'It Will Be Up To Parents To Make Sure Children Are Tested Regularly'

Education Secretary’s plan to keep schools safe

- Macer Hall

Parents must make sure their children take home Covid tests when they go back to school, the Education Secretary said yesterday.

Gavin Williamson said secondary pupils should have two tests a week when classroom lessons resume.

Fathers and mothers will be told to “support” their offspring in carrying out lateral-flow tests – nose and throat swabs – at home from March 8.

Mr Williamson added that schools will be required to keep open some space for pupils unable to do them off-site.

He said: “I certainly hope that parents will be encouraging and supporting children but we are also asking schools to keep open an asymptomatic testing centre.

“So if children haven’t been able to get the support or help they need to do the test at home, it is possible to do the test in school as well.” Jenny Harries, deputy chief medical officer for England, said the virus checks are “very simple things to do”. She added that “many of the public” were doing them.

She said: “The testing programme in schools is clearly going to mean that people – parents, grandparents and teachers and other school children – can be very assured schools will be as safe as they can be because we are trying to remove infection from that environment.”