Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to tackle sexual violence and sexual harassment between pupils in schools.

The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough, may wish to be aware that on 14 December, we published dedicated advice on sexual violence and sexual harassment between children in schools and colleges. This explains what sexual violence and sexual harassment is, how to minimise the risks of it happening and how to manage reports of incidents.

At the same time as publishing the advice, we launched a consultation on proposals to update the department’s statutory safeguarding guidance, ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’, from September 2018. The consultation closes on 22 February 2018.

As part of the consultation we are seeking views both on the content of the advice on sexual harassment and sexual violence and on the extent to which it should be reflected in the statutory guidance.

We plan to publish the revised ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ guidance, for information, early in the summer term 2018. This will give schools and colleges adequate time to review their policies and procedures and make any changes necessary to meet the requirements before the guidance comes into force in September 2018.