Teachers warn over schools reopening

A teaching union chief says the Government must rethink its plan to get children back to school as the coronavirus lockdown eases.

Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said Prime Minister Boris Johnson is risking “squandering a great deal of parental goodwill”.

Dr Bousted was speaking after a survey of more than 1,000 parents conducted by the union found 33% do not immediately plan to send their children back to school once measures are relaxed and 92% feel that the closure of schools has been an important factor in containing coronavirus.

She said: “The NEU has supported the lockdown, but the past few days have revealed the Government’s garbled approach to the next phase. In his haste to use schools as a symbol of recovery, the Prime Minister has merely succeeded in revealing the incoherence at the heart of his strategy.”

She added: “Now that the Prime Minister has set himself on a course out of lockdown, he needs to act fast to reassure unions, school staff and parents that when schools do open it will only be when our shared and widespread concerns for personal safety are fully met.”

The NEU commissioned a Deltapoll of 1,024 parents of school-age children in England last week.

In he poll 82% of parents said schools should only reopen when the Covid-19 new case count is much lower than it is now, 77% said extensive testing and contact tracing must be in place, and 84% said scientific or medical evidence must show that it is safe.