Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether his Department plans to implement a national bereavement policy for schools to help assist children who have experienced the death of a member of their immediate family.

The Department’s Mental Health and Behaviour guidance includes links to sources of information and support, including on how to respond to bereavement and other traumatic events. This includes MindEd, which the Government has funded to provide online advice and training on mental health for all professionals working with children and young people. Information on MindEd is available here: https://www.minded.org.uk/.

The Department has also provided advice to schools on how to provide access to high quality school-based counselling, available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/counselling-in-schools.

Where children need specialist support, it is important that schools are able to make referrals quickly. The NHS long term plan sets out how specialist mental health support will be increased, including through access to crisis care 24 hours a day by 2023/24. It also includes support for at least an additional 345,000 children and young people to access NHS funded mental health services, including through new mental health support teams linked to schools and colleges.