Paul Nowak, the new general secretary of the TUC, has raised the prospect of stepping up industrial action this year, saying coordinated strikes “make absolute sense”. My colleague Aletha Adu has the story here.
Good morning. Parliament is not sitting this week but over the next 36 hours the prime minister, and the person most likely to be prime minister after the next election, will both be making major speeches about their vision for Britain in 2023. It should provide a great “compare and contrast” opportunity for the political commentariat – although what the public at large will make of it all is, of course, another matter.
Rishi Sunak is speaking today, and according to the overnight preview from Downing Street, he will set out his “priorities for the year ahead and ambition for a better future”. Keir Starmer is speaking tomorrow and, according to a note sent out by Labour yesterday, he will “outline how his Labour government will ‘create change, and fuel hope’, by moving away from the sticking plaster, short-term mindset of the current government, and tackling the long-term challenge our country faces”.
Sunak and Starmer are both criticised as managerial politicians who are short on passion and vision, and it seems that Sunak at least will seek to counter this charge when he speaks this afternoon. So far most of his time as PM has been focused on headline problems, like small boat Channel crossings, which don’t seem to engage him a great deal personally. But, as Pippa Crerar reports in her preview, today he will say that education is “the single most important reason why I came into politics” and outline plans to ensure all pupils study maths in some form up to the age of 18.
Responding to the extracts from the speech released overnight, Munira Wilson, the Liberal Democrats’ education spokesperson, said this was “an admission of failure”. She said:
This is an admission of failure from the prime minister on behalf of a Conservative government that has neglected our children’s education so badly. Too many children are being left behind when it comes to maths, and that happens well before they reach 16.
The prime minister’s words mean nothing without the extra funding and staff to make it happen. You don’t need a maths A-Level to know it takes more teachers to teach maths to age 18 than to 16. But schools are already struggling with a shortage of maths teachers, and the Conservatives have no plan to turn that around.
And Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, said this was just an “empty pledge” without the promise of more funding. She said:
The prime minister needs to show his working: he cannot deliver this reheated, empty pledge without more maths teachers, yet the government has missed their target for new maths teachers year after year, with existing teachers leaving in their droves.
Now, maths attainment gaps are widening yetRishi Sunak as chancellor said the country had ‘maxed out’ on Covid recovery support for our children.
Here is the agenda for the day.
11am: Richard Tice, leader of Reform UK, holds a press conference on “the challenges faced by the nation after 12 years of Tory failure”.
Lunchtime: Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, meets business groups to discuss his plans for how the energy support scheme for businesses will be scaled back from April.
2pm: Rishi Sunak delivers his speech setting out his priorities for the year.
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