the issue of teenagers and social media, we think first about the early years. Ofcom data shows that the proportion of three to five year-olds using social media has risen from 25% in 2022 to 37% in 2024, with one in five of those using it independently of their parents. That data is reported by Ofcom but without any comment or action associated with it. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s response as to whether the high-quality age verification that may accompany Amendment 94A in my noble friend’s name would be welcome in restricting use among our very youngest children also.
It is not just social media. Some 85% of three to five year-olds go online, with one in six owning their own mobile phone, while 98% of two year-olds watch television, videos or other digital content on a screen on a typical day, averaging around two hours each day—double the WHO recommendation—and among the top 20% of two year-olds that figure averaged five hours per day. Such levels of usage go against everything we know about what is needed for good development in the early years, where adult-child interaction is paramount. It goes against everything we know about how much physical and active play our youngest children need, the importance of outdoors activities and the development of healthy eyesight.
The reason this is so important is that we know that the early years are an important time for a child’s development and impact them much later on in life. That is why this Government have rightly placed so much emphasis on their early years strategy. In that context, the Government’s announcement last week that they will produce guidance for parents and carers on the screen time of preschoolers was incredibly welcome, if overdue. However, this will have a positive impact only if the high-quality guidance reaches parents and helps to change their behaviour. Can the Minister provide any more detail on the early years screen time advisory group that the Government are forming to develop this advice? We have the chairs and the terms of reference, but group membership and planned meetings remain to be updated “in due course” on the government website. Given that the guidance is being published in just three months, it would be useful to know more detail on that.
What plans do the Government have to publicise this advice once it is drawn up to reach parents where they get their information and ensure join-up across government, particularly with the Department for Health and Social Care so that it is integrated into the healthy child programme and available through health visitors and GPs, not just through Best Start Family Hubs? Given the importance of joint working in this area, would the Minister be happy to commit to a joint meeting between the two departments and experts to develop this further?
I turn to Amendment 91. The welcome action on guidance for parents makes the lack of any proper guidance and policy within early year settings an even greater outlier. There is policy around the use of technology in schools, but, in nurseries, often the most tech-rich environments as practitioners use tablets to log so much of a day’s activity, there is currently nothing. This is deeply problematic. It is problematic from a child development point of view, as the use of YouTube in early years settings has been described by one expert as “ubiquitous”, not just replacing the all-important adult-child interaction but using content that is too fast paced for children to learn from. This actually stimulates their fight or flight response, capturing their attention but in a way that is associated with hyper-alertness, hyper-wakefulness and later-life affective disorders. It is problematic from a safeguarding point of view, most starkly illustrated by the tragic case of Operation Lanark, where 18 nursery-issued devices were among the almost 70 seized from the home of a nursery worker charged with the most horrendous cases of abuse.
I am incredibly grateful that the Minister and her colleague Liv Bailey, the Early Education Minister, met me to discuss this and the parental guidance issue discussed earlier. I am really pleased that the Government’s intention is to update the voluntary guidance for settings on the help for early years platform, and, as part of their review into the non-statutory curriculum guidance, Development Matters, to not only include information on screen time and digital literacy but to include it in the next update to the statutory early years foundation stage framework. I would be grateful if the Minister could repeat this commitment today and give a clear timeline for when the amendment to the EYFS will be made.
In undertaking this work, will the department consider the impact of screen time and the wider use of technology and devices in early years settings, by children and practitioners, as well as child development and safe- guarding issues? Screen time is important but, based on research published about current levels of screen time use, “less is better” is an important message. The evidence shows that context and content matter too, and I hope the Government can commit to incorporating this in their approach.
I should be absolutely clear that those settings which choose not to use screens or tech should be free to do so. Tech is not needed for good child development in the early years. If it is being used, it should be informed by our understanding of early years development and accompanied by robust safeguarding practices and clear policy within the setting.
It is essential we get this right. I know a host of education, health and research professionals stand ready to support the Government in their work. I thank Katy Potts at the Digital Standards for Early Years Action Group, Professors Rachael Bedford, Tim Smith and Sam Wass, Birth to 5 Matters and Health Professionals for Safer Screens. These are among the many dedicated people who have been generous to me with their time and worked so hard in this area.
Finally, I should probably explain why it is so important to get clear reassurances from the Minister on this now. I first tabled amendments on this in May last year, but there was no mention of digital technology or screen time in the Government’s early years strategy published in July. Guidance for parents of preschoolers was announced only in January, with no accompanying detail of a campaign to reach parents. On the incorporation of guidance into the early years statutory framework, the Digital Standards for Early Years Action Group wrote to the previous Early Education Minister over a year ago calling for this to be incorporated into the update to the EYFS that went live last September. That call was rejected, although I have never been able to find out why.
I welcome the Government’s commitment to action now and believe it is genuine, but I need reassurance that, once the spotlight has moved on, work will not stop and delivery will happen at pace, in particular on making a substantive change to the early years foundation stage statutory framework this year; otherwise, a two year-old who started nursery when we first debated this issue will have left for school before any change is made. I beg to move.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I rise to speak to the two amendments in my name, which are both amendments to Amendment 94A in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Nash. These are necessary if this House is to respond to the online harms that children face in a way that is effective, proportionate and grounded in evidence.
To be clear from the outset, I share the concerns across this House about the real harms that children face online. These range from exposure to age-inappropriate and damaging content to the disturbing prevalence of grooming and exploitation. Parents are right to be worried and Parliament is right to intervene. However, as the NSPCC made clear in its briefing to us, a complex safeguarding problem demands a risk-based response, not a blunt one-age ban.
My Amendment 94B would introduce a mechanism for limited and tightly controlled exemptions to a blanket minimum age requirement. Crucially, such exemptions could exist only where they demonstrably improved child safety, not where they weakened it. Any exemption would be jointly specified by Ofcom and the Children’s Commissioner. That joint responsibility is deliberate and important. It would ensure that decisions were made independently of commercial interests and rooted firmly in regulatory expertise and the statutory duty to act in the best interests of children.
The amendment sets out a high evidential bar for platforms. Providers would have to show compliance with Ofcom’s risk-based guidance on minimum age, have full regard for UK GDPR principles and give explicit consideration to children’s rights as recognised by the UN Convention on the Rights of a Child. They would also be required to assess impacts on children’s mental health, examine whether their platform’s design or features encouraged addictive or compulsive use, and scrutinise the role of algorithms in content recommendations and targeted advertising for any products or services, including, for example, gambling content marketing. Importantly, any exemptions would be subject to periodic reviews, with powers for amendment or revocation if Ofcom and the Children’s Commissioner were no longer satisfied that adequate protections were in place. This would place a burden squarely on the platforms to prove safety on an ongoing basis, rather than leaving children exposed to unmanaged risk.
The NSPCC, the 5Rights Foundation, the Molly Rose Foundation and 39 children’s rights and online safety organisations have warned us this week that
“blanket bans on social media would fail to deliver the improvement in children’s safety and wellbeing that they so urgently need”.
We already know that age limits are not meaningfully enforced, and these organisations are well respected up and down this country. The NSPCC estimates that, in the UK, more than 2.5 million children under the age of 13 are currently accessing social media. Raising the minimum age to 16 does not solve that problem. Indeed, it risks pushing children into less regulated and higher-risk spaces, including encrypted platforms, anonymous forums and unsafe gaming environments. Children who bypass age checks are likely to register as adults, placing them in an environment with weaker safeguards and a higher exposure to harm. There is also a real risk of unintended consequences. Safe, age-appropriate use of social media such as family group chats, peer support networks and access to services like Childline could be lost, particularly for vulnerable children. Bans may also deter children from reporting harm for fear of being punished for being online at all.
Briefly, Amendment 94C would ensure that the definition of “regulated user-to-user services” was aligned with the Online Safety Act 2023. This House invested significant effort in establishing a risk-based regulatory framework under the Act, and it is essential that this Bill operates coherently within it.
These amendments would not dilute child protection but strengthen it. They would move us away from a blunt, one-size-fits-all ban towards a proportionate, evidence-based approach that respected children’s rights, held platforms accountable and generally reduced harm. The public out there have sent a clear message that they want us to act. It is now up to us in your Lordships’ House and down the Corridor in the other place to act on this. We need to heed the warnings of these respected organisations that have written to us all and to say, “We hear you that there is a need for a ban, but we think we can look at a much more sophisticated model than just a simple, one age limit ban”.
“subject to any exemptions under subsection (1A).
(1A) Any exemptions to regulations made under subsection (1)(b)—(a) must be specified only by Ofcom and the Children’s Commissioner acting jointly, and(b) can only apply where—(i) the primary purpose of the exemption is to address or mitigate harms arising from social media use by children,(ii) the exemption specifies an alternative minimum age to that provided under subsection (1)(b), and(iii) the provider of the service has demonstrated to the satisfaction of Ofcom and the Children’s Commissioner that it—(A) meets Ofcom’s guidance concerning appropriate, risk-based minimum ages,(B) has due regard to relevant standards and principles of the UK General Data Protection Regulation, (C) has particular regard to the importance of protecting the rights and best interests of children, as recognised by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child,(D) has considered the potential impact of the service on the mental health and psychological wellbeing of children,(E) has investigated the extent to which the service’s design, functionalities or features may encourage addictive or compulsive use, and(F) has considered and reviewed the use of algorithms for content recommendation, amplification or targeted advertising.(1B) Regulations made under subsection (1)(b) must also provide for—(a) periodic review of any exemption to ensure the continuing adequacy of protection for children, and(b) amendment or revocation of an exemption where Ofcom and the Children’s Commissioner are no longer satisfied as to the matters set out in subsection (1A)(b)(iii).”
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
I thank all noble Lords for the debate that we have had, but I would still like to test the opinion of the House.
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
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“Establishment of Child Protection Authority(1) The Secretary of State must, within six months of the day on which this Act is passed, establish a Child Protection Authority for England.(2) The purpose of the Authority is to—(a) improve practice in child protection,(b) provide advice and make recommendations to the Government on child protection policy and reforms to improve child protection,(c) inspect institutions and settings at some times and in such ways as it considers necessary and appropriate to ensure compliance with child protection standards, and(d) monitor the implementation of the recommendations of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and other inquiries relating to the protection of children.(3) The Authority must act with a view to—(a) safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children;(b) ensuring that institutions and settings fulfil their responsibilities in relation to child protection.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment establishes the Child Protection Authority for England.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, it is very late, so I will not go through the five pages of my speech. However, I will speak to Amendments 102 and 103 in my name.
The arguments have been well rehearsed previously. I thank the Minister in the other place, Josh MacAlister, for meeting some of us to go through the issues. He is very clear on the so-called postcode lottery of child in need reports that are often produced for children. In some areas it is as high as 70%, and the research I did found that in other areas it is 20%. The Children’s Commissioner found that the lowest percentage of young people known to social care in some local authority areas was 3%.
As we have heard earlier and in previous debates in your Lordships’ House, that number cannot just be demographics. My suggestion and the Children’s Commissioner’s suggestion has been, and we continue to maintain this, that we need some national thresholds so that we do not have a big gap in the care that young people get, depending on where they live. A child in need report is quite crucial.
I understand that the Minister in the other place is very sympathetic to the issue but does not see this as a way forward. Late into this evening and night, I hope I can use my power of persuasion to convince the Minister in front of me to be willing to at least continue to talk and see whether we can find a way forward.
Amendment 102 is about establishing a child protection body that would work to improve child protection practice, advise government and the sector, and conduct inspections. This is an important issue, in addition to the one I raised earlier. I do not intend to speak any further, but I would welcome a response from the Minister. Given that we agree that there is a problem, would she now be willing at least to look at whether we can reinvestigate the national thresholds? I beg to move.
Baroness Barran (Con)
My Lords, I too will be brief. I was slightly surprised at the need for Amendment 102. If I have understood correctly, the Government have committed to establishing a child protection agency and are currently consulting on it. I absolutely understand that the noble Lord wants to raise this because, clearly, implementation will be crucial if we are to avoid blurring lines of accountability and creating a bureaucracy. But it will be interesting to hear what the Minister has to say on that.
We covered standards for children in need thresholds in Committee. On these Benches, we retain the view that we need flexibility in the system so that practitioners can use their professional judgment to look at the overall situation of a child and keep it under review. But I absolutely accept that there are real problems at what one might call the top end of Section 17, with an extraordinary number of children who are suffering child sexual abuse and child sexual exploitation still being classified as “children in need” rather than “child protection”.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
I thank the Minister for her response. I do not intend to prolong proceedings any further, so I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
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Lord Moraes (Lab)
My Lords, I rise to introduce Amendment 77 in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Lister, who tabled a similar amendment in Committee. I apologise to the House for not being in Committee to speak to this amendment due to a period of illness last year.
The amendment concerns a new statutory duty for corporate parents to be alerted to matters concerning children’s well-being. In this respect, there are a group of children in the UK who are entitled to citizenship but for various reasons do not achieve it. This is not widely understood generally, nor even among parents, foster parents and corporate parents of those children. Achieving their citizenship under British nationality law is good for the children, who gain stability, and for society, which sees the integration of children often in vulnerable situations. Here, I should declare that I am a patron of the non-profit Project for the Registration of Children as British Citizens.
We want to ensure in this amendment that there is no duplication of duties on the Secretary of State, while ensuring that duties on corporate parents under Section 21(1) concerning the well-being of young people include appropriate consideration of nationality rights. We do not want to see children being wrongly categorised or treated as if this is wholly a matter of immigration or discretion.
In Committee the Minister placed an emphasis on Section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act, which states that the Home Secretary should be the one discharging citizenship in relation to the safeguarding and welfare needs of the child. But this places the sole duty on the Home Secretary; it does not apply to the corporate parents to whom the new duty is to apply. Our amendment understands the importance of Section 55 but would ensure that care providers to whom the new duty is to apply are not left without the protection of any statutory duty altogether in relation to these child citizenship applications.
In Committee the Minister suggested that the Government are reflecting on the requirement to support children in gaining citizenship. That is welcome, and it is welcome that the Government are considering what further steps to take in this area. But this amendment would support those efforts by ensuring that corporate parents could act on whatever new policy or practice was brought forward by the Home Office.
While we welcome the Government’s steps to improve local authority practice in relation to child citizens, the experience of credible practitioners on the ground, such as PRCBC, is that these rights are not widely known or acted on, and any improvements that are seen are not uniform, with some local authorities showing evidence of no improvement at all.
My noble friend the Minister is probably aware that a number of noble Lords, including my noble friend Lady Lister, have been pressing the case for children in this situation for many years. Government support for this amendment would ensure that these important children’s rights are not overlooked by local authorities in their role as corporate parents.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I support and will talk to Amendments 75 and 76, which the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester set out powerfully; I fully support the arguments. Last week I hosted a meeting in your Lordships’ Committee Room 1, which showcased care experience and protected characteristics. The room was full. Care-experienced people had travelled from across the United Kingdom to be there because they wanted their voices to be heard, and I speak today to ensure that those voices are heard in your Lordships’ House.
Care-experienced people are asking that relevant bodies in the exercise of their corporate parenting duties are required to have due regard, as we heard earlier. One care-experienced person told us: “I deserve to have my voice heard to create real change. Too often decisions are made about us but without us”. Another said: “Care-experienced individuals need recognising because our outcomes are constantly poor yet our insight is rarely used when services are designed”.
At that meeting, Terry Galloway, who often helps and supports these young people with care experiences, offered a simple but striking example. He asked us to imagine driving down a road in a fast car and seeing a child standing in the road. You are alert to that child being there, but you drive straight through them—and you say your duty has been discharged because you were alert to them being there. Contrast that with a duty of due regard. On the same road and with the same child, discharging that duty would require you to stop the car, get out and speak to them. You would seek an understanding of why they are in the road and whether there is something you can do to help them.
Youth Guarantee Scheme: Evaluation
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
It will certainly be the case that in the evaluation we will want to track how many young people are able to move into permanent employment. I agree with the noble Lord about that. Evaluations of job support schemes in the past have suggested that there is a positive movement into long-term employment from these types of schemes.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I am all for opportunities for young people, but I challenge the Minister on why, particularly, young people on universal credit have to wait 18 months before accessing support. Why can we not move this forward, like we do for younger people who are in danger of being NEET, to six months?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
They will not have to wait 18 months. The backstop at 18 months is a guaranteed job of six months. Before they get to that point, they will have received support much earlier on from specialist work coaches, access to the additional 300,000 opportunities through either a swap or work experience to try work, and the support of other organisations to help tackle the issues that may be keeping them out of the workplace in the first place.
Sexual Harassment in Educational Settings
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
As I say, the Technology Secretary has already made it clear that X needs to deal urgently with the issue of Grok. Ofcom has already contacted X and xAI to understand what steps they have taken to comply with their legal duties to protect users in the UK. If services fail to adhere, Ofcom can impose fines of up to 10% of qualifying worldwide revenue and, in the most serious cases of non-compliance, could apply to the courts to block services.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
Can I just quiz the Minister about research by Girlguiding last year? Its Girls’ Attitude Survey 2025 found that one in 10 young girls aged between 11 and 16 was missing education, deeply affecting their life chances going forward. I take the point that sexism and harassment existed before social media, but there is now clear evidence that social media is playing a huge role. I ask the question that other noble Lords have asked: will the Government now reconsider their position, particularly on mobile phones in schools but also on social media access for under-16s?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
I think I have responded to that point. I have pointed out that one of the most appropriate things that schools can do—recognising that misogyny and abuse are not innate to children but are learned, including through the internet—is to help teach children different attitudes and to reinforce the decency that I think we all know most children and young boys have. To support schools to do that, we are investing through the provision that I talked about earlier, providing new guidance through the relationships, sex and health education guidance and supporting our teachers and parents to be able to do that.
Schools and Universities: Language Learning
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Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this timely and thoughtful debate. I add my thanks in particular to the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, for securing it. Across the House, there has been striking consensus on two points: first, that the decline in modern foreign language learning in our schools and universities is deeply worrying; and, secondly, that the shortage of qualified language teachers is a central and urgent cause of that decline.
Language learning is not a luxury add-on to the curriculum. It is fundamental to our economic competitiveness, cultural understanding, diplomatic reach and national security. In an increasingly competitive global economy, linguistic capability is a core economic asset. Research commissioned by the former Department for Business, and subsequently cited by the British Academy and others, has estimated that the UK’s language skills deficit costs the economy around 3.5% of GDP, as we were told by the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, in opening the debate. That equates to around £40 billion in lost trade annually, reduced export performance and missed investment opportunities, driven in part by an overreliance on English and a shortage of people able to operate confidently in other languages.
Many British companies that export have demonstrated more productivity and resilience than those that do not, yet surveys of small and medium-sized enterprises consistently show that language barriers are among the most common obstacles to exporting. Businesses report losing contracts, failing to enter new markets and relying on costly intermediaries because of a lack of staff with the necessary language skills. This is particularly damaging for SMEs, which form the backbone of our economy but often lack the resources to compensate for that language gap.
There is strong evidence that language skills enhance individual and national productivity. Graduates with foreign language skills enjoy a measurable wage premium during their working lives, often estimated at between 5% and 10%. This reflects their higher employability, access to roles and a range of life skills, as my noble friend Lady Smith said in talking about lifelong learning. When multiplied across the workforce, these individual gains translate into significant national economic benefits.
The United Kingdom now seeks to deepen and diversify its trading relationships with our European neighbours post Brexit. I want to comment on the “French weekends” mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard. A close friend of mine, Antoine, who works for the French Government on the Erasmus programme, is watching this debate keenly, because he is keen to expand connections between France and the United Kingdom, particularly around the French language. I was particularly moved by that.
The Government’s own trade ambitions depend on people who can negotiate contracts, understand regulatory systems, build long-term relationships and operate with cultural fluency. Language skills are not a “nice to have” in this context; they are our economic infrastructure. Yet uptake at GCSE and A-level, as we have heard from many noble Lords, remains stubbornly low, university language departments continue to close, and schools, particularly in disadvantaged areas, are increasingly unable to offer a broad and sustained language curriculum. This threatens to create a two-tier system in which language skills and the economic advantages that flow from them are concentrated among the most privileged, while the wider economy suffers from a shrinking skills base.
We cannot reverse these trends without addressing the supply of teachers. As several noble Lords have made clear, domestic recruitment alone is not currently meeting this need. The pipeline is weak, retention is fragile and workload pressures are driving skilled teachers out of the profession. Against that backdrop, it is simply self-defeating to erect additional barriers to recruiting qualified modern foreign language teachers from overseas, particularly when the economic cost of inaction is measured in tens of billions of pounds each year. That is why the question of visas and migration policy is so important.
Language teachers are, by definition, internationally mobile professionals. Many are native speakers, and bring with them a cultural knowledge and linguistic authenticity that directly improves teaching quality and student outcomes. In economic terms they represent not a cost but a long-term investment in the skills base on which future growth depends. Yet the current system remains slow, expensive and, in many cases, actively discouraging. That is why on these Benches we believe that there is a strong case for targeted visa waivers or streamlined routes specifically for modern foreign language teachers, and I welcome the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Blower, and the noble Lord, Lord Hampton. These roles should be treated as shortage occupations not just in name but in practice. Schools should not be deterred from appointing excellent candidates because of prohibitive fees, bureaucratic delays or uncertainty over status, especially when the economic returns of stronger language capability are so well evidenced.
But visas alone will not be enough. Sustainability must be the watchword. Overseas teachers need proper induction, professional support, and a clear route to settlement if they are to stay and build long-term careers here. We must ensure that their qualifications are recognised swiftly and fairly and that schools are supported in navigating the process. At the same time, we cannot lose sight of the broader ecosystem. Teacher supply is inseparable from student demand. Pupils are less likely to study languages if provision is patchy, courses are withdrawn midway or teaching is delivered by non-specialists. Universities, in turn, cannot sustain language departments if school uptake continues to fall. This is a vicious circle, as we have heard from many noble Lords, and one that the UK can ill afford economically.
I was particularly struck by contributions highlighting the impact on less commonly taught languages. They are often first to disappear when staffing becomes difficult, yet these are precisely the languages in which the United Kingdom most needs capacity. Languages such as Arabic, Mandarin, Japanese, Russian, Portuguese, Polish, Turkish, Urdu and Persian are spoken in regions accounting for a substantial and growing share of global GDP. Further, when it comes to the issue of security—I see that the noble Lords, Lord West and Lord Robertson, are here—having individuals who can speak Arabic, Mandarin, Russian and Persian will be crucial in years to come. Weak provision in these languages undermines our ability to trade, attract investment and operate effectively in strategically important markets.
This is not simply an education issue, nor is it simply a migration issue; it is an economic and security strategy issue. Will the Government commit to working across departments to develop a coherent approach, one that recognises the proven economic and security value of language skills, values international expertise and places long-term sustainability at its heart? From these Benches, we stand ready to support pragmatic, evidence-based measures to rebuild language learning in this country. That includes fairer visa routes, better support for overseas teachers, stronger incentives for domestic trainees, and a renewed commitment to languages as a core part of a broad and balanced education.
If we fail to act, we risk presiding over a slow erosion of one of the UK’s greatest strengths: our ability to engage confidently, respectfully and effectively in the wider world. That would be a loss to not just our education system but our economy, our global standing and our society as a whole. I hope that the Government will listen carefully to the strength of feeling expressed across this House and respond with the urgency and ambition that the situation so clearly demands.
Jobs Market: Wider Economic Implications
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Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Viscount will know that we have a number of what we call sector work programmes to develop skills and support people into many areas of our economy, including hospitality and retail, and many others. I come back to the fact that there are challenges across the globe. The UK unemployment rate is firmly below the EU 27 average. The UK has the third-highest employment rate among the G7—higher than Canada, the USA, France and Italy. I fully accept that these have been challenging times but there has been a reduction in demand across the globe, for a range of reasons. I am confident that things are looking good. We are seeing, for example, that vacancies have stabilised. We are seeing interest rates coming down and businesses getting more certainty, not least from the fact that we now have an Employment Rights Act.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, we will hear from the Lib Dems next, please.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I am more than happy to speak to Alan Milburn, given my long experience of working with NEETs. The question I will ask the Minister is about His Majesty’s Government having two key priorities. One is around net zero and the other is building 1.5 million homes. I want to know: what is the strategy around young people and apprenticeships? I ask this because I spoke to a young person studying at Sheffield College who is doing an electrician course. He is really stressed out that he is unable to get the apprenticeship course he needs to get properly qualified and contribute to the economy, because otherwise he told me that he will look for a job in McDonald’s.
Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
I am not going to diss looking for a job in McDonald’s, but I do not want to see anyone unable to pursue the things that they want to do. The noble Lord is absolutely right. We have invested £600 million in a construction package and are working closely with the industry. We have a strategic relationship team in DWP that works with key sectors to try to make sure, if jobs come on stream, that our people get them. We want young people and people who are not in the labour market to get them—those who are struggling with economic inactivity. I am grateful to him for raising that.
Special Educational Needs: Investment
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
As the noble Earl knows, or should know, primary numbers have been falling since 2019, which is why our additional investment—the 10% pay award for teachers, which applies across primary and secondary schools and which will bring in additional teachers—has, as I have already identified, increased the numbers of teachers in secondary and special schools, which is where they are particularly needed. It is already being effective, as is this Government’s commitment to keeping teachers in the classroom, not just attracting them in the first place.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, given that one of the big challenges for local authorities has been school transport for SEND children, what assessment has been done on how quickly these school places will be delivered? More importantly, has any work been done on the potential savings for local authorities, because this is one budget that is really challenging for local councils up and down the country?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
The 50,000 additional places that will be funded through the £3 billion that we announced last week are on top of the 10,000 new specialist places in mainstream and special schools, supported by the £740 million that we invested this year. That goes back to the point I made earlier: this is not about saving money, but it is about saying that, for many children, they will be best served in local schools with specialist provision to care for them and help them to thrive alongside their friends. A side benefit of that is that we will no longer need to be transporting children long distances at great cost for education that they could more effectively receive closer to home.
Free School Meals
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
I agree with my noble friend. This Government, in providing the additional commitment to children and the additional investment to expand free school meals, have recognised that, wherever it comes from, in-house provisions can often have a range of benefits for the school. More children will be able to benefit, with all the changes that that brings, such as the ability for them to concentrate on their learning and to have the food and nutrition that all children need to be able to succeed.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
I welcome the child poverty strategy, which commits to no child in school going hungry. However, I am deeply concerned to hear that many schools, particularly in deprived areas, are having to use teaching budgets to fill this gap. Can the Minister provide a list, not in the Chamber now but to me, of how many schools are topping up free school meal provisions from their teaching budgets?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
As I have outlined, the national funding formula already includes provision for the funding of free school meals. It quite rightly targets funding to schools on the basis of those with the greatest numbers of pupils with additional needs. I will investigate whether it is possible to provide those figures. I am not sure that it will be, given how school meals are funded, but I will have a look.
Schools: Funding
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley Excerpts(1 month, 4 weeks ago)
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
No, that is not true. The noble Baroness is keen on facts and concerned about the closure of private schools, as would anybody be if a school was closing. I hope she will be somewhat reassured by knowing that, while on average 74 private schools have closed per year over the last 20 years, in this last year 59 closed.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, do His Majesty’s Government have in place a monitoring system to look at the numbers of young people with special educational needs accessing private schools? I am deeply worried that when state schools cannot provide that service, parents often then fall upon the private sector.