Our schools, colleges and university are exceptional. I fight for fairer funding for all.
Essex MPs successfully campaigned for fairer funding for our schools and next year funding for our Chelmsford schools will increase by over 6%. Well up on the national average of 4%.
In February 2020, I was enormously honoured to join the Government as Minister for Children and Families. I remained in close contact with the heads across Chelmsford and am deeply impressed by their resilience, professionalism and commitment during this most difficult of years. In September 2021 during a government reshuffle, I became Minister for Africa at the Foreign Office.
The Government’s ‘catch up’ package for the next academic year, worth a total of £1bn, to help support children and young people to catch up after the recent period of disruption to their education. It includes a ‘Catch Up Premium’ worth £650m to help make up for lost teaching time for all pupils.
Alongside this, we have announced a new £350m national tutoring programme for disadvantaged students. This will increase access to high quality tuition for disadvantaged and vulnerable children and young people, helping to accelerate their academic progress and tackling the attainment gap between them and their peers.
Furthermore, in order to support the Early Years sector the government has agreed to bulk buy childcare hours for next autumn term based on the attendance levels pre-covid and on the January 2020 actual term attendance.
This funding will be passed to local authorities for them to distribute. It will be paid to local authorities even if children are unable to attend or settings are closed for covid related matters.
