My Lords, I declare my interests as a patron of the Traveller Movement, a member of the All-Party Group for Gypsies, Travellers and Roma and a founding chair of the All-Party Group on Bullying. The noble Lord, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, has introduced his probing Amendments 171J and 171K, ensuring that the Secretary of State reports on spoken language, or oracy, and communication, and that Ofsted
“must assess the provision available to develop pupils’ spoken language and communication skills”.
I support these amendments, and not just because of the problems that very young pupils have had with lockdown during the pandemic. He laid out very clearly why oracy is absolutely critical for children right from the very start, and certainly in their early years once they get to school.
In some areas it can be extremely difficult for children with speech and language difficulties to get any appointment at all, let alone a speedy appointment, with speech and language therapists, who, frankly, are among the unsung heroes of the NHS and the education system. The Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, in its response to the Health and Social Care Select Committee inquiry into clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic, has identified that a minimum increase is needed in the speech and language therapist workforce of 15%, but year-on-year increases in recent times have been around 1/10th tenth of that, at 1.7%. Then there are delays while newly qualified speech and language therapists gain the expertise they need. Meanwhile, the schools White Paper—Opportunity for All, which was published in March—is silent on how to reduce the ever-widening language gap for disadvantaged or disabled schoolchildren.
I know from my granddaughter’s experience of SLT support almost from birth—because she frequently used an oxygen mask and had a feeding tube down her
throat for the first three years of her life—that SLTs can perform miracles with babies, toddlers and children who literally cannot use their voice for large parts of the day. Without more staff, though, they cannot work with more children. I absolutely support the aims of the amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Watson, but, frankly, we have to tackle the workforce issue too. I hope the Minister will tell the House how the increasing speech and language workload can be managed without a corresponding increase in therapists.
Amendment 171L, on a children’s Covid-19 recovery plan, looks extremely sensible. I have one question for the Minister. Last week, an employment tribunal confirmed that an employee suffering from symptoms of long Covid was disabled for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010—by the way, more cases are in the pipeline and lawyers are saying we will shortly have a considerable amount of case law history. In addition to that, academic studies in the UK, Europe and the USA now recognise that a small number of children get long Covid, and get it badly. Can the Minister say if the advice to head teachers about long Covid, for both staff and pupils, will be updated to reflect that some may have long Covid so badly that they are to be regarded as disabled, with consequences for employment and for SEND?
I have signed Amendments 171N, 171O, 171P and 171Q, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, on the creation of a duty to register protected-characteristic-based bullying, and I am very much looking forward to hearing the noble Baroness. She is an outstanding advocate for our Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, and is co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Gypsies, Travellers and Roma.
I think it might be helpful to quote from the statutory guidance for schools on pupils with medical conditions. Paragraph 3 says:
“In addition to the educational impacts, there are social and emotional implications associated with medical conditions. Children may be self-conscious about their condition and some may be bullied or develop emotional disorders such as anxiety or depression around their medical condition.”
Many schools now have effective anti-bullying policies and practices but that is not universal, and still too many children suffer immensely from bullying.
I am a co-founder of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Bullying, and we have had joint meetings with the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Gypsies, Travellers and Roma, of which I am also a member, to take evidence about how GRT children are treated in and out of school. Our last session, which was pre pandemic, was eye-opening. Perhaps the most shocking evidence was of the number of racist incidents to GRT children in schools by their teachers that were then copied by other children. The use of derogatory names, assumptions about their lifestyles and the lack of interest in their academic progress all breached the Equality Act 2010, but very rarely could families take them up, as head teachers or governors were not interested. As a contrast to that, we also had evidence from schools that were doing an exceptional job with the same sort of children, and you could not recognise that this was the same community at all.
However, I am afraid that the same challenges were faced by other children who look or sound different. The wonderful charity Changing Faces continues to fight for ending appearance-related discrimination, but it has told the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Bullying that, for many children with a visible deformity, school is not the welcoming place that we all assume it should be.
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One six year-old girl I know well has a large birthmark on her leg. She is already being teased—let us call it that—about it. She feels uncomfortable, wants to wear a uniform that means it cannot ever be seen, and is worried about days when she has to wear a swimsuit. Her parents have raised the issue with teachers, but it is only one step on, if that teasing continues and increases, to the pupil getting worried about going to school. That is the experience of children who are now looked after by Changing Faces. The targeting can escalate all too easily. It may be only a small disability, but PHSE at school should be managing the practical examples that pupils face in their own lives.
The amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, would ensure that the bullying of children of all protected characteristics, including race and disability among others, did not go unreported. They would provide a suite of techniques for recording and reporting, which would provide important data for schools, local authorities and, at a national level, Ministers. I am delighted to have added my name to them and I look forward to the Minister’s response.