We have reviewed our plans for the inspections of schools,
early years and further education, which were due to begin
next week. In light of a change in emphasis from the
government and clear advice to ‘act as if you have the
virus’ over the next few weeks, we have decided that all
planned inspection activity will be carried out remotely
until March 8 at the earliest.
We have sought regular advice from Public Health England
and we remain satisfied that our planned on-site activity
would be safe and appropriate under current restrictions.
However, the new government messages and the practical
challenges of deploying inspectors across England have
prompted this change.
Remote inspections
of schools and further education providers will begin
from 25 January, with a particular focus on how well
children and learners are being educated remotely. We will
inspect schools rated ‘inadequate’ or ‘requires
improvement’ as planned, but we will also follow up on
complaints raised by parents across all grades of school in
order to resolve issues. As these inspections will not
involve an on-site visit, they will be unable to cover the
full scope of a monitoring inspection. We will publish
details of the inspection process shortly.
We will continue to undertake on-site inspections if we
have immediate concerns – for example about safeguarding,
the leadership of a school or a failure to provide
education to children.
It is not possible to provide the necessary level of
assurance of early years providers without an on-site
inspection of the premises, so early years
assurance visits will be paused until March 8 at the
earliest.
We will continue with our vital regulatory work in early
years and children’s social care. This work will sometimes
require on-site visits, which will be risk-assessed based
on the nature of the premises and the urgency of the work.
