On Friday, 18th March, Nadhim Zahawi acknowledged that school closures were a mistake. If he and Government actually mean this, they need to back it up with action and adopt the Essential Infrastructure Bill.
Please send the following email, and share it with any parents you know who would be against further school closures.
Please direct to:
nadhim.zahawi.mp@parliament.uk
ministers@education.gov.uk
And copy in your MP and :
halfon4harlow@roberthalfon.com
munira.wilson.mp@parliament.uk
Dear Secretary of State
On 18 March 2022, you acknowledged that closing schools during the pandemic was a mistake. You state that it was “wrong to bar hundreds of thousands of children from classes”. You are right. It was a catastrophic decision, one that has led to a catalogue of injustices for the children of the United Kingdom. The latest research has found that around 120 thousand children are persistently absent from school, with over 2 million frequently missing school (source: BBC) and there have been over a million children who have had specialist mental health referrals made by GPs and hospitals (source: The Telegraph). To add to these concerns there is now a burgeoning obesity crisis amongst our young (source: digital.nhs.uk).
As such I am writing to you today to ask that you support and adopt Robert Halfon’s Essential Infrastructure Bill. This Bill states that the government of the United Kingdom needs to make provision for educational settings including early years, schools, colleges and universities to be classified as essential infrastructure and remain open to all students during public health and other national emergencies; and for connected purposes.
As a nation, we need to ensure that we never shut the doors of our schools again. As Secretary of State, I call on you to back and adopt Robert Halfon’s Bill, supporting him to ensure that any decision on closing or restricting education has children’s interests at their centre.I look forward to your response and ask that you back the Essential Infrastructure Bill as a matter of urgency.
Best wishes,
[Name AND Address]