Covid-19: Schools Debate
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Lord Mann
Main Page: Lord Mann (Non-affiliated - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Mann's debates with the Department for International Trade
(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Baroness Berridge
My Lords, this is a new virus and the scientific understanding of it is developing. The current understanding is that there is a high degree of confidence that the severity of the disease in children is lower and there is moderate to high confidence that the susceptibility to clinical disease of children up to the age of 11 to 13 is lower than for adults. Hence, this is forming the basis, along with Public Health England guidance on the hierarchy of controls in schools, of the plans to reopen schools in the week of 1 June, assuming that the five tests are satisfied at that time.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
Every school can have an elected trade union health and safety workplace representative with statutory powers to carry out risk assessments. How many have done so?
Baroness Berridge
My Lords, I am not aware of how many health and safety officers have performed such risk assessments, but I will seek to obtain the information for the noble Lord. It is the responsibility of school leaders to carry out those kinds of risk assessments in the course of planning to reopen on 1 June.