I refer the Noble Lord to the answers given on 30 July and 26 January to questions HL2264 and HL13621.

All education must promote peace, tolerance and non-violence. Any incitement to hatred or violence is unacceptable and has no place in the classroom. We have raised this with the Palestinian Authority (PA) and will continue to do so.

The PA is undertaking a multi-year curriculum reform in which textbooks are systematically being updated to align with UNESCO standards. Recent independent analysis has identified credible progress since 2018 in removing material of concern from PA textbooks. We welcome this initial progress, but we recognise that more needs to be done to bring every textbook page for every Grade in line with UNESCO standards.

We have made clear that the Palestinian Authority must fully implement the reforms they have committed to make, including in relation to the school curriculum, and will continue to support them to do so.

The UK has long recognised the importance of education for Syria's long-term resilience, stability and prosperity. Since 2022, the UK's Syria Education Programme has trained over 15,000 school staff and provided foundational literacy and numeracy materials to primary school children in Idlib and Aleppo. In the past year, the UK has funded the rehabilitation of 90 schools in Idlib and Aleppo and provided £2.5 million to UNICEF for school rehabilitation across the country.

The UK also places the inclusion of women and girls at the centre of its approach to Syria's recovery. Syria is a priority country under the UK's National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security and we are supporting agricultural livelihoods, vocational training and entrepreneurship opportunities with a focus on young people, female-headed households and conflict‑affected communities in economically marginalised regions.

The UK's Global Mine Action Programme is supporting mine clearance and livelihoods programming in North East Syria and our Syria Education Programme provides safety information to children in Idlib and Aleppo, promoting safe behaviours and encouraging the reporting of suspicious or hazardous objects.

I refer the Hon Member to the answers I gave on this topic on 3 March at Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Oral Questions, and on 9 March in response to Question 115698.

High-quality music education must not be for the privileged few but an entitlement for all. It is an essential part of the broad and rich education every child deserves. It is a decision for schools which resources they want to purchase and use to support them to teach the national and wider school curriculum, including musical scores and texts.

The department buys copyright licences for all state-funded schools in England covering almost all their copyright requirements. Funding for this comes from the Core Schools Budget.

Purchasing these licences directly saves schools money and administrative time, while ensuring that intellectual property rights are respected.

The department appreciates the importance of educational licences to the music publishing sector and negotiate with Copyright Management Organisations to obtain licences for an appropriate range of content and usage at a fair and transparent cost.

Guidance and advice for state schools in England on copyright licences is available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/copyright-licences-information-for-schools.

I refer the Noble Lord to the answer provided in the House of Commons on 16 December 2025 to Question 98592, which - for ease of reference - is reproduced below:

We welcome the Palestinian Authority (PA) contracting an independent audit firm to complete a review of curriculum reform in early 2026, and we would expect the results of that audit to be made public. The UK will continue to press for implementation of the PA's reform commitments, and will assess progress in the education area based on the audit results.

As I stated in my response to Question HL11399, all our education programmes in Pakistan are subject to due diligence, and any materials provided under those programmes are reviewed for equity across gender, ability, ethnicity, and religion before being shared with government counterparts.

On the broader issue of textbooks used in Pakistani schools, we are clear that any incitement to hatred or violence is unacceptable and has no place in education, and we urge the Pakistani authorities to ensure that all teaching materials used in their schools meet the relevant United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) standards.

We welcome the Palestinian Authority (PA) contracting an independent audit firm to complete a review of curriculum reform in early 2026, and we would expect the results of that audit to be made public. The UK will continue to press for implementation of the PA's reform commitments, and will assess progress in the education area based on the audit results.

I refer the Noble Lord to the answer I provided on 27 November to Question HL11630.

I refer the Noble Baroness to the answer given on 6 November to question HL11399.

I refer the Hon Member to the statement made by the Foreign Secretary on the Middle East on 18 November, where support for Palestinian institutions was discussed. We will update the House in due course on any further developments.

We have a regular dialogue with both the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Government of Israel in which we reiterate the need for both sides to prepare their populations for peaceful coexistence, including by promoting a more positive portrayal of one another to contribute to building the conditions needed for a peace. We continue to urge the Israeli and Palestinian leadership to avoid engaging in, or encouraging, any type of action and language that makes it more difficult to achieve a culture of peaceful coexistence and a negotiated solution to the conflict. Instead, we encourage promoting a more positive portrayal of one another to contribute to building the conditions needed for a peace. Our partnership with the PA includes a commitment from the Palestinian leadership to adhere to the principle of non-violence and to tackle language and actions that could incite violence or hatred. We have been clear that any incitement to hatred or violence in children's textbooks is unacceptable and has no place in education. The UK regularly raises this issue with the Palestinian Authority, including most recently at official level on the 9 May.

In 2022 the department published comprehensive guidance to support schools to meet their duties on political impartiality. This guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/political-impartiality-in-schools/political-impartiality-in-schools.

The guidance is clear that all schools should take full responsibility for ensuring lessons and materials are age appropriate, suitable and politically impartial, particularly when using materials produced by external organisations. The guidance also highlights that legal duties on political impartiality are unlikely to be relevant when teaching about political events from previous historical periods. However, the guidance is clear that, when teaching about more recent historical events, it is important to ensure that political issues that remain contentious today are presented to pupils in a balanced manner.

Overall core revenue funding for schools totals almost £61.6 billion this financial year, 2024/25. At the Autumn Budget 2024, the government announced an additional £2.3 billion for mainstream schools and young people with high needs for the 2025/26 financial year, compared to 2024/25. This means that overall core school funding will total almost £63.9 billion in 2025/26.

These increases, against the backdrop of a challenging fiscal picture, demonstrate the government’s commitment to schools and ensuring every child can achieve and thrive through its commitment to the Opportunity Mission.

Schools have autonomy over how they use their core funding, including for their non-staff costs such as textbooks. The department will continue to monitor the balance of funding and costs for schools.

Education is an essential component to the humanitarian response in Gaza, and critical to building the foundations for a sustainable and lasting peace for the Israeli and Palestinian people. It is therefore essential that partners delivering education services across the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPTs), including United Nations Relief and Work Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), uphold the highest standards of neutrality. Catherine Colonna's Independent Review of Mechanisms and Procedures to Ensure Adherence by UNRWA to the Humanitarian Principle of Neutrality notes that the most recent UNRWA Rapid Review of textbooks from the Palestinian Authority (2022/2023) "found that 3.85 per cent of all textbook pages contain issues of concern to UN values, guidance, or position on the conflict". The UK supports the Colonna review's conclusion that "the presence of even a small fraction of problematic content in textbooks, supplemental material and teaching content remains a serious issue." We welcome the initiatives launched by UNRWA to ensure neutrality of its educational material and teaching, in addition to its long-standing work with UNESCO and the Palestinian Authority to reform curricula and educational materials. £1 million of UK funding to UNRWA this financial year has been earmarked for the implementation of the Colonna review's recommendations.

We regularly discuss issues related to the school curriculum and textbooks with the Palestinian Authority (PA) and UNRWA. The UK-supported 2021 review of the PA curriculum found improvements in content, with previously flagged materials removed. But it also indicated that problematic content remains in Palestinian textbooks: we therefore need to see further curriculum reform from the PA, and we continue to raise this with them regularly. UNRWA and the PA are engaging seriously on this issue.

Antisemitism is abhorrent and has absolutely no place in any society, and we are committed to tackling it in all its forms.

We regularly discuss issues relating to the curriculum and textbooks with counterparts including in the Palestinian Authority (PA). The UK-supported 2021 review of the Palestinian Authority (PA) curriculum found improvements in content, with previously flagged materials removed. We need to see further curriculum reform from the PA, and we continue to raise this with them regularly.

We are aware of the findings of this report. We take any allegation of the promotion of racism and discrimination extremely seriously and have been clear that incitement to hatred or violence is unacceptable and should have no place in education. Any allegations of breaches of UN staff regulations and rules, including neutrality breaches, are reported to FCDO and investigated. We continue to urge all parties to condemn incitement wherever and whenever it occurs.

The UK-supported 2021 review of the Palestinian Authority (PA) curriculum found improvements in content, with previously flagged materials removed. What we really need to see is further curriculum reform from the PA and we continue to raise this with them regularly.

We have discussed issues relating to the curriculum and textbooks with counterparts in United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and the Palestinian Authority. This specific report has not been discussed with the Commissioner-General, however we are aware of the findings. We take any allegation of the promotion of racism and discrimination extremely seriously. Any allegations of breaches of UN staff regulations and rules, including neutrality breaches, are reported to FCDO and investigated. We continue to urge all parties to condemn incitement wherever and whenever it occurs.

We continue to engage on the critical need for Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) in Pakistani schools. At Pakistan's Universal Periodic Review in January, the UK recommended action to ensure that school textbooks are inclusive of all religions, and urged Pakistan to ensure that religious minorities can access suitable alternatives to compulsory Qu'ranic studies. In July 2023, the British High Commission participated in a civil society-led panel discussion on Minorities and Education. We have previously supported initiatives to review the National Curriculum of Pakistan, providing technical assistance to create a more inclusive curriculum and textbooks.