Skip to content
16 April 2026

Tag: Robert Halfon

Where is £3.1bn catch-up cash coming from, MPs ask DfE

MPs have demanded ministers provide answers regarding the £3.1 billion in catch-up funding after the government’s own sums appeared not to add up. It is unclear whether all of the money provided has been additional monies, or if some has been derived from DfE savings elsewhere The education select committee has written to Gavin Williamson […]

Tell us how grade inflation can be ‘washed out’, MPs urge Williamson

MPs have demanded to know how 2020 grade inflation will eventually be “washed out” of the exams system. In a letter to education secretary Gavin Williamson, education committee chair Robert Halfon said he was “keen to know your current thinking” about how grade inflation can be ended “once you deem it is appropriate to do […]

MPs to look at ‘more active’ inspection role in new home education inquiry

MPs have launched an inquiry into home learning which will include looking at the role inspections should play in the future regulation of home educating. The education select committee has announced today it will be investigating how home-educated children are being supported in their learning and also looking at the impact the Covid-19 pandemic has […]

Broadcast Oak Academy lessons on TV, says education committee chair

Recorded lessons such as those put together by the Oak National Academy should be shown on television, the chair of the Parliamentary education committee has said. Robert Halfon has written to culture secretary Oliver Dowden to ask what “incentives and funding could be put in place to encourage the creation and transmission of such content […]

Halfon’s ‘reckless’ plan to scrap GCSEs a ‘non-starter’, says baccalaureate fan

Calls to replace GCSEs and A-levels with a “holistic baccalaureate” have been branded a “non-starter” by an advocate of a similar model. Tom Sherrington, a trustee of the National Baccalaureate Trust, warned that “headline-grabbing” comments made this week by Robert Halfon, the chair of the education select committee, and a number of other high-profile leaders […]

Why reinvent the education wheel, when a solution already exists?

It’s great that we’re talking about alternatives to GCSEs and A-Levels, but we don’t need to start from scratch – there’s already a qualification out there, says Ryan Kelsall Robert Halfon this week advocated the scrapping of GCSEs and A-Levels in favour of a broader baccalaureate-style education, with a mix of academic and vocational subjects, and […]

Halfon: Give schools their own NHS-style 10 year plan

Education needs a ten-year funding plan like the one drawn up for the NHS, the chair of the parliamentary education committee has said. Writing in Schools Week, Robert Halfon (pictured), a former education minister and Conservative Party deputy chairman, said it was “inexplicable and astonishing” that the health service can have a ten-year funding and […]

Careers and Enterprise Company will face questions from MPs

The parliamentary education committee will question the leaders of the government’s Careers Enterprise Company next week. Claudia Harris, the organisation’s chief executive, will appear alongside chair Christine Hodgson on Wednesday May 16. They will answer questions about the company’s role in the delivery of the government’s careers strategy and their wider work coordinating careers and enterprise support and guidance. […]