WHITE DISADVANTAGED PUPILS REPORT

Today I spoke in the Westminster Hall debate on the ‘White Disadvantaged Pupils Report’ released earlier this week by the Education Select Committee, of which I am a member. I mentioned how I have been surprised by some of the comments from the opposition benches, claiming that this is all to do with austerity and poverty in a general sense. Surely if this was true then all students, from all ethnicities and backgrounds, would be impacted in the same way? This just isn’t the case. When the facts are right there in front of them, some people seem determined to ignore them. I do wonder if this is either a case of wilful ignorance, or a sense that this group is less deserving of support than other disadvantaged groups? The key issue to me here is that there is a disparity between one particular disadvantaged group performing less well than other disadvantaged groups. The report clearly highlights that and it cannot be ignored.