Mass testing offered to schools and colleges in new year
By Rachel Lawler
The government has announced that it will be rolling out mass rapid coronavirus testing to schools and colleges next year, but early years providers have been excluded from the plans.
From January 2021, staff and children who are close contacts of someone who has tested positive for the virus will be tested daily.
The tests will be offered to secondary schools and colleges, while primary schools and early years providers are left out from the plans.
Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Alliance, commented: "The announcement of more priority testing for secondary school staff beginning from January, with the planned exclusion of dedicated early years providers, is just exasperating. Early years professionals have gone out to work throughout the pandemic, to care for the children of other frontline workers, in a setting where social distancing is simply not possible. The Government should be doing all it can to protect them.
"Instead, our sector has been excluded from the Covid Workforce fund and unable to claim for exceptional costs relating to the virus. Now, facing unprecedented staff shortages because of illness and self-isolation, it is again forced to fight for the same access to testing as other parts of the education system.
"Early Years has long felt like the forgotten sector, but the treatment it has received during this pandemic has been nothing short of a blatant disregard. When will the government start treating early years professionals like the front-line workers they are?"