Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many laptops have been (a) requested by schools for home learning and (b) delivered as of 14 January 2021.

The Government is investing over £400 million to support access to remote education and online social care services securing 1.3 million laptops and tablets for disadvantaged children and young people. As of Monday 18 January, over 800,000 laptops and tablets had been delivered to schools, trusts and local authorities.

The number of devices available for each school, trust or local authority is based on children eligible for free school meals and takes into account existing devices available in schools. Schools, trusts and local authorities are responsible for distributing the laptops and tablets and are best placed to know which disadvantaged children and young people need access to a device.

The Government is providing this significant injection of devices on top of an estimated 2.9 million laptops and tablets already owned by schools before the start of the COVID-19 outbreak. On 12 January, we announced that we will be providing a further 300,000 devices over the course of this term.

Figures on the number of devices delivered, including by local authority, are available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/laptops-and-tablets-data/2021-week-3. These figures are broken down by local authority and academy trust.

We have also partnered with the UK’s leading mobile operators to provide free data to help disadvantaged children get online as well as delivering 4G wireless routers for pupils without connection at home.