Paul Whiteman, general secretary of NAHT, which represents
leaders in the majority of schools, said:
“This is another last-minute mess which could so easily have been
avoided if the government had listened to school leaders before
the holidays. Instead, back then, schools that wanted to shift to
remote learning were threatened with legal action. Now we have a
situation where the government is instructing schools to reduce
the amount of teaching time available.
“If we’d had the freedom to take action before the holidays, we
might have been in a position to have more schools open for more
pupils. School leaders will be baffled, frustrated and
justifiably angry tonight.
“All along, we have called for mass testing in schools. However
the resources are not there yet. Neither is there any detail to
support the rationale for closing some schools and not others and
why primaries and special schools are being treated differently
to secondaries.
“The delays announced by the secretary of state do at least show
that the government now agrees with us that more time is needed
to deliver mass testing. However, it is a mystery why this has
taken so long. Once again the government has dallied and we’ve
ended up with a worse picture than we would have done.
“It is not clear that the government knows how many staff and
volunteers will be needed to deliver mass testing safely and
effectively.
“What we have here is the education system supporting the public
health response to Covid, when what we need is support from the
health system to preserve the quality of education for young
people. Teaching is the only profession that is being asked to do
two things – preserve education for children AND play a part in
the mass testing programme.
“If mass testing is a priority, then the government needs to put
much more clout into it – and school staff need to be put on the
priority list for testing.
“Confusion continues in the government’s response to coronavirus.
Today, the government appears to be following neither the science
nor what education professionals have said is necessary to
preserve the quality of education for young people. The
government cannot expect to command public confidence with such a
consuming and last-minute set of plans.”
