Lord Hampton:

Moved by Lord Hampton

333ZA: After Clause 31, insert the following new Clause—“Review of safeguarding protections in private tuition settings(1) Within 12 months of the day on which this Act is passed, the Secretary of State must publish a review of—(a) the adequacy of safeguards in place to protect children who receive private tuition, either online or in-person, (b) the extent to which providers of private tuition carry out background checks on their tutors, and(c) the impact, if any, of the activities defined as “Regulated activity relating to children” in Schedule 4 of the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 on safe- guarding in private tuition settings.(2) Within six months of the completion of the review, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament a report on the findings of the review and any recommendations to improve safeguarding protections in private tuition.”Member’s explanatory statementThis Amendment seeks to require the Government to assess the adequacy of safeguarding protections for children with private tutors, who may not have to undergo an enhanced DBS check under current requirements.

My Lords, I will speak to the rather dramatically numbered Amendment 333ZA in my name and belatedly declare an interest as a state secondary school teacher. In the past I also worked as a private cricket coach, which is quite relevant here. I acknowledge the help of Edapt in this amendment and in bringing this issue to my attention.

I was astonished to discover that under current UK legislation, individuals barred from working with children can still legally operate as private tutors if hired directly by a parent. This is due to the private arrangement exemption in Schedule 4 to the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006. As a result, there is no legal requirement for such tutors to undergo an enhanced DBS check, nor a legal mechanism to prevent someone on the barred list offering or delivering tuition to children. This is also true of those who have been struck off by the Teaching Regulation Agency. This loophole presents a significant and increasingly relevant safeguarding risk, especially in the context of rising private tuition, including via online platforms.

The private arrangement exemption applies even where tuition is paid, unsupervised or delivered online. Research published by the Sutton Trust suggested that 30% of 11 to 16 year-olds in the UK had received private tuition at some point. That includes both my children; it never occurred to me to ask for a DBS. The BBC recently reported that 90 private tutors in the UK have been convicted of sexual offences involving children over the past 20 years.

While many tutoring platforms and companies require DBS checks, the current legal framework leaves a large part of the educational landscape unregulated, particularly for self-employed tutors working independently. This is not commonly known. Speaking in September last year, Children’s Commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza said:

“Anybody who is working one-on-one with a child as a tutor, should have a DBS criminal record check. It’s an absolute basic minimum”.

Her predecessor, the noble Baroness, Lady Longfield, who sadly is not in her place, said in 2021:

“The Government should look at this loophole and see how it can be closed”.

This is also supported by organisations including the Safeguarding Alliance and the Tutors’ Association.

This amendment would put private tutors on the same legal footing as freelance sports coaches and mainstream teachers, close a bizarre safety loophole and contribute to making children’s lives safer. I beg to move.

I am sorry that I raised this issue in the debate on an Amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Wei, spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I was not aware of this situation until this morning, and I was dumbfounded. We have rightly made our schools very safe places for our children, and safeguarding is one of the key things that Ofsted inspections look at. As we have heard, the Sutton Trust says that about 30% of children aged between 11 and 16 have private tutoring, either in person or online.

Imagine a situation where a teacher in a school has been dismissed from their position after being arrested for a serious child sex offence, and might even have gone to prison if found guilty. They could do private tutoring if they were employed by a parent, with no safeguarding taking place. That surely cannot be right. This is not about criminalising parents who employ them—I do not think parents would be aware—but about making sure that, on Report, perhaps after conversations have been had with the Minister, this final loophole is sorted once and for all.

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, has made a very clear case that providers of online and in-person tuition services should be subject to the same safeguarding checks as those providing tuition in person, particularly in relation to the gap in the current legislation that he outlined. I agree completely on the importance of safety for children who receive private tuition and that those barred from teaching should not be able legally to offer their services directly to parents.

However, I have a slight hair shirt in relation to this issue, because I think that parents are ultimately responsible for checking out the tuition services that their children receive. Having a DBS check can contribute important information, but it is by no means sufficient. We know that the vast Majority of sex offenders do not get reported to the police or end up with a criminal record, and their behaviour would not appear on a DBS check. There is a balance to be struck—in no way diluting the responsibility of parents while closing the loophole as the noble Lord suggests.

The noble Baroness might not be aware that not all agencies that employ tutors carry out checks.

I was aware of that, but my point on having clarity that parents need to think very carefully about who their child spends time with still stands.

Parents might not have the wherewithal to know how to go about checking and would assume—wrongly, obviously—that if they employed a tutor from an agency, that tutor would have been cleared. If the tutor was not from an agency but employed directly, parents would assume that, because they were a teacher, they would have had safeguarding checks.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, for initiating such an important debate, which has already had an effect by ensuring that more Members of your Lordships’ House are aware of this issue. His Amendment would prompt a review of current safeguarding practices in private tuition, including background checks on tutors, and of the impact of activities defined as

“Regulated activity relating to children” on private tuition settings.

This is an important issue and the Government recognise it as such. That is why we have already acted to improve the safety of children in private tuition, along with the wider out-of-school settings sector. The Government have published safeguarding e-learning for tutors and other providers, as well as strengthened guidance to help local authorities to act where there are safeguarding concerns. We are also widening the scope of regulated activity to include those who work frequently with children in supervised roles. This change will mean that employers engaging tutors in supervised roles can check whether the person is on the children’s barred list because the DBS considers them to pose a risk of harm to children.

The Government are also taking action to ensure that all those working in regulated activity with children can access enhanced barred lists checks, whether that is a teacher in a school or a self-employed tutor offering private tuition. With these measures, we will reduce the risk of a barred person working with children. However, we recognise the need to understand what more can be done. That is why we have also published a call for evidence on safeguarding in out-of-school settings. It will gather much of the information this amendment seeks and will help inform any future action to further enhance the safety of the sector. The deadline for submissions is 21 September, and I hope that noble Lords will actively participate in this consultation.

I want to take this opportunity to reassure the noble Lord, Lord Storey, about online DBS checks. Anyone who regularly teaches, trains, instructs, supervises or cares for children unsupervised is considered to be working in a regulated activity. This includes the Majority of private tutors, whether they operate in person or online. By engaging in regulated activity, these individuals are eligible for and able to access an enhanced DBS check, with a check of the barred list if working as part of a tutoring organisation or engaged through an agency. We are legislating to extend this access to those who are self-employed.

It is important to note that it is a criminal offence for a barred individual to work in a regulated activity. We have also published safeguarding guidance for parents on using after-school clubs, tuition and community activities, and would encourage them to use this for any in-person and online tutoring.

We genuinely take this as a very important issue. We welcome the debate, and I hope that, when we see the results of the call for evidence, we will be able to move forward collectively. Therefore, for the reasons I have outlined, I kindly ask the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, to withdraw his amendment.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for those slightly more reassuring words, but the fact that it was news to all of us just shows how much work still has to be done. We will wait and see on this one, and I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.

Amendment 333ZA withdrawn.

Clause 32: School attendance orders