Education Committee
Oral evidence: The work of the Department for Education, HC 355
Wednesday 17 June 2026
Ordered by the House of Commons to be published on 17 June 2026.
Members present: Helen Hayes (Chair); Jess Asato; Sureena Brackenridge; Darren Paffey; Rebecca Paul; Manuela Perteghella; Peter Swallow; Caroline Voaden.
Questions 1 - 60
Witnesses
I: Rt Hon Bridget Phillipson MP, Secretary of State for Education; Susan Acland-Hood, Permanent Secretary, Department for Education.
Witnesses: Rt Hon Bridget Phillipson MP and Susan Acland-Hood.
Chair: Welcome to this evidence session of the Education Committee. This is an accountability session with the Secretary of State for Education and the permanent secretary at the Department for Education. Thank you both for making the time to be with us today; we are really grateful.
I invite any Members who would like to make declarations of interest to do so.
Peter Swallow: I chair the all-party parliamentary groups for schools, learning and assessment, for social mobility and on classics.
Rebecca Paul: I am a serving Surrey county councillor.
Q1 Chair: Thank you. I invite the Secretary of State to make an opening statement, if she would like.
Bridget Phillipson: Good morning, Chair, and good morning to the Committee. Forgive me: I have a bit of a bad throat this morning, unfortunately, so please bear with me if I need to cough occasionally; apologies in advance. Thank you for the opportunity to be with you this morning.
Before I go on, I know that the Committee will want to hear that this Government will very soon be making a full apology, on behalf of the state, to all affected by historical forced adoption in England. The Prime Minister will have more to say on this shameful period in our history, reflecting the gravity of what has happened, but here and now I say to all those affected: you will get the apology that you so profoundly deserve. I am grateful to the Committee for all your work in this area.
Since we last met, I have got on with delivering our opportunity mission. My focus has been lifting the life chances of every child and breaking the link between background and success. I am sure we will cover all the detail of that this morning, but I want to briefly highlight some of the progress of which I am most proud.
At the top of that list are ending the two-child limit and all of the work that we are doing around child poverty, the 1,200 free breakfast clubs that are already up and running, and the preparations under way for half a million more children to get a free school meal every day.
You will know that early years has always been a priority for me, so I am delighted that half a million children are now benefiting from the roll-out of early years entitlements. Young families across the country are already getting early support from the 200 Best Start family hubs that we have opened.
In children’s social care, I am reforming the system and delivering 10,000 more foster places by 2029. In schools, I am bringing together inclusion and high standards, fixing historical inequalities so that every child can achieve and thrive. On SEND, I am taking responsibility and giving children the rights they deserve—to go to their local school, to succeed in the classroom and to live a full life. On skills, I am building a high-quality system to sit alongside the academic route, with 29 new technical excellence colleges in place, and with V-levels launching less than 15 months from now.
We want to deliver better childhoods for our children, but we must accept that childhood is changing. To build an education system that works for every child into the 2030s, our action must stretch from birth to workplace. That is why I am working with families and partners across nurseries, schools, colleges and universities to deliver both the most radical and the most consequential agenda for education in living memory.
To see that starting to become a reality, and to know the difference that it is already making to the lives of children across our country, is a special privilege. I am delighted to be here with you today to discuss the progress we have made.
Chair: Permanent Secretary, would you like to say anything by way of an introduction?
Susan Acland-Hood: No, I am absolutely fine, thank you.
Q2 Chair: Thank you very much, Secretary of State, for your recent response to our report on SEND; we are grateful for it. One of our report’s recommendations, which the Government have rejected, is to extend the Local Government Ombudsman’s remit to cover complaints about the delivery of inclusive SEND provision. You will know that the Local Government Ombudsman currently has a remit over some local authority schools, but not all schools, so there is an accountability inconsistency and gap in parts of our education system. We highlighted the fact that accountability overall is currently unevenly distributed within the SEND system, and that there is a need to address that.
That recommendation had strong support from the sector. Given the well-documented strain on accountability and the inconsistencies, how can the Department be confident that the current system and the proposed changes you want to make will have the capacity and expertise to manage the additional pressures that will come from the proposed reforms?
Bridget Phillipson: Thank you, Chair and Committee, for your work in this area and for the report that you published. It allowed us to consider, ahead of launching the full consultation and the White Paper, all the areas of interest that you had identified. Thank you also for all the work you have done with parents, to understand their frustrations about this important point on accountability.
While we did not accept the recommendation of the Committee, it is fair to say that, through the consultation process, this has emerged as a key theme; parents are seeking continued assurance that children’s rights will be well understood, and that accountability and the right outcomes for children will be delivered. I know it is a key area for parents, and when I said that the consultation that we were launching was a genuine one, I meant it. We will be reflecting very seriously on all the areas where parents have identified what they perceive to be gaps within the current system.
Given the level of trust that parents have at the moment, and given the failures and problems that we have all experienced as Members of Parliament, I do understand the nervousness that parents will feel, but I believe that the vision we have set out of a system that is more inclusive—one that will allow for more children to go to their local school, with their friends, and achieving better outcomes—is the right vision. But I appreciate that this will have to take place over time, with a transition from where we are now into that new system.
Again, I think a key theme that emerges from both your report and our engagement with parents is a sense of urgency about making change happen now and a nervousness about bigger reform and what that will mean. But we are not waiting to deliver those changes, and I am sure we will come on to talk about all the investment that is going in up front, right now, to move the system into a better place, so that we can identify need much earlier than is the case at the moment.
Q3 Chair: What we hear from parents is not that they do not believe that the system can be better, but that they live in a reality in which no system will ever get things right 100% of the time. Their concern is not whether things can get better; it is whether they have a robust backstop and robust access to redress when it goes wrong—because it will sometimes, because no system is ever perfect. Are you saying that you are looking again at the accountability proposals, and that parents could take some comfort from that at this point?
Bridget Phillipson: I have been clear that, on every aspect of what we set out in the consultation, we wanted to hear the views of parents, teachers and experts on how we make sure that we get that system right. I am clear that we need a system that protects and actually strengthens children’s rights. The delivery of individual support plans will see a broadening of rights to a much bigger group of children than is the case right now, but I recognise the importance of redress—of opportunities to put things right where things do go wrong. But, over time, we want to see a reduction in the adversarial system that too many parents experience at the moment.
When we look to the evidence of what happened in the past, particularly with Sure Start, where we saw better, earlier identification of need, that did not necessarily translate into what were then statements, because we had met that need sooner. That is very much the driving principle behind the additional support that is going into Best Start family hubs, with every family hub having a trained SEND professional. If we can identify need sooner and meet that need, including within mainstream schools, over time we will no longer be in such a strained position between parents, teachers and schools.
I have also heard from education staff, through the consultation, about the importance to them of making sure that we move to a better place where some of this can be resolved through the development of those plans, where parents have input, where parents are heard and where education staff, led by the evidence, can put in place the right level of support to make sure that children can achieve all that they are capable of.
Q4 Chair: The argument that we made in our report was precisely that it would be possible to bring down the numbers of children seeking EHCPs and the number of cases going to the tribunal, but that is a completely different argument from removing the important protections that are there. You want fewer people having to rely on those protections, but that does not make their existence any less important.
Bridget Phillipson: Sure. Obviously, the tribunal will continue to exist within the system that we have set out. EHCPs will remain an important function of the system. We might come on to talk about our plans for specialist provision packages and the independent expert panel that I have appointed, with Tom Rees and Dr Anne Gordon co-chairing that work.
Even where it comes to EHCPs, there is too much variation in what is available to children. It can often be difficult as children move between areas, as you will doubtless have heard. It is important to make sure that is digital, updated more frequently and best informed by the evidence, but there will remain that backstop of the tribunal. That will still be a feature of the system. Of course, the current system remains in place until we move beyond the point of transition. The first change is not flowing through until 2029, as we move into a system in 2030, so we have the time and the space not just to invest up front as we are doing, but to make that big, deeper cultural change in how we support children and families.
We are working very closely with Health colleagues on this. I know that the Committee has been concerned about Health’s engagement. I was delighted that the new Secretary of State for Health and Social Care came, in I think his first couple of days in the job, to meet directly with parents and some of our key stakeholders to hear what they wanted to see from Health, working closely with education services to deliver really strong outcomes for children.
Chair: On that theme, we will go to Jess for the next question.
Q5 Jess Asato: Nicely following on, your Department has rejected the proposal to give the SEND tribunal binding powers over health services, despite acknowledging that integrated care boards do not consistently act on its recommendations. Given that known failure to comply, why has the Department chosen not to close what is clearly a huge accountability gap?
Bridget Phillipson: It is a question of both the accountability gap and the failure often to deliver even where things have been set out for children. I recognise the challenge there. It is why we have been working incredibly closely with Health colleagues, including the new Secretary of State. It is why, in terms of the development of specialist provision packages, we have a Health co-chair to recognise the need for Health and Education to work closely, alongside the wider panel supporting that work.
Health’s view would be that it would be unusual to make the distinction here about mandating the delivery of health provision in a way that you would not in areas beyond the provision of special educational needs. That would be the position that they would present if they were in front of the Committee this morning.
Q6 Manuela Perteghella: We know that, under the reforms, the SEND tribunals will not be able to name a specific placement or setting any more. That is problematic. Can you tell us how disputes over the naming of a setting will be resolved? What will compel local authorities to reconsider decisions on support and placements when the tribunals refer cases back to them?
Bridget Phillipson: We have heard from many people, including those working in specialist provision and special schools, that sometimes the tribunal would name a school place in a particular setting even when that school is heavily oversubscribed and does not feel safely able to deliver that provision. Seeking to resolve that presents a problem for the school and for the parents.
I also believe that there should be a stronger role for local authorities in managing and delivering specialist provision within their local area through the delivery of more inclusion bases and more specialist provision in schools, and in making sure that the local area has the necessary specialist provision in place. As I referred to at the start, a number of themes have emerged through the consultation and that is one of them. We want to look carefully at making sure that local authorities are upholding their responsibilities and that children get the places that they need.
It is a big feature of our wider work as a Department to hold local authorities to account for the work that they are doing. They are receiving significant investment from Government to deliver the places and the support, whether through Experts at Hand or capital programmes. I appreciate that there are huge variations in local government performance. Some local authorities that I have visited are doing fantastic work, with clears plan for SEND delivery and to support children and young people. With others, I have heard really quite harrowing tales from parents about significant failure.
SEND delivery is a big feature of the Department’s work on accountability at local authority level, as are the accountability questions that we have talked about. We are making sure that support is put in place at the individual-child level more quickly than happens at the moment. That is why I appointed Sir Kevan Collins as my delivery adviser to work with local authorities on those important questions, including around SEND. There is more work to do; I think that we all recognise that as constituency MPs.
Q7 Chair: To follow up on that, the question and the concern from parents is quite specific. Notwithstanding that the reforms might lead to fewer instances of dispute and conflict—and everybody wants that; we want better outcomes the first time around, and better conversations and engagement with parents—under the reforms as they currently stand, where a parent who disputes the school place that the local authority has named and the tribunal agrees with the parent that that is the wrong school place for the child, the case will be sent back to the same local authority that made the original decision to try to negotiate something different. I think that everybody is struggling to understand exactly how that will work in practice and how those disputes will be resolved. Can you answer on that specific point?
Bridget Phillipson: Yes. I do understand the point. As I said at the start, when I said this was a genuine consultation, I meant it; I do want to consider the views and concerns of parents. But an important principle underpins some of this as well: as I have just said to Manuela Perteghella, often the process will name settings where there are not places or, sometimes, settings where there is not always the right provision for a child. We need to make sure that we have the right kinds of places within settings in the right local areas. That is what we are working to deliver.
Q8 Peter Swallow: Secretary of State, as you know, the Committee called for a ban on social media for under-16s. It was good to see that ban announced. One potential challenge that has been identified is that the Government are also committed to delivering votes to 16 and 17-year-olds, and concerns have been raised about a cliff edge. Everyone is very concerned about the level of misinformation online. When I ran a local survey with more than 500 respondents on social media, over 75% of those respondents, including under-18s, told me that the most alarming content they saw was misinformation; it was the largest issue that they identified. What steps are you taking to make sure that when we empower young people with the franchise, we also empower them with the skills needed to make informed democratic decisions and to spot misinformation and disinformation online?
Bridget Phillipson: It is a really big and important area. I believe the approach we are taking and what was announced this week is the right one for children under 16, giving children their childhoods back and protecting them from some of the most damaging content that they will see online. But I recognise that many young people at the moment will not just access misinformation and disinformation, and sometimes the slop that they see on some of those platforms, but also access good news output on some of those platforms. It is important to make sure that there is good content available for young people. Of course, they will still be able to access the internet in this world and will still be able to engage with news and current affairs with their parents and with their families.
I also agree that education has an important role to play in all of this, which is why, coming out of the curriculum and assessment review, we are committed to making citizenship a new statutory requirement for key stages 1 and 2—focusing on the things that will be most important around young people understanding both their rights and their responsibilities within the modern world. That is alongside wider changes we are making around media literacy and being able to discern and challenge what you see in front of you, through revisions to the RSHE curriculum.
This is an area that will continue to need further development. This is a big change that we are delivering in terms of citizenship education for our youngest children. Of course, we are also going through the process, as we update the programmes of study for the new national curriculum, of looking at further changes to the GCSE and the subject too.
Q9 Peter Swallow: You touched on a really important point. I think it is fair to say that there are a range of approaches to teaching citizenship in schools at present. Some schools are doing it fantastically and embedding it across subjects and making it a really important part of their school, while others are perhaps teaching it in a more cursory way. What work are you doing to make sure that we are not just embedding citizenship at all schools and colleges but that there is good, embedded cross-curriculum teaching of citizenship, so that we can meet this moment?
Bridget Phillipson: There are examples, as you say, of schools that do this really well and other schools that find it more of a challenge. We are continuing to keep under review what more we need to do by way of teacher training and support, and the materials that we make available as a Department. As you say, it is about embedding those approaches across our schools—which many will do anyway, through the teaching of British values, for example—but also updating the programme of study right across both the primary and the secondary curriculum, to make sure that all young people are able to be curious, engaged citizens, especially as we move towards those young people being able to vote at 16.
Q10 Peter Swallow: Finally, Scotland and Wales already have votes at 16. What lessons have you learned from the support that has been extended in Scotland and Wales?
Bridget Phillipson: We are keen to understand the impact that we have seen there. MHCLG colleagues are leading some of the work connected to this about how we make sure that young people are registered to vote ahead of time—the practical challenges, as well as some of the areas for further development. Susan, I do not know if that is something you have discussed with your counterparts.
Susan Acland-Hood: Yes. We have conversations with counterparts in Scotland and Wales about the work they have done on lowering the voting age. We have looked around the world as well, at countries like Austria and Malta that have successfully lowered the voting age to 16. There is some really interesting evidence, including around the fact that those who vote at a younger age are more likely to continue to vote as they get older. If you can engage people early, that is important.
There is the curricular content, and there is also something about active citizenship and opportunity to take part, which, again, we are thinking about very carefully as part of the curriculum reforms. We will continue to work in a really evidence-based way on this. Some of the evidence is not necessarily what people would assume. If you look at something like media literacy, some types of media literacy learning and training are much better evidenced than others. Some perform less well than the equivalent amount of time spent on literacy and numeracy in helping people to distinguish between fact from fiction, for example. You have to be quite careful about how you fit the right thing into the curriculum.
Peter Swallow: I am an ex-classics teacher, so you don’t need to convince me that sometimes the way you teach people to develop skills in the modern world does not have to look at the modern world.
Q11 Caroline Voaden: Good morning. I would like to move on to talk about mobile phones in schools. The Committee heard evidence during its inquiry into screen time and social media that, although the 2026 Act makes the guidance statutory, there is a risk that the “never used, seen or heard” policy could still be pursued by heads and teachers. Is “never used, seen or heard” consistent with your expectation of mobile phone-free environments?
Bridget Phillipson: Every approach that schools adopt, whether in that case or any other, has to be backed up by strong enforcement. Every policy is only as good as the enforcement and consistency that follows. We have put the guidance on a statutory footing. I am clear that children should not have access to their phones during the school day. They should not be disrupting the child’s education. They should not be disrupting classroom teaching.
That extends to break times and lunch times because I want children to be focused on those moments—on spending time with their friends and eating their lunch, not worried about a phone buzzing or about what is going on elsewhere. That guidance will become statutory from September.
We have also made clear that we expect Ofsted to ensure that schools are upholding that. Alongside that, I believe that the vast majority of schools are doing this well. Where they are not, Ofsted will ensure that action is taken to prevent children from using phones in a way that disrupts their education.
There is also a question about the rightful autonomy of headteachers in making decisions about what is right and best for their setting. I have visited schools that use pouches. I have visited schools that use lockers. I have visited schools that insist that smartphones cannot be brought into school. There are different approaches, and it is important to allow headteachers some flexibility in decision making in responding to what works best for their setting.
I will also add, because sometimes this can be a source of some misunderstanding, that school leaders do of course have the power to make exceptions where this relates to, for example, the use of health devices. I appreciate sometimes that when I talk about children not having access to phones it can raise concerns among parents of children who may be diabetic, for example, and require access to a phone in order to regulate. I just wanted to add that at the end for the avoidance of any doubt.
Q12 Caroline Voaden: That is very important. You talk about children not having access to phones, yet you have not specifically said that “not seen, not heard” policies do not work. We have all heard evidence. I regularly hear from parents who say, “We know it does not work because we know the kids are going to the toilet and using the phone in the toilet and using the phone at lunch time.” It is quite a big ask of a teenager to say that they can have their phone in their bag beside them, but they are never allowed to look at it. For most of us, for a whole day, that would be quite hard. It seems slightly disingenuous to expect a teenager to be able to do that.
If I can just push you, do you think that “not seen, not heard” is an acceptable, workable and suitable policy? Or should headteachers move beyond that and have policies that require the phone to be removed from the child when they come into school and given back at the end of the day or not brought in at all?
Bridget Phillipson: It is better for children not to have the distraction, and I appreciate that it is a distraction if you have a phone in your blazer and it is buzzing away. That is undoubtedly a distraction. But it is important that school leaders continue to have flexibility to respond best to their contexts. For example, many schools, for good reason, choose not to spend vast amounts of money on expensive pouches, although some do and it works well. But this is a commercial enterprise, let us be clear.
Equally, some schools may not have room for lockers. That is why that school may insist that smartphones are just not allowed. That is an approach that many have taken. I should not be in the business of micromanaging individual decision making by school leaders. So long as phones are not causing disruption and there is clear enforcement, that is what matters most.
It is part of the same challenge around under-16s and social media. As the Prime Minister made clear, we are not going to be in a position where no under-16-year-old ever gets on social media. With the best will in the world, kids can be quite devious and will try and get around rules that adults set. Smoking was banned in the toilets when I was at school but there were plenty of girls in there at lunch time having a tab. The enforcement has to follow. That is the point.
We have moved to a strong position on phones in schools. There is genuine agreement across the political parties about the challenges that come with mobile phone use in school and beyond school. We have responded to what school leaders have told all of us, which is that they can manage a lot of that challenge within their setting. What they found harder to control was everything that went on when children returned home and were sat in their bedrooms for hours, often seeing material that is not appropriate for young people.
Q13 Caroline Voaden: So you are not going to update the guidance on “not seen, not heard”.
Bridget Phillipson: We will continue to keep the guidance under review, but we are putting it on a statutory footing from September. That sends a very clear message to school leaders. I have had shared with me various letters that school leaders had issued to their schools following the updating of the guidance previously; subsequently, when it was put on a statutory footing, many school leaders have prayed in aid the Department’s guidance in making very clear that they are taking a firmer and tougher approach around the use of phones.
Sometimes this can have a lead in time. For example, I am aware of one area where the school said there will be no smartphones from September, so as not to make changes for existing children in the school. But if parents are sending their children there, they will have clear expectations about what they should be doing as parents. Parents have to try to play their part too.
Q14 Caroline Voaden: I want to move on to how the falling birth rate is affecting school rolls. The National Audit Office’s report on changing demand for school places states that your Department “has not assessed” the impact of those changes on “educational quality…for pupils.” Why have you not done so?
Bridget Phillipson: Susan, could you start off? The NAO considered not just more recent times, but some of the history around this. I will then supplement.
Susan Acland-Hood: In the education estates strategy, which we published in the spring, we committed to developing a decision-making framework for mainstream schools to support them through demographic change. Overall, the responsibility for shifting pupil numbers has traditionally sat, and continues in large part to sit, with local authorities. That is because they are best placed to make some of those decisions. This is often not about aggregate numbers, but about the intimate geography of where people live, where housing is planned and so on. We have a national picture of falling rolls, but we also have very wide variation within that, including quite local variation.
In terms of the effect of numbers on quality, there is a long-standing tradition of education research around school size and class size, and most of the discussions about falling rolls turn into one or other of those things in various ways. The evidence on school size is that who is running a school and teaching in it is massively more important than how big or small it is, and it is similar for class size. Very small classes—under 10 to 15—appear to make some difference. Extremely large class sizes—over 60—make some difference. Between that, it is difficult to discern significant effect from class size itself. The effect from teacher quality is much more significant, so the most important thing is that you are putting the best possible teachers in front of children.
Just to be clear, I am not advocating for classes of 60. I do not think people would find that acceptable, and there are lots of other pastoral reasons why you might not want to do that. The most critical thing is that people are thinking and planning for how they put the best-quality teachers in front of children in reasonably sized classes. You do not see very much effect at the margin of the numbers.
Overall, not very surprisingly, we are seeing class sizes come down as a result of the falling rolls, and we are seeing pupil-teacher ratios come down as well. We do look at that, because people want to understand that we are thinking about that. At individual school and local authority level, we want to give better frameworks for supporting people to make good decisions as rolls fall, because we understand that marginal changes can suddenly have bigger effects: for example, if you are running a two-form entry school and the number of pupils comes down to the point where it will become a one-form entry school. There are awkward moments in between for schools, where they are between what look like sensible sets of class sizes. We want to support schools with that.
We have seen lots of schools take sensible and thoughtful decisions about that—often different decisions that reflect their local circumstances. We want to support that without setting a straitjacket or constraining the way that schools can sensibly respond. We also respond through the funding system by protecting schools against significant in-year change. We have floors in the funding system that protect you as you change.
Bridget Phillipson: In terms of the broader picture, there are both challenges and opportunities that come with what we are seeing at the moment. There are challenges in terms of how local authorities manage this and how individual schools manage this. As Susan has just said, sometimes those are very locality-based. There are communities within a local authority area where you can see some significant fluctuation, particularly in relation to housing developments. You could be in a situation where a local authority is seeing falling rolls overall, but you may then have a concentration of need for primary places within one given community.
We also have a birth rate at an historic low. These things can fluctuate. We have been through this kind of cyclical moment before—although this is more pronounced than previously. You have to be careful as to make decisions that are not too hasty, given the cyclical nature of some of this.
There are also some opportunities that arise in the short and medium term. That is why we are investing more capital into our school-based nurseries to programme—to use some of the space that has opened up to create more early years education. I have seen schools that had a two-form entry but have moved to one have now been able to open expanded early years provision or expanded inclusion bases. We set out through the White Paper our intention that every secondary school and a commensurate number of primaries will have inclusion bases. I have the expectation, as we also set through the education estates strategy, that schools will use that space well, but this is undeniably a challenge where we as a Department will have to work together with local authorities to understand both the bigger picture and the quite localised scenarios that schools will experience on the ground.
Q15 Caroline Voaden: Do you have any plans to review the per pupil funding formula? As the pupil numbers fall, that will have a significant effect and disproportionately disadvantage already smaller schools.
Bridget Phillipson: We are and will continue to look at funding overall. As Susan said, there are protections where schools experience sharp drops in pupil funding. There are also protections in place for small rural schools to recognise the distinct role that they will play, but, again, there is a challenge there, because were we to continue for an extended period of time to fund schools beyond that, where the numbers had fallen significantly, quite rightly others in other parts of the country where they are seeing an increase would say, “Well, hang on.” There is a fairness point here about how we manage that.
There is a balance in terms of how we deliver those protections and ensure that rural communities in particular have the necessary provision that is required, alongside the overall fairness across the education system. It is a fair way of allocating funding that the funding broadly follows the pupil, but that of course is not the only mechanism that is used to allocate funding to schools.
Q16 Caroline Voaden: But what if a small rural school becomes unsustainable and is forced to close? I have a couple of schools that are going down to one class for the whole school from September. As soon as that school closes, the whole community changes, the social cohesion of the community changes and the village becomes a very different place. We are seeing that in parts of Devon and Cornwall. You say there are protections for small and rural schools, but is your Department taking into account the wider social cohesion impact that would happen if a school were allowed to close, given that in 10 years’ time there might be more kids and the school might be needed?
Bridget Phillipson: Yes, and that point about the school possibly being needed in 10 years’ time is something that we have to be mindful right across the system as we consider this. Local authorities again have to be mindful of taking a decision about closure when they know that there could be further housing development in the near future.
These are difficult decisions across the board, but where it comes to rural schools, there is a presumption against the closure of all rural maintained schools. That presumption against closure does not mean that rural schools will never close—again, there is a fairness point there and a point about how we make sure it that is done in a way that works—but it makes sure that the case for closure is strong and that proposals are clearly in the best educational interests of the area. Maintained primary schools have additional protection through the rural designation order, which requires that certain bodies be consulted prior to a decision on closure. Those protections—that provision—exists so that we take into consideration the important role of rural schools, but some of this we will see elsewhere in the system as the years develop.
Some parts of the country are further ahead on some of these challenges, including places like London and big urban centres where there has been not just a significant change in population but a significant fall in the birth rate, and it is our job as a Department to work closely with local authorities and others to manage that. As I say, this not only is a challenge in some way, but presents us with some opportunities as we consider how we embed early years education in our schools, and ensure strong special educational needs provision across all schools, as local authorities take decisions, perhaps in a rural context as well. That matters, too, because children in those communities will have additional needs and have to access strong specialist provision. Those are careful balances. It is not always easy, I appreciate, but those protections do exist.
Q17 Chair: Briefly, on the role of local authorities, it simply is not the case that local authorities have had the jurisdiction that they have needed over a majority of the education system to make decisions about pupil place planning. We have seen examples of that—schools that have academised in order to take themselves out of a pupil place planning process that could have resulted in the closure or merger of the school—and that has happened across the piece.
Some local authorities have found it easier than others to marshal their academies—which have control over their own decision-making processes and pupil place planning—to co-operate in an authority-wide process, or not, but it has been very chaotic, very frustrating and inadequate for lots of local authorities. Can you say a bit about the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026? Does it change the provision? What difference do you expect it to make? I am surprised to hear you say that local authorities have had control of this, because it simply is not borne out in reality that they have until this point.
Bridget Phillipson: It is fair to say that there is significant variation in local authorities’ responses and the extent to which they have been able to convene and co-ordinate in their local area. I have seen local authorities where that has worked incredibly well, but I am also aware of the problems that have arisen in some local authorities where there has been significant disagreement or conflict about the best way forward. Those are rarely easy conversations to have, because they will often involve quite deeply held views about the provision in one local area, and the reluctance of parents or others to consider whether their children may need to travel further afield. I understand that.
We went through the process in Sunderland some years ago, when we were experiencing a falling roll situation in about 2009. In 2014-15, we ended up with a significant expansion in the need for school places. Luckily, we had not taken a decision at that point—the local authority did not take the decision to close significant numbers of schools. Had it done so, we would have ended up having to re-create lots of the places. Again, that is a difficulty that can arise, but it is where I believe local authorities are best placed to understand some of the demographic change that might be developing, whether that is a falling birth rate or expanding housing development.
The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act has introduced new measures to enable greater local collaboration on pupil admissions, between local authorities and schools, including a measure to enable the schools adjudicators—in cases where they uphold an objection to a school plan—to specify what it should be. School quality and parental preference will be key considerations in that process, but we have introduced new duties for mainstream state schools and local authorities to co-operate. I think that the Act gives a clear message to all those working in the system that we should be working together to address some of the challenges. As I say, that can work well; it has not always done so, but I think that the Act gives us that clear framework for a better understanding of our shared responsibilities—Department, local authorities, schools, trusts. While the most pronounced falls in the birth rate have been in parts of London, this is going to become an everywhere challenge.
Chair: There is an important difference between a local authority being a decision maker, because its schools are maintained schools and it can take those decisions in a democratically accountable way with the local community, and being a convenor and persuader for schools that are academies and therefore not directly in its purview. It is important to be realistic and accurate about how we describe those processes, because it has been extremely difficult and continues to be so for lots of local authorities to navigate the process when they are not directly decision makers over the school places that are involved. We will move on.
Q18 Manuela Perteghella: I will focus on the curriculum and assessment review and, in particular, on vocational qualifications, because of the numerous attempts to introduce various forms of vocational qualifications over the past few decades. You intend to introduce V-levels. Given the succession of vocational qualifications created and then abolished since the 1980s, what evidence can you point to that the Department’s approach this time will have learned from those lessons, and that the delivery of V-levels will succeed where others have failed?
Bridget Phillipson: I believe it is important to address the very mixed landscape that we see in post-16 technical and vocational education. Often there is confusion for parents, young people and employers about the nature of the qualification, what it means and what it will equip the young person with for onward progression. We have some very clear and well-established academic routes. It has been more confused and mixed on technical and vocational education. It is essential that we have really high-quality options for young people who want to pursue those routes, alongside a much stronger focus on apprenticeship opportunities for young people. That is why we have taken the decision to refocus apprenticeships on young people, where the numbers and the completions are starting to rise, which is really welcome.
V-levels will be the same size as A-levels. They will offer applied learning and can be taken alongside A-levels, recognising that some young people post 16 might not want to choose a T-level that is more specified and more focused on a very intensive period of study of one area. It is allowing young people to have that mix, but V-levels will also be linked to occupational standards, to ensure a close join-up between what the young person is studying and what that will mean for onward progression and employment.
It has been mixed in the past, and that has led to not just confusion for employers and young people but sometimes, sadly, young people studying for qualifications that have not equipped them as well as they ought to have. There has been a lack of clarity around the status and standing of that qualification. A-levels are a well-understood qualification. T-levels are getting there, and I hope we will see that parity—and that does matter. V-levels will be a welcome addition to the system, and will allow young people to also study really high-quality technical and vocational courses that will equip them for what is needed.
To your point about how we manage this, managing the implementation well is incredibly important. We have set out an implementation plan around this and we have worked closely with colleges and providers, because this is a big change. It is a fantastic chance to reshape how we are doing things, but making sure that we work with colleges, providers, sixth forms and others to deliver these qualifications will also be the key test.
Q19 Manuela Perteghella: Will you have a programme of communication about this new qualification for parents—not just in school settings but parents, carers and young people? With T-levels, we heard evidence of low retention rates and that they were not communicated properly and so on. Will you have a programme to raise awareness of this new qualification?
Bridget Phillipson: Yes. That is why the implementation in its wider sense is incredibly important. Yes, we do lots of communication to parents and young people so that the Department makes sure that we are getting those messages across, but also that schools and colleges are able to provide high-quality advice to young people about all the routes and options out there. As you will have done, I have visited many schools and colleges where young people have said that they were not made aware of everything that was available. That is especially true when it comes to young people who wish to pursue an apprenticeship route, especially post 18, and feel that they are advised that university is the only option, when it is a great option but it is certainly not the only option.
Q20 Jess Asato: Ofqual told us in January that they cannot require or rebuke exam boards for not offering certain qualifications. Daniel Jillings, a 12-year-old constituent of mine, successfully campaigned to get the DFE to recognise BSL as a new GCSE. But at present, no exam board is offering British Sign Language, Romanian or Ukrainian GCSEs. Do you believe that Ofqual needs stronger powers to address this market failure?
Bridget Phillipson: I have discussed all three of those areas with Ofqual and with exam boards. Exam boards would say that they have to be confident around the delivery and the scale of some of these programmes. I have impressed upon exam boards and awarding organisations the case that others are making. I do not have the power to compel them to act. Ofqual will regulate the system, but it is for individual awarding organisations to decide whether they wish to bring forward qualifications. I am sure your constituent will make the case to all those organisations about the importance of bringing it forward. I do believe that bringing forward British Sign Language would be a welcome step.
Q21 Jess Asato: Following OCR’s withdrawal of the classics AS-level, do you accept that leaving provision entirely to exam board viability risks narrowing the curriculum at a time when we are hoping to broaden it? What steps will be taken to prevent the loss of strategically important subjects?
Bridget Phillipson: Across the board, in terms of strategically important subjects—and Peter Swallow might disagree that classics is perhaps not put into that category, although I am sure—
Peter Swallow: It depends on what you mean by strategically important.
Bridget Phillipson: Indeed. That is the definitional challenge. There are significant numbers of subjects that are exceptionally popular, where there are no challenges for awarding organisations around what they can deliver because of the sheer volume of young people who wish to study those subjects. Of course, classics is not taught, sadly, in a huge number of schools, and I suspect that that is part of the issue around the volume and number of students who wish to enter those qualifications.
We as a Department will continue to work with Ofqual and with the awarding organisations to ensure that young people have that range of high-quality options, whether that is through A-levels, V-levels, T-levels or level 2 reforms that we are delivering as well, to ensure that all our qualifications are aligned to strong onward progression, whether that is into further study in the subject, onwards to university or to an apprenticeship.
Q22 Chair: This Committee established in a previous evidence session that it would be possible for a new entrant to offer new subjects; it does not have to come down to persuading one of the existing awarding bodies to do so. Given that there is really strong demand for BSL, Ukrainian and Romanian GCSEs because of the diaspora communities that have been growing in recent years, is the Department working proactively with those communities and those who are campaigning for those subjects to establish whether new entrants could come in to solve this problem, which is incredibly frustrating?
Bridget Phillipson: We will continue to work with anyone with an interest in bringing forward important qualifications in the areas that you have just described. Certainly, a GCSE in Ukrainian is something that, every time I meet my Ukrainian counterpart or with representatives from the Ukrainian Government, they raise with me. They believe it is important that young people from Ukraine in this country should have the opportunity to study Ukrainian.
I know similar calls are made around Romanian. I appreciate the case that has been made around British Sign Language as well. We will continue to keep this as an area where we hope to see progress. I understand the call of the Ukrainian Government in this area and I do recognise it, but it is not within my gift to bring forward that GCSE.
Q23 Sureena Brackenridge: We have heard evidence regarding concerns with the English curriculum that can undermine reading for pleasure, particularly around the volume of content and texts, which the curriculum and assessment review did not address. Will you commit to looking at that again for the GCSE English curriculum?
Bridget Phillipson: Coming out of the curriculum and assessment review, we are looking at all programmes of study that will give rise to the new GCSE qualifications. We are taking account of those important questions while maintaining high standards within those subjects.
I know the Committee is very interested in reading for pleasure and the National Year of Reading, and I am really pleased that, for the first time in five years, we are starting to see progress in terms of an increase in the number of young people who are reading for pleasure. That is an important step forward. There is lots more to do, but through the National Year of Reading, we have an opportunity to spread that joy and passion really widely among young people.
Of course, to become a confident reader, we need to get the basics right when children are young. There is clear evidence to support the impact, for example, of phonics within our primary settings. However, I do not just want young people to be functional readers. I want them to find a passion, find what they enjoy and, as the National Year of Reading would say, “Go all in.”
Q24 Sureena Brackenridge: Specifically around the English GCSE curriculum and the volume of texts, we welcome the move towards looking at the diversity of texts, but we have heard evidence that the crowded curriculum is an issue.
Bridget Phillipson: I understand, and that is an area that we are working through right across the curriculum, as part of the work arising out of the curriculum and assessment review. We are working with experts in the field, and we have expert drafters supporting us to make sure that young people do have that breadth, while also recognising the history—whether that is Shakespeare or other authors who bring a richness and a breadth to what young people can experience. I want to make sure young people do enjoy a breadth when it comes to experiencing the full richness of all the works out there.
There is a question of balance in all of these areas of the curriculum. We need to make sure that it is not overwhelming, that it is deliverable and that we work alongside teachers to get the content right to make sure that they are confident as we bring those changes forward.
Q25 Sureena Brackenridge: Regarding age reading tests, we have heard evidence that they will be a good opportunity to boost targeted support, but we have also heard concerns regarding teachers’ workload and the strain on pupils. Can you give staff and pupils assurances that it will not create additional strain?
Bridget Phillipson: My expectation is that, over time, it will make the job of teachers easier because if we identify young people who are struggling with their reading more quickly and put in place the right support, that will open up the whole of the curriculum to our young people.
Not being a confident reader is not just a barrier to enjoying English; it is a barrier to maths, geography and so many subjects. We know it is an issue for young people from the most disadvantaged backgrounds. A big focus of the White Paper was around white working-class young people and the attainment challenges they will see. The reading test is designed to ensure that schools are identifying and putting in place support that young people need more quickly.
It was a key thing that emerged from school leaders, who have said that key stage 3 has increasingly become a lost time for many students. Ensuring that young people are confident and functional readers is a critical part of how we will make sure that they are set up to succeed, whatever they go on to do later in life.
Q26 Sureena Brackenridge: And it will not be a performance measure?
Bridget Phillipson: It will be a statutory test, but we want schools to use it to shape and inform how they support pupil progress.
Q27 Chair: Why did you not take Becky Francis’ recommendation about the age at which the screening test should be introduced?
Bridget Phillipson: Professor Francis brought forward two areas, both around English and maths. In terms of when you do it, because we want schools to focus on improving reading in year 7, the assessment should be made in year 8.
Professor Francis is also keen, as am I, that we make progress in maths, but to Sureena Brackenridge’s question, there is a limit to what can be delivered, how we deliver within schools, and what we ask of schools. For me, reading is how we unlock the entire breadth of the curriculum for all young people.
Q28 Darren Paffey: Secretary of State, we are all navigating the brave new world of AI, and the challenges and opportunities of that. We have heard evidence that in education there is no comprehensive framework to support schools in making informed decisions about how to engage with AI platforms. Indeed, some have described it as the “wild west”. What is your Department doing to make sure that schools do not feel left on their own to navigate this?
Bridget Phillipson: In terms of the wider technologies used by schools and AI, there are amazing benefits that we can deliver, both for young people in their education and for the workforce, in terms of managing workload pressures, admin burdens and much more besides.
Setting that direction from the centre is important. As you said, schools will have to make their own decisions about how they manage the use of technology. Technology for technology’s sake cannot be, and never will be, the answer. That is why we are setting clear expectations around safety, quality and infrastructure as AI develops. We are looking at questions around pedagogy and how young people learn, and around wanting to avoid some of the downsides that could arise from AI use as well as recognising the benefits of technology. That sits alongside and is a central part of all the changes around curriculum, workforce and much more.
We have also driven forward work around the use of AI through Oak in lesson planning. We often think about the use of technology and AI as being how we might support children to make progress, perhaps those who have been struggling, and we have been doing a lot with DSIT in that area. In areas such as lesson planning, marking and some of the admin issues that teachers and school leaders experience, if we could free up more of their time to focus on what makes the biggest difference, which is human interaction and the fantastic teacher at the front of the classroom, that will make an enormous difference as well.
This is an area where things are moving very rapidly. We as a Department want to get ahead of some of that to ensure that schools are making good, well-informed decisions about use of resources, but also about what is most effective for supporting children’s learning; as you say, there is variation in how schools approach it.
Q29 Darren Paffey: No one is looking for a rigid diktat from the DFE, but can you confirm that you are at least working with schools to set out a set of broad principles, and say what you are finding to be positive and what should perhaps be avoided because of the evidence of how it might undermine educational progress?
Bridget Phillipson: Yes. It is about safety, which is critical, but it is also about how children learn, and wanting to make sure that the tools are aids to support learning and do not replace the ways that children’s brains develop and the way learning takes place. We want to avoid some of the challenges around cognitive offloading in particular.
Susan Acland-Hood: We have issued, and then updated, generative AI product safety standards for schools, so we have those out there. They cover not just safety, as in not letting bad people contact your children through edtech systems, but protections around cognitive, emotional and social development. They are a relatively high-level framework, so they do not tell schools what edtech products to buy or not buy; they say, “These are the principles you should work at, the questions you should ask and the things you should check against.”
We also launched a call for evidence on 7 June that looks at how screens are and should be used in the classroom, and that links to the work we are doing on guidance for parents on screen use for five to 16-year-olds at home, so we are looking at the use of screens more broadly in the classroom. We also have work going on to partner edtech firms and groups of schools to test AI tutoring tools, which again was announced by the Prime Minister. We have not announced the partnerships yet, but that is coming very soon. That is specifically designed to do that in a way that involves detailed, close co-creation between the schools and companies and detailed evaluation so that we can see and understand the impact and effect.
There is a really big question underneath all this, though. If you look at education systems around the world, there are lots that are much more dirigiste than we are about learning materials such as textbooks and the pattern of learning in lessons. There are lots of places around the world with centrally specified textbooks, for example, for classes. That is not how we have run the education system here. We have set out a clear national curriculum and really encouraged the spread of good-quality evidence about what works in education, but we have done that in a system where we have given more freedom to teachers and schools to make their own choices, consult the evidence and then feed that back into what they are doing.
The work we are doing in edtech sits in that framework. The challenge is getting good-quality evidence about what works for edtech and AI products when the availability and range of those products changes very rapidly. Even within one product, the programming may change and the algorithms may shift, and you may be using something that is quite different from the thing tested even a few months ago. That presents us with a real challenge.
The work we are doing to partner companies and schools goes further than we would have done in a non-tech world, precisely because we are in a different context and have to think about it in a different way. We have generative AI safety standards, and they cover things such as cognitive offloading as a principle. We are looking at whether we need to go further in giving more support and guidance almost at the product level. However, that is quite a big shift. It is not what we do in other parts of the system.
Q30 Darren Paffey: This is less about product than educational processes and assessment. We have heard that some AI platforms are already undermining assessments in education, particularly where you have takeaway coursework assignments done outside the classroom. Therefore, there are questions about the integrity of the work and how the mark scheme fits to recognise what individual students are—or potentially are not—doing. Do you have a concrete plan to best respond to that challenge in a way that ensures that everyone has the same understanding of the risks? We do not want a postcode lottery on quality of assessments across the country. How will you deal with that as a Department?
Bridget Phillipson: This is an area where we also work with Ofqual, particularly when considering, for example, on-screen assessment, where it must ensure the integrity of the exam system. As you say, there is a growing desire to consider the use of on-screen assessment and technology. However, in parallel, there are all the challenges that you have just identified about the nature of assessment. It brings into sharp focus the importance of exams in our system because of the growing challenges that we see around other forms of assessment, and how the advancement in technology may present challenges to ensuring the integrity of non-exam-based forms of assessment.
Given the big differences that exist between schools’ capacities to use technology and ensure the highest possible standards of cyber-security, I can understand that Ofqual wants to look very carefully at all these areas. I share that view. While I can see how it could well be desirable in certain subjects, the safeguards that we have in our system allow us to protect the integrity of the exams and qualifications system, give us confidence that the qualifications young people are awarded are robust, and leave us less susceptible to some challenges that you might see when you start to introduce technology. While there is amazing technology that presents lots of opportunities, there is also something very old-fashioned, but also rather useful about the traditional pen and paper when it comes to assessment and schools’ ability to make sure that there are no questions about the integrity or safety of the exam system.
Susan Acland-Hood: On non-exam assessment, you asked about assessment when people are taking work away. There are a couple of things on that. In qualifications that combine examined and non-examined assessment, exam boards regulated by Ofqual will always look carefully at the work of pupils who appear to have done significantly differently in non-exam assessments from how they have performed in examined ones. Some pupils will find some of those things easier than others, but exam boards are used to what a normal difference looks like and quite good at identifying differences that look unusual.
The other place where we often use non-exam assessment is in more practical skills such as a performance in music. Across a lot of vocational qualifications, you are often looking at demonstration of a pupil’s more practical work. This is one instance of where AI gives us opportunities to think differently about that. Sometimes students are writing a portfolio to describe practical skills that they are developing. The AI risk is that AI writes the portfolio, but the AI opportunity is that you might be able to use AI to support more direct assessment of the skill.
It is at a very early stage, but there is some interesting work going on with exam boards and Ofqual in thinking about V-levels and what the best possible assessment of those more practical skills looks like and how we move away from assuming that if you are assessing a practical skill, you immediately default to getting someone to write loads of stuff in a portfolio.
Bridget Phillipson: What is exciting about the consultation that we launched on the natural history GCSE is the strong fieldwork element. That is a minimum of 20 hours of fieldwork. We have worked very closely with drafters to make sure that can be done in or close to the school grounds and not via expensive fieldtrips. It is an area where there is a strong case for a non-exam assessment element, given the practical and hands-on nature of that qualification.
Q31 Chair: We have certainly heard from organisations that deliver tutoring that much of the benefit is in the relationship with the tutor. In seeking to roll out AI-based tutoring, have you explored that primary question of whether a machine will be able to deliver the same benefits as a human, given all the advantages of a human who takes a particular interest in you and your learning, which is especially important for some of the most disadvantaged pupils?
Susan Acland-Hood: The first thing to say is that the evidence for one-to-one tutoring, alongside and well integrated with really good-quality classroom teaching, is strong. You are right that some of the evidence around tutoring is about the interaction and the sense that someone is taking an interest in your work.
We are not testing AI tutoring because we expect the whole of education to be replaced by a bunch of robots. We think that the human connection remains spectacularly important. We are specifically testing AI tutoring that is complementary to really good-quality, teacher-led classroom teaching. We would not expect lots of students sitting in rows in the classroom interacting with their screen. This is about out-of-classroom things, such as homework support, that support and complement what is going on in the classroom.
It is at a very early stage, but we have seen some quite promising evidence that both good-quality AI tutors and good-quality AI support for tutoring that integrates the work that humans are doing can have what look like positive results, but what we are doing is testing some people who have some promising products, and we will evaluate that incredibly carefully and thoughtfully, and look at what works. If it does not work, we will not do it, because that would be silly.
Q32 Peter Swallow: We have seen in recent years the devastating effect of safeguarding failings in early years. As part of our inquiry into early years, we have heard concerns about an operational gap between statutory intent and real-world practice. What work are you doing to close that gap and strengthen safeguarding in early years?
Bridget Phillipson: This is an incredibly important area in which we have seen some deeply distressing and troubling incidents, as the Committee will have heard. I have met many of the families who have been affected by this. Liv Bailey, our Minister for Early Education, has been taking forward a lot of work in this area, engaging directly with parents, some of whom have lost children in the most awful circumstances, where children have been harmed or put at significant risk of harm, when they entrusted their most cherished children to people they thought were there to look after them.
It is a big step, as a parent, to leave a very small child in the care of others who are not your family, especially if those children cannot communicate and are not able to express what might have happened if they have been exposed to harm or violence. That is why we have been looking very carefully at, for example, CCTV in settings.
We have heard parents’ experiences of what has gone on around safer sleep, and I want to pay tribute to campaigners like John Meehan and Katie Wheeler, who have rightly pushed us to make sure this is a much bigger feature of the guidance and safeguarding standards in the EYFS framework. Updates have been introduced around that, but we are considering what further steps are necessary, working with Ofsted and others and working with parents to hear their experiences and make sure that, when children are in early years settings, we can have as much confidence as it is ever possible to have that children are having happy, wonderful experiences—without parents having any cause for concern.
We have been working with experts, particularly in these areas around CCTV, to make sure that we get the balance right, avoid any unintended consequences and consider the right way to strengthen the approach.
Peter Swallow: Needless to say, I hope you will look very closely at the recommendations on that in our report, once it is published.
Bridget Phillipson: Of course—absolutely.
Q33 Peter Swallow: I turn to a different but no less harrowing issue: historical forced adoptions. I recognise that in your opening statement, you said, “You will get the apology.” That is the clearest and most definitive commitment we have had on that up to now, and I thank you for it. However, you will also be aware that when the Education Committee—building on the work of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, on which I also sit—published our report, we were clear about three things: first, that an apology needed to happen at pace; secondly, that it needed to be co-produced with victim survivors; and thirdly, that it needed not just to be a standalone apology but to come alongside meaningful, fully funded support. Can I press you on those three points: timelines, co-production and the meaningful support that might come alongside an apology?
Bridget Phillipson: I understand. I will seek to say as much as I can, but you will appreciate that there are some limitations. First, I thank Committee members for your work in this area. Most importantly, I thank all the campaigners who have been working closely with us. These practices have caused deep and lasting harm. You will have heard the powerful testimony of those affected; it is impossible to hear that testimony and not recognise the case for action. It is incredibly powerful that so many years on, the harm, the trauma and the experiences that people had have stayed with them to this day.
We as a Government acknowledge the role that the state had in these events. We cannot change what happened, but we can seek to make sure that those affected, and campaigners, understand that the state has acknowledged its role in something that should never have taken place, and what was a very painful period for the country, and, most importantly, for the mothers, their children and the wider families.
We will look very carefully when setting out next steps. We are in the process of engaging with campaigners on all these important areas. It is right that the Prime Minister sets out further steps in this area, but I wanted to make clear at this Committee sitting—here, today—that we as a Government recognise that historical forced adoption should have never happened, that the state had a role to play in the trauma that so many people endured, and that we take those experiences extremely seriously and will do whatever we can to put in place the support and the apology, which are long overdue.
Peter Swallow: There will be some frustration about the time it has taken—not just under this Government—to get to this point, as it has taken many, many years. But I recognise what you have said today. Thank you.
Q34 Chair: You co-chair the child poverty taskforce with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. Because of that, there has been a degree of confidence that the Government are serious about the difficult and challenging cross-departmental work necessary to tackle child poverty. From our exchange of letters on the subject, you will know that we are deeply disappointed and concerned that you and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions have declined our invitation to come before our joint inquiry with the Work and Pensions Committee to answer questions on the delivery of the child poverty taskforce. We are left wondering whether this is because of a deprioritisation of that work across Government, and whether you are confident that junior Ministers, with all due respect to them, have the clout needed to do the difficult work of cross-departmental delivery for this complicated and extremely important area of Government policy.
Bridget Phillipson: There is certainly no question of deprioritisation. This has been a personal priority for me when co-chairing the work, first with the predecessor in the role, Liz Kendall, and now with Pat McFadden. I am delighted that, through the strategy, we are on course to lift more than half a million children out of poverty. I am very proud of what the previous Labour Government achieved, but we are on course to surpass that. There is more to do—there is always more to do—but I think that is real cause for celebration. It was most effective because we were able to bring together Departments across Government to consider, yes, important questions such as social security, but also early years entitlement, transport, housing and all the barriers and challenges that young people in poverty experience growing up.
We are establishing a new interministerial group on child poverty, and that will oversee the delivery of the strategy. I continue to monitor that, and I have a very active and keen interest in driving that forward. Of course, it is also linked to so many other areas of the Department for Education’s work, whether that is expanding early years entitlement, free school meals expansion, Best Start family hubs or new free breakfast clubs. There is a strong record in terms of the priority that this Government attach to child poverty, but this is not a job that is done, and I will not rest until all children in our country, regardless of background, have every opportunity to succeed, and until poverty does not blight the life chances of the sheer number of children who, at the moment, continue to endure avoidable poverty. I assure you and the Committee that this remains a deep personal priority for me.
Q35 Chair: Our Committee and the Work and Pensions Committee would be further reassured, and would much prefer it, if you and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions were prepared to make good on those statements and come and be accountable for the delivery of the strategy in front of our joint inquiry. We would be grateful if you could reconsider our request.
Bridget Phillipson: I will see what I can do.
Q36 Chair: Thank you very much. I will briefly turn to a bit of unfinished business. When he appeared in front of the Liaison Committee in December 2025, I asked the Prime Minister about the issue of VAT and further education colleges and sixth-form colleges. As you will know, this is an entirely unjustifiable loophole in the tax regulations that treats one part of the state education system differently from another one. The Prime Minister said that he would go away and look at it, and that he would talk to the Treasury about it. Has there been any progress on that issue?
Bridget Phillipson: The Prime Minister did give that commitment. This is also an area that I keep a keen interest in, and I assure you that I continue to discuss with colleagues in the Treasury the important case that you have made and that the sector has made, which is well understood. While I am not able to provide a further update in terms of progress or announcement, I assure you that I understand the case for this, and that it is something that we continue to discuss with Treasury colleagues.
Q37 Rebecca Paul: You pledged to recruit 6,500 teachers, yet you have excluded primary schools when measuring against that pledge—why?
Bridget Phillipson: As we set out in our manifesto, we will focus on shortage subjects, areas that face recruitment challenges and areas where those teachers are needed most. As we discussed earlier, we are sadly seeing significantly falling rolls in primary. It would therefore be illogical, given the significant drop—tens of thousands—in pupil numbers in primary, to prioritise primary school teacher recruitment at this point.
We are seeing significant progress against our target. We have now achieved over 70% of the 6,500 additional teachers that we need, and that sits alongside a very strong story around retention—the strongest retention numbers we have seen in many years. It is essential that we make teaching an attractive place for people to come and an attractive place for people to stay.
That is why I am also proud that we are delivering the biggest change in 25 years to maternity pay for teachers, to recognise that where we see teachers leave the profession, sadly it is often teachers—women in their 30s in particular—who find it just too hard to juggle work and family life. That is not just a question of maternity pay; it is also about wider workload challenges and there being good, flexible options for women as they return to the profession.
Alongside that, we have seen a big increase in the number of returners. The latest figures show over 17,500 returners, which again shows strong progress in recruiting more teachers into the profession and in keeping more teachers in the profession.
Q38 Rebecca Paul: But fundamentally, if you pick and choose the bits that you include, you can show an increase, but the reality is that, if you look over the past two years since you have been in role, the number of teachers has decreased significantly—by around 2,300. In the last year alone, we have had a reduction of 1,900 full-time equivalent teachers.
Bridget Phillipson: That is because, sadly, we need fewer teachers in primary school, given the falling roll challenges that we see, but we have seen more teachers in the places we need them most. There is a strong story to tell on initial teacher training, running alongside the numbers in the profession.
To give a few examples, in maths, we have seen an 18% increase in entrants to initial teacher training. We have seen a 37% increase in physics and it is 22% in STEM overall. Those are the areas where many schools have struggled for a long time—not just to have teachers in the classroom but to have the subject specialists who can provide the highest-quality education to young people in the subject area that they really know best. That is still a challenge in parts of the country where, while they may be able to recruit science teachers, they might not be able to find physics specialists.
Making progress on initial teacher training is important, alongside retaining teachers. I am proud of the progress we have made so far against the target, which is in line with the commitments that I previously gave to the Committee and with the manifesto commitment that we set out, with the clear rationale that the biggest difference to a child’s education comes with high-quality teaching.
Q39 Rebecca Paul: But would you accept that it was somewhat confusing when you launched that pledge? You launched it from a primary school, and the Government website talks a lot about readiness and those early years, so anyone listening to what you were saying thought you were including primary schools. Would the Secretary of State accept that that could have been communicated better?
Bridget Phillipson: What we said in the manifesto was: “Labour will recruit an additional 6,500 new expert teachers. We will get more teachers into shortage subjects, support areas that face recruitment challenges, and tackle retention issues.” Sadly, we do not face recruitment challenges in the same way in primary as we do elsewhere, because of the falling rolls that we face. I think what we have delivered is entirely consistent with the manifesto commitment that we made, and I am delighted that more people are recognising that teaching is a great place to be.
Q40 Rebecca Paul: So is the 2,900 reduction in primary all down to falling birth rates?
Bridget Phillipson: The overall drop in pupil numbers is tens of thousands of children.
Susan Acland-Hood: We have seen pupil-teacher ratios in primary coming down, so yes. We still look at, set and project the number of postgraduate ITT entrants we need in primary to make sure we are getting the numbers we need. We have surpassed the PGITT target for primary this year—we have met it by 128%. The absolute numbers that we need are coming down because the pupil numbers are coming down, but we are still making sure that we are recruiting enough teachers to replace the ones who are leaving to keep the pupil-teacher ratios flat or falling.
Rebecca Paul: Chair, do I have time to move on to tax?
Chair: Of course.
Q41 Rebecca Paul: My colleague, Neil Shastri-Hurst, asked a written parliamentary question recently. I felt it did not get an adequate answer, so I am going to take the opportunity to ask you both today. How much of the £1.8 billion raised from the VAT on school fees was directly spent on teaching staff in the state sector?
Bridget Phillipson: I am afraid I do not have the answer that was provided in front of me, but I will do my best to answer that question. We made a commitment to end tax breaks for private schools in our manifesto. That is something that we said ahead of time would happen, and that we have delivered. It will raise more than £1.8 billion a year by 2029-30. We are already investing more every year into schools than that will raise by the end of the Parliament, although we are raising more than was originally forecast, as set out in the autumn Budget, so we are raising more through that, which allows us to invest more in schools.
Of course, the vast majority of what schools spend will go on staffing costs. It will vary slightly between schools, but the overwhelming proportion of their spend will be on staffing costs. There is significant investment in the core schools budget, which we have already increased by £3.7 billion in 2025-26 compared with 2024-25. If you consider that the commitment was to raise £1.8 billion a year by the end of the Parliament through ending the tax breaks that private schools enjoy, we are already surpassing what we committed to invest.
Q42 Rebecca Paul: Julie Robinson, the chief executive of the Independent Schools Council, said that 105 independent schools have closed since this policy was introduced and that she expects more to close. One fifth of those were in London and the surrounding areas, and it appears that pupil numbers in independent schools have come down by 33,000. Do you recognise the negative impact on those children and on the local communities where those schools are closing?
Bridget Phillipson: These are decisions that individual schools will need to consider. They are independent; they can make decisions about how they budget and how they run their institutions, but private schools have been closing long before VAT was announced. You referred to London, and we talked earlier about falling pupil numbers. That is particularly acute in London, and therefore, I would expect reduced demand in both the state and the private sector.
It is sad to say, but where some private schools have closed, it does reflect long-standing financial challenges that the school may be experiencing. Sadly, sometimes it reflects poor financial management on the part of the school. Just as is the case in the state sector, private schools will also have to consider their options around funding, investment and viability. Actually, we have seen more private schools open than close in the last year, contrary to what is pushed about in the newspapers.
Q43 Rebecca Paul: We are seeing 33,000 more pupils come into the state sector, and many of those will have SEND. Do you anticipate seeing an increase in class sizes in the state sector as a result?
Bridget Phillipson: That is certainly not what we are experiencing at the moment, both in terms of numbers and pupil-teacher ratios. It is worth highlighting that the calculations and the analysis that underpin how much the policy will raise take account of any questions around pupil movement—they do already take account of that. The policy will give us a net £1.8 billion a year by ’29-30 to invest in state schools. That money is already going in.
The closure rate that we have seen in non-special private schools is consistently in line with the pattern that we have seen over many years. Private schools have choices to make about how much they choose to charge parents. Increasingly, they have made the decision to charge fees that way outstrip what parents are able to pay. They are independent—if that is their choice, that is their choice, but parents also have choices about how they spend their money.
Q44 Caroline Voaden: I would like to go back briefly to the teacher retention question. Obviously, you are hitting some targets on recruitment, and you can keep recruiting new teachers, but as long as teachers are leaving the profession, you are filling a leaky bucket. Having experienced teachers leaving the profession also means that schools are losing experience in their workforce.
The numbers of teachers leaving the profession are worst among school leaders, who are leaving at record levels—four times the rate seen in 2010. Jack Worth of the National Foundation for Educational Research warned that poor retention means that, even if you do meet your recruitment target of 6,500, it is not going to reverse the effects on the quality of education that have been occurring over the past decade under Conservative Governments. Do you accept that retention is as important, if not more important, than your recruitment targets in keeping teacher numbers level?
Bridget Phillipson: I absolutely accept the importance of teacher retention alongside strong recruitment. That is why I am really pleased that the leaving rates are the lowest they have been for many years—certainly since around 2010. We have a strong record on teacher retention, but there is absolutely more to do. I continue to work with school leaders, and with those representing school leaders and teachers, to address some of the workload pressures that I know continue to endure.
We have taken the first step in 25 years to improve maternity pay. There will be a doubling of maternity pay; I appreciate that people will seek to see further improvements beyond that as well. There is a lot that is happening to make teaching a better place—both for people to go to, but also for people to stay in.
In relation to our earlier discussion on child poverty, I also believe that addressing the wider challenges that sit beyond the school gate will make a material difference to the experience of teachers and staff. If they are spending less time supporting families in temporary accommodation, less time washing clothes when children arrive because they do not have a washing machine in their bed and breakfast accommodation, and less time supporting so many hungry children because they are now eligible for free school meals, I think that will make a huge difference to their experience. I appreciate that they want to see more and faster; I understand that, and that is exactly what I am focused on making sure that we do. There are strong numbers in terms of recruitment and strong numbers in terms of retention, but is there more to do? Of course.
Q45 Caroline Voaden: It is interesting that you talk about maternity pay, because teachers now get eight weeks’ maternity pay, whereas a civil servant at the Department for Education gets 26 weeks. Understandably, teachers might feel that there is a slight imbalance there, but briefly—
Bridget Phillipson: Sorry to jump in. We have doubled it from four to eight. That is a first step. I understand the case that people make around that, but that is the first change that has happened in 25 years, so I do believe it is an important step forward.
Caroline Voaden: I appreciate that, but there is a way to go.
Bridget Phillipson: There is.
Q46 Caroline Voaden: Briefly, on the workforce pressures, seven out of 10 school leaders report having to cut down on teaching assistants in the last year because of school budgets, and 49% have reduced their support staff. This is adding incredibly to the workforce pressures on classroom teachers. What is your Department doing to improve the situation for teaching assistants, improve retention and improve pay for teaching assistants? If we are going to move to a more inclusive SEND model of education, these teaching and classroom assistants are absolutely vital to the success of that shift. If schools are losing them, it is going to be even harder for them to meet the requirements of the new system.
Bridget Phillipson: I will just start by saying that our support staff play an incredible role within our schools. You will have spoken to many school leaders, as have I, who say that their schools would not be able to run without the amazing lunch time supervisors, caretakers and teaching assistants. That is why it was a key commitment in our manifesto, which we have delivered through the Employment Rights Act, to reintroduce the School Support Staff Negotiating Body, to make sure that our school support staff, for the first time in far too long, have a seat and a voice at the table.
I understand the important questions and challenges that are raised around pay, training and wider support. Of course, our support staff and all staff across education will be able to benefit from the big uplift in SEND training that we are rolling out; they will be within that. I have seen how brilliant it can be when support staff in particular have the training and the supervision to deliver targeted programmes—for example, the Nuffield early language intervention, allowing us to identify where children are facing speech and language challenges and step in early.
The highest quality will come where we do not allow support staff to just sink or swim, supporting children with complex needs without the wider leadership and teaching support that is needed. That is why, when it comes to, for example, inclusion bases within schools, we intend to be very clear that support staff time must not be replacing the important work that teachers do; it should be part of that whole school community delivering better outcomes and better standards.
Obviously, schools will make individual decisions about how they balance their workforce in terms of their local context and the demographics of the children within their care, but in terms of the most recent numbers, I think we saw an increase in support staff.
Susan Acland-Hood: Yes, the number of TAs is going up across the system.
Bridget Phillipson: But there could be differences across schools.
Q47 Darren Paffey: The Milburn report gives us a pretty stark warning that one in six young people could soon be out of education, employment or any kind of training whatsoever. That report and our own Committee’s inquiry into FE and skills found a system that is fragmented, really difficult to navigate and underfunded. If you have really complex needs, it is almost impassable. Do you accept that the current state of the post-16 system is failing a significant number of our young people in this country?
Bridget Phillipson: I believe that our post-16 providers, in terms of colleges and others, do a fantastic job in supporting young people, many of whom have had quite difficult and hard experiences further down the line. I will say a bit more about Alan Milburn’s interim report, which sets out a clear diagnosis and lots that we are considering as a Department and will be considered right across Government, and he will bring forward his final report.
What I felt was really powerful in what Alan Milburn identified was the importance of early years in determining children’s futures: that children who are not school-ready at the age of four and five are three times more likely to be NEET by the age of 16 or 17. Although it is right that we continue to reform the post-16 landscape—we talked earlier about qualifications, apprenticeships and good progression routes—there is a lot more that needs to happen long before young people ever reach that point at the age of 16 where they are at risk of falling out of education, employment or training. The things that happen within our school system and in early years are some of the biggest indicators of what will happen post 16.
Clearer pathways, qualification reform—especially at level 2 for many young people—and good routes into employment are all essential, but what I took from Alan Milburn’s initial report and from the extensive discussion that I have had with him is that it is important that we see this as a whole-system, holistic approach. We must not just address the problems that arise when young people fall out of education or do not present at college at 16, although we are doing work to make sure that does not happen.
At the same time, we must address the very significant number of young people—over 1 million, as you know—who are not in education, employment or training. That will not stop happening unless we address the root causes much earlier in those young people’s lives. Everything we are doing as a Government on Best Start family hubs, child poverty and early years investment will deliver long-term changes and better outcomes for young people, but we have to deal with the reality that we find ourselves in at the moment.
Q48 Darren Paffey: I definitely accept that the earlier you can change life chances, the better they will be later on. I certainly agree that the workforce—the tutors, teachers and support—working in that system at the moment are doing a fantastic job, but the scaffolding around them is creaking, isn’t it? What are the key priorities for fixing that so that those within it stand a better chance and those who will be coming through with better early experiences will meet a system that will serve them far better than it currently does?
Bridget Phillipson: There is the longer-term reform, and also responding to the here and now. On the here and now, you will know that the Government’s work on the youth guarantee, the extra investment going into further education and the work on refocusing apprenticeship starts on young people—tilting the system back towards young people—is under way. The longer-term reform will, over time, ensure that fewer young people end up in that position in the first place. Strong family support and early years education are protective factors for young people that guard against some of the challenges we are seeing at the moment.
There is also a need to continue to drive forward with qualifications and wider reform to vocational education. That is not to say that that is the right option for all young people, but it is an important gap that has been there for a very long time. We had a discussion earlier about V-levels, expanding T-levels, the changes that we are making to 16 to 19 English and maths preparation qualifications, alongside better level 2 options for young people and clearer progression routes.
In addition, we are doing more to support young people as they reach that critical moment at the age of 16, when too many young people drop out of education, never to be seen. There is a lack of accountability and a lack of responsibility across the system in terms of ensuring that those young people move into good destinations. That is all absolutely essential if we are to deliver the step change that young people need.
This also connects up to where we started the session: support for young people with special educational needs and disabilities. We know that young people who are not in education, employment or training are disproportionately more likely to be children with SEND.
Susan Acland-Hood: One particular policy from the skills White Paper, which we published in the autumn, has not had a lot of attention but really speaks to the point that the Milburn report makes about strengthening the sense that there is a kind of participation structure around children. By and large, children studying in the post-16 institutions do not do too badly out of the system; it is the children who drop through the cracks at 16 and are not in those institutions who do. You see that in the NEET rates over time.
We said in the White Paper that we are going to try to offer a default place in college to any 16-year-old who does not have another identified plan. We have pilots under way that are looking at doing that, and that is quite important. It is a suggestion made by David Hughes, who runs the Association of Colleges, which we picked up. The point that he made, which I think is right, is that for a lot of young people on academic routes, there is an obvious default: if you take no action, it happens to you; you can continue to study where you are. For young people for whom that is not the right route, if they take no action, they fall out of the system. We know how powerful it can be to flip those basic defaults; again, nobody will be forced to do anything they do not want to do, but the default, if you take no action, will be that you will be enrolled in a college place rather than left. We think that that is potentially quite powerful.
I would also say—we have talked a lot about school rolls in this session—that the demographic bulge is currently in that 16 to 19 space, so we have a lot of young people in the system. There is something very important about making sure that we are supporting that large group of young people, as they go through the system, to be able to participate.
Q49 Sureena Brackenridge: The Milburn report rightly identified that youth disengagement does not begin at 16—it is much before that. It also identified that pupils who were persistently absent are four times more likely to become NEET. What specific steps are you taking to address persistent absence?
Bridget Phillipson: This has been a big focus of the work of the Department right from the first day I became Secretary of State. I was clear in opposition, particularly after the pandemic—although these problems were emerging long before it—that we were seeing very high and stubborn rates of persistent absenteeism. As you say, we know the damage that causes to young people throughout their lives: they are less likely to go on to good jobs or secure good GCSEs. That begins by being every couple of days, but it then starts to add up and becomes an entrenched problem.
We have done a lot of work on supporting schools to understand the data and better use it to target interventions, including, as we talked about earlier, through the use of an AI tool to better track and understand what might be happening on a Wednesday afternoon with year 8 that means there is a problem where you see a drop-off. What is it about your year 10s and Monday morning? It is down to really quite granular detail. That allows schools to consider what action they might take in response.
Just this Monday, I was in Birmingham, speaking with primary leaders about the work to drive this further forward. We have done a lot of work on attendance conferences for school, local authority and trust leaders, initially at secondary but now moving into primary, to work together to embed good practice, identify the challenge, better understand the data and take action. There is a lot that schools can do, and sometimes when they have identified that there is particular issue on the Wednesday afternoon, their attendance rates can improve where they make a response around curriculum or think about how they run their school day.
But this is not something that schools can do alone. That is also why the work around expanding mental health support teams will make a big difference. We know that, for some young people, being in school can be difficult if they are facing wider challenges in their lives, especially around mental health, or if there are problems at home. The approach on school attendance should be one of support first; we are very clear that that is what we expect schools to do. But where those problems are more deep-seated, where they are connected to support for children with SEND or to support around mental health, or where families are struggling, that is something where Government should and must step in, and where we are stepping in, to provide the extra resources and support.
By the end of 2029, all schools and colleges will be covered by a mental health support team. This year, 800,000 more young people are set to benefit from that support than the year before. Again, it is an area where there is more to do, but there is significant progress. I think the message we all send about the importance of school attendance really matters. Every day in school counts; these occasional days can add up to quite significant challenges further down the line and can, again, reflecting the data we have been able to set out, lead to a reduction in overall academic outcomes for young people.
Chair: I aim to stop the session promptly at quarter to 12, and we have three Members still wishing to ask questions. I ask you to please bear that in mind as you are answering, so we can get through everybody who wants to come in. I will go back to Darren.
Q50 Darren Paffey: On higher education, the Department’s spending plans for 2026-27 include a £230 million uplift for HE “towards supporting HE priorities”. What are those priorities? What is that funding going towards?
Bridget Phillipson: We will be saying more on this topic shortly. Our priorities overall are to make sure that the higher education system is financially sustainable. Of course, universities are independent, autonomous institutions that can make decisions about how they operate, and they control their own budgets. But I appreciate that they operate in a context where the Government determine, for example, the level of the tuition fee. I took the decision to increase that to make sure that universities had that certainty. Costs had increased over time, but the fee had not increased alongside that. The Office for Students has also been doing considerable work, including that led by the new chair, Edward Peck, to strengthen the financial sustainability of the sector. We will be saying more shortly about some of those areas you have identified.
Q51 Darren Paffey: In the meantime, that uplift is very welcome. Can you put to bed any claims that there will be a £100 million reduction in the strategic priorities grant? It was reduced by £108 million last year.
Bridget Phillipson: We will set out the position on that very soon, so I am afraid there is a limit to what I can say at the moment.
Q52 Darren Paffey: Our inquiry looked at the financial solvency of universities, and particularly international students. We recommended that the Home Office become the co-owner of the Government’s international education strategy. Has it agreed to do that, and what is the nature of your joint working with it at the moment?
Bridget Phillipson: Not to my knowledge, but we do work very closely with the Home Office on making sure that we have a system that is fair for those who come and study in our country, and fair to the country overall. Of course, international students play a critical role in not just the economic contribution they make to universities, our society and local communities, but the ties of friendship, trading links and links between countries that they build. I am pleased that international students get a very warm welcome here, but we do work closely with the Home Office on managing some of these wider questions.
Q53 Darren Paffey: So there is ad hoc ongoing work, but the Home Office is not co-owning the strategy.
Susan Acland-Hood: It is formally a joint strategy with the Department for Business and Trade. We work really closely with lots of Departments on it, including the FCDO. It is a Government document. It is co-owned by the whole of Government together. We do work really positively with the Home Office on international students.
Q54 Chair: Can I push you on that a little? All the evidence that we had in our inquiry, which fed into the report that you have received, was that decision making by the Home Office is having every bit as significant an impact on the finances and the environment within which universities are operating as that by other Government Departments, yet the Home Office is not bound to any formal mechanism for making it think about the impact its policies are having on our universities and higher education sector. If it is has rejected joint ownership of the international student strategy, what is the mechanism by which it is held to account for the impact it is having on universities through its policy decision making?
Bridget Phillipson: As a Department, we work very closely with the Home Office at both ministerial and official levels. Colleagues across Government, including in the Home Office, recognise the importance of international students to our global impact. That includes the friendships and trading links that we have, and the difference and the impact that students will make here when studying with us in this country.
I do think it is right, however, that the Home Office continues to keep this under review and to make necessary changes where we see challenges with non-compliance, or where particular issues are identified. If not addressed, those would undermine the wider migration system in this country. The Home Office will do that in a way that is led by the evidence, but will also ensure that where challenges are identified with students coming to study, universities respond accordingly by upholding their responsibilities for ensuring not just the highest standards, but that we do not drift into non-compliance, illegal migration arising, and overstaying. It is understandable that the Home Office will push us to make sure that we play our role in maintaining the overall integrity of the immigration system, while recognising that the vast majority of people coming to our country to study from abroad will come for a set period, have a great experience and then return home, hopefully with lots to share in terms of the links that have been built.
Susan Acland-Hood: More technocratically, collective decision making and collective responsibility apply. So if the Home Office are going to do something that affects our work, they will consult. When that decision is made, it is a Government decision, not a decision by one Department. So, again, there is a process for making sure that anything is—
Q55 Chair: But that process has left universities in an extraordinarily difficult situation, where one part of their income stream, which they have been incentivised to rely upon because of decisions by other Departments that affect them, has been pulled from underneath them. They tell us that that is creating an incredibly challenging situation, which is part of what they would describe as the overall crisis in the funding of higher education at the moment. We probably do not have time to pursue this much more, but I would say that the ideal framework you are describing, Permanent Secretary, is not working terribly well from the perspective of universities at the moment.
Bridget Phillipson: The international students market remains incredibly strong and competitive. We are a very attractive destination for students from around the world. But I would also observe that, increasingly, universities have become overly dependent on international students in some cases, which presents a challenge.
Q56 Caroline Voaden: Our colleagues on the Treasury Committee are currently conducting an inquiry into student loans, focusing on whether repayment terms are fair and proportionate. That was prompted by the freeze in the repayment threshold. The decision on repayment appeared to be taken jointly by the Department and the Treasury, so can you explain what your relationship with the Treasury is in terms of control of student loan modelling and the changes in the terms and conditions?
Bridget Phillipson: The fact that Ministers from both Departments appeared before the Committee demonstrates the joint working that we are doing in this area. Our Minister for Skills was joined by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury at the most recent session, and we will continue to take a keen interest in the work of the Treasury Committee to understand their recommendations as they bring them forward. Of course, we have to take decisions across Government around priorities—around how we fund wider investment and around how we fund Government priorities. Although the threshold has increased, it will then continue to be frozen. I appreciate the arguments that are made against that, but I also recognise that there are decisions that have to be taken across Government in terms of managing overall priorities. I look forward to hearing the Committee’s recommendations in this area.
I recognise the challenges that the previous system presents. It was not a system that I designed; it was a system that was in operation since 2013. Therefore, there are many people, many of whom are not quite so young now, who are in the world on these terms—
Q57 Caroline Voaden: Is it a Treasury decision to freeze the repayment threshold, or is it a joint decision?
Bridget Phillipson: These are decisions that are taken at fiscal events. But, of course, we continue to work closely with Treasury colleagues on understanding the impact of such decisions on graduates.
Q58 Jess Asato: We know that care leavers are 38% more likely to drop out of university. When you were last in front of our Committee, you said you were working closely with universities on year-round accommodation for young people who might not have a family home to go back to. Will you therefore extend maintenance provision so that it automatically covers all 52 weeks of the year for those students?
Bridget Phillipson: That is not something that I can commit to now, but I will certainly take it away. You will of course know that we have expanded the maximum loan available to young people leaving care, to ensure that there is no question of their having to demonstrate family circumstances, or of some of the challenges that have arisen previously in that area. That is an important step forward.
We have done a lot of work with universities to address some of the challenges that care-experienced young people will see around accommodation outside of term time, and perhaps some of the wider difficulties that young people might experience, depending on what has happened earlier in their lives. Of course, that is part of a much wider agenda across the Department and across Government about providing better support for care-experienced young people, and a system that means fewer young people moving into the formal care system. Again, I know that that is an area the Committee has considered in detail, in terms of providing better support for fostering and kinship care. Over time, we want to see a reduction in the number of children and young people moving into the children’s social care system, through the investment that we are also putting into early help and the Families First Partnership.
Q59 Jess Asato: The value of maintenance loans has declined in real terms in recent years, primarily because forecast inflation has been markedly below actual inflation. As a consequence, students are taking more paid work, are more likely to stay at home to study, and face financial challenges. What steps are being taken to address the shortfall between the loan amount and actual living costs?
Bridget Phillipson: Again, this is an area where, over many years, we saw not just the erosion of the fee, in terms of the income that it generated for institutions, but an erosion in the level of maintenance loan support that was available to young people. That is not something we can correct for, in terms of overcoming that wider gap rapidly, but we have taken the decision to increase maintenance loans in a way that will make a material difference to students. I am not suggesting that that is the entire answer.
I am proud that, in parallel, we are bringing back maintenance grants for less well-off students; that will also make a significant difference. That is a big gap currently in the system; other recommendations at different periods have been taken forward, but that recommendation was not taken forward, and we will be bringing back maintenance grants for students in further and higher education where that need is greatest. I do understand the pressures that young people continue to experience. We have increased the loan, but sadly it did not keep pace in recent years under previous Governments.
Q60 Jess Asato: The two pilots for the lifelong learning entitlement showed considerably lower interest among potential students than had been expected. What evidence do you have that the lifelong learning entitlement will achieve widespread uptake?
Bridget Phillipson: The lifelong learning entitlement, as you know, represents a big change to the student finance system in England. It will launch in academic year 2026-27 and commence from 1 January 2027. This big change means that, for the first time, there will be a single, flexible funding system covering levels 4 to 6 across further and higher education. It will mean that people of working age who want to upskill or retrain throughout their working lives will have the same access to provision that young people might experience as they seek to move into university.
The current system was designed for younger students—for those that might not have the same level of complexity around work and family life. This is an important part of how we will deliver on the wider ambition of boosting to two thirds the number of young people accessing higher level study. We continue to want to support people to have awareness of what is becoming available, because take-up, as you identify, will be critical.
Chair: Thank you very much for answering the many questions from the Committee this morning. We are grateful to both of you for attending.