Sunday Times just reported that all schools in England will be back on 8 March

[LimitIsUp]

This quote from the article:
"All schoolchildren will return to the classroom on March 8 under plans to start lifting the lockdown, Boris Johnson will announce in a national address next week.

Under the government’s blueprint to reopen society, adults will initially have only small new freedoms so as to prioritise the return of schools — a move ministers know will raise the coronavirus R number for infections.

Adults will be allowed to sit down outdoors for a coffee or on a park bench with one friend, or with members of their own family — a slight relaxation of the current rule, which permits outdoor meetings only while standing up.

The decision to reopen both primary and secondary schools goes against the advice of some government scientists. But the prime minister was swayed by faster than expected reductions in hospital admissions and infections."

I can link to the article but for those of you without a subscription, there is a pay wall

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/back-to-school-on-march-8-as-johnson-starts-lifting-lockdown-0v5zbz5bt

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• Title edited by MNHQ (it said October, we've changed it to March as reported) *

Schools will go back, rates of infection will go up but no-one will blame it on children spreading the infection, they'll be saying it's pubs or Sainsbury's or too much sitting down in the park....

Yes, exactly this! It’ll be blamed on all that sitting down in the park, and the government will issue large spot fines for people caught sitting down outside. Thousands of kids sitting crammed together inside into schools won’t be the cause though, it’s only non-academic sitting that’ll be to blame.

If the plan is ‘to reopen all schools just as before’ then the government really have learnt nothing.

@AnniversaryScaresMe

This is ridiculous. Kids mixing in schools whilst adults still can't see even one person at home? They are torturing the population.

Err that would be because children need to go to school for an education whereas you need another adult to visit your home for a chat.

@Hardbackwriter giggling at the sarcasm in your post but I feel exactly the same. They expect us to be grateful that we can sit down after March 8th? I sat to tie my shoe on my run yesterday I do hope the police don’t come knocking today! Honestly what have we become.

@Allmyarseandpeggymartin

Lol for the one other person can sit on a park bench with another person!

What have we become?

Also people are doing this now bojo just FYI

Indeed, what have we become.

If Johnson, Hancock or any of their sidekicks that get wheeled out told the nation that "as of Monday, foxtrotting down the road is encouraged, as there is scientific evidence that it reduces transmission.", you can bet there would be some doing it!

Sorry no idea why the link didn’t work. It does when I look at it. Here is part of the article:

Lockdown has led to an “explosion” of children with disabling tics disorders and Tourette's syndrome, the president of the British Paediatric Neurology Association has said.

Consultants across the country have seen a “worrisome upshift” in the number of youngsters whose stress or anxiety has led them to suffer from debilitating tics, according to Dr Alasdair Parker.

His remarks come amid warnings that children will suffer life-long consequences from lockdown and that the “young have been sacrificed for the old” during the pandemic.

Dr Parker told The Telegraph that while mild tics can be fairly common in children, specialists have noted a marked increase in children displaying far more “troublesome” and complex issues in recent months.

“The most severe tics disorders I have seen over the last 20 years have all presented in the last five months to my practise,” Dr Parker said.

The only saving grace is that it will be 3 weeks until Easter, then may half term and then summer.
Doors and windows can be opened and teaching outside more freely...

There have been plenty of children at school during lockdown. Some schools have 70-80% occupancy but the numbers are still going down!!

Louise thank you!

The school keyworker system is ridiculously abused today anyway. The schools are already opened for 50% of the kids!

Of course they need to reopen to ALL the children.

If adults can't follow rules and guidelines, why should children be penalised. Blame the government for not issuing enough fines.

@EmmanuelleMakro

Adults will be allowed to sit down outdoors for a coffee or on a park bench with one friend, or with members of their own family — a slight relaxation of the current rule, which permits outdoor meetings only while standing up. This is the bit that got me /like this is sone kind of major concession! Where I am people are doing this now anyway and rates are pretty much the lowest in the country. I can’t believe how easily we’ve been disempowered

In England it us NOT allowed to meet with one other person standing up (or sitting down). You are allowed to exercise with one other person eg go for a walk/run/bike ride etc. I'm struggling to think of any exercise you can do standing still. People saying we can meet up with one other person for a chat are wrong.

All school children should absolutely be back in school on the 8th March (if not before) so I really hope this is correct. Most children/teens have been out of school for way too long already and the damage to many will only increase the longer this goes on.

Encouraging that the wording used in the Sunday Times article is definitive rather than 'could' or 'likely' so I am feeling optimistic this morning!

Numbers aren’t going down everywhere, even with lockdown. But worrying for those living in places where cases are steady or rising.

Bling12
The statistical chance of many of those things happening is quite small. The risk to poor outcomes for children and young people to keeping schools closed is high. I go with opening schools on 8th March.

@Letseatgrandma

Schools will go back, rates of infection will go up but no-one will blame it on children spreading the infection, they'll be saying it's pubs or Sainsbury's or too much sitting down in the park....

Yes, exactly this! It’ll be blamed on all that sitting down in the park, and the government will issue large spot fines for people caught sitting down outside. Thousands of kids sitting crammed together inside into schools won’t be the cause though, it’s only non-academic sitting that’ll be to blame.

If the plan is ‘to reopen all schools just as before’ then the government really have learnt nothing.

Spot on. The graphs that showed cases in schools that led to them being closed will be back again shortly sadly as no new mitigation’s are being mentioned. How many staff will have been vaccinated by then, very few I would imagine under the current criteria. Not to mention the community spread via children to parents, relatives, then workplaces, shops etc.

It's pretty obvious non one is respecting the lockdown anyway.

people are using "bubbles" to carry on as normal, have sleepovers, meet family and friends, and how many are going away for half-term when they can stay in their holiday home or with friends?

Keeping the schools closed is just wrong.

@Louiselady500

There have been plenty of children at school during lockdown. Some schools have 70-80% occupancy but the numbers are still going down!!

Most schools have low numbers of children in - we've got about 25-30% in where I work, many of them part-time. Even with that, the school has had to close due to low staff numbers as a result of Covid infections and isolation. You get a parent with Covid who has three DC at the same school, DC catch it before the parent has a test, they infect their classmates across three classes, who then infect their siblings... It's happened to our school in the last ten days.

It's a bloody miracle that infections have fallen as fast as they have.

This is ridiculous. They need to vaccinate school staff before they even consider sending pupils back in as getting a whole school to do the quick tests will be difficult and in school bubbles don't work at preventing the spread no matter how hard the staff try.

I really hope they add:

• Masks to be worn in classrooms for secondary
• ECV parents and CV parents who havent been vaccinated can choose to keep children at home without risk of fines
• ECV teachers not in school until two vaccines, and escalation of first vaccine for CV teachers so they have some protection before 8 March
• Return to isolating whole bubbles not just the child sitting next to the positive case
• Make it a criminal offence to send a child who should be isolating to school
• Secondary schools on a rota (blended learning) to enable social distancing and reduce transmission between year groups

Then we might have a chance of it working.

Yes fuck the y11s and y13s who have missed a massive chunk of their 2 year course. Its easy to say you can mitigate education when you have primary aged children.

Forgot to quote!

Thank you Louise.
My ds has started with tics from December onwards. He has ASD and an EHCP, wasn’t in school last year but has been this time round thank god. His normal life revolves Around trampoline parks, soft play and visits to grandparents. This has all been on hold for the last year.

Strewth - I'll get me coat...

@MoirasRoses

Incorrect about newspapers, *@NovemberR* - it’s well known Downing Street leak their plans into the press to gage public opinion. They’ve done it repeatedly over the last year. If it’s reported in the Times or Telegraph, you can certainly believe it’s the current line of thought! Tories together & all that.

Also, who had a clue you had to be bloody stood up to meet friends outdoors 😂 I mean, it’s been either raining or -1 for weeks, so I certainly haven’t sat down but good grief, it’s laughable. I hope it was OK to sit on my sledge while my friend sat on another. 😂 good job no-one was policing our sledging hill, children sat down sharing sledges left right & centre!

Anarchy in the UK !!!

@moomoogalicious

Yes fuck the y11s and y13s who have missed a massive chunk of their 2 year course. Its easy to say you can mitigate education when you have primary aged children.

I think you mean year 10's, 11's, year 12's and year 13's

If all school years go back 8th March the Easter holidays will act as a natural circuit breaker if no other restrictions are lifted. Allowing them to say the return to school has no impact then when they open up other stuff, schools continue but with no natural circuit breaker if numbers go up it won’t point to the schools again...for the sake of 3 weeks in school I would rather wait until after the Easter holidays for them to return (I am fortunate that I can work from home for an understanding employer so appreciate I don’t need the kids back I school quite as much as others might)