Tag: Speeches

  • Stephen Timms – 2022 Speech on the Cost of Living Crisis

    Stephen Timms – 2022 Speech on the Cost of Living Crisis

    The speech made by Stephen Timms, the Labour MP for East Ham, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.

    I am grateful that we have been granted this debate to discuss the spending of the Department for Work and Pensions. We are all familiar with the facts of the cost of living crisis: price rises are accelerating and inflation in May was the highest since 1982—the highest for 40 years—at 9.1%. In France, inflation was 5.8% and in the eurozone, it was 8.1% on average, so we have a particularly acute problem in the UK. The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee said last month that it expects inflation to rise to slightly above 11% in October.

    In the light of those rapidly increasing costs, the Chancellor announced measures to support households in February, March and May. I warmly welcome that support, which is valued at £37 billion. Two of the support measures that he announced are funded by the DWP and are therefore a focus of this debate: first, the £650 payment for households receiving means-tested benefits, and secondly, the £150 payment for people receiving disability benefits.

    I understand that the DWP will pay the first £326 instalment of the £650 payment in the second half of this month. The qualifying day for that—the day on which someone had to have been claiming means-tested benefits—was 25 May. The qualifying day for the second instalment has not yet been announced, but I gather that it will be no later than 31 October. Those payments will be tax free and will not affect other benefit awards. I particularly welcome the fact that, as the Secretary of State confirmed to me in the debate on the recent legislation to enable the payments, they will not be constrained by the benefit cap.

    The other measures that the Chancellor announced in May, which are not legislated for by the Social Security (Additional Payments) Act 2022, include two extensions of existing programmes for which DWP is responsible. First, pensioner households will receive a one-off £300 pensioner cost of living payment as a top-up to their winter fuel payment, which will cost in total £2.5 billion. Secondly, there will be an additional £500 million for the household support fund for local authorities to make discretionary payments to people in need—some £421 million for England and £79 million for the devolved Administrations through the Barnett formula. That will cover the period from October this year to March next year.

    The household support fund was originally announced in September 2021 with £500 million for local authorities for the six months from October 2021 to March 2022. It was extended with another £500 million for the following six months from April to September this year. I will say more about that later as a relatively new feature of the estimates.

    It is worth pausing to reflect on the fact that, although the Chancellor’s announcements are welcome, there are still some concerns. The Resolution Foundation estimates that the

    “measures announced this year to support households will in effect offset 82 per cent of the rise in households’ energy costs in 2022-23, rising to over 90 per cent for poorer households.”

    It is a substantial response to a substantial problem. The Treasury says that households with incomes among the lowest 10% of all households in England will gain just under £1,200 a year on average as a result of the package, while those among the top 10% will gain around £700 a year on average—significantly less. That strikes me as a broadly appropriate distributional impact.

    There are some caveats—for example, the payments are per household. As Save the Children and others have pointed out, larger families will not get any more support than smaller ones, even though children in larger families are at much greater risk of being in poverty. Nearly half—47%—of all UK children in a family with three or more children were in poverty in 2020, so that has a big impact.

    The Joseph Rowntree Foundation made the point that:

    “One key group who has lost out are unpaid carers”.

    We have just debated kinship carers. Only 59% of the 1 million people who claim carer’s allowance also claim means-tested benefits, so the other 41% will not get any additional support through the package. I applaud the Welsh Government’s initiative to provide an additional £500 payment for carers in Wales, and I think consideration should be given to comparable additional support elsewhere in the UK.

    People waiting to be assessed for a personal independence payment cannot access the £150 payment. People wait on average five months to be assessed and receive a decision, and some 300,000 people are waiting at the moment. We might think that they ought to be getting some help, but they will not. People waiting for a work capability assessment will not get the payment either. The backlog for work capability assessments for universal credit is not published, so we do not know the size of it, but we know that there is one.

    In April, as we all know, inflation-linked benefits were increased by 3.1% in line with the increase in the consumer prices index last September. When the uprating took effect, however, inflation was already over 7% and, as we have been reminded, it is now expected to rise to 11% this year. The Secretary of State previously told the Work and Pensions Committee that she does not favour one-off payments of the kind that the Chancellor announced in May. She is right: welcome though the Chancellor’s announcements are, I agree that it would be far better to have an uprating system that works properly, rather than having to resort to these stopgap measures to deal with the emergency.

    Universal credit can be updated quickly, as we saw when lockdown hit, but the legacy benefits cannot be. The permanent secretary told the Select Committee last week that the problem is that uprating programs can only be run at weekends, when the computer systems are not doing other jobs, and that is apparently why it takes such a long time to implement the uprating of the legacy benefits. We have already called for those older systems to be improved urgently, and for the gap between assessing inflation and uprating benefits to be reduced. The need for that to happen is now even clearer, given the problems that we have run into this year.

    The crisis is also exposing a much bigger and longer-term problem, which is the continued failure to keep the level of benefits in line with inflation. That is a consequence of successive policy decisions over the last 12 years. The chief executive of the Resolution Foundation said yesterday that the headline rate of benefit for someone who is unemployed is now 13% of average earnings, and that that is the lowest level it has ever been. That is lower, I think, than when Lloyd George introduced unemployment benefit for the first time in 1911.

    Nobody should be surprised that so many are having such a hard time; there is no resilience in the support that is being provided, because the level is now so low. We have asked Ministers to explain the reason or thinking behind setting the benefits so low, and all we have been told is, “Well, we uprated it that year, we did not uprate it that year, and this is where we’ve ended up.” There is no rationale for the situation that we have found ourselves in where, in real terms, the level of benefits is at its lowest for more than 30 years.

    Citizens Advice North Lancashire, one of the organisations that contacted the Select Committee, told us that

    “one-off payments are not a solution to inadequate benefit levels.”

    It is right about that. It went on:

    “Our detailed research…on Universal Credit from across Lancashire…shows that Universal Credit is not enough to live on in Lancashire. Benefit payments urgently need uprating so that people who cannot work can afford to live off them.”

    The Select Committee has agreed to look at the longer-term issue of benefit levels in an inquiry in the coming months, and we will be considering these issues carefully.

    I want to comment today on two specific features of these estimates. The first is the household support fund. As I have said, the Chancellor’s package included an additional £500 million for the household support fund, bringing the total amount in that fund to £1.5 billion since October 2021. It is administered by local councils in England, and each council sets its own eligibility criteria.

    The grant conditions set by the Government are, frankly, pretty vague. They specify that assistance can be issued by the authority itself or through a third party. One third of the grant is to support households that include a child, another third is to support households that include somebody of state pension age and the balance is for everybody else. It is for support with food, energy and other essential living needs. In a so-called exceptional circumstance, the household support fund can be used to support housing costs.

    Local authorities have to submit a statement of grant usage to the Department with plans of how they are going to spend the money, and they are supposed to maintain an adequate audit trail for how they do in fact spend it. We asked the Secretary of State about that at the Select Committee last week, and she told us that local authorities have to make two returns a year to the Department about what happens to that money. I think that information is supposed to be published, but as far as I can see, no information has been published about how the household support fund has been used. The truth is that we know very little about what has happened to that £1.5 billion.

    One thing that money could be used for is supporting families with no recourse to public funds, some of whom have been in a desperate situation in the last two years. When asked if the household support fund can he used for that, given that it is a public fund, Ministers—absurdly—say that local authorities should take their own legal advice to find out. At the very least, there must surely be clarity about what councils are allowed to do with this funding.

    It may well be that the household support fund is playing a valuable role—I imagine it very likely is—but we just do not know, and we should. If there is to be continued use of discretionary funds such as this, instead of uprating benefits properly, the Department must at least work with councils and develop a clear reporting framework for the household support fund to provide assurance that it is being used effectively and that the support is getting to where it is most needed, because at the moment we just do not know. It would be far better to have an effective and reliable system for uprating the level of social security benefits, so that we do not have to resort to these stopgap measures in situations such as the one we are in at the moment.

    The second point I want to pick out is about the benefit cap. The cap has not been changed since 2016, and in 2016 it was lowered. It continues to limit overall annual benefit support for a family to £23,000 in London and £20,000 across the rest of the UK, with comparable figures for a single person of £15,410 and £13,410 respectively. The new cost of living payments will not be constrained by the benefit cap, and I warmly welcome that. I think this sets an important and welcome precedent. It recognises that families up against the cap—and there are over 100,000 of them at the moment—are seeing their costs rising like everybody else.

    Given the uprating expected next April, based on the rate of inflation expected in September, the Child Poverty Action Group has estimated that

    “an additional 35,000 households will become capped overnight, resulting in a total of around 150,000 households capped in April 2023”.

    The North East Child Poverty Commission also contacted the Select Committee, and it told us:

    “The benefit cap impacts a relatively small number of households in the North East (fewer than 5,000)…almost all…are families with children…but they are being prevented by the cap from receiving all the support they have been assessed as needing. We urge the Government to lift the benefit cap.” The Government have a statutory duty to review the level of the benefit cap every five years. Until March this year, the obligation was to review it in every Parliament. The last published review of the benefit cap was in 2014, which was eight years ago. The cap was lowered in 2016. The Secretary of State, when we asked her about this last week, could not tell us when it was last reviewed. If it has been reviewed within the last five years, the review certainly has not been published, despite promises to the Select Committee that it would be—and of course it should be. The Government should be open about their thinking in this area.

    When the benefit cap was introduced in 2013—my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck), who is on the Front Bench, and I were in the Committee that debated this before it took effect—the income threshold was set at median full-time earnings, which at that time was £26,000 a year. Since then, it has been reduced, and of course median full-time earnings are very different now from what they were in 2013 anyway. The level of the cap now bears no relation at all to any particular earnings level.

    I warmly welcome that the cap will not apply to the additional payments announced by the Chancellor. That is an important precedent, recognising that families at the benefit cap will be hard hit too. However, with inflation at over 10%, it is imperative that the cap is reviewed ahead of next April’s uprating. It needs at least to reflect average household incomes, as it initially did—it needs to bear some relation to them, surely—and take account of increasing rent, energy and food costs. I urge the Minister to be open with the public and to publish the outcome of that review. The Chancellor’s package means relief from the benefit cap for tens of thousands of families this year, but next year the cap will be back and presumably there will not be any further additional payments from the Chancellor. The level of the cap must be raised before next April because if it is not, the consequences will be dire.

    I am very grateful for this opportunity to debate the very important estimates that the Government have provided for us. They make such a big impact on millions of our fellow citizens, and it is vital that such decisions about them are the right ones.

  • Munira Wilson – 2022 Speech on Kinship Care

    Munira Wilson – 2022 Speech on Kinship Care

    The speech made by Munira Wilson, the Liberal Democrat MP for Twickenham, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.

    I beg to move,

    That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for a statutory definition of kinship care; to make provision about allowances and parental leave for kinship carers who take on responsibility for children whose parents are unable to care for them; to make provision about education in relation to children who are looked after by a kinship carer; and for connected purposes.

    April—not her real name—is a constituent of mine. When her sister, who had bladder cancer, died, she left behind five children, all boys. The youngest was aged just five. His birth father was estranged and his stepfather had left the family when his mum got the terminal cancer diagnosis, leaving April’s nephew traumatised and with developmental delays. Shortly before April’s sister passed away, she asked April and her partner if they would look after her youngest son. Of course, they said yes. They would do anything to protect him. Before social services got involved, she and her partner welcomed in a new member of their family, but this decision came at a huge financial and personal cost.

    April was already contending with illness and disability in her family. She needed financial and practical support for her nephew, so she asked the council to pay for his therapy. The council officer said, “You did the right thing in taking in the child before you were asked to. This is the best place for your nephew to be, and you’ve saved us a lot of time and money. But this is a private family arrangement, so we have no legal duty to help you. There’s nothing we can do.” Had April not stepped up to look after her nephew, he would have ended up in local authority care. She has saved the taxpayer tens of thousands of pounds a year and likely ensured a more positive outlook for him. Yet because she did the right thing, she gets nothing in return for his living costs or to manage his mental ill health.

    April is not the only one. Every year, thousands of grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings and family friends step up to support a child whose parents are not able to care for them. Several kinship carers are watching in the Gallery today. They turn their lives upside down to provide children with a loving, stable home. For most of them, welcoming in a child is not a choice they make, but an instinctive reaction out of love to a dramatic, often overnight change in circumstances: a death in the family, domestic abuse or a similar situation. As the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne)—a kinship carer himself—described it to the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care, which he chairs, it is the “social services stork” that turns up unannounced at the door one night asking someone to take a child in.

    Kinship carers do this even though their own financial situation may be unstable. Around half of kinship carers are grandparents, relying on their hard-earned pension savings. One in three kinship carers is non-white. Yet the benefits to children of living with friends and relatives they already know are immense. Compared with care leavers, they are more likely to have better mental health, to have better exam results and to hold down a job. It is why in Australia kinship care is the preferred option when a child cannot be looked after at home by their birth parents.

    Kinship care is the Cinderella service of our children’s social care system—too often ignored. The Government have created a system full of unfairness and uncertainty, leaving some of the most vulnerable families without help. For carers such as Kim, another constituent of mine, who has a special guardianship order, the council has a duty to assess her financial needs. However, unlike for foster carers, any financial support is means-tested, discretionary and reviewed regularly. She told me:

    “At the last review, we were told that we didn’t qualify for an allowance, even though our costs had increased and my income had reduced due to the pandemic. I challenged this and we now receive about half of what we used to get. It is a help, but it does not cover all the extra costs we need to find.”

    However, others, such as April, are not legally entitled to anything. A survey published last week by the charity Kinship found that just 6% of kinship carers with an informal arrangement receive help. Those carers who do receive allowances are paid on average £40 a week less than the national minimum allowance for foster carers. That is bad enough, but the Government’s failure to tackle the cost of living crisis is only making the situation harder. Kinship’s survey this year found that 44% of kinship carers could not pay all their household bills. More than a quarter could not afford food for their families.

    April’s partner, who was training to be a police officer, was told by the council that he should give up work. Studies show that between 30% and 40% of carers leave employment completely after taking on a child. Kinship carers do not get the same rights to employment leave as adoptive parents do. They must rely on the goodwill of their employers.

    The unfairness is also reflected in our education system. If a child in kinship care was previously looked after by the council, their school receives pupil premium plus funding, but if a relative takes in a child to prevent them from becoming looked after in the first place, the school loses out. The relative’s generosity in stepping up at the earliest opportunity is punished by the state.

    I fervently believe that every child should get the best start in life. The Bill I am introducing today includes four proposals to ensure that kinship carers get the financial and practical support their children need. First, all kinship carers should receive weekly payments equal to the national minimum weekly allowance that foster carers receive. Secondly, kinship carers should be entitled to paid employment leave when a child starts living with them, just as happens when a family adopts a child. Thirdly, children in kinship care should have the same support as looked-after children in our education system, such as pupil premium plus, virtual school heads and priority in the admissions process. Finally, those things should be underpinned by a statutory definition of kinship care that will act as a gateway for carers to access the rights I have just mentioned.

    I am grateful to the Family Rights Group and to Kinship for their help with this Bill and their long-standing campaigns on these proposals. Voices from all sides of this House have recognised that the current situation is unsustainable. The Government’s own “Independent review of children’s social care” has called for change. We on the Liberal Democrat Benches will stand up for all carers in this country of all kinds. My right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey) has spoken movingly in the past of his “amazing nana and granddad” who took him in after his mother passed away. We speak from the heart when we say that we want to be the voice of carers in this place.

    I am glad to see the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Colchester (Will Quince), in his place. When I raised the issue of kinship carer allowances with him in the Chamber in May, he told me that

    “it can be advantageous…to invest in that family member to avoid the child going into care”.—[Official Report, 23 May 2022; Vol. 715, c. 42.]

    I completely agree with him, but I know that his colleagues in the Treasury will be concerned about costs or providing a sufficiently watertight definition of who is a kinship carer. However, neither of these problems is insurmountable. On average, it costs about £72,500 a year to put a child in local authority care. If we provided every child in kinship care with a social worker and a weekly allowance, it would cost the taxpayer just over half that. We know that there are systems already in place in the Department for Work and Pensions to recognise kinship carers for the purposes of the two-child benefit cap.

    For most kinship carers, welcoming in a child is an unexpected, life-changing decision, but one they would make again in a heartbeat. Ian, a constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran), said:

    “Having my granddaughter in the house gave us a new lease of life. It’s great, we love it.”

    However, he also recognised how much harder it would be for those in much more difficult circumstances. Surely we owe it to these children who have been through so much, and these carers who have sacrificed so much and have saved the taxpayer so much, to give them the financial and practical support they deserve and need to flourish. Let us step up for kinship carers and support every child to get a better start in life, no matter their background.

    Question put and agreed to.

    Ordered,

    That Munira Wilson, Ed Davey, Robert Halfon, Stella Creasy, Tim Loughton, Sarah Olney, Layla Moran, Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck, Helen Morgan and Richard Foord present the Bill.

    Munira Wilson accordingly presented the Bill.

  • Grant Shapps – 2022 Statement on the Headquarters of Great British Railways

    Grant Shapps – 2022 Statement on the Headquarters of Great British Railways

    The statement made by Grant Shapps, the Secretary of State for Transport, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.

    Today, 5 July 2022,1 am announcing the shortlist of the most suitable potential locations for the national headquarters of Great British Railways (GBR), which will go forward to a consultative public vote to be held online and by post.

    The confirmed list of shortlisted towns and cities is:

    Birmingham

    Crewe

    Derby

    Doncaster

    Newcastle upon Tyne

    York

    I announced on 4 October 2021 that a competition would be run to identify the headquarters for GBR, to be located outside of London. This was launched on 5 February 2022 and was overseen by the GBR Transition Team (GBRTT). Prospective local authorities were asked to submit a short Expression of Interest to GBRTT by Wednesday 16 March.

    GBRTT received 42 applications and has analysed their suitability against the published set of criteria for the national headquarters. The selection criteria are:

    Alignment to Levelling Up principles

    Connected and easy to get to

    Opportunities for GBR

    Value for money

    Railway heritage and links to the network

    Public support

    GBRTT will launch a public vote today that will give the public the opportunity to express their views. The vote is consultative and will be used to test public support for each shortlisted location, allowing the people that the railway serves the chance to have their say.

    Ministers will then make a final decision on the headquarters’ location based on all information gathered and against the above criteria, with a final decision expected later in the year.

    The new national GBR headquarters will be supported by a number of new regional headquarters across the country, putting decision-making and investment at the heart of communities that use those railways day to day.

    The Government are committed to levelling up, delivering jobs and investment beyond the capital. The national headquarters will be at the heart of the rail network and provide strategic direction for the running of GBR. Based outside London, it will bring a number of high-skilled jobs to the winning location.

  • Robin Walker – 2022 Statement on Key Stage 2 Attainment

    Robin Walker – 2022 Statement on Key Stage 2 Attainment

    The statement made by Robin Walker, the Minister for School Standards, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.

    The key stage 2 (KS2) national statistics released today show that the percentage of pupils meeting the expected standard in all three subjects of reading, writing and maths at age 11 was 59% in 2022. This is lower than it was before the pandemic: 65% of pupils met the standard in all three subjects in 2019. While this is disappointing, it was expected due to the impact of the pandemic. The Government recognise, and value, the work that teachers up and down the country are putting into education recovery, but also understand that there is more work to do.

    We welcome the increase in reading attainment from 73% in 2019 to 74% in 2022, despite the disruption of covid, which is a tribute to the hard work and dedication of our teachers, pupils and parents. Indeed, these figures build on the research we commissioned from Renaissance Learning, published in March 2022, that showed faster recovery in English reading than in maths. Reading is, of course, fundamental: we cannot knock down barriers for children if we do not teach them to read well. Attainment in maths and in writing, however, are disappointing, but not unexpected: in 2022 71% of pupils met the expected standard in maths, compared to 79% in 2019, while in writing, 69% of pupils met the expected standard, down from 78% in 2019.

    Today’s statistics summarise KS2 attainment at national level and, of course, we want to understand the detail beneath these figures. There will be a further statistical release on 6 September setting out breakdowns of the KS2 results, including by region, local authority area and pupil characteristics such as disadvantage. It is, of course, likely that some pupils, and some areas of the country, will have been impacted more than others due to the pandemic.

    It is vital that we have a clear understanding of the impact of the disruption caused by covid-19 on the attainment and progress of all pupils, to support schools in their work on education recovery. That is why we decided to go ahead with primary assessments this year, without adaptations, so that we can have a consistent measure of attainment before and after the pandemic. This will enable us to be open and transparent about the impact of the pandemic on attainment at system level. As we announced in July 2021, we will not be publishing school-level KS2 data this year in performance tables because we did not make adaptations to the tests and assessments or the standards. We will share school-level data in the autumn with schools, academy trusts and local authorities to inform school improvement and support school leaders. We will ensure clear messages are placed alongside any data shared to advise caution in its interpretation.

    The statistics published today underline the importance of our focus on recovery. Recovery funding is already making a difference, but we recognise that there is more still to do.

    That is why we have committed nearly £5 billion to fund a comprehensive recovery package. By May 2022, 1.5 million courses had been started by children across England through the national tutoring programme; and £950 million of direct funding, through the catch-up and recovery premia, was helping schools to deliver evidence-based interventions based on pupil needs. In light of the success of this year’s school-led tutoring route through the national tutoring programme, next year we will allocate all tutoring funding directly to schools, simplifying the system and giving schools the freedom to decide how best to provide tutoring for their pupils.

    As well as specific recovery investments, The schools White Paper, “Opportunity for all: strong schools with great teachers for your child”, published on 28 March sets out how our education system will deliver recovery through a wider programme of ambitious reforms that truly level up outcomes and ensure we build back better from the pandemic.

    On maths in particular, we continue to support and enhance the teaching of maths through our network of 40 school-led maths hubs, which are helping local schools improve the quality of their mathematics teaching based on best practice. We have also established the £100 million Teaching for Mastery programme, which is bringing mastery teaching to 11,000 schools across England by 2023. This teaching style focuses on depth of understanding and is based on best practice from East Asian jurisdictions that perform highly in international mathematics tests. Drawing on this approach, we have also published non-statutory guidance to support teachers to prioritise and sequence the maths curriculum in a way that aims to help pupils understand and progress in mathematics.

    On English, we continue to support the teaching of early reading through our network of 34 English hubs, established in 2018. The English hubs programme is dedicated to improving the teaching of early reading, with a focus on supporting children making the slowest progress. In July 2021 we also published “The reading framework: teaching the foundations of literacy”, non-statutory guidance for teachers and school leaders, aimed at improving the teaching of the foundations of reading in primary schools by defining best practice. We will build on this by publishing part 2 of the reading framework next year, to provide evidence-based non-statutory guidance on teaching reading for years 2 to 9.

    The ability to read fluently is also important when developing pupils’ writing skills. We are heartened that the data released today has shown an increase in reading attainment despite the disruption of covid, but we know there is more to do to ensure this translates into an improvement in writing attainment. In September 2022, we will launch the NPQ in leading literacy, which will support school literacy leaders to have a secure understanding of the importance of literacy and recognise the influence it has on pupils’ future academic achievement, wellbeing and success in life. It will support leaders to develop expertise in the teaching of reading and writing and enable them to share their expertise effectively to improve literacy outcomes for every child.

    We have also invested £10 million in core skills in English and maths for the 2021-22 academic year, as part of the accelerator fund, which included funding for the English and maths hubs programmes to help pupils secure the key knowledge and understanding they need to progress—and which may have been missed due to covid-19 disruption.

    The parent pledge in the schools White Paper will also make the Government’s vision clear that any child who falls behind in English or maths will receive the right evidence-based targeted support to get them back on track.

    Underpinning all of these initiatives is the need to help children and young people recover from the impact of the pandemic and to achieve their full potential. The Government remain fully committed to achieving this aim.

  • Ben Wallace – 2022 Statement on Continued Support for Ukraine

    Ben Wallace – 2022 Statement on Continued Support for Ukraine

    The statement made by Ben Wallace, the Secretary of State for Defence, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.

    Today, I am pleased to update the House with further details on the UK-led training programme of Ukrainian armed forces announced by the Prime Minister on his recent visit to Kyiv.

    In response to Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, the UK Government are providing £2.3 billion of military aid to Ukraine. Included in this is a commitment to spearhead an innovative programme which aims to train up to 10,000 new Ukrainian recruits in the UK.

    The first rotation of Ukrainian soldiers has recently arrived in the UK. Training will take place on military training areas across the north-east, south-west and south-east regions. The training will be conducted by elements from 11 Security Force Assistance Brigade.

    These Ukrainian soldiers will undertake courses based on the UK’s basic soldier training. This includes weapons training, battlefield first aid, fieldcraft, patrol tactics and training on the law of armed conflict. Each course will last several weeks. I have informed hon. Members whose constituencies include the bases being used for this training programme about local arrangements.

    Our ambition is to increase the scale and frequency of these courses, in line with Ukrainian requirements. We are also discussing with international partners options to broaden involvement in the training programme, working constructively with countries prepared to support either by contributing trainers or providing equipment.

    We expect the training package to evolve over time. I will keep Parliament informed of the outcomes of these initial courses and any plans to increase the programme’s scale or scope.

    This activity is a priority for the Ministry of Defence as part of the UK’s unwavering efforts to bolster the capability of the Ukrainian armed forces and demonstrates continued UK leadership in responding to Russia’s war of aggression. I can reassure the House that the Ministry of Defence has received strong support from across Government for the non-military provisions required to support such a significant training programme.

    While the training activity is being made public, some details will be kept confidential for security purposes.

  • Kemi Badenoch – 2022 Statement on Toilet Provision in Public Buildings

    Kemi Badenoch – 2022 Statement on Toilet Provision in Public Buildings

    The statement made by Kemi Badenoch, the Minister for Local Government, Faith and Communities, in the House of Commons on 4 July 2022.

    Toilets, both in municipal and private sector locations, are an important facility for members of the public, in particular, women, those with children, older people and disabled people.

    The Government have taken a number of steps recently to support the increased provision of ‘Changing Places’ toilets for disabled people for whom standard accessible toilets are not suitable. Last year, the Government introduced 100% business rates relief for public toilets in England and Wales.

    In October 2020, Government published a review: Toilet provision for men and women: call for evidence. This stemmed from evidence that shows that increasing numbers of publicly accessible toilets are being converted into ‘gender neutral’ facilities, causing problems for women and older people in particular.

    ‘Gender neutral’ facilities mean men and women share the same space for waiting and hand wash facilities; these should be contrasted with dedicated, self-contained ‘unisex’ toilets which maintain privacy for the single user (also known as ‘universal toilets’).

    Such ‘gender neutral’ toilets place women at a significant disadvantage. While men can then use both cubicles and urinals, women can only use the former. The net effect is actually to reduce toilet provision for women. Women also need safe spaces given their particular biological, health and sanitary needs (for example, women who are menstruating, pregnant or at menopause, may need to use the toilet more often). Women are also likely to feel less comfortable using mixed sex facilities.

    The review also asked for views on increasing the ratio of female toilets. Male toilets typically allow for a quicker transition of customers due to the use of urinals, yet insufficient female toilets are provided for a comparative number of cubicles to allow the same number of users to be served. This is not to disadvantage any sex – but greater ratios of female cubicles would help avoid queues inside and outside toilets.

    The Government are also aware of broader concerns that women’s biological differences are being ‘erased’ in public life. It is important that women’s biological needs are respected and taken into account in the provision of facilities such as toilets. A high volume of responses were received to the call for evidence, all of which have been read and analysed.

    The call for evidence analysis has been carefully considered, and research has been commissioned by my Department on the design of toilet facilities. Following on from this, in autumn 2022, the Department will launch a technical consultation on formal changes to the building regulations and approved guidance, informed by the call for evidence responses.

    The Government are minded to take the following approach to rules and guidance in England, subject to further consultation and assessment of equality impacts:

    Policy Goal

    Change to the building regulations and approved guidance

    To amend building regulations and guidance to ensure separate toilets for men and women continues to be provided,

    guidance to encourage the provision of a unisex toilet, where space allows

    Implementing a threshold approach i.e. above a certain number of toilet cubicles, require the provision of toilets for a range of users including separate male and female toilets, unisex toilets/ universal toilets, baby change, disabled Persons toilets, and changing places toilets.

    Where unisex toilets are provided, that privacy is ensured

    To set out the design of a unisex self-contained/ universal toilet cubicle with a sink which is designed to maximise privacy—informed by research underway and the call for evidence analysis.

    To announce the intent for greater provision of toilets to reduce queuing

    We will work with the British Standards Institution to develop the evidence base with a view thereafter to them updating their relevant codes of practice.

    The technical review will ensure that the specific requirements of disabled users remain salient, and that access to and provision of toilets for disabled people will not be undermined by wider improvements to toilet provision more generally. The Department will be considering already commissioned research on the design of both disabled persons’ toilets and changing places toilets as part of this review.

    Better customer toilet provision in commercial environments may encourage people to visit the premises. The Government will be undertaking a full regulatory impact assessment.

    Such changes to building rules will also complement existing statutory provisions in education law for schools to provide sex-specific—or self-contained unisex—toilets for children.

    We would also encourage Government bodies to consider how such principles can be adopted now in its own buildings, prior to formal changes in building regulations.

    The Government believe the proposals that we are minded to adopt will have positive equality outcomes for women, older people, pregnant women, those with babies, people who come under the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, and disabled people.

    This common sense approach on protecting and improving toilet provision will ensure dignity, privacy, tolerance and respect for all, and further the cause of equality and inclusion by recognising the different needs of everyone in society.

  • Liz Truss – 2022 Statement on the Persecution of Christians

    Liz Truss – 2022 Statement on the Persecution of Christians

    The statement made by Liz Truss, the Foreign Secretary, in the House of Commons on 4 July 2022.

    At the beginning of 2019, the former Foreign Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), asked the Bishop of Truro to review what more the then FCO could do to address the persecution of Christians. The Bishop published a report in July 2019 setting out the gravity of the issue, as well as practical recommendations for an enhanced FCO response to the plight of persecuted Christians and people persecuted for holding other religious beliefs, other beliefs, or no religious belief at all.

    Recognising that the persecution of people for their religion or belief is unacceptable and a significant international problem, the Government committed to implementing the recommendations of the Bishop’s review. His final recommendation was that an independent assessment of our progress in doing so should be carried out three years after the original report. I am pleased to publish that assessment today. We welcome and accept this expert review on progress and in line with the findings, accept their assessment for the need to continue to work to promote and strengthen freedom of religion or belief as a fundamental human right for all. We thank the reviewers for their important work. A copy of the report will be deposited in the Libraries of both Houses.

    I have seen first-hand how much work has gone in across the organisation to delivering the review recommendations. Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon has worked closely with the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on Freedom of Religion or Belief, my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), to promote freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) internationally and to oversee progress on implementing the review recommendations. The independent assessment concludes that the majority of the recommendations are either at an advanced stage of delivery or in the process of being delivered, whilst noting that there is still more to do. The reviewers have also recognised where there have been constraints to delivery or an alternative approach has been taken.

    I am encouraged by what has been achieved in recent years, in the face of many global challenges. We have led international efforts to increase collaboration to support those who are persecuted for what they believe. In March 2021, Lord Ahmad hosted a meeting at the UN Security Council to raise awareness of persecution of religious minorities in conflict zones. We used our G7 presidency to secure language on FoRB in the G7 communique for the first time, galvanising support for those suffering discrimination and persecution. The FoRB Special Envoy holds the Chair of the International Religious Freedom or Belief Alliance this year, demonstrating UK global leadership on FoRB. We have sent a clear message that the international community will not turn a blind eye to serious and systematic violations of human rights through our global human rights sanctions regime. Religion for international engagement training is now available to all civil servants to enhance their understanding of the role of religion and belief in a wide variety of contexts, in order to deliver the UK’s international objectives more effectively.

    Building on this work, we will continue to ensure that the changes we have made are embedded and to look for opportunities to make FoRB central to the FCDO’s wider human rights work. We will do this, working alongside others, to deliver real change for the good, protecting and promoting everyone’s right to freedom of religion or belief.

    Our work on this important human rights issue will never be complete, and we will continue to champion global efforts on FoRB. As part of that, on 5-6 July this year, the UK will host an international ministerial conference on freedom of religion or belief. We look forward to welcoming partner countries and stakeholders from around the world to London.

    Attachments can be view online at: http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2022-07-04/HCWS174

  • Will Quince – 2022 Statement on Early Years, Early Education and Childcare

    Will Quince – 2022 Statement on Early Years, Early Education and Childcare

    The statement made by Will Quince, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education, in the House of Commons on 4 July 2022.

    This Government are committed to ensuring that families can access high quality and flexible childcare and early education that helps children to learn in their earliest years, provides enriching experiences around school hours and supports families and the economy by enabling parents to work.

    With the cost of living rising, we want as many families as possible to benefit from the childcare support they are entitled to, saving them money, and helping to give children the best start in life.

    This Government have extended access to early education and childcare to millions of children and parents over the past decade. We invest a significant amount of funding in early education and childcare, including over £3.5 billion in each of the past three years on early education entitlements for two, three and four-year-olds.

    We have also introduced tax-free childcare, which provides working parents with support of up to £2,000 a year to help with childcare costs for children under 12, or £4,000 for disabled children under 17, and Universal Credit, where parents can claim back up to 85% of eligible childcare costs, compared to 70% under tax credits.

    The Government have today announced plans to improve the cost, choice and availability of childcare that will benefit families and give childcare providers more flexibility and autonomy to make decisions about their settings and needs of children.

    We will support more people to become childminders, which are generally the most affordable and flexible form of childcare, by:

    Reducing the upfront costs of becoming a childminder via financial support.

    Allowing childminders to spend more of their time working from a greater range of locations.

    Clarifying flexibilities in childminders’ ratios when looking after their own children, or siblings of other children.

    Working with Ofsted to reduce inspection for childminders.

    Publishing a slimmed down, childminder specific Early Years Foundation Stage framework.

    Encouraging the growth of Childminder Agencies—stimulating competition and driving down costs while providing parents with more options for care.

    We will also streamline the Ofsted registration process for providers. More providers registering would mean that parents have a wider choice of providers on which to use these schemes, to pay for childcare that supports their working lives.

    With safety and quality at the heart, as a first step, today I am also confirming the publication of two consultations:

    Childcare ratios and supervision while eating consultation.

    We are consulting on proposed changes to the current statutory minimum early years staff: child ratios in England for two-year-olds from 1:4 to 1:5; and clarifying flexibilities in childminders’ ratios when looking after their own children, or siblings of other children.

    These proposals hand greater flexibility and autonomy to providers to exercise professional judgement in their staffing decisions, according to the needs of their children. This change would bring minimum requirements into line with those in Scotland.

    As we continue this journey, there will be opportunities to explore further reform to statutory staffing requirements, and this document invites early views on some potential additional options.

    We are also consulting on supervision requirements while children are eating, to ensure the safety of every child across early years settings. Engagement with early years providers to date suggests that for many settings, adequate supervision while eating is already understood to mean that children are within sight and hearing of a member of staff. We believe that an explicit requirement in the Early Years Foundation Stage will reinforce this practice and ensure the safety of children in early years settings.

    The Early Years National Funding Formula and Maintained Nursery School funding consultation.

    We are consulting on updates to the funding formulae for the two-year-old and three and four-year-old early education entitlements in England, the scope of which will also include the distribution of supplementary funding for maintained nursery schools.

    We are proposing to update and adjust the funding formulae used to distribute the Government’s investment in the early years entitlements—which deliver 15 or 30 hours a week of free, high quality, flexible childcare for eligible two, three and four-year-olds for 38 weeks a year—fairly and transparently to local authorities across England.

    Many of the datasets which underpin these formulae, and which we use to reflect geographical cost variation, are not up to date. It is important that they remain current, to ensure the funding system can be fair, effective and responsive to changing levels of need across different areas, with targeted investment towards those areas where it will do the most good. Subject to the outcome of the consultation, we are therefore planning to update the formulae for the 2023-24 financial year and intend to continue to do so annually thereafter. We are also consulting on proposals to mainstream the early years elements of the teachers’ pay grant and the teachers’ pension employer contribution grant from 2023-24, bringing early years in line with schools and high needs.

    The proposed update will result in some changes to local authority funding levels given costs and levels of need in certain areas will have changed relative to others. As such, we are also consulting on applying new year-to-year protections to local authority funding rates, to help local markets to manage changes better. The 2021 spending review settlement allows us to offer protections which means that all local authorities will see an increase in the hourly rate that the Government provide for 2023-24.

    We are also consulting on proposals to reform maintained nursery school supplementary funding. Maintained nursery schools make a valuable contribution to improving the lives of some of our most disadvantaged children. As we have confirmed continuation of maintained nursery school supplementary funding throughout the spending review period, it is now right to examine the way in which this funding is distributed to LAs. We are therefore proposing to invest an additional £10 million into maintained nursery school supplementary funding from 2023-24 and are consulting on proposals to create a fairer distribution of the funding across all LAs with maintained nursery schools.

    Taken together, our current and proposed reforms not only reflect the Government’s commitment to supporting as many families as possible with access to high quality, affordable childcare, but also provide the foundation for taking a renewed look into the childcare system.

  • Robin Walker – 2022 Speech on Teaching Medieval History in Schools

    Robin Walker – 2022 Speech on Teaching Medieval History in Schools

    The speech made by Robin Walker, the Minister for School Standards, in the House of Commons on 4 July 2022.

    It gives me great pleasure to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) on securing this debate. He has shown his great passion and knowledge of medieval history as well as his deep understanding of how history is interconnected—a crucial part of the work on a model history curriculum, which we are about to launch.

    I am also passionate about history. I studied medieval history at GCSE and went on to read ancient and modern history at university—including, my hon. Friend will be pleased to hear, an extended further subject on the near east, from Justinian to Mohammed; I know that he is a big fan of the great law giver. I share his interest in that individual and in the great clash of civilisations that followed him.

    I firmly believe that pupils in our schools should receive high-quality history teaching that helps them understand different periods in history and the links between them, and to engage critically with knowledge about the past. The capacity that teachers have to help pupils to really think about the past, even when it seems far away, is always inspiring; bringing alive history through great teaching can lead to a lifelong love of the subject for all pupils.

    Our knowledge-rich curriculum is a key tool to help teachers develop a greater understanding of history among their pupils. The knowledge-rich approach focuses on knowledge and understanding; it is not about teaching a dry list of facts or dates, but about giving pupils a deep and rich understanding of history, making it meaningful through the use of stories and inquiry questions based on the latest scholarship. That is all the more relevant for the sometimes marginalised period of medieval history, because we know that there are sweeping myths about its many time periods and peoples. It could be argued that some popular conceptions of the medieval period are mired in stereotypes and reductive tropes, even among some pupils. It can be reductively typified as an era of war and plague, especially for England, and of castles, oppressed serfs in hovels, dungeons and widespread ignorance—the “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” version of medieval history. Even the word “medieval” is sometimes used as a term of denigration.

    The teaching that we support in our curriculum and the great examples that I will share show how such reductive and misleading myths can be tackled through informed and informative teaching. In the history curriculum, we expect that high-quality history education will help pupils to gain a coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain’s past and the wider world’s. History helps pupils to understand the complexity of people’s lives, the processes of change, the diversity of societies and the relationships between groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time. All those aspects can be taught through medieval history from key stage 1 to key stage 3.

    Teaching the early medieval period, pre-1066—the late classical period, as it is sometimes defined—lays foundational knowledge for teaching at key stage 3 and beyond. I reassure my hon. Friend that the history curriculum already refers to many of the interesting pre and post-1066 examples that he raised, whether as a requirement or as examples of what can be taught, such as the Anglo-Saxons, the Viking raids, the struggle for the kingdom of England at the time of Edward the Confessor and—as the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), will note—Aethelstan, the first king of England. In particular, the Anglo-Saxons are an important part of teaching at key stage 2, which is why their history is not, I accept, repeated at key stage 3, but it is further built upon. I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley that medieval history before 1066 is an important part of our knowledge-rich curriculum.

    In key stage 3, as part of the required theme of the development of Church, state and society in medieval Britain from 1066 to 1509, we set out some non-statutory examples, including the Norman conquest, the crusades and Magna Carta; society, economy and culture; feudalism; religion in daily life, including parishes, monasteries and abbeys; farming, trade and towns, especially the wool trade; and art, architecture and literature. Teachers can teach other examples at key stage 3 than those suggested, and can cover many of the themes that my hon. Friend referred to.

    Local history is also a key requirement in the curriculum. My hon. Friend referred to some fantastic examples from his Rother Valley area, including its mining history, which I knew about, and its contribution to the fabric of this building, which I have to say I did not. As the Member of Parliament for one of England’s great Norman cathedrals, which hosts the tomb of King John, I am well aware of how local buildings can inspire students of medieval history. I agree that medieval history is all around us. Much of the infrastructure of the period still survives—Westminster Hall, which my hon. Friend mentioned, castles, cathedrals, windmills, bridges and, indeed, some of our ancient universities. Teachers can use local history, combined with wider storytelling, to bring the period alive and inspire the interest of children and young people in history.

    Although I have mentioned castles as a dominant part of the stereotyping of the medieval age, they are also wonderful physical examples that children can visit as part of learning about the era. Many types of building were seen as castles in the period. The variety in their use helps to teach about the complexity of medieval life—not just their military use, for example, but their importance as living communities and as places of court.

    We also require that at least one study of a significant society or issue in world history and its interconnections with other world developments be taught as part of the curriculum. The non-statutory examples that we give are mainly beyond the medieval period, but teachers and schools can determine their own. The medieval era from 500 to 1500 is required to be taught as part of GCSE history; it can also be studied at A-level. At GCSE, there is a requirement to

    “study significant events, individuals, societies, developments and issues within their broad historical contexts”,

    which must be taken from the period from 500 AD to 1500 AD,

    “demonstrating both breadth (through period studies) and depth (through studying of a narrower, more specific topic)”.

    My hon. Friend expressed concerns about the extent of medieval history in exam specifications and papers, but the period’s inclusion in GCSEs and A-levels can further develop pupils’ understanding of it and can further develop knowledge taught at earlier key stages.

    Inspiring stories are an important tool of teaching. Used in the right way, they can enable teachers to help children and young people to really understand, engage with and remember history. Key stories from medieval history help to define our national culture, and I hope that they are not neglected: Alfred and the cakes, Lady Godiva, Robin Hood and Prince John, Henry II and Thomas à Becket, Henry V at Agincourt and—for our friends in the north, who sadly have not come to this debate—Robert the Bruce and the spider, to name but a few. Some of these stories also act as a conduit into history, and remain an inspiration for people today.

    Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)

    My hon. Friend has mentioned King John’s tomb, around which I used to play as a child, because I went to the school next to Worcester cathedral for 10 years. He has also mentioned Aethelstan. I do not know whether he is aware that Aethelstan was half West Saxon and half Mercian—otherwise known as Angle—and that he was placed in Mercia with, I think, his mother’s family to keep him safe, because not everyone wished him well in west Saxony. When he eventually became king, he was able to ally the Mercians—or Angles—with him in the battle to defend what became England against a combination of marauding Vikings and marauding Scots. Does it not surprise my hon. Friend that no one from the Scottish National party has turned up, given that the creation and the strength of England are largely down to the Scots?

    Mr Walker

    My hon. Friend has brought an extra touch of medieval history knowledge to the debate, for which I am extremely grateful. I am always pleased to celebrate the contribution of a fellow Worcester man. Of course, the Scots have come off badly in Worcester on a number of occasions, not all of which fit within the medieval period.

    Let me give an example, which is connected to our shared home city, of medieval history’s relevance and importance today. Within the next few weeks, I will be taking part in the unveiling of a plaque to commemorate the eviction of Worcester’s medieval Jewish community in the 13th century—a precursor of the wider expulsion of Jews from England under Edward I, and a reminder that the events of the past too often have echoes in the issues of today, or of more recent times.

    Teachers have access to a strong community of expertise within history, including the fantastic work of the Historical Association and its resources and publications, all of which help to support high-quality teaching. Teachers can also draw on the heritage schools programme managed by Historic England, which offers continuing professional development and resources to schools to support the teaching of local history. Wider resources from English Heritage and other organisations are also available. Oak National Academy now offers resources and lessons on, for example, Vikings and Anglo-Saxons, medieval monarchs, the crusades, Baghdad and the Normans, to name only a small selection.

    The good practice and examples that I now want to describe show the range of teaching that is already offered to pupils. My hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley said that teaching should cover the breadth and depth of medieval history, and I hope I can demonstrate to him that that is happening in some of the best schools in the country. He spoke about the importance of teaching expertise, and I agree with him about that. The strong community of history experts within schools supports such teaching, and acts as a forum for sharing good practice through, for example, the Historical Association and its publication Teaching History, whose special issue dedicated to the teaching of medieval history, published in 2018, went to all state secondary schools. Ian Dawson edited that edition, drawing on research on pupils’ attitudes to the medieval period and making the case for reviewing and renewing teaching in this area in order to challenge myths and stereotypes. Since then, Teaching History has featured many more articles by teachers and other experts on teaching medieval history.

    The special edition took an approach to the middle ages summed up by three words: sophistication, respect and representation. Its aim was to display the sophistication of life and ideas in the middle ages, and to help to explain why the people of the period deserve greater respect than they are often accorded for the ways in which they dealt with the issues and dilemmas that they faced in all aspects of their lives. That approach helps to illustrate to pupils how many of the aspects of the medieval period developed from the preceding historical periods, and also developed further into institutions, systems and ways of life that are still important today. As John Gillingham has said,

    “It is in the Middle Ages, after all, that crucial early stages of many things can be found: above all, of course, the languages of England, Scotland and Wales, but also some central political and educational institutions: parliament, monarchy, schools, universities, the law and the legal profession, as well as our freedoms, think Magna Carta”.

    Elizabeth Carr, Head of History at Presdales School, makes clear that laying the foundations of knowledge about the medieval period proves essential for pupils to be able to make sense of later periods. For example, understanding the Reformation requires secure knowledge of medieval Christian culture and the pervasive influence of the Catholic Church. Similarly, Parliament in the medieval period was very different from Parliament today, but the evolution of Parliament in later periods makes sense to pupils only when they have an understanding of its origins and role in the medieval context.

    In Ark schools, pupils study wide-ranging medieval history in Year 7, including 11th-century Constantinople, the Normans in England and in Sicily, the crusades, the Angevin empire, the influence of Muslim scholarship on medieval and renaissance worlds, the north African empire of Mali and its connections with wider worlds, and the role of the silk roads in linking differing medieval worlds. They also study detailed stories of political change throughout England’s medieval centuries, culminating in late medieval political instability and the long-term effects of the black death on the medieval economy and society in rural and urban areas. They draw on wide-ranging historical scholarship in shaping their curriculum and introducing pupils to contrasting interpretations of medieval pasts.

    Elizabeth Carr set out in another article published in Teaching History in September 2021 how she uses the biographical stories of Empress Matilda and Eleanor of Aquitaine to explore the concepts of power and authority and the relationship between England, France and the Holy Roman Empire. In doing this, she sets English medieval kings, particularly the much-studied John, and Magna Carta into a much broader geographical and political context. I do not want to detain the House too much longer with endless examples—

    Alexander Stafford

    I agree with everything the Minister is saying. I know that he wants to end soon, but does he agree that we should not just be teaching medieval history as a stand-alone subject and that it should be imbued in all other subjects? For instance, when we are talking about geography and climate change now, we should look back to the medieval warming period and discuss the implications of that. We could also link medieval history to sociology and religion. It can be included in every single subject, including maths. It should be in every aspect of life, and not just in history subjects.

    Mr Walker

    I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend that a full understanding of history can contribute so much to that broader understanding. In the case of climate change, as he has mentioned, we can refer back to the late medieval warm period. We should absolutely take into account the longer view that medieval history can give us. I wholly agree with him on that.

    I have endless examples that I could give the House, but I think that people have probably heard enough of them. What I would say is that we have an important opportunity before us. My hon. Friend rightly referred to our White Paper and the fact that we are not changing the curriculum at this time. That is because the curriculum is a framework that allows for some very rich, broad teaching. Indeed, the changes made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), which my hon. Friend praised, are in the curriculum that we are preserving.

    It is important that we exemplify what can be done within that curriculum, particularly at key stages 1 to 3. That is why we are developing a model history curriculum to support the teaching of this time period across key stages 1 to 3. I am delighted today to have published on the Department for Education’s website the names of the expert panellists who will lead this work. I am delighted that Michael Kandiah from King’s College London is the chair and that Christine Counsell is the lead drafter. We will benefit enormously from Christine and the wider panel’s expertise in the development of an exciting, broad and knowledge-rich exemplar curriculum, which will demonstrate the breadth and connectivity of what can be taught at primary and key stage 3.

    The exemplar of the model history curriculum will also demonstrate the principles of a well-sequenced curriculum. As my hon. Friend has highlighted, knowledge builds upon knowledge, and learning about key events, figures and themes pre-1066 is a basis for understanding the later medieval period. In turn, developments in medieval times in politics, government and society help to develop greater understandings of later periods including the history of the 18th and 19th centuries, the development of this Parliament and the understanding of American history. There is expertise about the medieval period among the panellists. They include Professor Robert Tombs, professor emeritus of French history at the University of Cambridge, and Professor Toby Green of King’s College London.

    The model history curriculum will draw on the best that already exists in the history community and act as a further stimulus to great curriculum design. It will help teachers to teach our history national curriculum, which already offers breadth and depth of teaching on medieval history. We also hope that the breadth, depth and geographical span will inspire more teaching of different periods of history across wider geographies. Although it is an example for schools, it could even inspire our universities to teach broader spans of time, as my hon. Friend suggested. As he has demonstrated, medieval history has a vital role to play in the sequencing of history that all children should learn. I am sure he will agree that the examples I have shared about good practice in schools show that there is wonderful teaching on this subject in our schools today, all of which helps our children and young people to develop a strong knowledge-based understanding of history. Once again, I commend him for bringing forward such an important and historical debate.

  • Alexander Stafford – 2022 Speech on Teaching Medieval History in Schools

    Alexander Stafford – 2022 Speech on Teaching Medieval History in Schools

    The speech made by Alexander Stafford, the Conservative MP for Rother Valley, in the House of Commons on 4 July 2022.

    I rise to argue that we need to consider the teaching of medieval history in schools. As every historian knows, when starting an essay we have to define the topic, so what is medieval history? At my university, I was in the last cohort to study so-called modern history, which was defined as everything after Diocletian split the Roman empire in 286 AD. In fact, I was in Diocletian’s palace in Croatia only last week, but I take a newer version of medieval history. More traditionally, medieval history is seen as the period following the fall of the western Roman empire in 476 AD to the start of the Renaissance and the age of discovery—a period spanning over 1,000 years. This period was one of the most important and turbulent times of human history, but this period is woefully neglected in our schools.

    It is worth reminding ourselves about some of the key events, such as the settling of the barbarian invaders, the reconquest of the west under Justinian, the black death, the rise of Islam, the Viking invasions, the Reconquista of Spain, the east-west schism of 1054, the crusades, the travels of Marco Polo, the medieval warm period—the list is endless. However, our education system barely touches this, and when it does, it is only in the briefest of ways. How many people in England know of the initial defeat of the Viking invaders under Alfred the Great, the conquest of the Danelaw and the reunification of England under his grandson, the first ever King of England, Aethelstan? Where is the focus on the ultimate clash between east and west, the crusades, during which Edgar Aethling, the last Anglo-Saxon king, supported the first crusade, and Richard I led the third crusade successfully, or even the huge Anglo-Saxon component of the Byzantine Varangian guard? Why do we never hear about the triumphs of England in the late middle ages or the Angevin empire, when the kings ruled England, half of France and parts of Ireland and Wales in personal union—an early forerunner of our great United Kingdom of today?

    Medieval history is all around us, in every single constituency and in most towns and villages, yet we do not readily recognise this fact. I look at my own constituency of Rother Valley, where we are rightly proud of our mining heritage. However, we rarely hear about our area’s medieval history, though I must say that local groups such as the Aston-cum-Aughton history group do a sterling job of writing it. If any area wants to stake a claim to mining longevity, it must surely be my area of Rother Valley. In Whiston, the mining of white stone was attested to in the Domesday Book, and many of our villages, such as Dinnington and Harthill, stretch back to Domesday and beyond. The owner of Firbeck Hall, Henry Gally Knight, was a Member of this House and a source of inspiration for the novel about the medieval knight Ivanhoe. Interestingly, Maltby in Rother Valley boasts Roche abbey, a medieval monastery that was later suppressed by the tyrant Henry VIII. Laughton-en-le-Morthen is home to Castle hill, the remains of a motte and bailey castle on lands granted by William the Conqueror. Anston also appears in Domesday as Anestan, for North Anston, and Litelanstan, for South Anston, potentially referring to a local feature known as “one stone”. The local limestone was perfect for use in buildings and nearly 1,000 years later it was used to construct the very building in which we are currently debating—the Palace of Westminster. Nearby Lindrick Common is suggested by some as the possible site of the battle of Brunanburh, when King Aethelstan overcame the Danes and became Lord of all Britain.

    Elsewhere in Rother Valley, Aston was settled by Saxon invaders in the 5th century, with the village name meaning “the settlement among the ash trees” or “the eastern fortification”. Before the Norman conquest, a man named Lepsi had a manor at Aston. After 1066, William the Conqueror gifted Aston to his son-in-law, William de Warenne. In 1317, the village fell into the possession of the Archbishop of York, who held several leading positions in Government—Lord Privy Seal, Controller of the Royal Household, and Treasurer of the Exchequer. The villages of Ulley, Aughton, Treeton, Brampton-en-le-Morthen, Todwick, and Thurcroft were also all Saxon settlements in Rother Valley. That is just one constituency. There are so many constituencies across England. We all have medieval history in our bones and in our soil—including you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

    However, we should not fall into the trap of teaching medieval history purely though the lens of England. We need to look at our wider place in the medieval world and at the wider impacts. I cannot think of a better example of the most important moments than the reign of the East Roman—some say Byzantine—Emperor Justinian the Great from 527 to 565 AD. His long reign exemplifies the beauty and importance of the teaching of medieval history, with which so many parallels can be drawn through the ages. Of peasant Illyrian stock. Justinian rose to become the most powerful and important man on earth—a lesson we can all learn from. He is remembered for building huge edifices and buildings that last and dominate to this day.

    Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con)

    I was listening with enormous interest to how medieval history surrounds us all. That got me thinking about architecture, which is one of the great examples of history coming to life. My hon. Friend mentioned the medieval period starting with the reign of Diocletian. Of course we see Diocletian windows in classical entablature. But more recently, we have the gothic and the neo-gothic—an example of which we are lucky enough to be in today. I am interested in his views on where we see the accents of medieval history in modern architecture.

    Alexander Stafford

    My hon. Friend makes an important point about the beauty of architecture. We can look at some of the finest medieval buildings across this land. Westminster Hall itself was built under William Rufus, which shows the longevity of medieval architecture. How many buildings nowadays could last 1,000 years, as Westminster Hall has done, or 1,500 years, as Hagia Sophia has done, which Justinian himself rose up in praise of God?

    But Justinian did not just raise up the Hagia Sophia, and many other buildings across the empire. He also did other great works, such as introduce the institutes of Justinian—the great codification and rationalisation of Roman law that, to this day, influences legal systems across the world. Perhaps above all, Emperor Justinian is rightly celebrated for his tenacious nature in refusing to accept decline, and successfully reconquering large parts of the western Roman empire: north Africa, Italy, Spain—not only was his reconquest vast, but it lasted for hundreds of years. The Byzantine empire, the East Roman empire, did not lose parts of Italy until well into the late 11th century. That shows the longevity of his conquests. Some historians claim that they were ephemeral —they were not; they were long lasting.

    Throughout his reign Justinian was supported by his wife Theodora, who is one of the most inspirational female figures in all history, from whom we can all learn. Under his reign, there was the first recorded outbreak of bubonic plague, which is estimated to have killed about 40% of the population of Constantinople. The reign of Justinian clearly had it all, yet like so many other hugely important moments in medieval history, it is being forgotten and is not taught in our schools. Indeed, I think the lack of teaching about Justinian in our schools is an absolute travesty.

    There is clearly an appetite for this history, as we have seen with the recent runaway successes of “The Last Kingdom” on Netflix, and “Game of Thrones”, which some say is inspired by the war of the roses. History bestows on us an understanding of the society, country and world that we live in. It explains why things are as they are today and provides a guide for where we are going. History is also wonderful for inculcating transferable skills, including the ability to reason critically, analyse, cross-reference, absorb and remember large amounts of complex information, and to write coherently.

    Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)

    I am enjoying my hon. Friend’s contribution and his emphasis on the importance of history. Is he aware that the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), who recently entered the Chamber, hosted an event over the road at Westminster School—it was due to be held upstairs under a big painting of Alfred the Great but it had to be moved because of one of the many lockdowns —at which Professor Michael Wood explained the importance of Aethelstan’s assemblies? I for one had no idea that a strong case could be made that the parliamentary system in this country began not with Simon De Montfort in 1265 over the road in the Westminster Chapter House but more than 300 years before that with Athelstan’s assemblies. Of course, Aethelstan was a grandson of Alfred the Great. Are those not things that we should be teaching our children?

    Alexander Stafford

    I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I completely agree. That is exactly what we should be talking about. We should be talking about the witans to which he referred and the coming together of great Anglo-Saxon kings. I commend the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), for his work on promoting that. I am glad to see him in his place listening to the debate—I hope that he will contribute.

    There is no doubt that the lacuna in our collective knowledge of medieval history is largely due to how it is taught in schools and the national curriculum. For maintained schools, history is a compulsory subject only until the age of 14. Proper teaching of medieval history only really starts from the age of seven, when students are only briefly introduced to Britain’s settlement by Anglo-Saxons, and the Viking and Anglo-Saxon struggle for England. For key stage 3, the Anglo-Saxon period, which is 500 years or so, is completely excluded.

    For the optional GCSE in history, it is clear that medieval history is being treated inadequately by exam boards. For example, AQA offers 16 topics in history, but only two directly address the medieval period and three do so tangentially. For Edexcel, of 17 options available, only six touch medieval history and only two directly so. But the problem does not stop there—it gets worse. A-level students are again being deprived of medieval history modules. AQA and Edexcel combined offer 70 history modules, but only seven are exclusively focused on medieval history. Students sitting WJEC papers have it worse as only one module—less than a 20th of the total—is given to medieval history, compared with nine modules on European history.

    The options for history at both GCSE and A-level are a lot more complex than they look at first sight. Many of the papers on offer are so-called theme papers—for example, “Migration to Britain over 1,000 years”—which do not meaningfully address events in medieval history. Finally, many options cannot be sat together, yet again restricting genuine choice and the opportunity to study the period.

    Exam boards and history departments have always seemed to have a drive to curtail medieval history, and especially the early medieval period. In the late 1990s, both AQA and OCR proposed a new syllabus starting at about 1066, cutting out hundreds of years of English history. Luckily, there was a huge effort by lecturers and teachers to save that history, including by my own former history teacher, Robin Nonhebel, who led the charge in defence of Anglo-Saxon history in schools. I am pleased to say that that was a success and I had the opportunity to study medieval and Anglo-Saxon history at A-level, but most schools do not teach that, and most pupils do not have the opportunity to learn about those key events. That is clearly madness.

    The medieval period is pivotal for England, but the focus tends to be rather on the Tudors and Nazis: the so-called Henry and Hitler version of history. Children are taught more about Stalin than about English historical characters. They are even taught more about the civil rights movement in the USA than about the unification of England under Aethelstan.

    Mr Bacon

    Disgraceful.

    Alexander Stafford

    Indeed.

    Looking through the papers offered by exam boards, I was dumbfounded to find topics such as “Migrants in Britain: Notting Hill 1948 to 1970” and “Changes in entertainment and leisure in Britain, c.500 to the present day”. Those papers show the absurdity of the situation. The study of history should not be reduced to bizarre themes, modern niche events over very narrow timespans, or huge topics covering over 1,500 years of history. We cannot learn something like that.

    I praise my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), who during his time as Education Secretary insisted that more medieval A-level courses became available so schools could teach them if they so wished. The problem, however, is that most schools will not teach medieval A-levels because they do not have teachers with the relevant knowledge. The situation is self-perpetuating: as most universities do not have compulsory medieval sections, few history graduates have experienced the delights of medieval history. Therefore, each year, fewer and fewer teachers know any medieval history as older teachers retire and are replaced by younger ones. And the latter, of course, only studied modern history at university.

    The teaching of medieval history can therefore be saved in schools only if universities play their part. Prospective graduate history teachers will want to teach material they are familiar with. If the universities they attended did not teach medieval history, or only provided options which few chose to take, they will not choose to teach it. If medieval history is to flourish again in schools, it needs teachers who have the knowledge to develop courses. We must start this at the latest in year 7. When we talk about the teaching of medieval history in schools, it cannot simply begin in 1066 as if England beforehand was in some dark age miasma.

    Therefore, the study of medieval history must begin with Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Danish rule, include key figures and moments such as King Alfred’s salvation of Wessex, Aethelstan and the formation of the Kingdom of England, and Aethelred the Unready and the long build-up to 1066. We must teach about the roots of Parliament, first under Aethelstan’s Witan, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) said, but also under John, Henry III and the first three Edwards. We must teach the wars of the roses, the black death and the peasants’ revolt, and the important relationships between England and the Celtic nations. We must include the formation of Europe alongside key events such as the crusades, and even international figures such as Justinian, Genghis Khan and the history of the papacy.

    Why is this so important? First, studying medieval history is fun. Vikings, the Norman conquest, and the crusades are obvious in this regard, but so is the religious dimension of King Alfred’s leadership, the battle of Brunanburh in 937, which confirmed the rule of England by the house of Wessex, Charlemagne’s coronation as Emperor in 800 AD, and the rout of the Byzantines when the fourth crusade turned on their allies.

    Secondly, it is often claimed that modern history is more relevant to today’s pupils. Why? Why is the political rivalry between Gladstone and Disraeli any more relevant than the rivalry between Aethelred and Cnut for the control of England, or between Henry II and his rebellious sons? Politics 1,000 years ago encompasses the same ambitions and the same successes and failures as today. It could be said that the modern relations between the Christian and Muslim worlds are more moulded by the crusades than the present relations between France, Britain and Germany are by the second world war. Key moments such as the harrying of the north in 1069 began the pattern of inequality that exists between the north and the south to this day, and the red wall’s rejection of the European Union elites is strikingly similar to the north’s refusal to bow to the very same European elites who occupied this country 1,000 years ago.

    Thirdly, the study of medieval history can be more testing and interesting than modern history because of the relative paucity of sources. Medieval historians and their students have to read between the lines, because there are far fewer lines. And medieval chroniclers were just as adept at spin doctoring or propaganda as Goebbels in the Nazi Reich.

    Fourthly, everyone should know something about the roots of their civilisations. Modern political relationships and civic institutions can only be properly understood by reaching back to study their origins. People should not be allowed to wallow in ignorance about why pilgrimage is important to religion, why Magna Carta helped to frame modern day freedoms, why there are two Houses of Parliament and, most importantly, who the first king of England was—Aethelstan.

    Fifthly, I believe that visiting medieval sites such as Hastings, the Bayeux tapestry, Kenilworth, Bodiam castle and the ruins of Glastonbury are often more interesting and bring history more to life than the battlefields of the world wars.

    I have argued the merits of medieval history, but what can be done to ensure its future in our educational institutions? First, the curriculum must be changed to make history compulsory at GCSE. Secondly, medieval history must be a requirement throughout history education, from the beginning to the end.

    Jerome Mayhew

    I am lucky enough to have a daughter who has just completed her history A-level. The experience of an A-level student in my family—I hope she passed last week—has been to have studied the origins of the first world war as well as the second world war to death. She has done more German history than history of the United Kingdom. Does my hon. Friend agree that there will be plenty of space for medieval history if we tweak the curriculum?

    Alexander Stafford

    I completely agree: there is plenty of space in the curriculum. Earlier, I mentioned that the “Hitler and Henry” version of history is often done to death. Children often study the Nazis and the Soviets at GCSE and then do the same course, just in more depth, at A-level. There is plenty of scope to make room for medieval courses; I have even suggested some papers that could be removed from the syllabus to make even more room for medieval history.

    I turn back to the solutions. Thirdly, medieval history must be taught with sufficient depth and breadth, ensuring that an array of events and figures are covered, including pre-1066. Whistlestop drive-by tours of the battle of Hastings alone must be a thing of the past. Fourthly, we must prevent the teaching of medieval history from being stymied by being included as part of a broad, intangible theme such as “Sports from 1000 AD to 1950 AD”. Fifthly, universities must be told to include compulsory medieval history options on their courses, so that we have a strong and steady stream of teachers with specialisms in medieval history imparting their knowledge to the historians of the future.

    The schools White Paper of March 2022 said that the Government would not make any changes to the school curriculum for the remainder of this Parliament. However, I urge the Minister to heed my policy asks in the next rewrite of the curriculum. I also call on teachers, schools, universities and exam boards to provide a more comprehensive medieval history offering right away. They do not need Government intervention to make that happen; teachers do not need the Government to tell them to take the courses already on offer.

    Medieval history is in our blood; it is our past but also our future. It explains why we are the way we are and why we live the way we live, but it also gives us a guide for what lies ahead. It teaches respect for our heritage, values, and culture, and instils critical reasoning and academic rigour. By teaching medieval history, we are not only preserving the past for future generations, but ensuring that millions more Britons in coming centuries will experience the pleasures of studying such a fascinating and rewarding discipline.