Former Agriculture minister questions Executive on phased reopening of schools

Former Stormont minister Edwin Poots has questioned the Executive’s decisions on the phased reopening of schools.

Mr Poots, who returned to the Assembly chamber on Tuesday following cancer surgery, said children’s education had “suffered inordinately” as a result of school closures.

“And for me the logic of putting P1 to P3 back for two weeks (from March 8) and then to take them out of school (on March 22) to allow senior school children from a different school, in years 11 to 14, to go back to school, I just can’t work it out,” he told MLAs.

“I know that this is not what the Education Minister (Peter Weir) wanted, it’s not what he desired but that other Executive members wouldn’t allow him to open up in a more meaningful and productive way.

“So I would urge that issue to be looked at again because the public health message isn’t one that schoolchildren are the big spreaders of Covid.”

Mr Poots was contributing to an Assembly debate on Covid-19 regulations in Northern Ireland.

The Lagan Valley MLA stood down as Agriculture Minister last month to undergo cancer treatment.

While he returned to the Assembly on Tuesday, the DUP said he was “easing back into work” and would not be returning to his ministerial duties immediately.

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It comes as Arlene Foster has said she hopes the Stormont Executive will revisit the dates for reopening schools.

Northern Ireland’s First Minister said she wants to give the public optimism when the path out of lockdown in the region is revealed next Monday but cautioned that this must be the last.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson set out a four-stage plan for exiting lockdown on Monday evening.

The first stage includes the return to school for all pupils in England on March 8.

In Northern Ireland, some primary school pupils will return to class on March 8, with some older post-primary school children on March 22, but there has been no date given for the full return of the wider school population.

Ahead of a meeting of the Executive on Thursday, Mrs Foster said she hoped that could be revisited.

She said Education Minister Peter Weir’s preferred option was to have all children back at school on March 8.

“Unfortunately our health advisers didn’t think that that was the right way forward and I understand that we have to take a safe and sustainable way forward, but I hope we can now revisit that again because I know full well from my own personal experience that the kitchen table is no substitute for a classroom,” she told the BBC.

The First Minister emphasised she wanted to ensure that this is “the last lockdown”, but said she wants to give optimism.

“I very much hope that we can give optimism next Monday, that’s what I want to give – brighter days are coming, people do feel a sense of optimism, not least because of our vaccination programme… over 32% of our adult population have now been vaccinated, nearly 500,000 vaccines have been deployed and that gives a lot of hope to a lot of people.”