Amber Rudd has been criticised for tell teachers to go back to school from the comfort of her own home.
The MP, who served as home secretary until 2018, discussed the big argument between current ministers, former education secretaries and teaching unions about when schools restart during The Andrew Marr Show on BBC One.
Sitting at home, she said:
“Everybody is looking for certainty; certainty about when they can feel safe; certainty about how infectious children may or may not be to adults; what underlying risks are going to take place at schools, all these things that just aren’t available.
“We’ve got this situation where the teaching unions are saying, ‘we are not prepared to allow teachers to go back to school, yet although we want them to go back, we need to be safe’.
“But they have to go back because we need to make sure that our children go back and that all the issues to do not just with education, but also with security, safety, mental health issues, safeguarding, those children need to go back to school.
“Teachers are being asked to reopen the schools and I hope they will do that.”
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The Daily Mail provoked outrage last week after it took an ungracious swing at the unions for protecting teachers.
Lisa Nandy tweeted: “We had a message this week from our school that said “we miss you, and we are always here for you”. They’ve been incredible.
“The Daily Mail should be ashamed of this. Our children and their teachers will not be divided.”
But the right wing rag was bolstered by support from a number of other papers at the weekend.
The Times reported that four primary school chains will follow government advice – and defy unions – to reopen at the start of June.
While The Daily Telegraph lead with comments from the children’s commissioner for England, who said ministers and teaching unions should “stop squabbling”.
Related: Experts: UK’s response to Covid-19 has been “too little, too late, too flawed”