Back to school week must start a new era for our schools

Visiting Haringey Learning Partnership for last year's International Women's Day celebration. Head Gerry Robinson and the team, supported by Haringey's Labour Council, do incredible work with young people who have struggled in mainstream settings.

Nothing says more about the state of our nation than the wellbeing of our children, yet there is so much work to do for our new Labour government.

I’m proud of the incredibly hard work going on in schools in Haringey and Barnet to provide supportive environments and high quality education. I was pleased to see Haringey Learning Partnership receive national coverage this week for bucking the national trend with their results supporting young people who have struggled in mainstream settings.

Yet as children in Hornsey & Friern Barnet return to school this week, they do so in the national backdrop of crumbling school buildings, teacher shortages, declining attendance, falling standards, and a broken system that is letting down so many children with special educational needs.

Labour will put education back at the heart of national life with free breakfast clubs in primary schools, and better mental-health support and inclusion for children with special educational needs and disabilities within mainstream settings right across the age range. We will focus on early intervention, whether that’s getting the right speech and language support in the earliest years when it’s so vital or working with families to spot attendance problems early and support children back into the classroom.

Our focus will be on ensuring children in all our state schools can enjoy high and rising standards, breaking down the barriers to opportunity that harm the lives of so many talented young people. That includes making the curriculum richer and broader with the arts and sport receiving the priority it deserves, improved careers guidance, and recruiting 6,500 expert teachers. We’ll fund this by removing the tax break for private schools.

One of the joys of my role as an MP is the opportunities it brings me to visit our schools and to welcome so many school groups to Parliament. I always get the most difficult and interesting questions from our young people! But on these visits I have also seen how tough the last decade has been for our Heads, teachers and support staff who have too often felt abandoned by the government that should have been there to support them. Our schools were on the frontline during COVID, and they have stayed there picking up the pieces afterwards, helping children catch up with their learning and supporting those who have struggled with their mental health. They’ve done this in the face of shrinking budgets and an often-hostile government.

Teachers lay the foundations of children’s lives. An investment in them is an investment in the next generation, and Labour is determined to make sure every child – whatever their background – has the opportunity to succeed. I’m pleased that the Education Secretary Bridget Philipson accepted the pay review body’s award of an above inflation pay rise for hard working teachers this year, and we’ve scrapped the one word Ofsted judgements that don’t reflect the rich picture of the work going on within the classroom. Instead, our report cards will offer a much clearer, broader picture of how schools are performing.

I hope the first week back has been a good one for families, teachers, and support staff across Hornsey & Friern Barnet. Let’s make this new term the beginning of a new era for our children, with education back at the heart of national life.