Children with Allergies: School Safeguarding

Stephen Morgan Excerpts

Thursday 3rd July 2025 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Stephen Morgan)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Lewell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Chris Bloore) for securing and opening this debate. I have greatly valued the opportunity to listen to his insights and hear the arguments on this important topic, especially given his personal experience with his family. I know that all hon. Members will today be thinking of their constituents and families who have lost loved ones as a result of allergies.

I acknowledge the contributions of my hon. Friends the Members for Clwyd East (Becky Gittins), for Tamworth (Sarah Edwards), for Stafford (Leigh Ingham), for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis), for Nuneaton (Jodie Gosling) and for North West Leicestershire (Amanda Hack) to this debate, as well as their contributions to the APPG or as allergy champions. I thank them for their hard work and for the priority that they are giving to this important topic for children, early years and schools.

I absolutely understand that allergies can be worrying for parents and pupils. When parents send their children to school, it is only right and natural that they expect them to be kept safe. For parents of children with allergies, there is understandably an additional level of concern. Allergies can be complex conditions and can range enormously in severity. While much of the debate focuses on food allergies, it is important to note that not all allergens are food, which makes the issue more complicated for individuals to manage. Allergies are therefore a highly individual condition, so there is no one-size-fits-all approach.

Last month, I was lucky enough to visit Edith Neville primary school with the Natasha Allergy Research Foundation. I got to see at first hand how allergy awareness training can increase the safety of pupils with food allergies and allow them to feel fully involved in school activities. I am sure that hon. Members will agree that allergies are complex and, by their very nature, require individualised approaches. These issues are best dealt with locally. That is why the Government have put in place a number of pieces of legislation, as well as guidance for schools and parents, covering a range of areas and circumstances. We are very aware of recent calls to strengthen the law around allergies, with specific references to voluntary approaches and voluntary guidance.

I stress that section 100 of the Children and Families Act 2014 places a legal duty on schools to

“make arrangements for supporting pupils at the school with medical conditions”

including allergies, and that governing bodies must have regard to the accompanying statutory guidance supporting pupils with medical conditions when carrying out their duties. The guidance makes it clear that schools should ensure that they are aware of any pupils with allergies, and have processes in place to ensure that those can be well managed. The guidance sets out that a school’s policy should be clear that any member of the school’s staff providing support to a pupil with medical needs should have received suitable training. The Department’s allergy guidance for schools signpost them to allergy available resources and training. I again stress that individual schools are best placed to work with parents to put in place a system that works for the school, parents and individual children.

Individual healthcare plans can set out arrangements for specific pupils’ medical needs, and schools will need to draw on, or seek advice from, clinicians on how the individual’s medical condition should be managed while in school. That is particularly important where children and young people have conditions that, if not managed effectively, could pose a high risk to their health and safety. Individual healthcare plans will be particularly important where conditions fluctuate or there is a high risk that emergency intervention will be needed. They are likely to be helpful in the majority of other cases, especially where medical conditions are long term and complex. However, not all children will require one.

In addition to the section 100 duty, schools are subject to other requirements. For example, in the UK, food businesses must inform consumers if they use any of the 14 mandatory allergens as ingredients in the food that they provide. How allergen information should be provided depends on whether the food is prepackaged, non-prepackaged or prepacked for direct sale. That includes food provided by institutions including school caterers, who have the responsibility to protect individuals in their care.

As hon. Members may know, rules on the provision of food labelling are set out primarily in the retained EU Food Information Regulations 2014. These rules include a requirement to identify to consumers the presence of any of the 14 mandatory allergens, including cereals containing gluten, eggs, fish and milk.

The Department for Education works closely with the Food Standards Agency on all matters relating to school food. The FSA provides a free food allergy and intolerance online training course, which offers practical advice to local authority law enforcement officers and anyone who wants to learn more about food allergies, such as those working in the food manufacturing and catering industries. The FSA also offers a host of other training, technical documents and guidance documents, including information on the 14 most common allergens, food labelling requirements, and the handling of allergen ingredients.

Auto-injectors can be vital if a child suffers an allergic reaction. To support schools in meeting the needs of children with allergies, the Human Medicines (Amendment) Regulations 2017 were passed and they allow schools to obtain and hold spare adrenalin auto-injectors for administration to pupils in an emergency. The Department for Health and Social Care has produced guidance on the use of these injectors and emergency inhalers in schools, including the purchase of spares. The guidance makes it clear that any adrenalin auto-injectors held by a school should be considered as a back-up device and not as a replacement for pupils’ own adrenalin auto-injectors.

Beyond this, families are also able to play an important role in managing their child’s condition. We are very clear with schools that no one will know a child’s needs as well as their parents, and that schools should work closely together with parents. The parents of children with allergies will work with medical professionals and other organisations to plan for and navigate their child’s specific needs, and parents should be fully consulted and engaged in any discussions about their child’s allergies. Schools will also need to ensure that parents and carers of children with food allergies or intolerances are given information about allergic ingredients used in the foods available, and good communication between parents and schools about allergies and pupils’ needs is essential to keep children safe while they are in school.

Since March 2024, the Department has reminded schools of their duties concerning pupils with allergies every six months, via the DFE’s bulletin to the education sector. These reminders have included links to Government guidance, as well as signposting to credible resources from the charitable sector, including the voluntary schools allergy code, which is co-produced by the Benedict Blythe Foundation, the Independent Schools’ Bursars Association and the Allergy Team.

For younger children, the early years foundation stage framework sets the standards that all registered early years providers must meet for the learning, development and care of children from birth to the age of five. The EYFS states that before a child is admitted to an early years setting, the provider must obtain information about any special dietary requirements, preferences or food allergies the child has, as well as any other special health requirements. Providers must also have a policy and procedures for administering medicines, and they must have systems to obtain information about a child’s needs for medicines and to keep this information up to date. Training must be provided for staff where the administration of medicine requires medical or technical knowledge.

There is also a requirement for at least one person who has a current paediatric first aid certificate to be on the premises and available at all times when children are present, and they must also accompany children on outings. The PFA criteria is clear that the training should include being able to help a baby or child suffering from anaphylactic shock. There is also a requirement within the EYFS regarding adequate supervision. This is explicit that while children are eating, they must always be in sight and hearing of an adult—not within sight or hearing—to help educators to notice the signs of an allergic reaction as soon as they are present and allow them to act quickly.

The new early years educator level 3 qualification criteria came into force in September 2024, ensuring that early years educators have an understanding of allergies and anaphylaxis. Following consultation last year and subject to parliamentary procedure, we will introduce changes to the safeguarding requirements of the EYFS from September this year. They will include a new safety eating section containing a number of requirements relating to allergies, such as a requirement for providers or childminders to have ongoing discussions with parents and/or carers about special dietary requirements, including food allergies and intolerances that a child may have, as well as a requirement to develop allergy action plans, where appropriate, to manage them.

In addition, providers and childminders will be required to ensure that all staff are aware of the symptoms and treatments for allergies and anaphylaxis and the differences between allergies and intolerances, and that they have an understanding that children can develop allergies at any time. That is particularly pertinent during the introduction of solid foods, which is sometimes called complementary feeding or weaning. It will also be a requirement that while children are eating there should always be a member of staff in the room who holds a valid first aid certificate. Where possible, providers and childminders should also sit facing children while they eat, to ensure that children are eating in a way that prevents choking and food sharing, and so that the provider is aware of unexpected allergic reactions.

From September, early years providers will be required to have regard to the new nutrition guidance published in May this year. It includes a section on food allergies, and it provides information on the symptoms of both allergic reactions and anaphylaxis, as well as common food allergens. It also provides links to helpful resources, such as the Food Standards Agency’s free food allergy training.

This Government are committed to breaking down barriers to opportunity and tackling child poverty. We have now announced that we are extending free school meals to children from households in receipt of universal credit from September 2026. This will lift 100,000 children across England out of poverty and will put £500 back into families’ pockets, supporting parents in a decisive action to improve lives ahead of the child poverty strategy coming later this year. The Department will expect schools to make every effort to ensure that eligible pupils with allergies can benefit from that entitlement.

In deciding what is reasonable, schools and their caterers are expected to take into account factors such as the type of diet required by the child with allergies, the number of children in a similar position and the cost of making suitable food available. It is important that schools have a culture of inclusivity, and we expect schools to do what they can to ensure that no child is unnecessarily disadvantaged or made to feel disadvantaged.

The same applies to breakfast clubs. The Government are committed to delivering on our pledge to introduce breakfast clubs in every state-funded primary school. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill will mean that every state-funded school with children on the roll from reception to year 6 will be required to offer a free breakfast club before the start of each school day. This will ensure that every child, regardless of circumstance, has a supportive start to the school day.

I have outlined the various legislation and guidance that covers allergies in schools. We do, of course, keep those policies under review, and we welcome feedback on how we can better support schools’ implementation of them. Senior DFE officials sit on the expert advisory group for allergy, which is convened by colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care and the National Allergy Strategy Group, and which plans to publish a 10-year strategy later this year. It will make recommendations to Government on levers that can improve the lives of people living with allergies, including in education. I encourage stakeholders to feed any ideas on those issues to officials via that route.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch again for securing this debate and for his instructive, insightful and personal contribution, and I thank all hon. Members, including those with lived experience, for their speeches and interventions this afternoon.