Webchat with Vicky Ford MP, Minister for Children, Friday 15 May at 2.15pm

[RowanMumsnet]

Hello

We're pleased to announce a webchat about COVID-19 and schools with Vicky Ford, Conservative MP for Chelmsford and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children and Families, at 2.15pm on Friday May 15.

As lots of you will already know, the government has recently announced plans to start sending Reception, Year 1 and Year 6 children, as well as nursery children, back to school and nursery settings from June 1. We know lots of you have questions about this, and about policy and plans for schools and schoolchildren in the COVID era more broadly. Vicky will be coming along to give us the government’s response to your concerns and questions.

Vicky was elected MP for Chelmsford in 2017, and has been Minister for Children since February 2020. Before joining Parliament she was an MEP for the East of England constituency in the European Parliament. In a previous life she worked in finance.

Please join us here on Friday at 2.15pm. If you can’t join us on the day, please post up your question in advance.

As always, please remember our guidelines - one question per user, follow-ups only if there’s time and most questions have been answered, and please keep it civil. Also if one topic is dominating a thread, mods might request that people don't continue to post what's effectively the same question or point. (We may suspend the accounts of anyone who continues after we've posted to ask people to stop, so please take note.) Rest assured we will ALWAYS let the guest know that it's an area of concern to multiple users and will encourage them to engage with those questions.

Many thanks,
MNHQ

Good morning, are PVI settings going to be given financial help with Cleaning and helping in making settings safe. Schools have been given a minimum of 25k towards these costs. I run a little village pre-school who are in dire financial straights due to this crisis we are facing, this is because the Furlough scheme and funding situation means have only been able to claim 26% furlough for my six staff, my FEE funding is down by half on the same time for the last three years for the summer term. We cannot claim any of the grants available because we do not meet the thresholds.
I have been looking at the risks for my setting and have decided that we need to buy items and products for cleaning, hand washing supplies, disinfect, gloves and aprons for personal care, visors and mask for each member of the staff. (For use if a child becomes ill whilst in the setting), along with this we need outdoor portable hand-washing stations. We are looking at fencing half the garden off to separate the pods of children. This all comes to over 4K. We just do not have these funds to pay for these products, added to this we are loosing children because parents are scared to send their children in. Therefore reducing our funds and furlough rates coming into the setting. More after some LA’s have advised settings that they will loose the funding for the children that do not return in June. Causing more financial hardships to some settings. How are we supposed to survive as a small business when we are constantly being beaten down and are treated as second rate providers compared to state run schools and nurseries?

The government has significantly weakened LAs' responsibility to provide the support detailed in EHCPs. Given that so many LAs were already failing in their duty to these children, is the Minister concerned that cash strapped LAs will use this as an opportunity to cut back SEND provision? What safeguards are there to ensure that children with SEND will receive the support they need to access an education?

Please can you explain why charitable preschools have not been given the £10000 small business grant YOU promised them.

What help is planned for these essential Early Years Providers who can now not afford to reopen simply because of their business rates classification? (Please don’t fob us off with the mysterious top up grant funding because we all know that has strings attached and we are likely to get a tiny fraction of what our private contemporaries have received, if anything at all...)

If a case of Covid-19 is confirmed in a school, is it government policy that the school should close temporarily until contacts of the infected person have been tested?

Hello thank you for answering questions.

It is not practical to expect children to observe social distancing rules. Do you agree that it would be better to accept the small risk and return all schools to normal in September? If not, what scientific evidence has been used to support your position?

Thank you.

Hello, thank you for doing this.

With regard to the 'ambition' for year 10 and 12 to have some 'face to face support' before the summer holiday and after June 1st at the earliest, has any thought been given to what that should/could look like?

Our local secondary schools are talking about offering one day in total to each year group. So two days between now and September. Was this what was envisaged?

As a self employed nanny working in a families home on a live out basis how am i supposed to socially distance from the 2 other adults in the house and keep 3 young children safe ?

I have 4 at school currently none are in the start back years but my concern is my year 5 child is on shielding isolation until 20th July where does she stand and her siblings with returning to school surely for her best interest none of the siblings return until September?

1. Is there going to be clear statistics relating to these age groups going back in regards to how many have got Kawasaki disease like symptoms or confirmed Covid-19?
2. Will these age groups be tested for Covid-19 if they are showing symptoms so they and their class group in school can get back to class without the fear of not knowing if they have been exposed to the virus when their group is sent home due to one child showing symptoms.
3. Will the impact on the mental health and well-being of sending so many children back to school with such severe social distancing restrictions in place be monitored and all information gathered used to inform and reflect during any future social distancing needed for school children later on down the line. I fear this is going to do more harm to children’s mental health and well-being than good.

Can a mainstream or a special school refuse a place for a child (from June) whose one parent is called back to work and the other parent is a carer for an SEN child, and is mentally struggling to cope with the demands of educating 2 children at home?

Early years teacher here, with a network of many other early years professionals.

We are all desperately concerned by the apparent lack of understanding of what early years provision needs to be to best meet the developmental needs of the child.

We are all VERY concerned that targeting the youngest children for June 1st will have a detrimental impact on their love of and willingness to learn and jeapirdise their socail development.

We strongly believe the impact this will have far outweighs the temporary benefit of childcare. We are all struggling to be part of something that goes against the very needs of the children in our care.

In our professional opinion this will harm their chances of meeting their full potential. We are shouting this out loud and clear but the message is getting lost in the equally important message of concern for health.

Can you please clearly tell me, and the other eyfs professional like me, of the developmental benefits to the 3-5 yo child of returning to provisions which under proposed guidelines, would score so poorly on the ECERs and SSTEWS?

Just to clarify, before you state anything about narrowing the gap between the advantaged and the disadvantaged. The ‘advantaged’ parents in our cohort are banging our doors down pleading for deferral for their children as they are beginning to understand the importance of getting this first step in education right.

It is our ‘disadvantaged’ parents who will, in an attempt to do what is right for their child, unwittingly send their child into provision that can no longer support their development in a holistic manner and therefore as a result further disadvantage their child.

As a parent and a teacher I would like clarification about whether schools must offer full day education to eligible pupils or if they can offer shorter sessions if they do not have enough of their regular staff available, without needing to get in total strangers (supply) to teach already confused and distressed children. (As per the latest non stat planning guidance) Thankyou.

Why have the government repeatedly refused to meet with the NEU, or respond to any of the Unions concerns?

Please dont explain they will meet now, explain why those meetings were refused when decisions were being made.

2nd question.

Will you be encouraging the exclusion of year 10 and 12 students who purposefully cough in a student or teacher/ school workers face.

If not, what safeguarding measures have the government put into place to prevent this and minimise the risk, considering we are told not to use masks?

Can you clarify why the youngest children are going back first, it seems rather coincidental that 3 of the year groups face testing next year. (Baseline, phonics screening, SATS) As are the year groups 10 and 12. This leads me to believe the government aren’t using science to decide about reopening schools.

Most schools/heads and teachers use one word: unenforceable. I am not allowing my children to go to school until September. Will I get fined, would I be sent to prison if I don't pay? I am ready to go to court to protect my decision. My kids attend the digital school plus private tuition with face to face online teaching. Sadly I have to pay to achieve that. I am the teacher for my 2 treasures (one with SEN) and I work from 5.00pm until 2/3 am at home. I am exhausted but we stay at home. I always follow the rules and law but UK has the highest infection/highest death rate, no full/proper/forced lockdown, no testing, no protection. Nurses are collecting sheets?! I can see myself as a PTA member to collect masks, shields to protect our teachers, and fundraising for deep, disinfection. I feel like I live in a 3rd world country. People died at home because they were scared to call the NHS, while poorer countries send ambulance for every sick person and they get tested in the vehicle. Nothing was ready and nothing has changed. Except public transport got jammed packed now with 0.5 cm social distancing. My children use public transport to go to school. If my child will be sick, no ambulance will get them and they will not get tested. Sadly I am also considered high risk; I can sacrifice a lot for my country but we will not get sick and risk death because of education. Health is number 1 and above everything. I

Why are teachers being asked to stand in a room with 15 others for 7 hours a day with no PPE? You aren’t asking this of any other profession. Where is the science to prove this is safe for my children and the teachers? The 15 person bubble is not truly a bubble -someone will have touched the cutlery they use at lunch, they will touch a door handle or tap that another child has touched, there is no way of controlling if the families are adhering to social distancing rules or even if the children come in clean clothes each day.

I would like to know what changes you are planning to introduce into the Childcare and Early years education sector once the dust has settled. Clearly this sector has been vastly impacted by this pandemic and many settings are at high risk of closure. The entire sector is and has been in crisis for many years and there is detailed evidence to support this. We are underpaid undervalued and struggling to make ends meet by no means are many settings double profiting from either scheme!
Will you accept responsibility for this chaos incurred and speak with both the Education Minister and the Chancellor and US to rectify this and inform US of your strategy for the coming months and our continued future!

My child is having massive issues not being able to socialise (as im sure alot of children are). However he has a fear of getting close to anybody now due to being terrified of getting ill. He already has attachment disorder and trouble with bonding/socialising. I have tried to explain the virus to him in the best way i can and also that there are a lot of people actually surviving the virus, I also try to reasure him the best i can. Im worried about him mental wellbeing during and after the pandemic. Are schools and/or the government going to provide services to help children feel safe again? And possibly deal with any phycological issues they may have because of the pandemic

I would like to know why we cannot get 80% furloughed pay for our staff as we get nef funding when there are companies out there that can furlough some of their staff at the full 80% and still have other staff members works. My setting is not by any means "double profiting" but other companies out of the childcare sector can? I welcome you to come and visit us and see my books. I can stay open until end of July and feel alot of other people within the sector may close.

I was devastated to see the Government shockingly drop its commitment to bringing in age verification for online pornographic sites, despite it being ready, being popular with parents, and the legislation being passed. What will the Government now do instead to protect children from the harms of seeing disgusting, misogynistic, violent online pornography? In my view, this is a horrific ticking time bomb as we allow the distortion of our children's normal, healthy sexual development. A generation of smart phone owning children can currently access the most violent and degrading pornography in seconds.

I watched the news report last night about students entering schools and hand washing. I noticed that the handwashing technique was poor and the tap was not cleaned. Who is teaching/ supervising? If students are using shared facilities incorrectly, infection will spread.

Why such an early reopening date? If children are such low risk of being transmitters, why can they return to school but still not see their grandparents at 2m distance outside. Stage 3 (July 4) would be much better to aim for.

Horrified that there will be no year 6 transition visits to secondary. It is either safe or not safe for the children to return. If safe then secondary should be making the adaptations to support transition with visits. For my SEN child needing extended transition and who has been out of school since November this was the hope for a successful reintroduction to school. The implications on families, the child and long term of getting this wrong is huge! So my question is how can it be justified for year 6 to return to school but secondary not to support the transition in whatever way is needed for each child.