Speeches by Hinds.

“To some extent, all schools do have breaktime, lunchtime and playtime, and most schools have, and have had for quite some time, breakfast provision of some sort. Indeed, after-school provision is also extremely widespread. We have had the holiday activities and food programme now for a number of years, and of course th…”

“Breakfast clubs are not coming in. They are already there in most schools.”

“Indeed. There is a review of the curriculum, a curriculum assessment, going on at the moment. Would it be fair to assume that you would be looking to that review to guarantee a certain amount of playtime in the traditional little break and big break?”

“The time the school day ends.”

“Good morning. Can I start by asking about schools? We understand that school break times and playtimes have become shorter over time. There is a general assumption that that is due to more things being packed into the curriculum. Can you tell us what you know about home time over time?”

“As always.”

“We started this session with Natasha giving us Frank Dobson’s definition of play, and later we heard about Lloyd George’s. I think both those definitions included the word “natural”. Do critics ever accuse you of over-engineering the problem, in that play does come naturally to children and there have been many generat…”

“You say “addictive by design”. If you are a game designer, or are indeed inventing a new sport, you want it to be good. You want people to want to come back to it, so to some extent all good activities are compelling. Are there particular features of certain video games that you think are a problem? People talk about l…”

“It is still play. There is a difference, that I think most of us would discern, between video games that you do on your own or with somebody else in the same physical space. Then there are these networked video games, which, of course, when almost all of us were young just did not exist. It is a whole new thing to pare…”

“Call it the age of consent, but it is a terrible term.”

“Breakfast clubs are not coming in. They are already there in most schools.”

“Indeed. There is a review of the curriculum, a curriculum assessment, going on at the moment. Would it be fair to assume that you would be looking to that review to guarantee a certain amount of playtime in the traditional little break and big break?”

“To some extent, all schools do have breaktime, lunchtime and playtime, and most schools have, and have had for quite some time, breakfast provision of some sort. Indeed, after-school provision is also extremely widespread. We have had the holiday activities and food programme now for a number of years, and of course th…”

“The time the school day ends.”

“Does the Secretary of State agree with me about the importance of step-down provision, provided by community hospitals such as Petersfield and Alton, both for patient care and for relieving pressure on acute hospitals, such as Queen Alexandra and Basingstoke?”

“The Government have tried to have it every which way on these elusive 6,500 extra teachers. If the Labour manifesto had meant that only secondary teachers counted, but they could be in any subject, presumably that is what it would have said. What it actually said was 6,500 new specialist teachers in key subjects, so wi…”

“I welcome what the Paymaster General has said about removing administrative burdens to payment and accepting the recommendations, and his commitment to working with the community and doing so in a timely way. I know that he will continue to devote his considerable energies to those things. Could he also say a word more…”

“I have a question for the schools Minister. The existing aim is to have two hours of quality PE a week and equal opportunity for all to access and enjoy it. That has been the case for some time. You rightly said that you could not pre-empt the curriculum review being undertaken by Professor Francis. However, the Prime …”

“The council will direct it, the local authority.”

“I think we are all in favour of co-ordination and co-operation and holisticness and strategic approaches. We also I think, though, believe in the independence of national governing bodies, the freedoms that schools have to make the right choices for their children and so on. If we talk about a co-ordinated approach or—…”