Young people are free to choose the A level subjects they take. While there have been declines in entries in recent years, English remains one of the most popular A level subjects. Entries for A level English Literature increased by 8% in 2024, and for English Literature and Language combined by 6% compared to 2023.

High and rising school standards are at the heart of the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity and give every child the best life chances.

The government has established an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review, covering ages 5 to 18, chaired by Professor Becky Francis CBE, an expert in education policy. The review and its recommendations will be driven by evidence and a commitment to high standards for all our young people, irrespective of background.

The review group ran a call for evidence and held events over the autumn term to gather the views of education professionals and other experts, parents, children and young people, and other stakeholders. The feedback received will help the review group to consider its next steps and recommendations.

High and rising school standards, with excellent foundations in reading, writing and mathematics, are at the heart of the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity and give every child the best start in life.

The department knows that reading for pleasure is hugely important and brings a range of benefits. In addition to strong links with attainment, wide recreational reading expands pupils’ knowledge about the world and language, as well as their understanding of subject-specific academic and technical vocabulary.

Further, pupils who read regularly report heightened levels of social and emotional wellbeing. For many, reading is a form of relaxation, a place to escape everyday challenges and a source of entertainment. Readers can adopt new perspectives, develop empathy and become more socially conscious.

In recognition of this, the department has implemented a range of measures to support reading for pleasure.

The English hubs programme supports the teaching of phonics, early language development and reading for pleasure with a further £23 million committed for the 2024/25 academic year to support this work. Further the government’s reading framework provides guidance on improving reading teaching provision, to ensure that every child is not only able to read proficiently, but also develops a genuine love of reading.

The current national curriculum states that teachers are expected to encourage pupils to develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information. The programmes of study for English make clear the importance of reading for pleasure.

The government has established an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review (CAR), covering ages 5 to 18, chaired by Professor Becky Francis CBE, an expert in education policy.

The CAR will look closely at the key challenges to attainment for young people, in line with the government’s ambition for a curriculum that delivers excellent foundations in reading, writing and mathematics, and ensures every young person gets the opportunity to develop the creative, digital, and speaking and listening skills particularly prized by employers.

The ‘Understanding progress in the 2020/21 academic year’ report finds that in reading Year 3-9 pupils are on average around 1.6-2 months behind where we would expect them to be in a ‘normal’ year. For primary pupils, estimates are:

The Government has invested £1.7 billion to give early years, schools and colleges support to help pupils get back on track, including additional funding for tutoring, early language support and summer schools.

We have also appointed an Education Recovery Commissioner to advise on this work. The objectives of the Education Recovery Commissioner, as outlined in the Terms of Reference, are to advise on the design and implementation of potential interventions that will help pupils catch up learning lost due to the COVID-19 outbreak. The Terms of Reference for the Education Recovery Commissioner is published here:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/960070/Terms_of_reference.pdf#:~:text=Education%20Recovery%20Commissioner%3A%20role%20specification%20and%20terms%20of,approach%20for%20education%20recovery%2C%20with%20a%20particular%20focus.

We are investing in a national network of English Hubs across the country to improve the teaching of literacy, focusing on Reception and Year One.

In 2018 the Department launched a £26.3 million English Hubs Programme dedicated to improving the teaching of reading. We have since invested a further £17 million in this school-to-school improvement programme, which focuses on systematic synthetic phonics, early language, and reading for pleasure. We have appointed 34 primary schools across England as English Hubs. The English Hubs programme is supporting nearly 3000 schools across England to improve their teaching of reading through systematic synthetic phonics, early language development, and reading for pleasure. The English Hubs are focused on improving educational outcomes for the most disadvantaged pupils in Reception and Year 1.

Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, English Hubs have continued to offer support and training to schools across the country by bringing much of their offer online.

The objectives of the Education Recovery Commissioner, as outlined in the Terms of Reference, are to advise on the design and implementation of potential interventions that will help pupils to catch up on lost education due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

The Terms of Reference for the Education Recovery Commissioner are published here:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/960070/Terms_of_reference.pdf#:~:text=Education%20Recovery%20Commissioner%3A%20role%20specification%20and%20terms%20of,approach%20for%20education%20recovery%2C%20with%20a%20particular%20focus.

The department will continue to assess the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on pupils and their catch-up needs to help target support across the system effectively.

Maths
Our national network of 40 school-led Maths Hubs aims to help local schools improve the quality of their mathematics teaching based on best practice. The Maths Hubs programme aims to improve attainment gaps, which may be associated with disadvantage, gender, or other factors, and the programme’s capacity has been substantially expanded in the geographical areas where it is needed most.

Maths Hubs deliver our £100 million Teaching for Mastery programme, which is focused on depth of understanding, and is characterised by whole-class teaching where pupils work on the same content together ensuring no one gets left behind. It encourages all pupils with the belief that by working hard at mathematics they can succeed and rejects the idea that some pupils “can’t do maths”.

Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, Maths Hubs have continued to offer support and training to schools across the country by bringing much of their offer online. The department has also funded the development of free expert resources to support maths teaching, including a range of materials now available from the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Maths, as well publishing new guidance to support curriculum planning and prioritisation in primary schools.

Reading

In 2018, the department launched a £26.3 million English Hubs programme dedicated to improving the teaching of reading, particularly for disadvantaged children. We have since invested a further £17 million in this school-to-school improvement programme, which focuses on systematic synthetic phonics, early language, and reading for pleasure. We have appointed 34 primary schools across England as English Hubs. The English Hubs programme is supporting nearly 3000 schools across England to improve their teaching of reading through systematic synthetic phonics, early language development, and reading for pleasure. The English Hubs are focused on improving educational outcomes for the most disadvantaged pupils in Reception and Year 1.

The overall programme is aimed at improving the teaching of early reading across England. In this early delivery stage, we are focusing on systematic synthetic phonics, but our hubs will start to deliver medium-level support in all three priority areas: improving the teaching of systematic synthetic phonics; encouraging early language development; and developing a love of reading. For early language development, hubs will focus on providing evidence-based approaches to early language development and closing the word gap in Year Reception and Year 1, including appropriate use of formative assessment.

Throughout the COVID-19 outbreak, English Hubs have continued to offer support and training to schools across the country by bringing much of their offer online.

We are providing £1 billion of catch-up support to schools to help make up for lost learning. All schools with pupils aged 5-16 are receiving their share of the £650 million catch-up premium, which can be used to prioritise support for all pupils. We are spending up to £350 million on the National Tutoring Programme (NTP). The NTP will provide additional, targeted support to disadvantaged children and young people in schools across England who need the most help to catch-up.

The NTP for 5-16 years olds went live on 2 November. The NTP offers tuition support for a range of curriculum subjects, including English, at both primary and secondary level. It is important that decisions about what support pupils receive are made locally by those who understand their needs. As such, teachers use their professional judgement to determine which pupils would most benefit from NTP support based on their need. Further information about the launch of the NTP is available here: https://nationaltutoring.org.uk/news/national-tutoring-programme-launches-in-schools.

Additionally, the NTP is supporting an oral language programme for reception-aged children. Any state-funded school with a reception class was able to register their interest in delivering the programme, with priority given to those schools with the highest levels of disadvantage (percentage of free school meals). Participating schools will begin delivery in January 2021. Further information about the oral language programme is available here: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/covid-19-resources/neli/.

We are also making funding available to school sixth forms, colleges, and all other 16-19 providers to offer support small group tuition for lower attaining 16-19 year olds, in English, maths, and other courses where learning has been disrupted as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak. Further information about this is available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/16-to-19-funding-16-to-19-tuition-fund.

The current restrictions will expire on 2 December, and our intention is to return to a system of local and regional restrictions. We will set out what this means for retailers and other businesses as soon as possible.

The Education Endowment Foundation’s publication emphasises the importance of systematic phonics approaches in reading and writing activities with pupils in key stage 1. There is sound evidence that systematic phonics is a highly effective method for teaching early reading. The evidence indicates that the teaching of phonics is most effective when combined with a language rich curriculum to develop children’s positive attitudes towards literacy. The National Curriculum for English places a renewed focus on the requirement for pupils to learn to read through systematic phonics, applying phonic knowledge and skills to word reading.

In 2018 the department launched a £26.3 million English Hubs Programme. The department appointed 34 primary schools across England as English Hubs. The English Hubs Programme is supporting nearly 3,000 schools across England to improve their teaching of reading through systematic synthetic phonics, early language development, and reading for pleasure. The English Hubs are focused on improving educational outcomes for the most disadvantaged pupils in reception and year 1. The Education Endowment Foundation’s publication has been used widely across the English Hub community.

The government has announced a catch up package worth £1 billion, including a ‘Catch up Premium’ worth a total of £650 million to support schools to make up for lost teaching time. Our expectation is that this funding will be spent on the additional activities required to support children and young people to catch up after a period of disruption to their education.

The package also includes the National Tutoring Programme which provides up to £350 million to support disadvantaged and vulnerable pupils. This will increase access to subsidised, high-quality tuition for the most disadvantaged young people, helping to accelerate their academic progress and tackling the attainment gap between them and their peers.

To support settings to make best use of this funding, the Education Endowment Foundation have published a COVID-19 support guide which includes evidence-based approaches to catch up for all students. Details can be found here: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/covid-19-resources/national-tutoring-programme/covid-19-support-guide-for-schools/.

An extension of the zero rate of VAT has been introduced in order to provide consistency in approach between certain physical and digital publications.

Audiobooks are already taxed consistently at the standard rate in both physical and digital format.

There are no current plans to extend the VAT zero rate to audiobooks. However, the Government keeps all taxes under review, including VAT.

Work is being undertaken to develop a world-leading quality-of-life metric, with pilot tests being carried out in four Cancer Alliances. For the first time, this will allow us to assess the quality of survival alongside survival rates, so that we can identify where additional support is needed.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has not made an assessment of the impact of the business rates pub relief scheme on the viability of community pubs in England. The Ministry will publish data on the amount of relief granted under the pubs relief scheme for 2017/18 as part of its scheduled Nation Non-Domestic Rates (NNDR) statistical release due in November.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has not made an assessment of the impact of the revaluation on bookshops. The Government has introduced a range of business rates reforms and measures to support businesses, including bookshops, worth over £10 billion by 2023.

This includes, from April 2017, permanently doubling Small Business Rate Relief and raising the threshold for relief meaning that over 600,000 small businesses now pay no business rates at all, and helping all business by switching the measure of inflation, used for the indexation of rates, from Retail Price Index to Consumer Price Index.

The Skills for Life Survey in 2011, assessed the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills of adults aged 16-64 in England using four competencies: word processing; emailing; spreadsheets; and a multiple-choice assessment of other ICT skills such as internet use (see table attached). The survey results demonstrated a broad correlation between the respondents’ performance in the ICT and in the literacy tests.

The Government is supporting adults in England to develop their basic digital skills for the workplace and in everyday life. We are introducing a new entitlement to fully-funded training in digital skills, which will mirror the current approach for improving literacy and numeracy.

The Department also funds the Future Digital Inclusion programme that aims to help one million adults gain basic digital skills by 2019. A majority of these adults are educated below Level 2, unemployed, in a low-income household, in receipt of means-tested benefits, or living in social or sheltered housing.

We welcome the work that UNESCO is doing on digital literacy to highlight some of the challenges and opportunities that the digital world presents.

The Government supports adults in England to develop the basic English and digital expertise they need for employment and everyday life. We provide funding for adults to access a range of literacy training up to English GCSE and equivalent qualifications, and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) courses.

Provisional Further Education and Skills data shows that in 2016/17 the Government funded the participation of 536,700 adults in English courses and 114,400 adults in ESOL courses. We are also introducing a similar right to funding for specified Information and Communication Technology courses.

Billing authorities are responsible for rebilling eligible businesses due to receive support as part of the £435 million package of funding announced by the Chancellor at the Budget. The Department for Communities and Local Government will be collecting data on the amount spent by billing authorities during the financial year 2017/18 at the end of that period as part of the normal process of reconciling local authority relief payments. On 13 October, the Government published a list of authorities that indicated that they had begun to rebill businesses on each of the three schemes. This list will be updated (attached)regularly, at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/business-rates-relief-schemes-2017-rebilling-progress

The Government will not be providing guidance on the use of the £300 million fund. Under the terms of the £300 million discretionary fund, billing authorities are responsible for designing the criteria of their local schemes and these criteria may include bookshops.

DCLG does not hold data specifically on the impact of the revaluation on bookshops. However, the Government has taken action to support small business; it put in place a £3.6 billion package of transitional relief and permanently doubled small business rate relief meaning 600,000 small businesses will pay no business rates at all. The Government also doubled the level of rural rate relief from 50 per cent to 100 per cent for eligible businesses

In addition, at the Spring Budget the Government announced a £110 million of support to help ratepayers losing small business rates relief and rural rate relief – this will ensure increases in their bills this year capped at £600. It also included a £300 million discretionary relief fund for local authorities to design their own schemes. Subject to meeting the criteria for local discretionary schemes, bookshops may be eligible for support from this fund.

The Government currently has no plans to extend the pubs' relief scheme. However, the Government has taken action to support small business. It put in place a £3.6 billion package of transitional relief and permanently doubled small business rate relief meaning 600,000 small businesses will pay no business rates at all.

In addition, at the Spring Budget the Government announced £110 million support to help ratepayers losing small business rates relief and rural rate relief – this will ensure increases in their bills this year are capped at £600.

It also included a £300 million discretionary relief fund for local authorities to design their own schemes. Subject to meeting the criteria for local discretionary schemes, bookshops may also be eligible for support from this fund.

My Lords, we know that strong literacy skills are fundamental to people’s education and employment prospects. That is why we have taken steps to improve literacy standards for people in the workforce by embedding English into our major education and work-based training programmes. We are also providing full funding for adults to access free English courses up to the equivalent level of GCSE, supporting community and workplace programmes, and working to improve the quality of English teaching for adults.

The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), which was set up in 2011 through a £125 million grant from the Government, received £10 million from the Department in 2012 specifically to fund and evaluate 24 projects focused on interventions to improve the literacy of pupils who do not achieve the expected standard in English at the end of primary school.

To date, the EEF has published evaluation reports on 26 literacy-related projects. Of these, 11 involved voluntary sector organisations. Details of all of these projects and the individual evaluation reports are published on the EEF website at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/school-themes/literacy.

The findings from evaluations of these and other EEF funded projects are incorporated into the EEF’s teaching and learning toolkit. This provides school leaders and teachers with an accessible summary of evidence from robust research studies on the impact and cost effectiveness of a range of educational interventions. This information can be used by voluntary sector organisations to inform their own approaches. The toolkit is published on the EEF website.

Business rates are based on valuations from the Valuation Office Agency and we do not intervene in their independent assessments. Nearly three quarters of businesses will see no change or a fall in their bills from 1 April thanks to the business rates revaluation with 600,000 businesses set to pay no business rates at all. We have put in place a £3.6 billion transitional relief scheme for England to support ratepayers at the 2017 revaluation.