Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what discussions he has had with Secretary of State for Education on ensuring that agencies employing education supply staff use the Coronavirus Job Retention scheme for those staff that are unable to work.

An employer can claim for any employees who were employed and on their PAYE payroll on 30 October 2020. The employer must have made a PAYE Real Time Information (RTI) submission to HMRC between 20 March 2020 and 30 October 2020, notifying a payment of earnings for that employee.

This includes education supply staff who are unable to work and clinically extremely vulnerable people, where they meet these eligibility criteria.

The furloughing of staff through the CJRS is a voluntary arrangement entered at the employers’ discretion and agreed by employees. The decision whether an individual firm should put its staff on furlough, or take them off it is one for the employer, in consultation with the employee.