Schools "unlikely to open without financial support package for parents" says former Chief Scientist
The Government's former Chief Scientific Advisor and Cambridge Academic Sir David King has said he thinks it's unlikely that schools will open in the new year without a proper financial support package for lower-paid parents.
The Government say secondary school pupils’ return to class in England will be staggered in the first week back after the Christmas holidays.
Yesterday housing minister Robert Jenrick said schools would reopen in the new year, with plans to implement a mass-testing system key to that reopening.
Professor Sir David King, who served as the Chief Scientific Advisor to Gordon Brown and Tony Blair and as climate change advisor under Theresa May, said he feared many parents in lower paid jobs would be forced to send their children to school without a proper financial support package for self isolating.
He said: "What we need is a system of support, where those people who are tested and found to be ill are given proper support."
The Government do offer a £500 payment for those who are self isolating and fulfil this eligibility criteria:
if you’re self-isolating because you tested positive for coronavirus, or because you were told to by NHS Test and Trace or the NHS COVID-19 app
if you’re employed or self-employed and unable to work from home
if you’re on a low income - for example if you get certain benefits
It's still unclear as to whether the new variant of Covid-19 is more transmissible through children, but early suggestions are that it could be.
Sir David said that the Government should be requisitioning large spaces like hotels and events centres to teach children outside of smaller classrooms, where the virus may be more likely to spread.