Education secretary slams schools which close ‘far too early’ in the day

Gavin Williamson also cautioned that exams were unlikely to return to normal next year

Education secretary Gavin Williamson has criticised schools which close “far too early” in the day just weeks after ministers unveiled a Covid catch-up programme which did not include extending pupils’ hours.

Mr Williamson hit out at secondary schools he said were finishing at 2.45pm or even earlier.

The education secretary also hinted his department could crack down on the practise, saying he did not want it to “continue”.

His comments come just weeks after the government’s education Tsar quit warning a plan to help students catch up after the pandemic did not go far enough.

Sir Kevan reportedly asked for £15bn to be spent on the programme. Instead ministers announced just a fraction of that budget.

Sir Kevan is also thought to have called for 100 extra hours of teaching per pupil - including for sports, music and the arts. A longer school day was not included in the plan, although ministers said they would continue to look at the issue.

Mr Williamson told the Commons Education Committee today: "We do have, sadly, a number of schools that are finishing too early in my view and I don’t want to see that continue."

Historically there had been "very little information published" on the issue, he said, but more work was being done to "build up a lot more evidence" on the benefits of a longer school day.

He said he was "very concerned" at secondary schools closing at 2.45pm or 3pm or even earlier.

He added: "On average, secondary schools are open for as long on average as primary schools. But in the post-16 environment, actually the average amount of time spent actually declines.

"We’re the only country in Europe where you see that difference and I think that actually sort of presents some concerns and some worries."

He also said university leaders should ask themselves “very searching questions” if some of their courses were not “opening doors” into employment for students.

Mr Williamson also warned that exams were unlikely to return to normal by next year. He said "adjustments and mitigations" would likely be required to ensure fairness.

He told MPs: "We very much hope and intend for exams to go ahead in 2022 as well as vocational technical qualifications as well.

"We’re considering what we need to do to ensure that there’s fairness and there’s the right level of support for pupils."

Asked if he expected adjustments to be required next year and possibly in subsequent years, he said: "I very much expect there to be …adjustments and mitigations to be put in place because I think that those youngsters who currently are in year 10 and year 12 will have obviously suffered disruption as a result of the pandemic. So I think that you don’t have a situation of immediately switching back to the absolute sort of same.. situation as it was back in 2019."

He told the committee he would "far prefer to see children sitting exams", but added: "We very much recognise that we can’t predict what we are going to be facing over the coming years".