Green Councillor Sarah Nield has today written to the secretary of state for education, Nadhim Zahawi calling on measures to protect schools and communities from the ongoing impacts of covid-19.
Green Councillors in Brighton & Hove have today called for the introduction of a better plan to manage the ongoing impacts of the pandemic in schools.
Highlighting Government figures from one day in March, which show high absences of both staff and pupils in schools across the country, Greens have called on the Secretary of State to recognise the ongoing impacts of the pandemic.
Their letter requests the Government introduce measures which protect pupils and the wider community from the ongoing pandemic, including:
- Adequate funding to improve ventilation in schools
- The return of face masks where covid-19 case rates are high
- Free lateral flow tests to be provided to education settings
In her letter, Cllr Nield, Deputy Chair of the Health & Wellbeing Board & Lead Councillor for Schools said:
“By removing Covid protections the current Guidance for schools does not represent freedom from Covid, or a way to live with the virus within them. For our schools it represents an endless round of infections, illness and upheaval.
“We want what you say you also want: a return to normality and stability for our schools and our young people’s education. But this will never be achieved while Covid spreads unchecked through those schools.
“New Guidance is needed which instates the layered measures necessary to reduce Covid transmission as far as is possible in our schools so that, after two years of near constant crisis, they can finally achieve the sustainable equilibrium which is in our children’s best interests.”