Ofsted boss says school inspections will continue
- Despite unions calling for a pause in inspections after head teacher Ruth Perry took her life while waiting for an Ofsted report, Ofsted’s boss says that they will continue.
- Chief inspector of Ofsted, Amanda Spielman has said that stopping school inspections in England would be against “children’s best interests.”
- She insists that “any changes to the current system would have to meet the needs both of parents and of government.”
- President of the National Association of head Teachers Paul Gosling has called for the grading system to be removed.
- He suggests that they replace it with a list of what a school does well and what needs improving.
- For more on this story, please visit the BBC News website.
Food banks supported 800,000 UK children in 2021-22
- New data shows that families, including 800,000 children, had to use food banks to feed themselves following the first year of the pandemic.
- It is thought these levels will have risen rapidly since the removal of the £20-a-week uplift to universal credit in October 2021 and the current cost of living crisis.
- A fifth of the UK population was in relative poverty in 2021-22, including 4.2 million children.
- 6% suffered from food insecurity and 33% of these food-insecure households said they had used food banks in the last 12 months.
- The Resolution Foundation said that data has shown that government measures had protected household income during the pandemic.
- However, the ongoing cost of living crisis has impacted household incomes and child poverty rates were likely to have risen as a consequence.
- For more on this story, please visit the Guardian’s website.
Northern Ireland man charged with online child sexual offences in Australia
- A 34-year-old man from NI has been charged with online child sexual offences in Australia following a joint operation between the PSNI and West Australia’s joint Anti-Child Exploitation Team.
- The man will be subject to sex offender restrictions if he returns to the UK.
- A PSNI spokesperson said, “This is an excellent example of our officers working across international borders to protect vulnerable people wherever they are.”
- For the full story, visit the PSNI website.
