Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of the time taken to deliver face masks to secondary schools in (a) Harrow West constituency and (b) England; what steps his Department is taking to ensure that deliveries are made in time to meet demand; and if he will make a statement.

To support the temporary measures recently introduced, the department has worked with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to deliver a contingency supply of face coverings to education providers. These face coverings have been provided by DHSC at no cost to education providers.

We would expect most staff, pupils and students already have access to face coverings. However, we recognise that some individuals may not have access or might forget their face covering. We hope that this extra supply will mean all students, pupils and staff are able to access a face covering when needed.

We delivered the majority of face coverings to secondary schools before the Christmas break, with the remaining deliveries completed in early January, including to those schools in Harrow West.