Boris Johnson says parents will be forced by law to send their children back to school in September, amid a growing outcry over the damage being done to youngsters’ life chances by the prolonged absence from classrooms.
The Prime Minister – stung by criticism of the slow and partial resumption of teaching – admitted that the closure of schools had been ‘a massive problem’.
‘We need to get the kids back into school,’ Mr Johnson told The Mail on Sunday. ‘I want all pupils back in school in September.’
Asked whether it would be compulsory, Mr Johnson replied: ‘Yes. It’s the law.’
He added that the teaching unions which had opposed the wider reopening of schools – on the grounds that it posed a risk to the safety of their members – should ‘take their responsibilities seriously’.
The Prime Minister Boris Johnson – stung by criticism of the slow and partial resumption of teaching – admitted that the closure of schools had been ‘a massive problem’
Children from lower-income families are seen as suffering the most because they are less able to access online learning or private tuition.
In a message to the unions, Mr Johnson said: ‘It’s the kids from the poorer families who aren’t going back, and so you are entrenching social injustice.’
Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has come under particular fire for his handling of the issue, having performed a U-turn on plans to get all primary school pupils back to the classroom before the summer break.
It forced him to pledge last week to Tory MPs to end the ‘softly, softly’ approach to dealing with the unions.
He promised to get children back to school in September by doubling the 15-child limit on class sizes in primary schools and ditching requirements for teachers to enforce the new ‘one metre plus’ social distancing measure.
Mr Williamson – tipped to be moved in an autumn reshuffle – told the backbench 1922 Committee that the National Education Union was the ‘No Education Union’.
Critics say the loss of teaching is causing disadvantaged children to fall further behind their peers and leading to an increase in bored youngsters engaging in feral behaviour.
Children from lower-income families are seen as suffering the most because they are less able to access online learning or private tuition. Pictured, Mr Johnson at Bovingdon Primary Academy in Hertfordshire on June 19
Last night, the parents’ pressure group Us For Them gave Mr Johnson’s words a cautious welcome.
Co-founder Molly Kingsley said: ‘Our 10,000 supporters now urgently need more clarity from the Prime Minister.
‘We call for an explicit statement that there will be no social distancing in schools and we want a return to normalised full-time education for all year groups, and all schools.’
The group, set up six weeks ago, is considering suing the Government on behalf of children whose education has been blighted and wants social distancing for children in schools to be scrapped.
Referring to the chaotic and patchy restart of primaries earlier this month, Mrs Kingsley added: ‘The Government must be prescriptive in its instructions to local authorities and schools.
The parents’ pressure group Us For Them gave Mr Johnson’s words a cautious welcome. Pictured, the Prime Minister at Hemel Hempstead in Hertfordshire on June 18
‘Deferring all risk assessments to local authorities and schools is resulting in huge inconsistency of approach.’
She called for far more detail from the Government: ‘We need to urgently understand the arrangements for all of the things that go alongside school, including late-stay and breakfast clubs, school transport and extra-curricular activities.
‘We would like to see summer holiday camps opened now for children across the country so that we can give them back some of their summer and support to parents who’ve been struggling to juggle work and childcare for too long.
‘This is now the greatest emergency facing our country and our members will be watching the Government’s next moves closely.
‘It is imperative that before MPs break for the summer there is a clear and executable plan in place, and that all parties have agreed to it.’
Find out more about Us For Them here.
Schools should go back in AUGUST and have lessons on Saturdays to make up for lost time, campaigners urge amid fears of ‘social catastrophe’
by Nick Craven for The Mail On Sunday
Campaigners have urged Ministers to send pupils back to school a fortnight early in the autumn to reduce the damage to their education.
The idea is part of a five-point plan proposed by the influential education policy group, Parents and Teachers for Excellence (PTE), to get children back into the habit of learning.
PTE co-founder Dame Rachel de Souza, who is chief executive of the Inspiration Trust of 14 academies across East Anglia, says children risk ‘becoming part of a social catastrophe unfolding before our eyes’ unless they return to the classroom quickly.
The PTE plan says:
- The new autumn term should begin on August 17 instead of September 2;
- Attendance must be compulsory unless pupils have a health risk;
- Sports grounds should be open for team sports and PE;
- Saturday lessons should be brought in to provide catch-up sessions for exam students, along with a longer school day for all;
- The Government should fund overtime payments for teachers who work extra hours.
PTE – a coalition of parents and teachers set up in 2016 to improve standards – says it is imperative that the Government gives clarity to both schools and parents to allow for the necessary planning before the return.
Dame Rachel said schools provided vital structure in young people’s lives and ‘without it we risk allowing them to drift aimlessly and damaging their futures irreparably’. She claimed that online learning had failed to bridge that gap, with students losing motivation and spending their time watching Netflix or playing video games.
Dame Rachel de Souza, chief executive of the Inspiration Trust, said children risk ‘becoming part of a social catastrophe unfolding before our eyes’ unless they return to the classroom
Dame Rachel said a return to school two weeks earlier represented ‘the only way we can make sure that we protect our children’s prospects’. Pointing out that pubs, restaurants, shops and cinemas are opening long before schools, she asked: ‘Do we as a nation hold these institutions as more valuable than our children’s education?’
A partial return, she added, would be a disaster. It would only widen the disadvantage gap among children because struggling students were the most likely to opt out.
Urging the padlocks to be removed from sports pitches, Dame Rachel said: ‘It has been heartbreaking to see school sports grounds locked and children unable to play with each other. Team sports inspire a healthy sense of camaraderie.’ Asked about the risk of spreading Covid-19, she said: ‘It can hardly be claimed that children who are meeting their friends are any safer than they would be at school.’
The nine secondary schools in Dame Rachel’s academy trust are restarting on August 18.
PTE – a coalition of parents and teachers set up in 2016 to improve standards – says it is imperative that the Government gives clarity to both schools and parents to allow for the necessary planning before the return. Pictured, The Falcon pub in Rotherwick, London
Mark Lehain, PTE’s chairman of networks, said he expected head teachers to ‘unleash a small army of volunteers’ comprising retired teachers and parents to help when the autumn term begins.
‘This needs to be a national effort,’ he said. ‘Children are at the least risk from the pandemic, but their futures and life chances have possibly been affected the most in the long term. Of course, parents are nervous about sending their children back to classes, but we’ve seen with primary schools that more children have been attending each week as confidence grows.’
PTE expects opposition from teaching unions, which last week branded Boris Johnson’s plan to reopen schools for all pupils in September as ‘pure fantasy’. Mr Lehain said: ‘There will, of course, be people who want to disrupt and obstruct this, but that’s another reason to give teachers and parents clarity so that the plans are on the table and people who want to prevent a smooth start to the school year can be pre-empted.’