When will primary schools in England reopen for the new term?
Until late on Friday evening, the answer had been that most primaries and attached nurseries would open on 4 January, but would remain closed within 50 local authorities spread across London and the south of England, including Kent and Essex.
In a U-turn, however, the Department for Education announced that all London primary schools would keep their gates closed until at least 18 January.
The schools are required to remain open for remote learning, and for the children of key workers and those classed as vulnerable to attend school in person.
Why had the government ordered some schools to close and others to reopen?
The government has not divulged the basis on which it selected the 50 areas where primaries had been told to shut. It said the “contingency framework” plans were being implemented in local areas “with high rates of infection and with significant increases in seven-day case rates, and pressure on the NHS”.
All 50 were in tier 4 areas but others in tier 4 had not been included. This led to confusion in areas with higher rates of infection but where primaries had been told to remain open.
How did local authorities in England react?
Haringey council, which has higher rates of infection than some areas on the list, said it would defy government advice and advise its primaries to close to all but vulnerable children and those of key workers.
The leader of Greenwich council, which was also not included in the government’s contingency framework, said: “There appears to be no logic to how this list was brought together.”
A group of London councils, including Haringey and Greenwich, jointly petitioned the government, asking for their primary schools to be able to close from 4 January.
What happens next?
The Department for Education had said it would review the decision on school closures in the 50 named local authorities by 18 January but that move is now redundant.
Possible next moves include adding more councils to the list of areas where primaries should close, adding secondary schools to the closures or an even wider closure across England.
The latter is a serious possibility on the basis of scientific advice, such as research by Imperial College London into the new Covid-19 variant, B117, which found that it was directly affecting a greater proportion of people aged under 20.
